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Woz Says Android Will Dominate
cloudcreator writes "Woz [said] that Android smartphones, not the iPhone, would become dominant, noting that the Google OS is likely to win the race similarly to the way that Windows ultimately dominated the PC world." Update: 11/19 04:54 GMT by T : Apparently, Woz's words were taken slightly out of context.
Isn't it obvious?
Open technology will always win over closed
Just like Linux....
er, hmm, never mind.
Use what you want and leave the "I win"/"you win" dogma aside.
Gone!
Part of the reason Windows was successful was that it supported a lot of hardware, with only one API. Android needs to insure that it's not difficult to write a single application that will run on every decently modern ( 2 year old) android phone, or else it would give up what is probably its biggest advantage.
Everything we've always said here about avoiding monocultures and the need for competition remains true. The phone market is actually much bigger in volume than the PC market, so a number of cultures could flourish and still have good economies of scale. So long as standards are enforced on security and the actual radio and phone parts, it shouldn't matter.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Gaming will play a measurable role in this. As things stand now, iOS is trouncing Android, as far as gaming is concerned. Pretty much the only leg up that Android has is the fact that there are multiple emulators available directly from the market, with no need to mod your phone in any way to use (don't even have to click the "non-marketplace applications" option.)
Besides that though, iOS is handily beating Android when it comes to gaming. Some developers are finally starting to wake up, and are either porting things over or making things specifically for it. I maintain that until there are more quality games out there for Android, iOS will continue to have a substantial lead.
Note: I'm not implying that gaming alone is the reason for the divide, but it certainly plays a role.
Living With a Nerd
I thought Woz and Jobs got along pretty well even now, but I can't imagine this sort of thing making their relationship any better.
And I hope Woz is wrong, and no company "wins" the phone OS wars, because if somebody wins, then eventually they'll become a monopoly and all the consumers will lose.
I am officially gone from
Android needs to insure that it's not difficult to write a single application that will run on every decently modern ( 2 year old) android phone, or else it would give up what is probably its biggest advantage.
No it doesn't. That would certainly help but it's not necessary. If you read the very short article:
However, he then conceded that, "Android phones have more features," and offer more choice for more people. Eventually, he thinks that Android quality, consistency, and user satisfaction will match iOS.
Emphasis mine. You're mostly right about Windows (I think marketing should be mentioned) but Android could fail on 5% of the phones that ship with it and I think it will still be okay if it can match iOS in the above categories. I think everyone knows that two or three years from now Android will be the clear winner. There would have to be earth shattering changes made on either Android or Apple's part in order to shake off course what has been set in motion. Even the market analysts have been saying this.
Let's face it, there's going to be some applications written on Android that demand multitouch support or the screen resolution of a tablet. And they won't work on the vast majority of smartphones that don't offer that kind of thing. That's not a bad thing, it's just the reality of targeting all the devices made by the Open Handset Alliance. That's a lot of devices. That's a lot of choices. They're doing the best they can but at some point you just can't magically give hardware support to a device that doesn't have the hardware. And I think that problem is inseparable from the choices Android wants to give consumers.
My work here is dung.
Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I was under the impression that mandatory data plans function as a way for the carrier to make back the share of the phone they paid for.
Not saying it's right (personally, I agree with you), just saying it's the way it likely is.
Living With a Nerd
Woz is arguing that it's the featureset that will lead Android to victory. I don't agree. Features don't sell the phones. So long as it covers all the most common bases the extra stuff is just nice to have, it's not a key decision point. Any smartphone could become dominant at the moment so long as it has a good interface, looks ok, gives the user access to the software they want and, crucially, is marketed well enough. Even if iOS lags behind on features Apple won't be lagging behind on marketing. It's what they're good at, and ultimately it's what will keep them on top.
http://twitter.com/onion2k
Windows didn't dominate because of random events. It piggy-backed on the popularity of the hardware, specifically the IBM PC. When the PC won, so too did MS-DOS and its overlay called windows. If the PC had died, so too would have DOS and windows.
Android doesn't have the advantage of sitting on the #1 piece of hardware like windows had.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
I have owned an iphone 3g, 3gs and an iphone 4.
