Posts Tagged ‘iPhone’

Reply to an interesting comment.

Saturday, November 14th, 2009

Here is an interesting comment. I thought it deserved a reply.

It’s not about technology, moreover, you totally missed the point on why people own BlackBerrys. BlackBerry will dominate anybody who is serious about their business (except for industries that are socially relevant like media/entertainment/fashion), and iPhone will be a price cool thing for people who want to think they are cool. Android made by nerds for nerds, and is after the iPhone market which will crush them.

I agree and disagree Blackberrys are for business; absolutely.

Backberrys used to be for people who wanted to be cool. Business warriors now have them strapped to their belts (Khaki pants, blue shirt); which most people think is sort of sad.

Non business people sometimes got them but found them generally useless for their lifestyle. Any keyboard phone was good enough.

Now iPhones are for people who want to be cool. (My phone is cooler than your phone)

iPhones have an apps avalanche which is making the iPhone more and more attractive for more people in both a superficial way (iFart) and a useful way. (Metronome for musicians)

But where it all boils down is that I have found that a successful product will appeal to people’s base needs: ego, greed, sex, stupidity, boredom.The iPhone has these covered in spades.

Ego (I’m cool for having this)

Greed – iPhone, not so much. Blackberry might win here a bit.

sex – Great browser plus many apps cater to this.

stupidity – the great browser makes wikipedia usable and other apps that can make you look smart

and finally boredom. I see so many people plunk themselves down and pull out their phone (any phone) and try to entertain themselves with whatever their phones can do. The iPhone does this really well with movies, podcasts, music, and games all at the ready. Other phones can do this but the iPhone does it in spades.

The last point is that the Blackberry has hit its highpoint. Damn it emails well. But my sister (government funded) has the same blackberry from 4 years ago. She has no desire for the coolest and newest in that offers nothing more for her. So cameras GPSs and whatnot probably won’t send sales spiking.

The android is still the wild card. Since this is a blog from a tech point of view I will end on a technical note.

Years ago (circa 1999) I downloaded the Blackberry SDK. Wow the engineers made it easy for me to make an app. Didn’t do anything for me to help sell it. Not a damn thing that I could see. When I contacted some large telcos to try and sell some apps through them they seemed shocked that you could even sell apps.

Then along comes the iPhone SDK in 2008 after a few hiccups Apple slams 3rd party apps right into iTunes and bang the app avalanche began. I have begun the development of some apps and it is fun and easy. I can’t wait to see the results. Once development is complete I throw my app into the app store and begin attracting interest where my app will live or die on its own merits. I get 70%, Apple keeps 30%. Then when apps are sold they wire the money to me. That rocks. From a programming standpoint it uses a language called Objective-C. This language is not hard to learn but it isn’t a commonly used development language outside of Apple products but Objective-C is based upon C which is one of the hardest of hard-core languages available. Most commercial apps are developed using either C or C++. That would include things like most operating systems, video games, most Microsoft products, your browser, almost everything. Basically you can do anything that pops into your brain and is theoretically possible on the computer. This leads to Android. Android apps are primarily programmed in Java. While Java is a perfectly nice language it is, in my opinion, a huge steaming pile of crap. Many business apps, your company’s payroll system for example, are generally programmed in Java. But in my experience it is too easy to end up either avoiding cool functionality due to the limitations of Java or getting stuck in a programming quagmire where you spend months spinning your wheels in the mud. Lastly there are lots of bozos programming in Java. They learned it in school last week and now they are churning out code this week. Thus Android is a bit handicapped by this. With no empirical evidence at hand I would guess that the general quality of apps will end up being lower on Android due to this Java development path.

But now for something about android that from a programming perspective is completely backwards from what the general public might perceive. There are around 50 Android phones out or coming out soon. This might seem like a good thing but from the perspective of a programmer this is a nightmare. It means that if I make an Android app I would have to test it on 50 platforms. Each platform could be quite different. This sucks. This really sucks. Programming for the iPhone can be hard enough and the various iPhones and iPod touches are almost identical to each other. Same basic screen. Similar processors and the core capabilities are nearly identical.

All these Android phones will make programmer’s brains explode but it does have one advantage. The iPhone is generally getting better and better with each release. But the Androids will be pumped out by many companies. If any one of them hits a home run they stand a chance of leaving the iPhone behind. But I suspect the opposite will remain true unless Apple drops the ball with the iPhone. I suspect that the niche that the Androids will occupy will be iPhone clones. They will appeal to people who can’t afford the absurdly expensive iPhones. This is a perfectly profitable place to sit whereas mounting a challenge to the iPhone will probably be financially ruinous even if the company in question wins.

