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You have nailed it... When apple introduced the iPhone, it became a big to-do because it was 10x better (at least?) than anything else on the market. "Me-too-

You have nailed it... When apple introduced the iPhone, it became a big to-do because it was 10x better (at least?) than anything else on the market. "Me-too-ing" the iPhone (palm?) (android in another year) isn't going to get you there. The trouble is, Apple had a lot of opportunity -- 3.5 years ago, if you looked at a cell phone, it was absolutely clear that a LOT of things needed to be done. Apple simply executed on those things, but did so in an absolutely stunning way -- it just worked. And it worked in a way that most of us didn't realize was possible. The second idea -- that a low cost version can work, I think is valid. But then, is that the chunk of the market that you want? To be another dell, making $4 per unit? Do carriers even want the smart phone that doesn't come with the data contract? As for openness, as the other commenters have pointed out, most people don't care. If something ends up happening that causes people to actually care about the openness (or lack there of), than Android will be well positioned. For now, with 75k apps, we certainly haven't seen it (regardless of how many rejection horror stories we hear about on hacker news or techmeme).

enjo 17y ago
I hinted at this in another post, but I want to detail it a bit. In short: I think you're wrong. Android can win this by me-too'ing the iphone as long as it has strong differentiation in hardware. Do you want a small stick phone? How about a blackberry style one with a physical keyboard? What about something flashy like the side-kick? Do you want a highly customizable phone with brightly colored cases and add-ons? Android can rise to address those quirks. That high level of segmentation shouldn't be discounted. A cell phone isn't just about software. It's a highly personal choice. If Android succeeds in becoming a mobile operating system with a vibrant 3rd party application base... well then they can win by appealing to a large number of segments through support of a number of form-factors. The issue of course being that supporting all of those form factors in anything resembling a consistent way is VERY difficult. It's something Symbian has never really figured out. If anyone can...it's Google.
- pospischil 17y ago
  Thats a valid point -- the big issue on this one is, how do you handle the varied screen size/varied capabilities dilemma? Or rather, how do you get developers to target so many different devices? I think you get stuck with devs building for the lowest common denominator. To illustrate the point, consider an imaginary situation where a android has 3 phones on the market, with equally split distribution: 1) black and white 200x300 screen 2) color 320x480 screen 3) color 800x600 screen Which one do developers build for? Multiply this by different capabilities (one has a compass, the others don't. One has a high quality graphics chip, the others don't, etc.) In this latter case, you can really see that it will be difficult to get a significant amount of developers to take advantage of all the capabilities of the phone. I think gruber talked about this a while back, but all I could find with a quick search was this: http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/09/24/g1-flaws http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/09/24/g1-flaws

enjo 17y ago

I hinted at this in another post, but I want to detail it a bit. In short: I think you're wrong. Android can win this by me-too'ing the iphone as long as it has strong differentiation in hardware. Do you want a small stick phone? How about a blackberry style one with a physical keyboard? What about something flashy like the side-kick? Do you want a highly customizable phone with brightly colored cases and add-ons? Android can rise to address those quirks. That high level of segmentation shouldn't be discounted. A cell phone isn't just about software. It's a highly personal choice. If Android succeeds in becoming a mobile operating system with a vibrant 3rd party application base... well then they can win by appealing to a large number of segments through support of a number of form-factors. The issue of course being that supporting all of those form factors in anything resembling a consistent way is VERY difficult. It's something Symbian has never really figured out. If anyone can...it's Google.

pospischil 17y ago
Thats a valid point -- the big issue on this one is, how do you handle the varied screen size/varied capabilities dilemma? Or rather, how do you get developers to target so many different devices? I think you get stuck with devs building for the lowest common denominator. To illustrate the point, consider an imaginary situation where a android has 3 phones on the market, with equally split distribution: 1) black and white 200x300 screen 2) color 320x480 screen 3) color 800x600 screen Which one do developers build for? Multiply this by different capabilities (one has a compass, the others don't. One has a high quality graphics chip, the others don't, etc.) In this latter case, you can really see that it will be difficult to get a significant amount of developers to take advantage of all the capabilities of the phone. I think gruber talked about this a while back, but all I could find with a quick search was this: http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/09/24/g1-flaws http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/09/24/g1-flaws