Recently the attitude from apple, in my opinion has been worse than Microsoft, some may claim otherwise but the 'our way or the highway' and general attitude specifically from Jobs himself in emails to people (on the occassions they leak out) is just awful.
The overall lock in bugged me a little but overall I was generally quite happy with my iphone, the itunes aspect I detested mind you. /selectively/ restore what I want to their BlackBerries - the iphone however is an utter nightmare for anyone with any real technical knowledge and wantign to do something even slightly out of the box. The lack of SMS tone changing (finally here, christ!) was ridiculous.
Every now and then something would bug me, for example - at work when supporting my clients, I can backup and
I also feel the lack buttons is holding the iphone back, despite what 'focus groups' claim about the buttons, you simply end up wasting screen real estate with onscreen buttons. I don't think the iphone needs 12 buttons mind you but even just THREE might be nice on the device - people are dumb but not that dumb.
So anyhow, I decide I might try Android out, I copied a guy at work and purchased a HTC HD2 (Leo) - which is a Windows Mobile 6.5 phone which can have Android hacked on to it if you fiddle about.
I have done so and been most impressed, there's a few small niggly issues some of which may be from using a non native Android phone, some are just design issues but overall I'm substantially more impressed than I expected to be.
There's an app called Appbrain http://www.appbrain.com/ which is kind of like an all in one sync tool, once installed it catalogues all you have installs and ties it to an account (in my case my google sign in) - I can add and remove applications from that website, anywhere in the world and sync entirely over 3g. It handles the updating of apps, it provides a better search interfact than the stock market and feedback too. It's really nice.
Someone showed me http://www.appbrain.com/wallpaper that today and I thought 'oh how cute, it's going to queue up a new background to download next time I open the application and run a sync' - only not, I clicked a button on the website, picked up my phone about 2 seconds later and it had pushed the picture down and set it as my background already. - incredible
I can take a photo of a Qcode (qrcode?) image and it too can queue up the installation of an application just like that.
I can add widgets to the desktop and while many are a complete waste of memory and cpu time, there are some genuinely useful weather / data usage / stock information I can drop on the home screen or a few screens off it.
I can set the tones I like, I can share my device as a wifi access point - the list goes on.
It's not without it's flaws, sadly I don't know if the small niggles I've had have been due to being non native or not but I hope to learn over the coming days. Also the way they handle podcasts boggles my mind, I do really just wish the music app searched in /podcast/ for podcasts /music/ for music and so on - nothing comes close to apples music player unfortunately. Fortunately for me I don't listen to much anyhow.
Email client searching actually works for gmail and the vast majority of my apps are on the device - tweetdeck, email, facebook, rdp clients, shazam, ebay, skype - it's all there and in 4.3" on this model, not 3.5" - honestly at 32, with my eyes - that's a bloody godsend.
We use these things more and more, I think 3.5 is really holding back the iphone, resolution or not (as I said, I own a 4, I know how pretty it is, it's just too small)
I could go on for ages, I'm really pretty happy overall though and the hippy open source fanboy in me says it's only going to get better with time, let's hope I'm right.
As long as both platforms keep making their customers happy I don't see why they won't both continue to do well. If neither knocks the other to irrelevance it's not "dominant".
Apple does great holding the line on the "premium" phone, making lots of money for their shareholders. Android does great at providing a vast array of choices at varying levels of cost.
The concern with domination is that a dominant player will crush all opposition and bring progress to a halt to protect its monopoly. I don't see that happening with either of these players. The player in the field that plays that way is having a hard time getting his game on.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
It's hard for me to look at Apple as a loser in this battle. They may not win the marketshare battle, but they are very profitable and influential. People generally love their products.
Not bad for coming in second place.
I doubt that.
Something like 70+ percent of iPhone4s sold were to existing users.
The iPhone market is pretty close to dried up.
Everyone that wanted one has gotten one by now.
Then you have the people that would jump ship off of AT&Ts crappy network to Verizon.
Those would likely be a lot of existing users.
Apple won't be gaining many new users but shuffling its existing users.
