Comments on: Cringely on WinMo: She is dying

By: Jason

Jason — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 06:58:56 +0000

“I still have no idea where to go to get apps for the G1. They should have included access to a mobile site for this on the phone … like the apple did.”

The Market link in the main app folder? Maybe you should return your G1 so someone who wants more than a pretty chassis can buy it.

The point of the article is that Android is poised to succeed because it is spearheading the push for feature phones to get a real unified operating system with previously smartphone-exclusive features. Apple will not own that space because mass-market is not what they do.

Everyone who is judging Android on the G1 should wait a year or two for some other manufacturers to jump on (and they definitely will). Android is not tied to HTC and neither is it tied to Google.

By: Access presenta ALP mini, Palm y Microsoft siguen en su mundo • La PDA de tungsteno

Mon, 27 Oct 2008 15:06:03 +0000

[...] vayamos más allá para ver como Access sí tiene visión de futuro. Podemos leer en este otro artículo de CrunchGear una verdad interesante: el mercado de los móviles tiene una distribución típica 85-10-5, es [...]

By: Engago Team

Engago Team — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 14:00:18 +0000

Mobile phones are complex devices:
They bring together hardware and software and require retail distribution plus application distribution.

In the PC world there was IBM-PC/MSDos, Apple Mac and CP/M.
Now there are way too many operating environments.

On the hardware side Samsung is the leader: they produce form the chips and deliver finished phones to shops. Thus they control 100% their channel.

On the application side Apple has probably the lead: Appstore and iTunes.

Nokia has a bit of everything: making the phones using third party chips and Symbian, but missing out on the applications.
But they are leading in the number of phones sold. twice as much as Samsung.

Google has now to learn how to sell hardware into retail stores, something quite different from selling a web service to businesses (AdSense). Microsoft learned about the difference between software in retail and hardware in retail the hard way: XBox360 A company with experience in retail.

The mobile phone market will be decided by the decisions of Nokia and Samsung.
In the eighties JVC proved that the best (engineered) product is not the winner in retail sales.

By: jeff

jeff — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 08:58:34 +0000

Windows mobile mostly targets corporate users where the competition is between RIMM and Microsoft. One reason Microsoft is in the lead is the whole corporate e-mail, security policies etc. abilities that are far more advanced than its competitors. iphone et al are competing in the upper-class portion of the what is referred to in this article as 10 dollar phone market so the comparison doesn’t really have a good basis.

By: Arthur Klepchukov

Arthur Klepchukov — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 22:04:28 +0000

I think this is a great point and why I vote for iPhone, RIM, and Palm (but not so much Palm) to succeed / keep growing. There is something to be said for being able to develop for a very consistent platform. And as noble of a vision as Android is, a developer can’t get any guarantees about who will be using your app on what phone. One can’t make assumptions about things like 3G, GPS, a keyboard, touchscreen, etc. if the goal of your OS is to run on as many phones as possible.

By: Google Phone Forum

Google Phone Forum — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 20:23:28 +0000

Give android 2 years and I think it will be on top. Look how many manufacturers are jumping on board. Microsoft its only a matter of time!

By: victor lund

victor lund — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 13:53:30 +0000

my G1 says Google on the back. So I would say they are in the hardware market eventhough HCI is the manufacturer

By: victor lund

victor lund — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 13:51:32 +0000

You must be kidding me.

Have you tried the G1? Nothing about the device is superior to the iPhone, with one exception –

I was able to order the device online, get it the next day, turn it on, enter my gmail un and pw, and the phone was completely set up. All of my contacts and calendars were in place, and I did not need to connect it to my mac.

But it is all downhill from there. The device is bulky and heavy. My 5 year old loves the iphone, but only likes the flipping motion of the G1 (she hates by Blackberry 8310 except for the camera with flash).

I still have no idea where to go to get apps for the G1. They should have included access to a mobile site for this on the phone … like the apple did.

The camera is very slow compared to the iphone and BB

The browser is fast (give credit where credit is due).

Not that Android is a bad device, it is just lacking in terms of what the iPhone provides. I do think that they will quickly pass Blackberry if they do not get the Bold to market quickly and support it with a killer app store.

