Android vs iOS: The Battle to the Death! (Or Not)
Back in January, I wished the iPhone a happy 5th birthday — and warned that its days are numbered. The comments, as they are wont to do, turned into an iOS vs Android flamewar. Commenter James B wrote:
Look at Apple’s marketing materials: the main marketing drive of the 4S is Siri (software). The 4 can run Siri – jailbreakers have proven that – but Apple doesn’t allow it to…because they’d sell less 4S’s. Screen DPI is unchanged, screen dimensions are unchanged. Camera resolution is up, storage is up (both standard things to increase in a new product cycle). The 4S now has a dual-core chip…like every Android phone released in the last 3 months. It’s still running 3G when every carrier is advertising their 4G networks and phones, and will be for a year. The 4S was not revolutionary from a hardware perspective, it was evolutionary, and their main new feature was software.
Once you start to understand that this is a software business, you will easily see where Apple is making the mistakes that will cost them this market segment in the long run.
Well, we’re not to the “long run” just yet, but I did ask James to “C’mon back on the evening of [April] 24th, and we can talk all about dying platforms.” He didn’t come back, despite a fairly lengthy post here yesterday concerning Apple’s quarterly results.
For the the iPhone, however, the interesting bit isn’t that profits were up 88% over a year ago — although that does seem like pretty big news for a company that is “making mistakes” which will “cost them this market segment.”
No, the interesting thing is how Apple’s Android competitors are doing. Former smartphone darling HTC reports that profits are down 70%, “thanks largely to the launch of Apple’s iPhone 4S.” Samsung is the distant Number Two in smartphone profits, but even second place might not mean what it used to:
Verizon, meanwhile, said it sold 6.3 million smartphones, 3.2 million of which were iPhones, over the quarter. More than half the smartphones that Verizon sold were iPhones. Verizon, too, posted healthy mobile data revenue of $6.6 billion.
AT&T posted an even bigger iPhone blowout. 75% of its smartphone activations went to iPhone, and more than half of all its activations were iPhones, including cheap-ass feature phones given away for free. Sprint can be said to be surviving, only because of iPhone sales. But what about overseas, where consumers can be even more price-senstive than here? “Greater China saw iPhone sales 5 times the level of the year-ago quarter.”
Again, not bad for a dying platform.
On the Android side, Jay Yarrow writes that “It looks like the mobile story for 2012 is not going to be so good for Android. It appears as though the operating system is in choppy waters, and is suddenly facing a lot of trouble.” Yarrow makes a good case, and I highly recommend you read the whole thing.
Which brings us to this blurb from GigaOM:
For developers, consumers and even carriers, Android seems irreparably broken. But Google will not fix the platform anytime soon, because despite its fragmentation problems, the company is getting what it wants: massive amounts of user data.
Google still makes most of its money selling cheesy banner ads, and it shows.
Meanwhile, Windows Phone is getting its big push, thanks to Redmond’s deep pockets — and Google’s missteps:
Microsoft has in the past acknowledged that it pays mobile developers to help them create apps for its Windows Phone platform.
That practice is now even more alive and well as both Microsoft and Nokia struggle to make a dent in a competitive marketplace with Windows Phone and the new Lumia lineup, according to the New York Times.
Microsoft has eagerly contributed money to developers, anywhere from $60,000 to $600,000, to help build apps. That’s the type of cash the developers themselves could never raise on their own.
While I like the Metro UI, I remain wary of Windows Phone’s chances after the less-than-stunning debut of Nokia’s top-of-the-line models. “Good” isn’t good enough in this highly-competitive market. Maybe WP8 will be a breakout hit this fall, but it’s far from a sure thing.
The Apple haters seem sure that Android will somehow bury iOS. It’s hard to see how that happens, since iPhone is only half of the iOS hardware ecosystem. The other half is the iPad tablet — and Android has simply failed to compete in that field. Meanwhile, Apple enjoys a virtuous cycle, where iPhone buyers become iPad buyers (and vice versa), and developers enjoy selling to both in a un-fractured App Store.
