SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
from the if-Google-won-did-we-the-people-lose? dept.
Android is 10 years old this week. In part one of a larger story, The Register looks at the beginnings of Android, including some early competition, and a brief comparison to Microsoft.
Google was in the game, at a time when others didn't realize what the game was. Or did, and couldn't turn the ship around fast enough. Android succeeded because it was just about good enough, and its parent was prepared to cross subsidize it hugely. Android wasn't brilliant, but it was better than Bada, and uglier than WebOS. Symbian simply wasn't competitive. If you were a Samsung or Sony or HTC, then Android gave you what you needed, it gave users a better experience. Developers were happy writing for a Java OS, it was a doddle after writing for WM and Symbian.
[...] Motorola also had a significant part to play in Android's success . . . as did Verizon. Carriers like Verizon had been snubbed by Apple's carrier exclusive strategy, and Verizon was badly burned by the BlackBerry Storm. It went all in.
[...] Android is far bigger and far more invasive than a PC could ever be. Google's dominance over our personal lives is far greater than Microsoft's ever was. The clunky laptop in the corner did not track your every movement or read your emails.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 14 2017, @02:09PM (1 child)
The other half of the story of the success of the IBM PC is that developers were free to program the damn thing as they saw fit; even a proprietary operating system like Windows allowed programmers to do just about anything they wanted.
So, while the Big Players have the ability to construct custom hardware to run Android, the software world is woefully constrained. As the other AC put it: You've got to break into your own computer to use it the way you want.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Tuesday November 14 2017, @04:48PM
Much agree. When I needed a personal computer, I knew that the Macintosh, with its very usable interface, was coming out real soon, and I wanted to wait for it. But I needed a computer *then*, not a few months from then. So I ended up with a PC instead. When the Mac finally came out, I was relieved at my hurried purchase, because the Mac was not user-programmable at all.