PACMan3000
Why Android is not Windows
Every other day and I do mean every other day, a so-called tech reporter writes a predictable article about how Apple is screwing themselves out of market share by not being "open." You probably know where this is going. Invariably they compare the current iPhone versus Android controversy to the Mac versus Windows drama that played out about twenty-six years ago.
Their wise argument usually sounds something like this:
"Back in 1984, Apple leapt way ahead in the PC market when it released the original Macintosh, the first popular computer to employ a graphical user interface. It took Microsoft six years to come up with something that could compare to the Mac, in the form of Windows 3.0. Six years! For all that time, Apple had the market to itself. Nevertheless, Windows took over the world and now holds more than 90 percent market share, while Apple squeaks by with less than 5 percent worldwide."
Actually those are the exact words used in a Newsweek column by the link baiting Dan Lyons, who ironically, masquerades as a parody of Steve Jobs in his popular blog. His words will sound ironic in a minute, so just hear me out.
On the surface, the comparison to Windows sounds not only prophetic, but if you believe the angst of the tech media at large, absolutely karmic. After all, Apple has been painted as the modern day Anti-Christ for their oppressive censorship of the App Store.
www.esarcasm.com/4212/apple-china-to-collectively-oppress...
Who better to bring us out of the darkness of iTunes than the "do-no-evil" Google? It sounds only natural, right?
Well, not exactly. There are at least three good reasons why the current situation with the iPhone and Android is nothing like 1984.
(1) Windows licensing is much more restrictive than Android licensing.
Much has been made of Google's licensing of Android to various cell phone manufacturers, inferring with it the promise of Microsoft-style world domination. Of course, there is a fundamental difference in the approach of Google and Microsoft. When you buy a Dell, you don't get a Dell user interface. You get Windows. When you buy a HP, you don't get a HP version of Windows, you get Windows. While Microsoft's Windows license is open in the sense that it doesn't restrict the installation of Windows on hardware, it does prevent PC manufacturers from modifying the underlying Windows foundation, and that restriction has had a positive affect on Windows app development.
In other words, when you code for Windows you know that the OS is going to be the same on all computers. When you code for Android, there is a different version for every phone (Android 1.5, 1.6 and 2.0), which means that when you write an app, you might have to debug for 3 different platforms. And even worse, Android is featured on different phone hardware and different cell phone carriers, who all dictate different features for their phones and want their phones integrated with their native services. Some companies, like HTC and Motorola, have even modified the user interface, firmware and internal ROMs, making Android compatibility a mess of epic proportions.
As our illustrious Dan Lyons admitted under the guise of his alter ego:
"Dear friends, this is only going to get worse, not better. Think about it. Every handset maker wants its device to be different. And special. So they intentionally tweak the OS to give themselves what they think of as an “advantage,” when really it’s nothing of the sort, because all it does is prevent ISVs from writing apps for them. Even if the handset makers weren’t totally short-sighted and evil, there’s the competency issue."
This brings me to another problem: what happens when all the Android partners start to compete with each other, if they aren't already? What company is willing to put money and development time into a unique app, only to have it stolen by another Android partner? Why insure compatibility when you can just as well make a modification that ensures the app only works on your Android phone? The implications of the "open" nature of Android is actually a hindrance to vibrant app development.
Currently, the App Store is the de facto standard for smartphones, whether the tech media wants to admit it or not. That may change in the coming future, assuming Google gets their act together, but developers tend to pick what they like at an early stage and stick with it, especially if they're making money. And as I've argued in the past, Android's ecosystem isn't exactly turning into Walmart right now.
www.flickr.com/photos/pacman3000/4127815088/
(2) Android has no equivalent of iTunes.
One of the most fundamental issues that tech reporters often leave out of their discussions about Windows is the reality of the situation with the Mac back in 1984. First of all, the Mac never had anything approaching the market share of the iPhone, which is currently at 17 percent worldwide. Furthermore, the forerunner of the Mac, the LISA, which featured the original graphical user interface, was an outright failure.