Me, I think there’s room for at least two major mobile platforms in such a rich marketplace. There will always be Feature Geeks demanding an “open” OS, even if they have to jailbreak their phones to make it that way. There will also always be an even larger market of people who want a nice touchscreen phone they don’t have to pay a lot of money for. Android fits both bills nicely. Windows Phone might find a niche in the bottom end, too, if their OEMs don’t flub another launch. Or maybe Android’s problems will open a door for Redmond to walk through.
The competition, of course, is good for everybody.
But unless Android tablet makers can figure out how to compete, and unless Windows Phone 8 is a hit in phones and tablets, it’s difficult to imagine a scenario where anyone breaks Apple’s stranglehold on mobile profits. Sure, “in the long run,” every platform eventually fails — which includes Android, too. But so long as Apple is making the big money, iPhone will remain alive and healthy.
Lollin’ at this update. “iOS is better than Android because Apple has enourmous profit margins.”
An iPhone is a fashion accessory, not all that different from a wildly overpriced and inferiorly constructed handbag. It is a toy for teenagers and a bauble for women and homosexuals. “Look at how pretty my phone is!” the grown (supposed) man squeals.
If you want superior hardware and software, use Android. If you hang around places (like airport bathrooms or bathhouses) with people who care what brand your phone is, I guess Apple is probably the right choice for you.
Let the flame wars begin.
Hiram, I can not deny your clearly reasoned critique of Apple products. Your detailed point by point refutation of my reasons and assumptions for owning Apple computers/phones has opened my eyes to the egregious errors I have committed.
My only dilemma remains weather to go and buy a Galaxy Tab. Or, to head over to West Hollywood for some bar hopping.
Decisions, decisions…
“you want superior hardware and software, use Android”
Really? What’s the Android tablet with better specs than an iPad, at a lower price? I’ve looked, and I can’t find any. Clearly you know more than I do, so, please, point me to this device.
I want: Same or bigger screen size (not just pixel resolution, but screen size too), some sort of Flash / Compact Mem / SDHC crad reader, equal or better CPU.
Got one? Because I’m in the market for one, and can’t seem to find it anywhere, at any price.
I thought homophobic smears of Apple fans went out in the 90s.
My mistake. I really need to catch up with all the cool cats like Hiram.
I probably shouldn’t feed the troll, but seeing as how I am one too. You people always make me laugh. You fan boys. Why can’t people like what they want to like without you or someone else telling them what to think? I find my iPhone to be a wonderfully simple device, as well as awesomeness. I also happen to have an iPad and and Acer Iconia A500. Android has it’s strengths and weaknesses but at the same time so does iOS. I’m a live and let live person. I don’t understand why this culture war even exists. Lastly I’m a 24-year old straight man who is deeply committed to my girlfriend, so what’s with the gay bashing bro? While I don’t really care for the homosexual lifestyle, nor do I care about what other sexual preferences people have simply because I don’t give a crap and it’s none of my business anyway. So do us all a favor and chill out. You are free to have and voice your own opinions, but what you are not free to do is tell people what and how to think. That’s the government’s job.
I forgot where I read it, but a Google executie nonchalantly said that Google doesn’t need Android to be profitable. I guess that can be true, seeing as how Google is now the world’s largest advertising firm that has a really great search engine. I still prefer Android to the iPhone, but we’ll see what the future holds.
I’ve never bought into the idea that Android vs iOS was a replay of Windows vs Mac. The mobile marketplace is simply a different beast. The next platform to fall will be BlackBerry. Not because it’s bad, but because RIM failed to execute on the hardware side, and (eventually) couldn’t make up its mind on the software side. I suspect WP8 will carve out a niche for Microsoft to stay in the game, but the Windows 8 tablet strategy is a confused mess. iPad will continue to dominate for the foreseeable future.
And iPhone vs Android? For the most part, they pursue different users, both willing to pay monthly fees to their carriers. Both will, I think, be around for a very long time.
But — the fragmentation of the Android marketplace(s) and OEM implementation means that Android will never enjoy the big profits iOS is able to command.
Interesting that you got Android-vs.-iOS flame mail from the original post; the way I read it (admittedly from the perspective of an Apple fanboy) is, “what will Steve…er, Tim and the boys do to top THIS, even if it means completely reimagining one of their most successful products ever?”