In the US the one carrier option probably did not hurt them very much, everyone that I know with one is actually thinking about jumping ship even if
it comes to Verizon citing the fact that it's 'boring' to them now.
iGadgets are driven by cliques and the desire for an image, and that audience is starting to fade away.
I don't see the kids at the bus stop with white earbuds anymore holding iPods - I am seeing kids with Droids, Zunes and Sansas.
There still are some with iPods but not as many as I used to see.
It's appeal is starting to fade away because in the end people like choice.
The only thing iWidgets have going for them is that on day 400 they behave like they did on day 1... unless Apple manages to botch updates
Hell, even the women I work with jumped off iPhones to Droids - that to me was a sign that things are shifting.
Eventually, Android will be dropped for the next best thing... and I hope that all of this competition leads to greater things down the line
because consumers will all benefit.
I think hardware architecture has a lot to do with this, too. Any good embedded engineering focus company can design their hardware and work with it with Android. Why? Because everyone knows the OS capabilities of the Linux kernel and how portable it is, that makes it easy. Woz has a point, but just a small one, Windows was dominant because it worked across the multitude of PC platforms and wasn't tied to specific hardware (al la RISC and Apple) Although Apple did have it's selling points, anything that's more encompassing that doesn't lock a consumer down is going to get tried and, more times than none, chosen over the competitor that doesn't.
Today, however, Apple makes some pretty bad-ass and inferior products that 'wow' you on functionality and usability from a UI perspective. I myself own a few device with iOS on them and their UI experience alone is worth the product. Android OS is just too portable not to use and it's using the Linux kernel; that alone gets you over the barrier and into competition because anyone can slap it on whatever hardware they want with for less reason and stand up a working product.
Cheap shit sells better. Why is this a surprise?
because there's no finish line. One can only hope to dominate for as long as possible. I agree that Android will probably become the most dominant mobile OS in the next few years, but that hardly means iOS is going to become insignificant. Windows dominates still, but as everyone can see Apple's hardly hurting financially with OS X. There's plenty of room in the market for two mobile OS's.
"The only normal people are the ones you don't know very well."
He is a techie. Jobs is the business genius. Apple does not need to dominate to make a tidy profit. It's like that saying, "You can fool some of the people all of the time, or all of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time." Microsoft does all of the people some of the time. Apple does some of the people all of the time.
Microsoft dominates the desktop. Does Apple care? Not as long as some folks are still willing to pay a premium for their desktop products. Nokia dominates cell phones. Apple says, "So, what?", as long as some folks make them a profit. If Android dominates smart phones, Apple will not care for the same reason. Why do some folks pay exorbitant prices for a Harley Davidson when compared to a rice burner?
And no, I'm not an Apple FanBoy, but I live with an Apple FanGrrrl. I only bought her an iPhone when I could get it re-imported, unlocked. And the UK uses some crazy-ass plugs on their electrical devices.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
Android will win by marketshare, which is percentage of phones running the OS. Of course, Apple doesn't feel threatened - and it makes sense when you think about it. Apple has 2 models of iPhones out there now - iPhone 4, and iPhone 3GS. Android devices - well, Samsung, Sony-Ericsson, Motorola, HTC, they seem to easily have a dozen different models each. Plus all the other no-name brands out there releasing Android phones without Google (or pirating it). So you probably have over 50+ models of Android phones out there, compared to 2 from Apple. Of course Android phones will outsell the iPHone.
Now, should Apple worry? Probably not, because they're raking in the money. Profit wise, Apple commands a huge chunk (nearly half) of total mobile phone industry profits (including dumbphones), while RIM, Nokia, Samsung and LG dominate the remaining chunk. By handsets sold, Nokia, RIM, Samsung and LG dominate the charts, while Apple just has a tiny sliver. It doesn't matter that Apple is in #3 or #4 (after Symbian, RIM and Android) - as long as they're raking in the cash.
And I'm talking phones only - ignoring Android running tablets and multimedia players, and iPod Touches and iPads. The numbers that way are too vague.
