For Android Users, 2012 Is Still the Year of Gingerbread
First time accepted submitter brocket66 writes with this excerpt from BGR: "Three major revisions of Google's Android operating system have launched since the company released Android 2.3 more than 21 months ago in December 2010, but Gingerbread is still the most widely used version of Android by a wide margin. A study conducted early this year by graphic designer Chris Sauve projected that based on Android adoption trends up to that point, Android 2.3 Gingerbread would be the dominant version of Android in 2012 despite the fact that Android 3.0 Honeycomb and Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich had already been released. Now, as the fourth quarter of 2012 approaches, data from Google's Android version distribution tracker confirms once again that those projections were accurate."
Speak for yourself. I like a having a hackable smartphone or tablet that lives outside the Apple walled garden. I do not like that developers are being forced to code to an API that Google froze as obsolete almost two years ago. Nor do I like the fact that a few braver developers are writing cool apps for the current API, but IU can't run them because phones I can afford are stuck on Gingerbread.
Android phone sales may be fine now, but technology is a grow-or-die marketplace. No matter how well it's doing now, Android doesn't have a future if it's stuck like this.
There's no real problem, this is just clickbait hype. Phones are lasting longer than 2 years, and normal people don't upgrade their OS. That's being spun as an issue.
No, the issue is that the manufacturers and carriers aren't upgrading the software. I bought my phone in January, it was released last October, eleven months ago, and the manufacturer (HTC) says it won't push ICS, and my carrier has been mum. I could install the alpha build of CM9 on it, and give up video recording and get "wonky" camera operation (according to the single dev on the project) - but I like having a camera on my person all the time.
THAT'S the damn problem.
My sister opened a computer store in Hawaii. She sells C shells by the seashore.