Linked List: December 27, 2011

Tuesday, 27 December 2011

People Who Didn’t Get What They Wanted for Christmas ★

This is what I mean about consumer demand and brand awareness.

Why Android Updates Are a Mess: It’s the Business Model ★

Ed Bott:

The Android community is traveling along a path that the old Windows Mobile platform followed a few years ago. It was a disaster then, and Microsoft wisely abandoned that entire business model when it developed Windows Phone 7. Alas, Google doesn’t have that option, which means that Android users are going to continue to face a mess when it comes to updates.

The Windows Phone Problem in Three Words: Way Too Late. ★

MG Siegler:

Two to three years in the hole, the only way Windows Phone can win the market now is to make a product that is leaps and bounds better than what’s out there. They need something that’s an iPhone-in-2007 type product. The product they have, while good, isn’t that.

It’s not enough to be better. (And we can argue as to whether iOS or Android or Windows Phone is better.) You need to present a product so good that people have to buy it. Windows Phone isn’t close to being that. I’m sorry, but it’s just not.

That’s the flip side of the problem for Microsoft. They don’t have strong carrier support because the carriers prefer Android, which gives them more control. And they don’t have consumer demand because they were too late. (And, as I’ve said before, I think the “Windows” brand hurts them here. Windows Phone 7 doesn’t sound like a new platform. It sounds like an old one. They should have called it Metro 1.0)

Why Hasn’t Windows Phone Taken Off? ★

Charlie Kindel:

The carriers choose what devices get featured on those TV ads. They also choose what devices to train their RSP (retail sales professionals) to push. They choose to incent the RSPs to push one device over another.

And the carriers prefer Android because Android gives them control. So when Joe Customer walks into his local phone store and asks the sales guy which phone he should buy, he’s very likely to be shown an Android handset, and unlikely to be shown a Windows handset. So far so good. But he’s wrong about Apple:

[…] Apple has been successful (at least in terms of generating revenue) in this space by cutting the device manufacturer out. They have then used that fact to force the carriers into being even more of a fat dumb pipe. A topic for another day, but my belief is over time this strategy will start to deteriorate for Apple.

It’s a decidedly Microsoftian perspective to say that Apple “cut the device manufacturer out”. That’s just looking at the market as regards OS platforms, and misses the whole point of what Apple does. Apple is the device manufacturer.

The carriers don’t like the iPhone much, either, for the same reason they seemingly don’t like Windows Phone: control. And Apple controls more than Microsoft does. The difference is that Apple was able to create consumer demand and massive brand awareness for the iPhone. People go into stores and say “I want an iPhone”.