Also, carriers LOVE Android. Face it - Sprint loves putting its NASCAR apps preloaded, Verizon loves its V-cast stuff, etc - all the "value-added" software to make carriers more money. Carriers hate the iPhone - what sane control-hungry corporation wants to give up complete control of the handset (hardware AND software) to Apple, and not only that, pay Apple for the priviledge of carrying the iPhone? When instead they can carry Android phones, and tell HTC, Samsung, and Motorola to shove it until they cripple certain features, preload crapware, and all the other stuff?
P.S. - I use an iPhone because it's free of carrier control. I want an Android phone, but giving up 3G isn't an option, and I want straight-from-Google updates. Hoping the Nexus Two will satisfy.
Anecdotal evidence is anecdotal, so let's look at the numbers. These charts show historical sales of iDevices. One shows iPod sales being replaced by higher-margin iPhone and iPad sales. And they're increasing, not decreasing. I think iPhone sales are more important as we have device convergence. If you truly want to look at just iPod sales another graph is there too. http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2010/10/23/the-ipods-rise-and-fall/
I also feel the lack buttons is holding the iphone back, despite what 'focus groups' claim about the buttons, you simply end up wasting screen real estate with onscreen buttons.
What would those extra buttons do? I don't think the use of the extra buttons on Android and WP7 are that much of an advantage.
- it's all there and in 4.3" on this model, not 3.5" - honestly at 32, with my eyes - that's a bloody godsend.
A bigger screen, in itself, is always good. But the thing I like about the size of the iPhone is that I can easily use it with one hand. If something is a bit too small, I just hold it closer.
I don't see Android winning here, just as I don't see Linux 'winning' against OSX or Windows. Apple offers a business model with apps and iTunes that provides a way for independent developers to sell stuff, whilst offering punters a 'safe' platform with easy access to everything developers/musicians etc. can think to offer them... This is a pretty potent marketing combination.
In terms of it being a closed environment - I think the loss of Flash support is a real pain in the arse, but this doesn't appear to be a deal breaker for a lot of people. Even on Slashdot (where you might expect folk to be more pro open environments then the general population). There aren't too many 'alternatives' to HTML5 about guys...
I love how many people argue that the Apple lock-in is what makes them prefer Android over iOS. Ever try to use an Android phone without a GMail account? A Droid from Verizon will not even activate without one. I would much prefer to be locked to my own Mac (Mobile Me is not mandatory) in my own home, than forced to use Google services. Unless I want to use third-party email, calendar, and contact list applications, which likely don't integrate with the OS, vary in quality, and often are a general pain in the port to use.
Michael J.
Root, God, what is difference?
All that matters is that there is competition among hardware and software vendors to drive down the price of systems
Competition drives down price only to the extent that you can sell something at the same price or slightly better than another competitor.
But Android is not its own market; it includes Apple too because you have to say that all phones are competing against each other - and here's where having a number of different hardware makers works against the lowest possible price floor. Because a company that sells quite a few devices alone can get better pricing on components than several other hardware makers that split the remainder of the market. It's why Apple has been able to price things like the iPad cheaper than anyone else can make them.
to drive down the price of systems and increase compatibility....This obviously will never happen with Apple's OS since there is no hardware compatibility or competition.
Which totally ignores the Apple devices are sold in a larger market, as I said. It's quite obvious it HAS happened already with Apple pricing all the device lineup pretty aggressively AND maintaing above average margins. And as for the compatibility angle, iOS apps are more compatible amongst the many iOS devices sold than Android apps are with all the Android systems around.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Heads up, all.
Woz was misquoted.
.
Trolling is a art,
http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/18/exclusive-woz-misquoted-almost-every-app-that-i-have-is-bette/
Woz says he gave the De Telegraaf reporter a lengthy demonstration of voice commands on iOS and Android, pointed out that Android offered the ability to say "Navigate to Joe's Diner," and suggested that Apple would catch up through its purchases of Siri and Poly9. According to Steve, that's about it -- he says he'd "never" say that Android was better than iOS, and that "Almost every app I have is better on the iPhone." Woz did say he lightly prognosticated that Android would become more popular "based on what I've read," but that he expects Android "to be a lot like Windows... I'm not trying to put Android down, but I'm not suggesting it's better than iOS by any stretch of the imagination. But it can get greater marketshare and still be crappy."