MS-DOS, the command line forerunner to Windows is actually the platform that garnered much of the original market share credited to Microsoft. The first two versions of Windows failed in the market. It was only after the release of Windows 3.0, with its native ability to run legacy DOS programs, that Windows became popular. In much the same way that the success of Windows was predicated upon the early success of MS-DOS, so it is with the iPhone.
In other words, iTunes is to the App Store as MS-DOS is to Windows.
(3) The iPhone is a premium phone without the premium pricing.
I think this doesn't need too much explanation, but the original Mac was sorta pricey. In fact, it was so pricey that Steve Jobs himself was pissed about it! If you know anything about the history of Apple, it was John Sculley, the Pepsi marketing genius that Jobs lured to the position of CEO, who jacked up the price of the original Mac. Apparently Sculley wanted to recoup the costs of an expensive marketing campaign (yes, that expensive 1.5 million 1984 Superbowl commercial). As a result, the Mac was relegated to niche status.*
This, however, isn't the case with the iPhone. Apple has vigorously lowered the price of the phone since the beginning, even going so far as to sell it at Walmart.
www.businessinsider.com/2009/2/99-iphone-coming-this-summer
So just to recap, I've established why Android licensing is nothing like Windows licensing. If anything, it has more in common with the platform on which it is based, Linux. Apple on the other hand, has broad appeal, thanks to the early success of iTunes (which resembles the DOS model), and the standardization of mobile apps because of the App Store (which resembles the eventual ascendance of Windows). And the iPhone, like early PCs, is reasonably priced.
So why is Android being compared to Windows again?
*Note: Mac sales were later revitalized by the introduction of the LaserWriter and Pagemaker, but in comparison to the mass adoption of DOS, that is a minor caveat in the scheme of things.
Related Links:
www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/11/android-fragmentation/
www.fakesteve.net/2009/11/developers-only-now-realizing-t...
www.russellbeattie.com/blog/android-is-splintering-just-n...
www.wirelessweek.com/Articles/2009/12/Android-Fragmentation/
Why Android is not Windows
Every other day and I do mean every other day, a so-called tech reporter writes a predictable article about how Apple is screwing themselves out of market share by not being "open." You probably know where this is going. Invariably they compare the current iPhone versus Android controversy to the Mac versus Windows drama that played out about twenty-six years ago.
Their wise argument usually sounds something like this:
"Back in 1984, Apple leapt way ahead in the PC market when it released the original Macintosh, the first popular computer to employ a graphical user interface. It took Microsoft six years to come up with something that could compare to the Mac, in the form of Windows 3.0. Six years! For all that time, Apple had the market to itself. Nevertheless, Windows took over the world and now holds more than 90 percent market share, while Apple squeaks by with less than 5 percent worldwide."
Actually those are the exact words used in a Newsweek column by the link baiting Dan Lyons, who ironically, masquerades as a parody of Steve Jobs in his popular blog. His words will sound ironic in a minute, so just hear me out.
On the surface, the comparison to Windows sounds not only prophetic, but if you believe the angst of the tech media at large, absolutely karmic. After all, Apple has been painted as the modern day Anti-Christ for their oppressive censorship of the App Store.
www.esarcasm.com/4212/apple-china-to-collectively-oppress...
Who better to bring us out of the darkness of iTunes than the "do-no-evil" Google? It sounds only natural, right?
Well, not exactly. There are at least three good reasons why the current situation with the iPhone and Android is nothing like 1984.
(1) Windows licensing is much more restrictive than Android licensing.
Much has been made of Google's licensing of Android to various cell phone manufacturers, inferring with it the promise of Microsoft-style world domination. Of course, there is a fundamental difference in the approach of Google and Microsoft. When you buy a Dell, you don't get a Dell user interface. You get Windows. When you buy a HP, you don't get a HP version of Windows, you get Windows. While Microsoft's Windows license is open in the sense that it doesn't restrict the installation of Windows on hardware, it does prevent PC manufacturers from modifying the underlying Windows foundation, and that restriction has had a positive affect on Windows app development.
