No, they don't. Can you imagine how much better life would have been had PNG been established early as the de facto image standard on the Internet instead of GIF, and later, JPG? Aside from the superior feature set, there never would have been any of the silly threats of massive lawsuits, no need to pay someone royalties to implement an editor, etc.
Except H.264 is superior to WebM.
Google isn't just smart, it is freakin' brilliant with this move. If they can help to establish WebM as the de facto standard for Internet video, they don't have to be part of the H.264 patent pool. Also, people can write video editors and other utilities galore for Chrome with no viable threat of being sued.
Or, people can just use the hardware and software they already paid for which supports H.264. There are plenty of programs which use QuickTime to encode and decode H.264 with absolutely no fear of being sued by MPEG-LA. And they get the benefit of using a superior codec, all at no additional cost.
I get the reason behind liking something for being open source, but WebM objectively inferior to H.264. Please tell my why I should use it when I have a superior option available at a reasonable price? As it seems to me, to do so would be entirely irrational.
Most people have sufficiently short memories, or high enough tolerance for absurd contradictions, that they won't bat an eye.
In other words, most people are able to adapt to changing circumstances and their brains don't lock up when encountering logical (i.e., verbal), but not actual (i.e. physically existing), contradictions.
The people who don't fit in this category will never be satisfied, so why bother worrying about them?
The people who don't fit this category are doomed to a life of frustration and will often disparage those less encumbered by an irrational over application of logic.
Of course, there are upsides too, but they don't really apply here. I'm just providing some perspective that people aren't as stupid or lacking of character or whatever values the above comments carry with them.
I'd rather they made their integrated graphics fast than simply support new DirectX capabilities. I don't really see the point of supporting certain features if the whole thing is going to be slow. I suppose it's easier to implement something than it is to implement it well.
That depends if you are currently overworked. If not, then you will just fill up that work with something else. So will you end up making more than you do now? Do you think Apple could make more money by dropping the Mac and replacing that effort on something else? I highly doubt it. Also, it's a strange thing to discuss on the eve of the launch of an App Store for the Mac. Macs are gaining in market share, why would they just throw that all away?
But more to the point, having a PC line is core to Apple's business. They can't stop selling Macs, not that they have any desire to. The single most important aspect of Apple's success is in providing the entire core user experience. Dropping Macs and dumping their many tens of millions of loyal customers into the Windows world is just about as counter to Apple's strategy as is possible.
That's some crazy train of thought you have there.
Apple is not going to release Xcode for Windows. It makes no sense. Apple doesn't want to control developers. It makes no sense. Apple isn't going to get rid of Macs or Mac OS X. It makes no sense. Why is the lack of mention of Lion Server a sign that Apple is going to get rid of their desktop PCs? It makes no sense.
Do you see the trend here? All those things you mention are possible, but at this current time, absolutely none of them make any sense. The only time they will happen is when they do (or are about to) make sense. Most of this hinges on Apple getting out of the PC business. As long as there is a thriving market for PCs, Apple will make theirs. The faulty logic is in the notion that Apple can't both make Macs that are quite open with the exception of third-party primary hardware, and iOS devices that are notably less open.
What you've described was very true until the last year or so. Steam really made a huge difference here. All the Mac games I've bought through Steam are native, not simply Cider wrappers. I have Civ V, but haven't installed the Mac version yet, so I don't know how well the port is.
Also, Blizzard has always treated the Mac as a first-class platform with excellent native support, and id software supports the Mac well, too (although Doom 3 does require the disc in the drive--very annoying, but it's like that on Windows too, so I don't see how that's a differentiating feature).
EA has been porting games, but as far as I know, they use Cider.
It's also very difficult to know which device to even upgrade to! It's not like PCs where you can say, "well, this game needs a 5770 and a Core i5 quad" and you can just spec out an upgrade to give you that. It's more like, "this app is slow. which phone can run it better?", which will leave most consumers confounded, and they will be forced to opt for the "find some other preoccupation" route, which is going to really sour their experience.
Do you think consumers in the 80s were any smarter than the modern day counterparts?
Absolutely. Specifically, consumers who bought computers in the '80s and early '90s. Because computers were still relatively rare back then, so it was a self-selected geek subset that bought computers.
How do you think consumers knew which IBM clone had what specs to run which game? They went to a store and asked some guy there "will this run such and such?" and found a computer that fits their needs.
They looked at the box. Back then, everyone knew what CPU they had, which was the only thing that really mattered for Doom.
The same thing can happen with phones. The consumer walks into the store for their upgrade and says "I have such and such slow phone. I need a phone that is faster." and the clerk, just like in the 80s, points to the various phones and says which ones are faster or not.
It's the exact same situation.
