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Google (GOOG) has thousands of brilliant engineers, but do they understand consumers? Gizmodo's...
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Saturday, June 30, 2012, 4:09 PM ETGoogle (GOOG) has thousands of brilliant engineers, but do they understand consumers? Gizmodo's Sam Biddle has his doubts after going over Google I/O's product announcements. The sharing features of the Nexus Q streamer, panned in reviews, don't "sound like any fun unless you're an Android engineer." Google+'s new "party mode" feature "is as painfully dorky as it sounds." And the adoption of Project Glass requires "not just a leap in technology, but in culture." (also)
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This news story has 23 comments:
Goodbye, Google. You'll eventually be replaced.
But the Nexus tablet will sell like hot cookies.
Google does search and some kinds of software engineering well; and they do some geeky cool things, looking at your house on the internet. But beauty? customer service?
Microsoft was just plain lucky, it has never been world class good at anything. OK, I understand they have a game box that is good. OK, maybe world class good at destroying others' products that competed with their products. It is a company that was in the right place at the right time and has almost completely shot itself in the foot at every other opportunity. If there was a viable alternative to Office, Microsoft would be bankrupt or it would shrink to nothing particularly important in the grand scheme; they have developed a good game box..
No focus or clear path. It has so many failed initiatives and more to come.
This is an exact repeat of history from the 80s when Apple had the innovative hardware and slick SW, but eventually couldn't keep up with a standardized operating system and open platform. In the fight between one company (Apple) vs. the world (open platform), long term Apple has no chance of remaining competitive. Apple has already started falling behind in features. It doesn't matter *yet* because they still have tons of loyal fans, and their products are still pretty slick, but eventually that halo will start wearing off.
Even the lawsuits that Apple is filing (look and feel type) are eerily reminiscent of the ones they tried to use to stop Windows 30 years ago. That effort, as everyone is well aware, failed.
Five years from now Google will be a far more relevant company than Apple.
If this were true, how come Motorola doesn't exist today? Remember their early Android products: Droids and Xooms? Where are they now?
We are pitting the innovative capacity of one company against the innovative capacity of the entire planet. In the long run my money would be on the entire planet.
But Google just dumped them...which should be expected anyhow...after all, Google is headed by a Silicon Valley Judas who used his privileged position as a board member of Apple to steal the iPhone trade secret. Why should HTC, Samsung, LG, etc. continue to "partner" with the "Don't be Evil" Google of Dr. Strangelove?
Nevertheless, I personally think that you are mistaken about Apple doing the wrong thing because Apple learns its lesson in the 1990's and it is creating the ecosystem to protect their profit. Still technology moves so fast that it is almost pointless to talk about a long term.
Google is a long term buy, and I think current prices are a good entry point.
The best way to be long "the planet" is to buy the semiconductor companies, particularly Qualcomm, Broadcom, and somewhat more speculatively Nvidia (just as one of the best ways to have benefited from the PC innovation cycle was to buy Intel). All semis should benefit from a cyclical upswing in chips, which should provide another nice tailwind for these companies.
I bought a used HTC-- and it doesn't sync with my Mac. Then I bought a Samsung Series 5 and it didn't automatically sync.
and then, Cn govt blocks certain Google products (play, drive ...)
In 3 years, my computer and phone will all be Apple.
No shares though.
http://1.usa.gov/LMPwtu
I just know that the refurbished HTC Evo 3D, doesn't work (partly my naivete, partly cn govt Google blocking, partly HTC).
Until Android/Chrome products become less Msft-like (looking for apps to properly use), the iOS or Apple Universe has nothing to worry about.
Caveat Emptor
Let's go through this one by one, if I may:
To my knowledge, Google does not have any business relationship with any of the mobile operators in the world. And neither does Microsoft. Now, HTC, Samsung, LG and the other hundred-or-so OEMs may or may not have any business relationship with the mobile operators but none of the OEMs have their own mobile platforms, relying instead on either Google (Android) or Microsoft (Windows Mobile), both of whom are now actively competing against their OEMs. Samsung does have its own homegrown BadaOS but whether Samsung eventually drops Android (or Windows Mobile) in favor of BadaOS remains to be seen.
I can say one thing with absolute certainty: there won't be 5 different mobile OSs when the dust settles. The buying public will not be able to wrap their heads around that. There will be only 2: a dominant OS and an also ran.
Right now Apple, Google, and Microsoft are locked in a death struggle to determine what that dominant OS is. My money is on Android winning. Android has huge momentum right now.
Their only problem is that they release too many versions that results in fragmentation. They have to figure out a way to standardize their products better. That's their main selling point, that Android looks and feels the same across all devices and platforms. They are not their yet, but I think they will get there. And when they do, Google will be to mobile devices what Microsoft is to the PC. I don't think people realize what a huge potential revenue stream this could be for Google.
Individual OS will eventually become irrelevant because of services such as Google Docs and Dropbox, and the fact that the major apps are not platform restricted.
Apple still holds the lead in hardware and design and will continue to hold share for that alone.
The most important underestimated development is that Windows on ARM will make phone factor and USB drive-sized form factor fully mobile desktop environments viable.
Also: consider ChromeOS, and Mozilla's Firefox phone OS when you contemplate the OS galaxy.
One is that Apple holds a lead in hardware. Current Android phones have much better hardware specs, and have had better specs for about a year now (LTE, bigger screen, higher res cameras, faster processors, more powerful graphics).
Where Apple holds a lead is in software, and the software ecosystem built around IOS. If you define the OS as broadly the operating system, core applications, and the look and feel of the device, everything I know about consumer behavior suggests that the buying public will not be able to get behind more than 2 operating systems at the most.
Everything moving to the cloud doesn't really make a difference because what users will see and interact with is still either iOS or Android.
Here is what I am stating, broadly restated:
The end user experience is normalizing across OS, in part as a result of 'moving to the cloud' and in part because 'apps' from major devs are being made for multiple platforms, i.e. differentiation in the end user experience is decreasing.
The point of technology is to make life easier and more efficient, if all the available OS can provide same - which let's face it they couldn't say 2 years ago, but that's changing - then other factors come into play for driving consumption.
This is also why I strongly disagree with your assertion that the world can only accommodate 2 OS; if the OS becomes irrelevant, there is no reason the world couldn't support dozens.
But Web usage is moving from the PC to Mobile. Using a Web browser on a mobile device is not as easy as using native apps. For some apps, going native is the only way to go, eg., Instagram. Being dependent on cloud services doesn't remove the need for a native app on a mobile device, it simply reinforces the ongoing transition from Browser-Web to App-Cloud.