In other words, when you code for Windows you know that the OS is going to be the same on all computers. When you code for Android, there is a different version for every phone (Android 1.5, 1.6 and 2.0), which means that when you write an app, you might have to debug for 3 different platforms. And even worse, Android is featured on different phone hardware and different cell phone carriers, who all dictate different features for their phones and want their phones integrated with their native services. Some companies, like HTC and Motorola, have even modified the user interface, firmware and internal ROMs, making Android compatibility a mess of epic proportions.
As our illustrious Dan Lyons admitted under the guise of his alter ego:
"Dear friends, this is only going to get worse, not better. Think about it. Every handset maker wants its device to be different. And special. So they intentionally tweak the OS to give themselves what they think of as an “advantage,” when really it’s nothing of the sort, because all it does is prevent ISVs from writing apps for them. Even if the handset makers weren’t totally short-sighted and evil, there’s the competency issue."
This brings me to another problem: what happens when all the Android partners start to compete with each other, if they aren't already? What company is willing to put money and development time into a unique app, only to have it stolen by another Android partner? Why insure compatibility when you can just as well make a modification that ensures the app only works on your Android phone? The implications of the "open" nature of Android is actually a hindrance to vibrant app development.
Currently, the App Store is the de facto standard for smartphones, whether the tech media wants to admit it or not. That may change in the coming future, assuming Google gets their act together, but developers tend to pick what they like at an early stage and stick with it, especially if they're making money. And as I've argued in the past, Android's ecosystem isn't exactly turning into Walmart right now.
www.flickr.com/photos/pacman3000/4127815088/
(2) Android has no equivalent of iTunes.
One of the most fundamental issues that tech reporters often leave out of their discussions about Windows is the reality of the situation with the Mac back in 1984. First of all, the Mac never had anything approaching the market share of the iPhone, which is currently at 17 percent worldwide. Furthermore, the forerunner of the Mac, the LISA, which featured the original graphical user interface, was an outright failure.
MS-DOS, the command line forerunner to Windows is actually the platform that garnered much of the original market share credited to Microsoft. The first two versions of Windows failed in the market. It was only after the release of Windows 3.0, with its native ability to run legacy DOS programs, that Windows became popular. In much the same way that the success of Windows was predicated upon the early success of MS-DOS, so it is with the iPhone.
In other words, iTunes is to the App Store as MS-DOS is to Windows.
(3) The iPhone is a premium phone without the premium pricing.
I think this doesn't need too much explanation, but the original Mac was sorta pricey. In fact, it was so pricey that Steve Jobs himself was pissed about it! If you know anything about the history of Apple, it was John Sculley, the Pepsi marketing genius that Jobs lured to the position of CEO, who jacked up the price of the original Mac. Apparently Sculley wanted to recoup the costs of an expensive marketing campaign (yes, that expensive 1.5 million 1984 Superbowl commercial). As a result, the Mac was relegated to niche status.*
This, however, isn't the case with the iPhone. Apple has vigorously lowered the price of the phone since the beginning, even going so far as to sell it at Walmart.
www.businessinsider.com/2009/2/99-iphone-coming-this-summer
So just to recap, I've established why Android licensing is nothing like Windows licensing. If anything, it has more in common with the platform on which it is based, Linux. Apple on the other hand, has broad appeal, thanks to the early success of iTunes (which resembles the DOS model), and the standardization of mobile apps because of the App Store (which resembles the eventual ascendance of Windows). And the iPhone, like early PCs, is reasonably priced.
So why is Android being compared to Windows again?
*Note: Mac sales were later revitalized by the introduction of the LaserWriter and Pagemaker, but in comparison to the mass adoption of DOS, that is a minor caveat in the scheme of things.
Related Links:
www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/11/android-fragmentation/
www.fakesteve.net/2009/11/developers-only-now-realizing-t...
www.russellbeattie.com/blog/android-is-splintering-just-n...
www.wirelessweek.com/Articles/2009/12/Android-Fragmentation/