It's not. Because it's not simply a matter of a choosing a phone with a faster CPU. Now it's a many-dimensional feature matrix. It's far, far more complex. Especially given how hidden the internal specs are, and the fact that things like responsiveness of the touch display and upgradeability are not even discernible from the specs, and other things are orthogonal to performance, like keyboard style, size, camera, etc.
And it's not like people are going to walk into the store knowing ahead of time which apps they will end up wanting to run, and it's not feasible to upgrade your phone just to play Angry Birds today, then again for Epic Citadel tomorrow.
Also, back then, the computer salesman could state objectively that a given PC was superior or not than some other. This is almost still true today, except that it's not always clear between things like AMD or Intel, ATI vs Nvidia, and even whether quad core but slower clock is better than faster clock, but dual core, because of variability in usage patterns.
Anyway, the point being, the consumer has no way to know which phone is the right one to pick.
The silly thing here is Android proponents acting like fragmentation isn't an issue. It undeniably is. With the iPhone, the matrix is essentially either current or previous gen, different flash storage capacities, and sometimes color. With the iPhone, you know that the current gen will run *all* apps on the App Store at the best performance.
This is an inevitable side-effect of Android's key strength. You can't have the one without the other. And for the iPhone, this is why the single source is such a key benefit.
If you want choice, you *must* give up usability and overall user experience. But you do get choice. If you favor usability and user experience, you give up choice. It's no surprise that a lot of geeks are fine with the downsides of choice, and prefer the benefits choice has to offer. And it's no surprise that the average consumer would rather give up choice for a better experience.
What is surprising, however, is the legions of geeks who can't seem to grasp this.
There is absolutely a hardware reference for Android. It requires a CPU based on the ARM11 or newer architecture, at least 256MB of RAM, at least so much (not sure on exact numbers, "enough to fit Android + system Apps") flash storage, and a touchscreen. That's the same as saying "IBM compatible,"
No, it's not.
which really just meant "80286 or better CPU, enough RAM to run DOS, a screen, and a keyboard."
No it wasn't. IBM compatible defines a lot of things, including BIOS and various busses.
With things like a smartphones, there are far too many variables for it to be like "IBM compatible".
The inability to run Need for Speed: Shift or whatever on a low-end Android device does not "fragmentation" make. There were plenty of computers that were fully "IBM compatible" in the early 90s that couldn't run DOOM.
And if your CPU wasn't a 386, or a 486 DX2 50 (for optimum performance), you knew you couldn't run DOOM. With a smartphone, the user doesn't know which chips will run an app well or not. There's no proper frame of reference.
So, yeah, simply not being able to run some game on slower phones "does not 'fragmentation' make", that's just the tip of the iceberg.
It's the EXACT same situation. Apple releases one line of products that is locked down to their OS, expensive, and internally inferior to the like-priced competition.
That's a load of bullshit. When I looked into this, I was shocked that many Android phones cost more than the iPhone, yet have lesser features, including having abysmally small flash memory.
Mark my words: in a decade, most people won't even remember Apple was ever a major player in the smartphone market.
HAHAHA. You should have started your post off with this. It's a real gem.
They'll be forced to re-image themselves as a "boutique" product for idiots who value form over function and cost-effectiveness, just like their PCs.
No, only blindered geeks image Apple as a "boutique" product maker. Form is inextricably tied to function. Macs are very cost-effective. They just don't have a low end (which consumers would like) and they don't have DIY kits (like the geeks like). But when you go into the price range where Macs are, you tend to find nothing but inferior PCs at usually superior prices.
Or to use your example: how many people got Macs for Christmas in the 80s? How about now?
Significantly more got them now than in the '80s. I'm not sure what your point is.
massively different user experience on different devices
consider: different user experience on massively different devices
Why should it be otherwise? Should a quad-core i7 SLI provide exactly the same 'user experience' as an Atom netbook? Obviously not.
All you've done here is just restated the fact that Android is fragmented.
It is not reasonable to expect the same results from increasingly diverse hardware. Android will be found on the lowest end freebee 'smart' phone China can make, while also appearing on the most outrageous hardware that doesn't present an immediate fire hazard. Where, exactly, was it written that the limits of one must apply to the other?
It's written into the license and business model Google chose for Android. Sure, it's not a universal rule, but it is a good rule of thumb. Just like your Atom vs i7 example, most Windows apps aren't written to take advantage of multiple cores, even those that could really benefit from it. So the i7 gets stuck running software designed for the Atom and its single and dual-core ilk. It's the nature of a fragmented market.
This problem has been solved over and over again. An architecture must exist that provides fall-back software implementations of hardware accelerated functions. When some app performs poorly due to inadequate hardware the user may find some other preoccupation or upgrade to a sufficient device.
"Find some other preoccupation" is not a consumer-friendly answer. The alternative you mention is not as simple to do in a market dominated by multi-year contracts and relatively complex upgrade procedures. It's also very difficult to know which device to even upgrade to! It's not like PCs where you can say, "well, this game needs a 5770 and a Core i5 quad" and you can just spec out an upgrade to give you that. It's more like, "this app is slow. which phone can run it better?", which will leave most consumers confounded, and they will be forced to opt for the "find some other preoccupation" route, which is going to really sour their experience.
