
Will Google’s Android Play DOS to Apple’s iPhone? - raganwald
http://www.roughlydrafted.com/2008/08/25/will-googles-android-play-dos-to-apples-iphone/
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raganwald
_The paradox of the Windows PC market has been that Microsoft’s broadly
licensed software supposedly saves hardware makers from investing in software
development while ensuring compatibility, when in reality it adds significant
costs to PC makers while limiting their ability to differentiate themselves.
That explains why PC makers have been perpetually merging together and going
out of business while Microosft has rolled in money over the last two
decades._

~~~
allenbrunson
... which led to the boring, gray monoculture we suffered under during The
Microsoft Era.

now that microsoft has finally done its evolutionary duty and has begun its
course of repeated foot-shooting, let's hope it's at least another decade or
two before another, similar monopoly gains traction.

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sanj
Welcome to the party:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=79253>

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peregrine
Well there goes parts of my life I will never get back.

Using the past to predict the future works. But using the past as the ONLY
GUIDE to predict the future is mad raving idiocy. Did anyone else get about
half way and think "What the fuck is this guy going on about?" He is clearly
over analyzing it and failing to see the big picture.

Poor guy doesn't even know that he is rambling.

~~~
trezor
He also calls Windows Mobile a "total failure", despite me having a hard time
seeing a single smart-phone _not_ a Windows mobile phone when out among
people. I honestly have no idea how he can possible come to a conclusion like
that.

Granted, I don't live in the US where the carriers have a history of killing
any interest in sophisticated mobile devices with high speed mobile internet
trough vendor lock-ins, non-competition and asinine pricing.

~~~
wvenable
In its first full quarter of sales, the iPhone exceeded the marketshare of
Microsoft's entire lineup of Windows Mobile smartphones in North America.
That's HUGE. Despite Microsoft's massive head start, years of smartphones
sold, they were overtaken in a single quarter. You could easily call that
"total failure" without it being a huge hyperbole.

~~~
trezor
That still only transfers to a market where people are used to lockins. In
Europe the Apple iPhone lockins make it a lot less sexy.

I'm not saying it's a phone which can be _ignored_ entirely, but the truth is
that I still see Windows Mobile smart-phones everywhere having a hard time
seeing anything else. Hence calling Windows mobile a complete failure seems
like a rather narrow look at things which has no basis in reality.

Add to this that basically _every_ brand of phone sold here except for the
iPhone comes with any carrier and any plan you like, and the iPhone has
serious hurdles it needs to overcome to be a viable alternative to most people
here.

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fauigerzigerk
Many words but he's entirely missing the point. All these comparisons
completely ignore the difference between gadgets and platforms. A platform is
nothing without many third party softwares that run on top of it. Phones or
MP3 players are gadgets that come with the main functionality built in and
don't need any third party software to be useful. Their usefulness depends on
how well these core functions are implemented and not much else.

The role of DOS or the Mac simply doesn't exist in the mobile space and
therefore these comparisons are meaningless. Mobile platforms don't exist.
Phones are just gadgets and smart phones are gadgets with optional addons.

