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Devs Bet Big On Android Over Apple's iOS
CWmike writes "A majority of mobile app developers see Android as the smart bet over the long run even as they vote for Apple's iOS in the short term, according to a survey conducted jointly by Appcelerator and IDC. The survey polled more than 2,300 developers who use Appcelerator's Titanium cross-platform compiler to produce iOS and Android native apps. Of the 2,300 polled, 59% said that Android had the 'best long-term outlook,' compared with just 35% who pegged Apple's iOS with that label. But three out of four said that iOS offers the best 'near-term' outlook, with 76% tagging Apple's operating system as the best revenue opportunity."
Given the way that Apple treats 3rd party devs and the locked down phone, it would be very surprising if Apple keeps their loyalty without making a major course correction. Those dick moves like randomly rejecting applications and stealing functionality out of apps for the base system isn't really endearing them with the people they need to keep the appstore vibrant.
This is not really a surprise considering it is the only mainstream open platform not tied to any particular hardware.
So among cross platform developers, just over half said one platform was better than another.
Talk about sampling bias. This just in, 70% of AppleInsider users think iOS is great, and 99% of lactose intolerant people think Ice Cream suck
big deal.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
Perhaps I'm missing something, but isn't this effectively a survey of people who are undecided? After all, isn't that why they're using a cross-platform kit rather than writing right to Android/iOS?
I would think looking at the developers who have firmly committed themselves to a platform as a better metric. The uncommitted developers have nothing to lose.
Apple obviously never thought of that.
USERS paid developers over $1 billion, and Apple snatched over $300,000. Saying Apple has paid $1 billion to developers is like saying VISA has paid companies $1 zillion dollars. Nice try, Steve Jobs!
Wow im shocked, developers that are trying to cater to both and likely started on the android hope android wins. I have no leanings either way, imho they both have their pluses and minuses but if your going to do a survey should people that are actively involved in a platforms development beyond a cross compiler be at least sampled? This reminds me of the AdMob survey back in march that claimed 70% of iPhone developers were jumping ship while surveying only 108 hand picked participants, oddly enough it was the same week that Apple announced it had passed 100,000 licensed developers. I've been dabbling with android itself, but frankly until they can get their act together (3-4 different versions in the wild, poor upgrade paths from oem's, google denying marketplace to non-phone devices) I really don't think Apple has much to worry about. Yes Apple is draconian as hell in their licensing, contracts and at least IMHO rather greedy on the profit sharing but at least there is some organization and direction.
Face it. If you're a Verizon customer, a Sprint customer, or a T-Mobile customer, then your only smart phone choice is... Android.
Windows 7 phones are still vaporware, and no one wants the soon to be unsupported Windows 6.5. Blackberry failed to up their game significantly, and it shows. Palm's WebOS was a non-starter.
So what's left on the shelf? Android.
The way I see it, the majority of the people who're buying Android aren't "choosing" Android.
Walk into a Verizon store, or Sprint store, or T-Mobile store, and the only viable options available are Android phones. Faced with no real choice, customers examine a couple of nearly identical plastic phones for a few minutes, find the same set of features on each... and then proceed to buy the cheapest one.
Hence Android's sales growth.
What will tell the tail is the day AT&T loses its exclusivity agreement, and the iPhone hits Verizon...
Any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.
Objective-c is Apples attempt to co-opt developers
Objective-C never was a developer lock in, it is merely used by the API for the operating system. You have always been free to use C/C++ for your application's code. Whether the OS API is objective-c or C/C++ doesn't really matter, such calls are rarely portable to begin with as they are generally platform or hardware specific.
It's obvious you can read and count from your user name, but do you understand logic?
"Apple has paid $1 billion to developers." - is a half truth. That's maybe why the editor of the article put in the full sentence:
"And Apple has paid out over $1 billion to app developers (their 70% cut fo all sales)." (spelling error preserved so you could get a hardon)
Apple didn't 'pay $1 billion to developers' cause they're such nice guys. They did so because that's what the developers had coming to them. To put it in the context that they did it for any other reason is faulty and/or misleading logic.
is 100% correct so don't get your panties in a bunch.
*DrugCheese rants*
>I just find it so disgusting that there are so many developers all of a sudden interested in making money from their code.
I find it disgusting how many people expect other people to work for nothing.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Objective-c is Apples attempt to co-opt developers.
Really? I thought Objective-C was Brad Cox's attempt to create a message-passing object-oriented extension to C in the manner of Smalltalk.