What is the problem? At the moment it appears to be Google's obstinacy. This is a losing battle for them; they're creating a differentiating point among the manufacturers because the manufacturers can alter Android, including accelerating stuff with hardware. Marketing will then make claims about how xyz's Android is better than the other Androids because of xyz's special sauce (that may or may not port easily to some other collection of chips.) If the manufacturers don't the users will.
How exactly do you expect this to work out in the real consumer world? How are people going to know which Android phone is faster/better than the others? It's like that checkout lane story from a couple weeks ago. No matter what you choose, you likely didn't choose the best one. Normal people aren't going to put in the effort to keep up with the latest Android news.
Lets hope Google wises up and deals with the issue properly.
They won't. It's essentially impossible to properly deal with this issue, because it's inherent with the very thing that has been so valuable to Android. The openness that allowed Android to spread across so many handset makers has to deal with the effects of being available from so many handset makers. You can't have your cake and eat it too.
There was such a thing as "IBM compatible" in the '80s and '90s. There no such hardware reference for Android. Apple is correcting many of the mistakes made during that time frame, while Google is making entirely new ones.
In fact, it's extremely difficult to find all that many ways that this *is* like that time frame. The only thing that is similar is it's Apple's platform vs a platform shared among many manufacturers. In almost every other way, there are notable differences.
For example, things like price and features are not downsides for Apple. In fact, Apple quite often is the winner in these measures. And cell carriers distort the market. Watch what happens once Verizon carries the iPhone. I really doubt most Android buyers actually specifically want Android. It's just the nicest phone for the cheapest price on their carrier of choice with the least offensive data plan.
Or put another way, do you think "Android phone" or "iPhone" had the higher place on people's Christmas lists this year?
No, that one game everyone talks about doesn't count; it's not a result of OS fragmentation, but a result of some devices not meeting minimum hardware requirements.
Nice try. You slipped in the phrase "OS fragmentation" when what people refer to is hardware fragmentation, which is what the last part of your statement is describing.
No, they mean both. Also, carrier fragmentation and app store fragmentation.
I don't see how you can completely dismiss OS fragmentation, when most handset makers (and carriers) make rather notable modifications to the versions of Android they ship, and often leave their users stuck with obsolete versions.
I'm always amused that everyone who goes on about smugness, usually does so acting smug about how they are too smart/geeky/etc. to be an Apple customer.
iPad and iPhone are toys, because they try to stop you from exercising choices you might make to get real work done.
Yeah, they only offer hundreds of thousands of choices in the form of apps, and trillions of choices in the terms of web pages, and virtually infinite choices in terms of audio, video, text and almost any other type of document.
And "real work" is a bullshit term. There are plenty of work, productivity, creative, and other apps for the iPad.
But as you say, that is why they are successful. Some people don't mind making a toy into a tool, and the rest of the people are tools who can only handle toys. (Yes, there are some who can and don't want to, but they are a vanishingly small minority, though that doesn't stop them from speaking up as if they mattered. Or had any place among geeks.)
You're just a tech snob. Like all the people who decried the original Macintosh. The problem? It was too pretty. No CLI, just a GUI and... a mouse??? Who will ever be able to do any real work with something like that?
The iPad is in the exact same boat. It's no surprise that the usual fools on Slashdot can't see this.
The iPad isn't a toy? And no, not because it's simple, but because it isn't meant for productivity.
I guess that's why Apple doesn't sell iWork for it, or there aren't plenty of music creation and photo editing software for it...
I also suppose things like tables and chairs are toys, because they aren't meant for productivity?
No, the fact is that you are calling it a "toy" because it doesn't meet your oh-so important requirements to be a "real" computing device. People called the original Macintosh a toy as well, because it lacked a command line!
And no, Apple isn't "the largest public company in the world", unless you deliberately choose to use only the silliest measure, which says more about you than about Apple.
I never said it was. I said it was the second-largest. Which is the truth. The fact that you wish to call it "the silliest measure" says more about you than about me or Apple. It says no matter what, you can't accept that Apple is good at anything of value.
Gambling or not, it's difficult to argue that AAPL's track record over the past decade isn't the definition of a good bet.
Also, what you've described is the exact same thing currency like the dollar is based on. The US government does not pay dividends on the dollar. In fact, due to inflation, the value of each dollar constantly decreases. But people still trade in dollars because they trust in dollars. If the trust in the US dollar were to evaporate overnight, it would be worthless.
The same is true for AAPL (or any other stock, including those that pay dividends). There are almost a billion shares of AAPL out there. If some number of people begin to falter in their confidence in the stock, the price would start to fall. As it falls, there will be other people who will buy up the stock as they see an opportunity to bet on AAPL rising to new highs, as it has been doing even during a depression period of the US economy.
