

Google is leapfrogging Apple - edw519
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37261393/ns/technology_and_science-tech_and_gadgets/

======
zackola
The whole leapfrogging thing implies (to me) that you are not only doing more
things than someone, but also doing them better. Yes, FroYo has added a ton of
great features to android, however I still feel that Apple has not yet been
leapfrogged in the most basic parts of design for core parts today's mobile
experience.

The most obvious of these to me is text entry via touch screen. There can be
no claims of leapfrogging until I can use an android device's touch screen to
SMS someone without pulling (what little is left of) my hair out.

Next is the whole activity response/switching thing. Yes, blah blah, tradeoffs
for multitasking, whatever. Why not have a way to turn off non-system multi-
tasking in favor of super lightning quick responsiveness on android? It's
enough to almost throw the phone across the room when you are trying to answer
the phone and key presses don't register.

In terms of industrial design, there have been no great leaps by any of
Google's hardware partners - Every single android handset I've used has felt
like a cheap, disposable piece of junk (G1, Hero, N1) or a giant tank (Droid)
compared to the first generation iPhone. I haven't played with the incredible
yet, so I still have hope, but not much.

Google and Apple have taken two different approaches to mobile. Google is
trying to throw as many different features into android in as short a time as
possible, and Apple is set on perfecting each detail before incorporating
more. This is fine, it's two different philosophies.

After my prolonged experiences with the G1 and the original iPhone, I'd much
rather live day to day with software and hardware that has been developed to
Apple's design and usability standards. (I'm talking about the system software
here, not 3rd party apps) I hope in the coming year Google has a chance to go
back and spend time polishing what they've accomplished so far instead of
continually heaping feature upon feature onto android.

If Google can get back to user interaction basics and stop mucking around with
some of their other tangents, they could make android great, not just
passable.

Or maybe I was just too abused by my time with the G1 to judge this argument
fairly anymore, definitely possible.

~~~
moultano
>There can be no claims of leapfrogging until I can use an android device's
touch screen to SMS someone without pulling (what little is left of) my hair
out.

This is almost certainly what you are used to. I haven't had any difficulty
with my nexus one. The iphone drove me to insanity everytime I tried to type
on it.

>Every single android handset I've used has felt like a cheap, disposable
piece of junk (G1, Hero, N1)

Everyone I know who has seen the nexus one in person found it much more
attractive than the iphone. (sampling bias, yadda yadda)

>Or maybe I was just too abused by my time with the G1 to judge this argument
fairly anymore, definitely possible.

That's the only reasonable explanation I can come up with for your post. (I
feel your pain on that one. ;)

~~~
zackola
It's kind of funny - people seem to be fairly split down the middle between
our posts, even with all the up and down voting.

What I was used to before I got the G1 was a Samsung Trace, which could not be
considered any sort of "smart phone". No Qwerty keyboard, tiny screen, etc. I
did not actually use the original iPhone until about a year ago when a friend
gave me an unlocked 2G when she got a 3GS.

I don't know much about the subject of text input, but there are two
distinctly different implementations between android and iPhone. Android tends
to be more predictive, but less enthusiastic about what it thinks you mean,
and hence less corrective. I find the more decisive autocorrect on iPhone OS
to work out much better for me. It's less about picking out words from a
suggestion list and more about just banging away on the keyboard and trusting
the software knows what I mean.

~~~
lftl
The biggest advantage Android has in this area is that Google doesn't have to
get it "right" for everyone. On Android phones you can just switch to one of
the other keyboard implementations if you don't like the default.

~~~
zackola
recommendations? and not swype please.

~~~
OrangeGuutan
Smart Keyboard Pro: text expansion, custom dictionaries, custom skins, and
more. I'm not the developer even if I sound like a walking advertisement, I
just love the app that much.

------
davidedicillo
There are few things that bothers me when people talk about Google taking the
lead:

1) They are comparing two different things, an open OS vs an OS tied to one
company.

2) Google didn't surpassed anybody. FroYo hasn't been released yet and they
are comparing them to a phone that is going to be updated in two weeks. FroYo
has tethering, but iPhone has tethering since 3.0, if AT&T doesn't allow it,
it isn't Apple's fault. And I'm not sure how free that wireless hotspot will
be. FroYo is faster, but nobody knows if faster than OS 4.0 on the new iPhone.
They presented wireless sync, but nobody knows if Apple will introduce the
same in two weeks. After all, they bought Lala for some reason. Maybe it's
just me, but I like to compare shipped products, not demos and announcements.

~~~
tvon
The tethering issue may not be Apple's fault, but that's fairly irrelevant
since you can't get the phone with any other carrier in the U.S.. Point being,
no matter whose fault it is, the iPhone just doesn't have tethering in the
U.S..

