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Android Update Alliance Already Struggling
adeelarshad82 writes "Earlier this year many Android phone vendors and U.S. wireless carriers made a long-awaited promise, which was to push timely OS updates to all new Android phones. Seven months in and especially with the release of Google Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich), PCMag decided to reach out to all those vendors and wireless carriers to see how things were coming along. Brace yourselves Android fans, you're not going to like the responses."
Android is dead!
Why is anyone surprised? A pledge, not backed up by, say, a money-back guarantee, is meaningless. If these people could get a refund for their phones if they weren't updated, the "pledge" would have teeth. This is why nobody trusts companies who pledge not to sue over patents. This is why people didn't trust AT&T about their merger pledges. Pledges are just for PR and they mean nothing.
Android is more like a collection of related but not entirely compatible operating systems. The inability to have a consistent version of the operating system across current smartphones is really surprising for something that's supposed to be an open source project, but one of the big drawbacks of Android is how much control Google gives the carriers over your phone.
Why do you think Steve Jobs pushed to hard with AT&T and demanded full control over the OS? So shit like this wouldn't happen with the iPhone platform.
Money grubbing cell carriers would rather have your device locked down, so if you want the latest features, you buy a new phone.
And yet people are still surprised that Android is becoming more fragmented every day. The drawing has been on the wall since the launch of the the OS.
It seems to me that phone vendors have not changed their mindset from the pre-smartphone era. Back then, no one cared about OS or version. You got an integrated product and it never changed. Today, it feels like phone makers still think "we put it together and ship it - this idea of later changing or upgrading the software is kind of weird to us."
To them, a phone is complete and unchangeable one it leaves the factory. Alas for their mindset, consumers see phones as customizable, upgradeable devices. If they were $50 each, sure, just replace it, but at $500+ (even if it's stretched over two years), people are making a more significant investment and don't want to be left behind.
Looking for a job in Portland, Oregon?
Even Microsoft does better job regarding Windows Phone 7 than Google with Android. They have by far updated all of their old phones. In fact, they demand from manufacturers that they update. Manufacturers are only allowed to skip one update. If they skip and next one comes, they are required to provide that update to users. That is how it should work, not unlike how Google runs things.
And this is the main reason why my next smartphone will be another iPhone. I have a bit of lock-in because of my existing apps, but that's less than $100, so I would not mind switching to something more free. Currently I'm still on my 2.5 years old iPhone 3GS, for as least as long as it still gets updates and the battery is good.
Stories like this give me very little in Android, Google might lose to Microsoft what it gained the last couple of years very quickly.
RogerWilco the Adventurous Janitor
I'm replacing my Droid Incredible next month, and this very issue is steering me towards an iPhone 4S even though I'm generally happy with other aspects of Android.
If I'm locked into a contract for 2 years for a phone, I don't think it's incredibly unreasonable to expect updates (especially ones that relate to security, stability, or performance) for at least 18 months.
i mean, there are just so many clones! who knows what bus you use, is it ISA? EISA? PCI? what kind of memory does it use, EMS or XMS? which version of DOS do you want, 4 or 5? what about Windows -- windows 3 or WFW?
there are just too many choices, too many options. the X86 based PC platform is dead. and so is the x86 processor.
this is 1986 for crying out loud. people want stuff that is easy to use. not junk that you have to fiddle around with.
Screw their pledge, just let us root our phones easily. CyanogenMod has treated me better than any carrier or handset maker, and it will never ever come with Carrier IQ: http://www.cyanogenmod.com/blog/cyanogenmod-will-never-have-carrier-iq
They plan Ice Cream Sandwich via CM9 for almost any CM7 (current version of CM) compatible phone they already support, except for really old models like the G1.
I8-D
Owning 30% of the market while only selling two generation models at any one time is hardly a failure for Apple. Considering that there are dozens upon dozens of different Android models it's only natural they'd have more market share.
This has little to do with Google, the exception being for hand sets that Google made themselves. Would you blame MS if HP didn't release Win7 drivers for old printers for example?
which is totally what she said
Um, Verizon blocked Google Wallet, as they are working on a propriety - and no doubt to be a crap and insecure - competing service.
Yes. Thats why Apple release Siri for older phones. Its because they dont want you to buy the latest iProduct.
No, that's because Siri is beta and they want to tune the thing with a reasonable amount of load before they push it out to all iOS5 owners.
I'm sure there's some degree of marketing behind the choice as well, but the fact is that it's a technically sound choice with a good reason behind it as long as Siri eventually makes it to all iOS5 owners.
I expect we'll see that mid-year, though it may not support the 3GS (that may lack the CPU to handle the audio encoding fast enough to get it to the server in a reasonable time).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
an Android phone is almost certainly going to be out of date very quickly and will almost certainly never be upgraded to the latest OS
if you're writing for a general audience, yes. If you're writing for Slashdotters, Cyanogenmod seems like a better recommendation.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)