Basically, to worry about AAPL, you'd have to think people are going to stop buying iPods, iPads, iPhones, Macs, etc. Every single one of those markets are constantly growing, except the iPod which has the occasional quarter of negative Y/Y growth, primarily due to the iPhone.
So a toy company is the number 2 company because people want to be different, just like everyone else.
Name a single "toy" Apple sells. There isn't a single one. Strange to call them a "toy company".
However, the thing that makes you think of their computers and devices as "toys" is the very reason they are so successful. By making technology so simple and so attractive that some people start to call them toys, they've essentially catered exactly to the mass market of non-geeks.
Apple is the largest public company in the world, with the exception of one petroleum company. You don't get there by making toys.
Exactly this. For Google, Android is merely an ad serving OS, just like the iPhone, and every other phone OS. The only difference is they have a stronger hand in branding the Android OS, so they have an upper hand when it comes to putting ads on that OS.
And Bray's words in the summary, "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," shows exactly why Apple will win at least in terms of profit and handset manufacturer market share. What he said as possible is technically possible, but the examples of open source "user-experience rock-star teams" is vanishingly small. Thinking that it's reasonable to talk about such a thing happening is to enter the realm of extreme speculation.
As far as an "industrial-design rock-star team", that's far more reasonable, and even then, you are competing against the industrial design all-star Jonathan Ive, so it's still a very, very tall order.
The only advantages Android has to the broader consumer market are that it allows any handset maker to ship with a modern platform (very few have the resources or expertise to do this themselves), provides the consumer with a wide variety of hardware choices, and is available on more carriers in the US (this is about to change). The Slashdot-friendly features of being Open Source and having multiple stores are both virtually meaningless to the average consumer.
Betting on someone out-designing Apple in terms of hardware or software is setting oneself up for failure. Or in the case of Tim Bray's blog post specifically, it's a case of providing a hypothetical situation that will never be tested, so it can be used to make an un-disprovable claim.
And GeoHot was never granted the right to copy the root key. Not that I agree with the way the law works here, just that if you're going to argue from a legal standpoint, you've got it wrong. If you want to argue from a moral standpoint, that's an entirely different thing.
The word "right" has both moral and legal connotations. You absolutely have the moral right. Whether you have the legal right is up for debate on a case-by-case basis.
So you believe installing and maintaining cell phone towers and server networks costs nothing?
I'm sure he said nothing of the sort. He said it costs nothing extra, since the system is already doing the equivalent of text messaging anyway.
Why do so many readers of Slashdot have such an uninformed, anti-capitalist view of how the world works?
Why is it that every time someone points out a flaw in capitalism, someone is always ready to decry that person as an "uninformed anti-capitalist"?
Even the software you think of as free, such as Linux, is worked on by paid developers working at companies with a vested interest in the software. Nothing in the world is truly free. It's all based on an exchange of something.
I'm 100% confident the software that "I think of as free" on my computer *is* actually free to me. I'm quite certain that in the vast majority of the free software I've used in my life, very, very little of it involved "and exchange of something" between me and the programmers or the companies funding the development.
>>>The value of a text message is what ever the customer will pay for it. It has nothing at all to do with cost.
That's only true to a point. As companies compete with one another, the tendency will be for Company 1 to drop the price to 15 cents/text. Company 2 will undercut them and drop it to 10 cents. Company 3 will observe this and say, "We can beat all of you," and drop it to 5 cents. Eventually competitive price pressure will lower the customer's fee to just above the actual cost. Say... 1/10th of a penny.
Is this satire? If not, how did you write this without realizing how wrong it is? Text messaging has had about a decade for this to happen, and it hasn't. There's a strange thing around here where people quote theory as though it's reality, when reality quite clearly contradicts the very thing they just said!
The Scotsman Smith called this the invisible hand.
And if you actually read Smith, instead of what people say about what he wrote, you'll quickly realize that the invisible hand is just something that sometimes leads to the betterment of society, and has absolutely nothing to do with prices being lowered to just above cost.
That picture from National Geographic of the Afghan girl with the crazy green eyes that you've seen a million times? That's Kodachrome.
That photo the way you saw it on the cover of National Geographic, and on the link you provided? That's digital.
Kodachrome is just a medium through which create works of art. There's nothing wrong with lamenting its loss, but it's now a dead technology. There are countless other uninvented film types, and now there is just one more.
Digital, on the other hand, is virtually infinite in its variability. It can emulate any type of film you'd like, including not just Kodachrome, but also any of those other countless uninvented film types. With a properly color-calibrated photo workflow, it's trivial with a Kodachrome color profile to get the same colors.
Slashdot Mirror
You're probably thinking of WebM compared with Theora.