Otherwise I tend to agree, there are no devices shipping with Froyo so saying
it has surpassed a shipping and soon-to-be-updated product is a bit silly.

~~~
davidedicillo
The only Android phone that initially will have that functionality won't be
available with AT&T nor T-Mobile... And the Nexus One isn't a pentaband phone
either.

~~~
warfangle
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'll be able to flash froyo to my nexus one,
correct?

And the nexus one _is_ available on at&t.

Ergo, I will be able to tether my phone on at&t.

Right?

~~~
davidedicillo
Why do you think AT&T would let Nexus One tether before the iPhone?

~~~
warfangle
How would they be able to stop me?

------
jsz0
I think Apple as a very mature company likes the long term strategy. They
start with a bang but they also realize Version 2 of a product, at its core,
is strikingly similar to Version 10. I don't think they feel pressured to
dominate a market probably because their business model doesn't require it.
The iPod was a bit of a fluke in that sense. It had a lot more to do with the
competition losing than Apple being hell bent on domination. Google on the
other hand, like Microsoft in the past, needs to succeed with big volume. More
searches, more data collected, more services to serve more advertisements, new
places to put advertisements, etc.

~~~
boucher
I think that was a good description of Apple Computer, Inc. Now that we live
in the post iPhone world of Apple, Inc., they seem to be behaving quite
differently. Their strategy seems dominated by short term market share
grabbing in the mobile space, rather than long term product innovation and
higher priced products.

~~~
grinich
* Their strategy seems dominated by short term market share grabbing in the mobile space, rather than long term product innovation...*

Even in light of the iPad?

~~~
grinich
Actually, I've rethought my comment a bit and I agree with you. I see the way
Apple is behaving now very akin to the early PC wars, when a bunch of
platforms were trying to become the dominant one.

These days, the platform war is the tablet form factor, and the iPad is
definitely cheaper than anyone really expected. I have yet to see an actual
competitor, in terms of price, software, and retail locations.

So sure, it's a land grab right now. But I wouldn't confuse that with true
product innovation. They're just taking it step-by-step. And I'm sure the iPad
still maintains their margins, although it seems cheaper. (my hypothesis as to
why it has no camera, cleaning cloth, included slipcase, etc.)

~~~
zweben
"But I wouldn't confuse that with true product innovation. They're just taking
it step-by-step."

Iterative improvement and innovation are not mutually exclusive. Just like
with the iPhone (which had no app store at launch, and would be boring by
today's standards,) most of the iPad's innovations are ahead of it. You don't
have to revolutionize a market right off the bat to be innovative.

------
ShabbyDoo
What is more remarkable to me than any Apple vs. Google rivalry is how
infrequently the press has mentioned Microsoft in articles on the matter. Is
it a given that MSFT has gotten so far behind that it won't ever catch up?

~~~
whughes
Palm?

~~~
ShabbyDoo
Yeah. They've been mentioned even less in all of this. Certainly the HP
takeover and the quiet surrounding it hasn't helped their PR.

------
dedward
I love all the new android phones I see.... and I like the openness - the
hacker in me wants one.

But you know - the iphone/ipod Touch - it took me 10 seconds to figure out how
that stuff worked.

I had to ask my friend to show me how to navigate around his android based
phone with all it's buttons and gestures and whatnot...... I can definitely
see more possibilities wiht the android - but Apple still has them beet on the
Mom test.

------
czhiddy
Interesting on how the tone of the Gizmodo article is almost over-the-top pro-
Google and anti-Apple. Seems almost like a backlash to the entire Jason
Chen/REACT situation.

------
erikstarck
The thing to watch is not the feature list on one phone or platform release
but the innovation speed and how fast you can improve the product in a closed
environment vs an open one.

------
cpr
Man, how breathless can one article get?

Nothing is this simple in real life.

------
joegaudet
Something seems suspect about an article on (ms)nbc claiming that google is
now beating apple... Can't quite put my finger on it.

------
MikeCapone
Wasn't Google supposed to announce an encrypted search this week? Whatever
happened to that? Anyone has the inside scoop?

~~~
bonecandy
[http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2010/05/encrypted-google-
sea...](http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2010/05/encrypted-google-search-
coming-to-a-browser-near-you.ars)

It's coming

~~~
sandipc
it's here. (beta)

<https://www.google.com/>

~~~
kmfrk
I get redirected to the http site. (I use Duck Duck Go---which is encrypted---
but I just wanted to let you know.)

~~~
bbatsell
My guess is that it's being slowly rolled out to some of Google's front-end
servers. I'll get the SSL homepage one load, then a few minutes later when I'm
round-robinned to a different server, I get redirected to <http://>.

------
fuminahara
Froyo looks really cool, and I would seriously consider the jump from iPhone
to Android, but AT&T has such crap android phones. I want a nexus one or a
droid!

<http://listeasy.net/>

~~~
cubicle67
no spammy links please

