rocketpig said:
Yep. Until Android can figure out a way to convince its userbase to spend money like the typical iOS user, Apple is going to rule mobile gaming. Not to mention that iOS is relatively unfragmented, making development much easier while Android is fragmented beyond belief. Android is a pretty good OS (I have an Android phone) but I spend virtually nothing on apps for it. Whereas hardly a week goes by where I don't drop some money in the App Store to install something new and shiny on my iPad. Not to mention that Android is getting its ass kicked in the tablet market and the Fire is only going to hurt them in the long run. Why buy a full-featured tablet for $400 when you can get a locked-down version from Amazon for $200? It's a bad move by Google to continue to allow companies to clamp down on their operating system like this. It gives them a huge install base but it also fragments the OS to hell and makes people reluctant to buy into the platform wholesale like people have with iOS (there is a lot to be said about consistency from device to device). I can pick up any iOS device and figure it out in ten seconds. I've owned an Android phone for a year and unless the device is made by HTC, it takes me fucking forever to do anything on another Android device. That's bad business and Google fucked up big time by letting it continue for as long as it has. Google is creating zero brand loyalty with Android right now. |
1) Android focuses on ads not upfront cost. 6 or half a dozen of the other its all the same. There are always ad-free versions for a cost. Consumers tend to want the free up-front cost with little ads, so in reality Android has the better system.
2) Fragmentation has been tossed out by dev after dev as really nonsense overall. Its just marketing banter from Apple mostly.
3) Tablets are really new... a real android tablet OS is not even a year old. It took a little while for Android phones to pick and and then steam roll past iOS. It will be the same in tablets as the OS has finally gotten there with Honeycomb and Ice Cream Sandwich. Then like Verizon's Droid line as the catapult for the phones, we have Kindle Fire and other lower priced android tablets to kick off the assault on tablets. We should revisit this topic in a year.
Also, when you talk about locked down tablets... umm its a tablet. Its not a laptop. The greater mass of people will only want to use it for web and fun content. I know I'd rather buy a kindle fire for cheap than buy a fully featured tablet as I don't need all the other crap. I would rather use my phone for pics/recordings/phone etc. I'd only use the tablet for reading, games, movies, browsing, etc. With that I dont' need all the extra connections, cameras, etc. Beyond that, what else is it missing?
Now, I'd rather not have Amazon's tailored UI, so I would root/rom it, but there will also be similar low cost tablets that don't have that UI as well as soon as vendors realize they should NOT be trying to build $600 laptops/tablet crossovers. Instead they should build $100 or $200 tablets.
4) I agree that Google shouldn't have allowed so much leeway with the customization on the overall UI, however, I don't think its a huge problem. For one, Nexus phones are starting to be on every carrier now and two, the various manufacturers are similar enough that its not hard to learn the differences. I've used Samsung, HTC, and Motorola and I think you're over exagerating the hardship by a lot.
Apple will continue to have higher 'loyalty' rankings just as they do in every other market they are in. Its a cult. lol, jk.
Fact is its just a different option with various plusses and minuses. I like the far larger choices and lower prices considering everything else is about the same give or take a thing here or there.