No, they don't. Can you imagine how much better life would have been had PNG been established early as the de facto image standard on the Internet instead of GIF, and later, JPG? Aside from the superior feature set, there never would have been any of the silly threats of massive lawsuits, no need to pay someone royalties to implement an editor, etc.
Except H.264 is superior to WebM.
Google isn't just smart, it is freakin' brilliant with this move. If they can help to establish WebM as the de facto standard for Internet video, they don't have to be part of the H.264 patent pool. Also, people can write video editors and other utilities galore for Chrome with no viable threat of being sued.
Or, people can just use the hardware and software they already paid for which supports H.264. There are plenty of programs which use QuickTime to encode and decode H.264 with absolutely no fear of being sued by MPEG-LA. And they get the benefit of using a superior codec, all at no additional cost.
I get the reason behind liking something for being open source, but WebM objectively inferior to H.264. Please tell my why I should use it when I have a superior option available at a reasonable price? As it seems to me, to do so would be entirely irrational.
Most people have sufficiently short memories, or high enough tolerance for absurd contradictions, that they won't bat an eye.
In other words, most people are able to adapt to changing circumstances and their brains don't lock up when encountering logical (i.e., verbal), but not actual (i.e. physically existing), contradictions.
The people who don't fit in this category will never be satisfied, so why bother worrying about them?
The people who don't fit this category are doomed to a life of frustration and will often disparage those less encumbered by an irrational over application of logic.
Of course, there are upsides too, but they don't really apply here. I'm just providing some perspective that people aren't as stupid or lacking of character or whatever values the above comments carry with them.
I'd rather they made their integrated graphics fast than simply support new DirectX capabilities. I don't really see the point of supporting certain features if the whole thing is going to be slow. I suppose it's easier to implement something than it is to implement it well.
That depends if you are currently overworked. If not, then you will just fill up that work with something else. So will you end up making more than you do now? Do you think Apple could make more money by dropping the Mac and replacing that effort on something else? I highly doubt it. Also, it's a strange thing to discuss on the eve of the launch of an App Store for the Mac. Macs are gaining in market share, why would they just throw that all away?
But more to the point, having a PC line is core to Apple's business. They can't stop selling Macs, not that they have any desire to. The single most important aspect of Apple's success is in providing the entire core user experience. Dropping Macs and dumping their many tens of millions of loyal customers into the Windows world is just about as counter to Apple's strategy as is possible.
That's some crazy train of thought you have there.
Apple is not going to release Xcode for Windows. It makes no sense. Apple doesn't want to control developers. It makes no sense. Apple isn't going to get rid of Macs or Mac OS X. It makes no sense. Why is the lack of mention of Lion Server a sign that Apple is going to get rid of their desktop PCs? It makes no sense.
Do you see the trend here? All those things you mention are possible, but at this current time, absolutely none of them make any sense. The only time they will happen is when they do (or are about to) make sense. Most of this hinges on Apple getting out of the PC business. As long as there is a thriving market for PCs, Apple will make theirs. The faulty logic is in the notion that Apple can't both make Macs that are quite open with the exception of third-party primary hardware, and iOS devices that are notably less open.
What you've described was very true until the last year or so. Steam really made a huge difference here. All the Mac games I've bought through Steam are native, not simply Cider wrappers. I have Civ V, but haven't installed the Mac version yet, so I don't know how well the port is.
Also, Blizzard has always treated the Mac as a first-class platform with excellent native support, and id software supports the Mac well, too (although Doom 3 does require the disc in the drive--very annoying, but it's like that on Windows too, so I don't see how that's a differentiating feature).
EA has been porting games, but as far as I know, they use Cider.
I'm too smart
Like I said, smug.
It's also very difficult to know which device to even upgrade to! It's not like PCs where you can say, "well, this game needs a 5770 and a Core i5 quad" and you can just spec out an upgrade to give you that. It's more like, "this app is slow. which phone can run it better?", which will leave most consumers confounded, and they will be forced to opt for the "find some other preoccupation" route, which is going to really sour their experience.
Do you think consumers in the 80s were any smarter than the modern day counterparts?
Absolutely. Specifically, consumers who bought computers in the '80s and early '90s. Because computers were still relatively rare back then, so it was a self-selected geek subset that bought computers.
How do you think consumers knew which IBM clone had what specs to run which game? They went to a store and asked some guy there "will this run such and such?" and found a computer that fits their needs.
They looked at the box. Back then, everyone knew what CPU they had, which was the only thing that really mattered for Doom.
The same thing can happen with phones. The consumer walks into the store for their upgrade and says "I have such and such slow phone. I need a phone that is faster." and the clerk, just like in the 80s, points to the various phones and says which ones are faster or not.
It's the exact same situation.
