According to Baird analyst William Powers, roughly 87% of Android developers believe that fragmentation is a problem for the Android platform. 57% feel Android’s fragmentation problem is either “huge” or “meaningful,” and about 30% agree that it is a problem to a lesser degree. Google said this past November that the overwhelming majority of Android devices — 77% — run Android 2.1 or Android 2.2, but developers apparently still feel that the existence of multiple Android versions in the market at the same time is less than ideal. What’s more, the company’s recent decision to provide limited early access to upcoming Android builds for partners whose plans for the software are approved by Google suggests that the company views fragmentation as more of a problem than it might convey publicly.
Category: Google
On Google and CNN
This is just crazy, but it’s what happens when you have companies that are so secretive, they lie to cover things up that leak. I believe CNN over Google any day of the week.
The Amazon Tablet
The tablet space is a weird little corner of the technology market right now. Apple’s crushing everyone with its iPad 2, clearly. There are several tablets on the horizon, but most of them feel like knock-off iPads.
There is more to a good tablet OS than the cloud, though. People are using tablets for content consumption, and with Android, that’s tricky. Android’s strength is its tie-in with the Google cloud, not with easy ways to purchase music and movies.Honeycomb apps can be counted on both hands.
On the Promise of Android’s Openness
When Android was first announced, Google’s evangelists touted it as an open ecosystem that would enable innovation—a hardware and software reaffirmation of the Carterfone decision. They spoke of a future where users would be free from restrictions and be able to install whatever software they want.
Sadly, those promises were never fulfilled and the dream of an open mobile ecosystem around Android never materialized. In reality, Android has become an insular platform developed almost entirely behind closed doors in an environment that is hostile to external contributors and is mired in a culture of secrecy that serves a small handful of prominent commercial hardware vendors and mobile carriers.
Another Example of Android’s Openness
This was a smart move on Amazon’s part, but is potentially bad for consumers.
The $200 Tablet
The Wall Street Journal’s Brett Arends bought a Nook Color, rooted it, and is calling it a tablet:
Be aware that you perform this software hack entirely at your own risk. Barnes & Noble says it invalidates your warranty. The process ran smoothly for me, but when I read the Internet chat rooms, I found at least a few people had had problems. If it goes wrong, you’re on your own.
On Beta Products
Although the Xoom has a lot to offer, the product feels very incomplete. A surprising number of promised hardware and software features are not functional at launch and will have to be enabled in future updates. The Xoom’s quality is also diminished by some of the early technical issues and limitations that we encountered in Honeycomb. Google’s nascent tablet software has a ton of potential, but it also has some feature gaps and rough edges that reflect its lack of maturity.
The Chase
This brave new Apple is fast, agile and and above all, cool. Well, to be fair they’ve almost always been cool, but there’s something different this time. This isn’t like the iPod or the iPhone (or even the iMac for that matter.) The iPad marks a shift in the company. Before 2010 they had the luxury of waltzing into an existing market, picking a product, reinventing it and saying, “look how much better we made this.” With iPad, all that changed. Now that they’re creating markets Apple is finally forcing the competition to ask, “how are we going to keep up?” This is perhaps the first time a successful Apple product is in the lead and a generation beyond the also-rans. And they’re scaring the pants off of the competition.
The More Things Change...
Joshua Topolsky, in his review of the Motorola Xoom, the first Honeycomb-powered tablet to hit the market:
The problem with the Xoom isn’t really about the core of the experience or the core of the hardware – it’s about the details. Too much in both the design (like those wonky buttons) or the software (like the feeling that this is all very much in beta) makes you wonder if this wasn’t rushed out to market in order to beat the next wave from Apple. Regardless, there isn’t much here for consumers right now. The Android Market is almost devoid of tablet applications, the OS feels buggy and unfinished, and the hardware has pain points that we find troubling. And that’s to say nothing of the pricing and carrier commitments being asked of first-time buyers.
On Obama’s Meeting with Tech CEOs
A ‘Groundbreaking Pen Experience’
Oh, HTC. You hurt me.
On the Need for Better Notifications
The problem: iOS notifications get in the way, interrupt one’s workflow or media consumption and once they’re gone, they’re gone.
This is the number one thing that has frustrated me moving back to an iPhone after using a Droid for almost a year.