John Sculley (yeah, I know) once opined that every major product category has room for two leading brands (Coke/Pepsi, Microsoft/Apple, Ford/Chevy, Toyota/Honda, etc.) – and IMHO, I see Windows Phone supplanting Android as the major market competitor to the iPhone. The Metro UI on WP7/Mango is *sweet*, even if fewer tiles fit on any given screen than iOS icons. And even though, if I had to choose only one tablet between my Asus EP-121 slate running the Win8 consumer preview and my iPad2, I’d still choose the iPad, I have to acknowledge that Win8 on a tablet – once the developer community gets to play with it awhile – is going to be a *serious* player in the tablet space. It’s very cool, even in beta. It seems, after all these years, Microsoft has finally discovered design – and how to be rather good at it.
Time will tell. Man, I love this industry….
That last line. Right there. Yeah, me too.
But I’m not a tech guy. I couldn’t program my way out of a GOTO loop. I’m a gadget guy from way, however — and I know (and love) a good gadget when I see one. I haven’t yet seen that from a Windows 8 tablet. In fact, MS’s whole “Windows Everywhere” strategy to me seems misbegotten. They’re a helluva software company, and they still could be, if Ballmer could step away from the Windows platform just long enough to see that it doesn’t fit everywhere.
Mr. Green. You have touched around the reason I am an iPhone/iPad user while still a windows computer user: my phone and to a lesser extent my tablet are appliances. I don’t want to play, i don’t want to tinker. I simply trust apple to play that role better for these items. When I do decide I want to have fun and tear in the guts of something, I will get an android and have a party.
Re: Windows Everywhere: “If I can….Blue Screen there, I can Blue Screen aaaanywhere…”
Agree – I prefer the Apple philosophy of “to each function its proper device,” with the Mac as digital hub. The iPad is much more a purpose-built device than a Win8 tablet, which really does attempt to be a replacement for a conventional PC. It’s actually not a bad PC…but it’s not a “gotta-have-one-this second” tablet right now, because it doesn’t have the rich population of tablet-optimized apps that the iPad does (and because it can’t quite make up its mind whether it wants to be a tablet or a PC). That said, I do find the Metro GUI on a tablet to be very appealing, and a good fit for a table form factor. It all rests with the developer community. We shall see. Beats the living crap out of Win7 on a tablet – but that’s (admittedly) a pretty low bar.
Have you played with the Samsung Series 7 slate with a Win8 build yet? *That’s* a good gadget – or, at least, it will be when more Metro-ized apps hit the street.
Very late to this party. A couple of notes on the MS strategy. I don’t think it’s as confused as it seems. Windows Phone and Windows 8 are simply must for MS to delay it’s IBM v2 trend line (i.e. a highly profitable software and services company catering to the enterprise that is mostly invisible in the consumer’s mindset). The tablet and smartphone world are now the preferred content and data consumption platforms, even in the corporate world. Content creation is still where Windows + Office will dominate for the foreseeable future. But, as a computing function, that is becoming less and less.
I actually think MS carving out the low end with Windows Phone is quite possible. What’s counterintuitive however, is that they will also probably own the high end tablet market (for those who want a PC in a table form).
That said, if they can fit 90% of a full fledged PC into Windows RT into a $500 tablet, then they might be able to come back. We’ll see.
Future operating systems will be self-modifying. That is, they will adapt to their users, like species to their environments. Needless to say, they will be AI-driven, and sooner that predicted will become a runaway intelligence that will complement and extend their “owner’s” intelligence, though soon enough it will seem that the software owns the human.
Skynet on my iPad.
Not sure why, but that leaves me feeling a little uncomfortable….
Android v. iOS tablets? I’ve tried both. I use my iPad 90+ % of the time because it “just works” within a rich infrastructure. The rest of the time, I use a Kindle Fire. It’s not as smooth, but the Amazon infrastructure provides decent support. Phones? Never bothered with an Android; I had a working iPhone when Android came out and saw no compelling reason to switch.
I hope that either Microsoft or Google do well in the mobile marketplace. The competition would be good for keeping Apple on its toes, and, who knows, they might come out with something worth owning some day.