It's not. Because it's not simply a matter of a choosing a phone with a faster CPU. Now it's a many-dimensional feature matrix. It's far, far more complex. Especially given how hidden the internal specs are, and the fact that things like responsiveness of the touch display and upgradeability are not even discernible from the specs, and other things are orthogonal to performance, like keyboard style, size, camera, etc.
And it's not like people are going to walk into the store knowing ahead of time which apps they will end up wanting to run, and it's not feasible to upgrade your phone just to play Angry Birds today, then again for Epic Citadel tomorrow.
Also, back then, the computer salesman could state objectively that a given PC was superior or not than some other. This is almost still true today, except that it's not always clear between things like AMD or Intel, ATI vs Nvidia, and even whether quad core but slower clock is better than faster clock, but dual core, because of variability in usage patterns.
Anyway, the point being, the consumer has no way to know which phone is the right one to pick.
The silly thing here is Android proponents acting like fragmentation isn't an issue. It undeniably is. With the iPhone, the matrix is essentially either current or previous gen, different flash storage capacities, and sometimes color. With the iPhone, you know that the current gen will run *all* apps on the App Store at the best performance.
This is an inevitable side-effect of Android's key strength. You can't have the one without the other. And for the iPhone, this is why the single source is such a key benefit.
If you want choice, you *must* give up usability and overall user experience. But you do get choice. If you favor usability and user experience, you give up choice. It's no surprise that a lot of geeks are fine with the downsides of choice, and prefer the benefits choice has to offer. And it's no surprise that the average consumer would rather give up choice for a better experience.
What is surprising, however, is the legions of geeks who can't seem to grasp this.
There is absolutely a hardware reference for Android. It requires a CPU based on the ARM11 or newer architecture, at least 256MB of RAM, at least so much (not sure on exact numbers, "enough to fit Android + system Apps") flash storage, and a touchscreen. That's the same as saying "IBM compatible,"
No, it's not.
which really just meant "80286 or better CPU, enough RAM to run DOS, a screen, and a keyboard."
No it wasn't. IBM compatible defines a lot of things, including BIOS and various busses.
With things like a smartphones, there are far too many variables for it to be like "IBM compatible".
The inability to run Need for Speed: Shift or whatever on a low-end Android device does not "fragmentation" make. There were plenty of computers that were fully "IBM compatible" in the early 90s that couldn't run DOOM.
And if your CPU wasn't a 386, or a 486 DX2 50 (for optimum performance), you knew you couldn't run DOOM. With a smartphone, the user doesn't know which chips will run an app well or not. There's no proper frame of reference.
So, yeah, simply not being able to run some game on slower phones "does not 'fragmentation' make", that's just the tip of the iceberg.
It's the EXACT same situation. Apple releases one line of products that is locked down to their OS, expensive, and internally inferior to the like-priced competition.
That's a load of bullshit. When I looked into this, I was shocked that many Android phones cost more than the iPhone, yet have lesser features, including having abysmally small flash memory.
Mark my words: in a decade, most people won't even remember Apple was ever a major player in the smartphone market.
HAHAHA. You should have started your post off with this. It's a real gem.
They'll be forced to re-image themselves as a "boutique" product for idiots who value form over function and cost-effectiveness, just like their PCs.
No, only blindered geeks image Apple as a "boutique" product maker. Form is inextricably tied to function. Macs are very cost-effective. They just don't have a low end (which consumers would like) and they don't have DIY kits (like the geeks like). But when you go into the price range where Macs are, you tend to find nothing but inferior PCs at usually superior prices.
Or to use your example: how many people got Macs for Christmas in the 80s? How about now?
Significantly more got them now than in the '80s. I'm not sure what your point is.
massively different user experience on different devices
consider: different user experience on massively different devices
Why should it be otherwise? Should a quad-core i7 SLI provide exactly the same 'user experience' as an Atom netbook? Obviously not.
All you've done here is just restated the fact that Android is fragmented.
It is not reasonable to expect the same results from increasingly diverse hardware. Android will be found on the lowest end freebee 'smart' phone China can make, while also appearing on the most outrageous hardware that doesn't present an immediate fire hazard. Where, exactly, was it written that the limits of one must apply to the other?
It's written into the license and business model Google chose for Android. Sure, it's not a universal rule, but it is a good rule of thumb. Just like your Atom vs i7 example, most Windows apps aren't written to take advantage of multiple cores, even those that could really benefit from it. So the i7 gets stuck running software designed for the Atom and its single and dual-core ilk. It's the nature of a fragmented market.
This problem has been solved over and over again. An architecture must exist that provides fall-back software implementations of hardware accelerated functions. When some app performs poorly due to inadequate hardware the user may find some other preoccupation or upgrade to a sufficient device.
