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Android vs. iPhone — Who Wins In 2011?
Hugh Pickens writes "Philip Elmer-DeWitt writes in Fortune Magazine that Apple and Google have two very different strategies in the competition shaping up in 2011 between Android and iPhone. According to the conventional wisdom as espoused by Don Dodge, a Developer Advocate at Google, both Apple and Google will win because they are playing different games. Android will win the market share battle, but Apple will generate bigger profits. 'Apple goes for the high end of the market where they can charge high prices and enjoy great profit margins. Apple has been successful with this strategy multiple times, and will do it again with iPhone,' writes Dodge adding that Google's strategy with Android is to generate revenue streams from mobile search and advertising. Another Google employee, Tim Bray, sees things differently and says he won't be surprised if Apple ships a cheap iPhone and if this time next year, dirt-cheap iPhones were competing against Androids that push the user-experience lever farther than Apple. 'There's nothing fundamental in Android that would get in the way of a industrial-design and user-experience rock-star team, whether at Google or one of the handset makers, testing the hypothesis that these things are central to Apple's success.'"
I meant to comment earlier, but my iPhone alarm didn't go off.
Based on my experience with both Android phones and iPhones, here's how I see it:
Do you want something that "just works" out of the box, but with somewhat limited customization options? Do you want something that's dead simple and requires little to no learning to use? Get an iPhone.
Do you like to be able to modify every little facet of your phone, right down to the hardware it runs on? Do you not mind a small learning curve if it means more flexible overall operation? Get an Android phone.
They both have their place...it all comes down to your preferences and needs.
Living With a Nerd
Symbian rocks!
iPhone owner here. I use it all the time & develop for it, but Android simply has more & less expensive options. You can get Android on virtually every carrier and you can get them 2 for $99. The iPhone is only on AT&T, and even AT&T runs advertisements for Android phones. Apple's saving grace is that the iOS also runs on the iPod Touch & iPad. Android wins if by winning you mean continues to increase in market share, but Apple will continue to turn a handsome profit off of the iPhone, which I'm sure is their only real concern.
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
Not to cast aspersions on your wife, but logically speaking, until she's dead you haven't disproven anything.
IMHO Android would have been a non-starter if the iPhone had been available to all carriers (GSM & CDMA both) and not restricted to AT&T. A lot of people (myself included) passed on iPhones for the sole reason of refusing to use AT&T. Android currently suffers from too much product fracture. Too many different customer experiences based on vendor customization, and so much different hardware it's hard for developers to test everything, as well as hard to use newer, better APIs because older OS versions, whose updates are controlled by the carriers and may or may not happen, don't have them.
Michael J.
Root, God, what is difference?
I have been sick to death of advertising for pretty much all my adult life. I think it's a horrible shame to name so many of our modern points of interest after corporations. I hate how everything must be branded, and I especially hate how tasteless it all is. Product placement sucks. Most of all I'm just blown away at how I have to pay for the carrier to bring the advertisements to me.
I pay about $80 per month for cable TV, and all the channels are ad-laden; it is standard for each hour of programming to contain 20 minutes of advertisements. Now, DVR technology has allowed us to skip those commercials if you're willing to watch the program on a time delay. But doing that costs extra. A few years ago I used an old PC as a homebrew DVR and it didn't cost anything above a small investment in hardware and software, but nowadays things are so locked down the only realistic option is to rent the box and pay for the "service" from the provider. So, as I see it, I'm getting screwed from every direction.
The content itself is laden with product placement, it's subsidized further by being 33% pure commercial advertisements, I have to pay to bring the crap-laden content to my TV, and I have to pay more to filter out some of the noise.
The internet is rapidly heading in the same direction. You can't view a lot of content without turning on scripting and flash, and the scripting and flash bring advertisements that cannot be blocked. I'm paying an ISP to bring the crap in for me, and the services that offer to sell me access to the content still won't promise to remove all the advertising if I do so.
So, with my iPhone, at least it's not loaded with advertisements. Of course it brings in the Internet ads for me, but it blocks the invasive ones and I bless the iPhone for the lack of flash. But at least for the most part I'm getting fair value for the service I pay for: I make and receive phone calls and text messages, and neither are subsidized by advertisement.
So, to me, the iPhone wins. I don't care about the openness and inexpensiveness of Android if it means everything I do with my phone is partially paid for by advertisement. I'm not going to pay a carrier for voice and data service so that they can use that pipe to shove ads in my face every time I pick up my phone. It's just ridiculous.
I'm starting to believe that our society will end not in natural disaster or nuclear armageddon. Instead, the signal-to-noise ratio of all our communications will drop so low that our culture and our future just disintegrate.
Fun with Anagarams! LADS HOST, SHALT DOS. HAS DOLTS. AD SLOTHS, HATS SOLD. ASS HO, LTD.
Quote FTFA:
"There's nothing fundamental in Android that would get in the way of a industrial-design and user-experience rock-star team, whether at Google or one of the handset makers"
Nothing fundamental in Android, no. Except the solid design/UI-experience from Apple doesn't have anything to do with technology, but rather with the whole company structure and culture. I don't think that can be emulated by putting together "an industrial-design and user-experience rock-star team" and then planting it at Google or HTC or Samsung or whatever.
8 of 13 people found this answer helpful. Did you?
One manufacturer makes iPhone, many make Androids. It seems like an easy question to me.
And I'm a nerd, dammit, not a marketer or MBA. Why should I care who gets the most profits or market share? When did the Ferengi take over slashdot? I don't care how it sells, I care how it works.
Free Martian Whores!
I mean, there is no doubt that Android will be on more devices sold. With uncounted devices from uncounted companies and carriers this is to be expected.
What's interesting is if there will be *one* model of an Android phone that will sell better than the iPhone. If the iPhone will stay the best selling smartphone in 2011, well, it's still the bestselling smartphone.
I'm totally expecting the prices for smartphones spiralling down. An unlocked Android smartphone for $99 with no contract should be possible. It will have crappy battery life, a crappy touchscreen and a crappy camera, though.
You haven't seen "Paladin Gangbang" 1 through 7, have you?
Is it just me, or does it seem like every Slashdotter here that has a girlfriend or wife feels like they have to let everybody else know about their significant other, regardless of how out of context it is to mention them?
I don't know, let me ask my lady for her opinion.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
The analyst may not be surprised if Apple ships a cheap iPhone, but I would be. What on earth would make anyone think they would? There's a reason why the "conventional wisdom" is that Apple sticks to the high end of the market - not only has that been their strategy forever, but Steve J. never misses an opportunity to reinforce the idea that it's their strategy. Right now, Apple customers can count on the fact that whatever Apple puts out is at least going to be well-made. If Apple were to make a cheap, crappy iPhone, that friendly customer perception would be out the window - folks that now instinctively by Apple products would become open to persuasion by other companies.
I can't understand why anyone would think Apple would drop a strategy that's made them so much money. Apple can't be Dell, and doesn't want to be.
I think the definition of expensive on this forum is whatever price Apple charges. Expensive in this space used to mean $600, now you can get a spectacular top of the line iPhone for $299 and less capable units (new) for down to $99.
$229 for a very nice iPod touch or $499 for an iPad? Seems like a pretty good deal to me.
Apple's strategy isn't to charge extra to artificially inflate their brand, but rather to make high quality devices and charge as little as they can for them and still sustain their business and large R & D expense.
The best selling single android phone to date is the original Motorola droid (a high end smartphone). So, I don't think that you can say that the primary target demographic for android phones is "cheap".
God is imaginary