Well, me starting today's Wave [a daily thing with high school / uni mates] with Techcrunch's review of the Nexus One led to some fantastic discussion [it's normally not tech-heavy at all, which made it even better reading for me], so I'm just going to dump a crapload of it here. Because it's my blog, and I can! With a few minor edits.
A: "Google's angle is the open apps community, and how they can nurture collaboration, distribution, encourage participation, and grow loyalty that way. As opposed to Apple's ease of use (consumption) store."
B: "Dunno man, I hope it works but I'm kinda doubtful how mass market it will be. Cos Apple's closed system allows them to control all the content which has both pros and cons, but for the mass market probably more pros"
C: "The iPhone only has ONE PERCENT handset market share... this article just came out today, it sums up things well - Android or iPhone? Wrong Question"
B: "Wow, yeah that changes things quite a bit actually. Cos I can imagine Android being the main platform for mid-level smartphones and above. If it ends up replacing Win Mobile or s60 (?), then yeah it'll actually get a good chunk of the market without crossing over to Apple land. If Android starts appearing on Nokias I might seriously consider going back to a Nokia phone.
One hurdle though would be the hardware that powers it. You'll probably have varying degrees of enjoyment using the platform. Sony and Nokia have always been a bit slow on adopting the newest processors so it might hurt Android's chances there. Anyway if the next Nokia N9X series is an Android I will be buying one."
D: "Sif, give up on Nokia it's crap."
E: "Nokia is sticking with Symbian but changing the UI."
B: "Man Symbian is always changing its UI but it's never actually that good compared to its competitors. It was great 3 years ago when there was no competition but now it's different."
....
F: "http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/01/analysis-yawn-google-introduces-iphone-clone"
E: "Retarded article from an obvious iPhone user."
D: "So basically you fight his argument by calling him an "iPhone user""
E: "I'm not fighting."
D: "Doesn't make any of what he says incorrect. Maybe a bit inflammatory"
E: "No it's a bit stupid. Google ain't in the business of making hardware nor do they give a shit about a superphone that has all the features mankind can think of, that isn't their strategy. Their (nice!) strategy is to have people use Google for email, search, navigation, etc.
What they want is the exposure to the mobile market, exposure to more ad revenues period. Google isn't in the business of selling stuff to consumers, their business is ad revenue.
I think the guy has lost the point, if they were to make a superphone, the be all and end all of all phones they would piss off their partners (Motorola, Sony Ericsson, etc) who'd probably just abandon the platform. The more phones out there and the more products using Android and using Google specific apps the better their bottom dollar is."
...
D: "Look there's nothing wrong with the phone, but when you brand it GOOGLE PHONE then that's what it becomes in the market"
C: "They're not branding it as that. People are"
D: "If you can buy it through google.com/phone I think it speaks for itself"
C: "Fine"
E: "Dude it's marketing, Google Phone or a phone by Google gets people interested. Fuck if HTC brought out the same phone no one would give a shit or even notice. But what this has done is brought all the media companies to cover it... If they can use their name to give Android the attention it deserves then all power to them. One thing "Google Phone" has over HTC is awareness."
...
D: "I think both articles are right. It's obvious to me that Google is targeting to be a superphone eventually, and it's late to the race. But the population of phone users is big enough and diverse enough for both of them to "win" in their own rights"
C: "It's all about the $$ from ad revenue"
D: "I'm saying that there is enough market share to go around for everyone, so the article you linked is right and I agree, but that doesn't change that Google is still aiming to have a superphone"
C: "Yeh, but I'm saying that that's a secondary goal. Like, if they thought about it, they'd think, we want all this mobile ad revenue, etc. That's the first thing, and then, yeh, how the fk do we do that? Create a mobile OS that we can dump on a shitload of phone manufacturers that functions as well as the iPhone OS."
D: "What's this got to do with anything at all? As proven above it's still a Google phone. You can pay someone else to do something and endorse it, it's still your phone"
E: "You don't get it, it's not about the phone, it's Android they're pushing. Putting their name on it creates Android awareness, that's all. If a mainstream consumer were to now walk into a phone store and go can I have a Google phone, they'd be like can I play with it, etc.
They'd understand there's other shit out there that functions just as well as the iPhone. They'd also be told there are other phones that use the same OS and have different price points, etc."
D: "You somehow treat the OS and the phone as two totally separate things. If this was true, then why even bother, and just work with HTC with one of their previous phones to make it work better"
E: "Come on try selling a HTC phone which has an Android OS and market it compared to selling a Google phone. Fuck half the idiots out there don't know what an OS is."
D: "And those idiots are really going to see the Google phone and go, OH BUT I CAN GET A SAMSUNG WITH THIS SAME OS.
No they'll just get the Google phone"
E: "No but it creates awareness about the OS period. That's the point, I doubt you'll see many Google branded phones in the future... Ok, let's say two years later they come for a new phone and there's a bunch of Android phones, Nokia's own Symbian OS based phones and the iPhone. What they had before is the Google phone and they want something similar. What do you think they're going to choose?"
D: "This is on the assumption that there are no more Google phones. My prediction is, even if this is not what they are anticipating (please), that in 2 years the other phones get edged out and the Google phone becomes the main Android phone in the market.
Regardless of the OS, functionality in the phone trumps all for the consumer, and even now it seems to me the Google phone beats all the other alternatives"
...
Thanks to you all! I was a mere spectator, and may not necessarily agree with it all, but I loved reading it. Didn't know how you felt about being named so I stuck with random letters.
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