"Find some other preoccupation" is not a consumer-friendly answer. The alternative you mention is not as simple to do in a market dominated by multi-year contracts and relatively complex upgrade procedures. It's also very difficult to know which device to even upgrade to! It's not like PCs where you can say, "well, this game needs a 5770 and a Core i5 quad" and you can just spec out an upgrade to give you that. It's more like, "this app is slow. which phone can run it better?", which will leave most consumers confounded, and they will be forced to opt for the "find some other preoccupation" route, which is going to really sour their experience.
What is the problem? At the moment it appears to be Google's obstinacy. This is a losing battle for them; they're creating a differentiating point among the manufacturers because the manufacturers can alter Android, including accelerating stuff with hardware. Marketing will then make claims about how xyz's Android is better than the other Androids because of xyz's special sauce (that may or may not port easily to some other collection of chips.) If the manufacturers don't the users will.
How exactly do you expect this to work out in the real consumer world? How are people going to know which Android phone is faster/better than the others? It's like that checkout lane story from a couple weeks ago. No matter what you choose, you likely didn't choose the best one. Normal people aren't going to put in the effort to keep up with the latest Android news.
Lets hope Google wises up and deals with the issue properly.
They won't. It's essentially impossible to properly deal with this issue, because it's inherent with the very thing that has been so valuable to Android. The openness that allowed Android to spread across so many handset makers has to deal with the effects of being available from so many handset makers. You can't have your cake and eat it too.
There was such a thing as "IBM compatible" in the '80s and '90s. There no such hardware reference for Android. Apple is correcting many of the mistakes made during that time frame, while Google is making entirely new ones.
In fact, it's extremely difficult to find all that many ways that this *is* like that time frame. The only thing that is similar is it's Apple's platform vs a platform shared among many manufacturers. In almost every other way, there are notable differences.
For example, things like price and features are not downsides for Apple. In fact, Apple quite often is the winner in these measures. And cell carriers distort the market. Watch what happens once Verizon carries the iPhone. I really doubt most Android buyers actually specifically want Android. It's just the nicest phone for the cheapest price on their carrier of choice with the least offensive data plan.
Or put another way, do you think "Android phone" or "iPhone" had the higher place on people's Christmas lists this year?
Nice try. You slipped in the phrase "OS fragmentation" when what people refer to is hardware fragmentation, which is what the last part of your statement is describing.
No, they mean both. Also, carrier fragmentation and app store fragmentation.
I don't see how you can completely dismiss OS fragmentation, when most handset makers (and carriers) make rather notable modifications to the versions of Android they ship, and often leave their users stuck with obsolete versions.
I'm always amused that everyone who goes on about smugness, usually does so acting smug about how they are too smart/geeky/etc. to be an Apple customer.
Thanks for never failing to disappoint!
Yay, another lame AC who thinks simply calling someone a "fanboy" makes for a valuable argument.
I guess that you have to post AC, if you don't want to lose your spent mod points...
iPad and iPhone are toys, because they try to stop you from exercising choices you might make to get real work done.
Yeah, they only offer hundreds of thousands of choices in the form of apps, and trillions of choices in the terms of web pages, and virtually infinite choices in terms of audio, video, text and almost any other type of document.
And "real work" is a bullshit term. There are plenty of work, productivity, creative, and other apps for the iPad.
But as you say, that is why they are successful. Some people don't mind making a toy into a tool, and the rest of the people are tools who can only handle toys. (Yes, there are some who can and don't want to, but they are a vanishingly small minority, though that doesn't stop them from speaking up as if they mattered. Or had any place among geeks.)
You're just a tech snob. Like all the people who decried the original Macintosh. The problem? It was too pretty. No CLI, just a GUI and... a mouse??? Who will ever be able to do any real work with something like that?
The iPad is in the exact same boat. It's no surprise that the usual fools on Slashdot can't see this.
The iPad isn't a toy? And no, not because it's simple, but because it isn't meant for productivity.
I guess that's why Apple doesn't sell iWork for it, or there aren't plenty of music creation and photo editing software for it...
I also suppose things like tables and chairs are toys, because they aren't meant for productivity?
No, the fact is that you are calling it a "toy" because it doesn't meet your oh-so important requirements to be a "real" computing device. People called the original Macintosh a toy as well, because it lacked a command line!
And no, Apple isn't "the largest public company in the world", unless you deliberately choose to use only the silliest measure, which says more about you than about Apple.
I never said it was. I said it was the second-largest. Which is the truth. The fact that you wish to call it "the silliest measure" says more about you than about me or Apple. It says no matter what, you can't accept that Apple is good at anything of value.
Gambling or not, it's difficult to argue that AAPL's track record over the past decade isn't the definition of a good bet.
Also, what you've described is the exact same thing currency like the dollar is based on. The US government does not pay dividends on the dollar. In fact, due to inflation, the value of each dollar constantly decreases. But people still trade in dollars because they trust in dollars. If the trust in the US dollar were to evaporate overnight, it would be worthless.