Windows and Symbian are not even players in the North American market anymore. Palm is dead.

By: touch?

touch? — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 06:18:18 +0000

Windows mobile already has stylus support, if buttons of the screen are made bigger it will work for finger touch. Next version should have that otherwise it will die the death, there is no future for all keyboard high end phones.

By: venkat

venkat — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 05:25:25 +0000

It will take time to Android come top on the Windows Mobile

By: Cringely on WinMo: She is dying | official tech blog

Cringely on WinMo: She is dying | official tech blog — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 01:03:59 +0000

[...] Via [crunchgear] [...]

By: Michael

Michael — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 23:42:15 +0000

Cringley leaves out something. The iPhone, RIM and Palm model (hardware and software) is very different from WinMo, Android, and Symbian (software only).

While we have three entrants in each category, I believe that we’ll see a battle over which model prevails BEFORE we see whether WinMo survives.

If the hardware and software model wins, we could easily see MSoft buy one of the ODMs and then the battle will be joined.

By: Mike

Mike — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 23:39:17 +0000

yes WiMo has the lead right now but microsoft messed up their lead with MSN and went along way towards killing windows with vista
google, in case you havent noticed, has been growing like mad and is poised to take over the world :)
no one has any confidence in microsoft anymore

By: links for 2008-10-24 « 個人的な雑記

links for 2008-10-24 « 個人的な雑記 — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 22:00:53 +0000

[...] CrunchGear » Archive » Cringely on WinMo: She is dying (tags: Windows mobile) [...]

By: amolpatil2k

amolpatil2k — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 20:59:25 +0000

Think of inertia. As a player becomes bigger, it becomes harder to beat it and so on. But if this carries on, people hate it. So when MS became too big, there was a lot of action in Linux.

Think of dichotomy. Businesses pay top dollar for what they need. Ordinary people hang around deal sites and forums, hoping against hope that they don’t miss a deal or worse, a trend.

Think of roadmaps. How the roadmaps of Palm, WinMo, Symbian, iPhone, BlackBerry, Android affect each other. Which roadmap peaks at what time and why and for which users.

iPhone is locked down but idiot proof. Jobs doesn’t trust us with even the battery change. Also iPhone has an American focus. Also iPhone is a concept establisher. Because Apple has the highest brand awareness and hype, it is in charge of establishing the concept of a smartphone.

Similarly, Symbian has a European focus. Just like Apple would never get aggressive in Europe, Nokia would never get aggressive in US.

I am not saying that all that I have said is the truth or that I am an expert. I am only trying to point out the sort of symbiotic thinking needed to understand such markets.

By: bgold

bgold — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 20:24:38 +0000

Google model here is simple: trying to being in a good place if MS will play hard game. In addition, Google want to be anywhere you can search, and not give any competitor the edge to win anywhere. (Think that MS will be the default search engine – Google will not let it happens). Schmidt is so afraid of MS that he will do anything, really anything to offend MS. His philosophy is: OSF is out (offend Sun Forever), OMSF(Offend MS Forever) is in.

By: Joe

Joe — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 18:17:56 +0000

One thing that I still don’t understand is how the open source Android works with Google’s business model.
Sure, right now there’s a whole lot of service lock-in on the phone. But what stops another headset manufacturer from taking the open source project and wiring up another service?
Has Google just spent a lot of investment to level a playing field that was already tilted in their favor?

By: Mohamed

Mohamed — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 18:13:21 +0000

Android is the only player in the market that plays with similar rules of WinMo, both are not locked for a certain manufacture or carrier, both are very and highly customizable, and both have pretty good potential to evolve, WinMo on the other hand is getting great momentum from manufacturers like HTC, with the new HTC touch lineup of mobile devices with great features and value for money, it is very unlikely to predict a death of an OS that has this much consumer based and investment.

I think such prediction is lame

By: Mohamed

Mohamed — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 18:13:21 +0000

I think such prediction is lame

By: Dave Sturgis

Dave Sturgis — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 18:03:41 +0000

LOL. Have you seen their Q3 earnings?! Go read that… LOL.