So in summary. From a technical point I love the iPhone. As a technical consumer I love the iPhone. I also want the latest and greatest iPhone.

From a technical point the Android annoys me. As a technical consumer I don’t have any interest in the Android.

From a technical point the Blackberry confuses me. As a technical consumer the blackberry is useless to me.

From observing people; nearly everyone I know wants an iPhone and those with them either have the latest or wish they did. In fact I meet many people who pull out their iPhones and we spend 20 minutes comparing apps. The few who have blackberries either are happy or wish they had an iPhone but have zero desire for the latest and greatest blackberry.

So will RIMM die? No. Will the iPhone crush them like a bug? No; but who crushed the pager?

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Google Android vs Blackberry vs iPhone

Monday, October 6th, 2008

In summary Google will win and Blackberry will lose. A quick summary of the three products from a simplified technical point of view.

iPhone is cool and plays music. It surfs the web very well unlike almost any other web capable phone. It will show you the web in miniature as well as your desktop will show you. Except for pages using flash technology. The biggest inherent obstacle for business users is the lack of a keyboard. This means the iPhone user is mostly limited to consuming information. Cool is a major feature here. Everything about this phone is quite cool. It has quite a few applications being developed but Apple seems to want to battle with developers. Microsoft lost a whole generation of developers by doing this “our way or the highway” thing.

The blackberry line is as everyone knows is very good at email. But that is about it. Its web capability is squirlly and nobody that I have ever met uses any of the other applications. Technically it is possible for developers to make things for the blackberry but I don’t see much of this. In my opinion all RIM products are ugly and aimed at 50 year olds who think they are cool but truely truely aren’t. RIM does not seem to have much of an idea that phones are jewelry for some people.

The android is pretty ugly but cooler than anything RIM makes. It has the RIM keyboard and the iPhone web capability. But Google is doing a good job of wooing developers to make apps for the android. This will probably allow the android to be all things to all people. Quite simply it will have all the best features in both the iPhone and the various RIM products. Some coolness, a keyboard for email and stuff, and great web browsing.

The various reviews of the new Android phone compare it mostly to the iPhone and a few compare it to the Blackberry. Most of these reviews either call it a tie or they give the Android a close second place. A very few call it a winner. None of this is relevant until you consider that this is google’s first phone. What will their second phone be like?

The people who I see running around with blackberries are government people, finance people, and real-estate people. The last two groups are taking a huge hit both in jobs and budgets. Thus I foresee a general drop in all smart phone use but mostly blackberries. This will hurt the android somewhat in that it won’t be the raving success that might have come its way with a boom economy but overall this might benefit Google. From a technical point of view it looks like the Android might be cheaper to run than blackberries and iPhones and due to what google is providing to geeks it will soon have applications that will cover any software feature found on the other phones. So if you like some software feature on your favorite phone it will be matched and bettered by the android.

So I see a market that will be looking to cut back hurting blackberry and iPhone but not Android as they have doubtfully built up much dependancy on their tiny market share where as RIM basically has a single product and will be seriously hurt by any drop in revenues. iPhone will be less affected by this but it will give their many competitors such as samsung to catch up with cheaper units. This will hurt things like RIM’s R&D and general moral.

Then I see some companies adopting some Androids to cut cost. This won’t amount to much but it will get people exploring non RIM options. Then when the market rebounds people will not all return to the RIM family. Many will go to Android for both capabilities and cost.

So the timing of this bust will only put nails in RIMs coffin and open a door to Google. I don’t see this as being a huge revenue generator for Google but I do see this as being a massive revenue eraser for RIM.

So in summary Google will do OK; RIM will die a slow death; and Apple will just continue along.

PS My prediction is the RIM will fade in spurts. Basically look at the history of companies like Novell and Sun. They just sort of faded from relevance. Once in a while they would make headlines with a sizable layoff but due to a lack of any crushing debt they just sort of faded from the scene. One customer base that probably won’t switch and will keep RIM plodding along will be governments. Due to the lack of real impact by the economy they won’t cut way back and since they generally are very old school people who are very uncool they will keep on and on with their blackberries. That should fit in well with their various Novell and Sun systems.

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