The same is true for AAPL (or any other stock, including those that pay dividends). There are almost a billion shares of AAPL out there. If some number of people begin to falter in their confidence in the stock, the price would start to fall. As it falls, there will be other people who will buy up the stock as they see an opportunity to bet on AAPL rising to new highs, as it has been doing even during a depression period of the US economy.
Basically, to worry about AAPL, you'd have to think people are going to stop buying iPods, iPads, iPhones, Macs, etc. Every single one of those markets are constantly growing, except the iPod which has the occasional quarter of negative Y/Y growth, primarily due to the iPhone.
So a toy company is the number 2 company because people want to be different, just like everyone else.
Name a single "toy" Apple sells. There isn't a single one. Strange to call them a "toy company".
However, the thing that makes you think of their computers and devices as "toys" is the very reason they are so successful. By making technology so simple and so attractive that some people start to call them toys, they've essentially catered exactly to the mass market of non-geeks.
Apple is the largest public company in the world, with the exception of one petroleum company. You don't get there by making toys.
Exactly this. For Google, Android is merely an ad serving OS, just like the iPhone, and every other phone OS. The only difference is they have a stronger hand in branding the Android OS, so they have an upper hand when it comes to putting ads on that OS.
And Bray's words in the summary, "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," shows exactly why Apple will win at least in terms of profit and handset manufacturer market share. What he said as possible is technically possible, but the examples of open source "user-experience rock-star teams" is vanishingly small. Thinking that it's reasonable to talk about such a thing happening is to enter the realm of extreme speculation.
As far as an "industrial-design rock-star team", that's far more reasonable, and even then, you are competing against the industrial design all-star Jonathan Ive, so it's still a very, very tall order.
The only advantages Android has to the broader consumer market are that it allows any handset maker to ship with a modern platform (very few have the resources or expertise to do this themselves), provides the consumer with a wide variety of hardware choices, and is available on more carriers in the US (this is about to change). The Slashdot-friendly features of being Open Source and having multiple stores are both virtually meaningless to the average consumer.
Betting on someone out-designing Apple in terms of hardware or software is setting oneself up for failure. Or in the case of Tim Bray's blog post specifically, it's a case of providing a hypothetical situation that will never be tested, so it can be used to make an un-disprovable claim.
And GeoHot was never granted the right to copy the root key. Not that I agree with the way the law works here, just that if you're going to argue from a legal standpoint, you've got it wrong. If you want to argue from a moral standpoint, that's an entirely different thing.
The word "right" has both moral and legal connotations. You absolutely have the moral right. Whether you have the legal right is up for debate on a case-by-case basis.
So you believe installing and maintaining cell phone towers and server networks costs nothing?
I'm sure he said nothing of the sort. He said it costs nothing extra, since the system is already doing the equivalent of text messaging anyway.
Why do so many readers of Slashdot have such an uninformed, anti-capitalist view of how the world works?
Why is it that every time someone points out a flaw in capitalism, someone is always ready to decry that person as an "uninformed anti-capitalist"?
Even the software you think of as free, such as Linux, is worked on by paid developers working at companies with a vested interest in the software. Nothing in the world is truly free. It's all based on an exchange of something.
I'm 100% confident the software that "I think of as free" on my computer *is* actually free to me. I'm quite certain that in the vast majority of the free software I've used in my life, very, very little of it involved "and exchange of something" between me and the programmers or the companies funding the development.
>>>The value of a text message is what ever the customer will pay for it. It has nothing at all to do with cost.
That's only true to a point. As companies compete with one another, the tendency will be for Company 1 to drop the price to 15 cents/text. Company 2 will undercut them and drop it to 10 cents. Company 3 will observe this and say, "We can beat all of you," and drop it to 5 cents. Eventually competitive price pressure will lower the customer's fee to just above the actual cost. Say... 1/10th of a penny.
Is this satire? If not, how did you write this without realizing how wrong it is? Text messaging has had about a decade for this to happen, and it hasn't. There's a strange thing around here where people quote theory as though it's reality, when reality quite clearly contradicts the very thing they just said!
The Scotsman Smith called this the invisible hand.
And if you actually read Smith, instead of what people say about what he wrote, you'll quickly realize that the invisible hand is just something that sometimes leads to the betterment of society, and has absolutely nothing to do with prices being lowered to just above cost.
That picture from National Geographic of the Afghan girl with the crazy green eyes that you've seen a million times? That's Kodachrome.
That photo the way you saw it on the cover of National Geographic, and on the link you provided? That's digital.
Kodachrome is just a medium through which create works of art. There's nothing wrong with lamenting its loss, but it's now a dead technology. There are countless other uninvented film types, and now there is just one more.
Digital, on the other hand, is virtually infinite in its variability. It can emulate any type of film you'd like, including not just Kodachrome, but also any of those other countless uninvented film types. With a properly color-calibrated photo workflow, it's trivial with a Kodachrome color profile to get the same colors.