| Soleron said: Honest question: why did Android succeed? It's just another shell on top of a Unix core. I know it's as solid as iOS now but that wasn't true when it started. |
It gave the carriers and the OEMs what they needed: Software development expertise. Dismissing Android as "just another shell" is rather underselling the difficulty of developing a good set of dev tools, APIs, default programs and user interface, not to mention all the back end services and infrastructure that a good smartphone relies on.
Carriers have next to no expertise in making good software, and OEMs have only a little (see their constant bungling of software updates and their clunky custom UIs). Android gave carriers and OEMs those tools at very little cost in terms of licensing fees or control over the relationship with the end user. When the iPhone was exclusive to some carriers (and came with that crucial loss of control) and there was no way that Blackberry OS or Symbian was going to compete, Android was simply a deal they couldn't refuse.
"The worst part about these reviews is they are [subjective]--and their scores often depend on how drunk you got the media at a Street Fighter event." — Mona Hamilton, Capcom Senior VP of Marketing
*Image indefinitely borrowed from BrainBoxLtd without his consent.
