Posts by Olivier 2 10 publicly visible posts • joined 30 Jun 2009
It's not about who is right or wrong, patent litigation is one of the weapon in the arsenal of tech firms to make competitor's life harder. But in the long run this one will be as successful as whatever has been attempted in the past against Microsoft....
I don't see that Google tried hard to sell this phone "en masse". No advertising, no marketing campaign, and remember, the prelaunch hype only reaches the gadget geeks like us. Looks more like an experiment, some way for google to get hard feedback from the hardware front line, and also, without canibalising partner's handset sales.
When Google wants to push something, they do mass advertising (chrome campaign) like everybody else.
Noone around me knows that there is a nice phone OS called Android. 75% of surveyed british people know roughly what the iPad does.
The Magic doesn't have any custom addition and is a Google branded phone. Vodafone say they have no control over the upgrade process and that it is driven by Google. Apple upgrade all the models they can because it helps the sale of new handsets. And customers have expectations. That's also business.
I don't understand why there is so little communication around these upgrades. I don't even need to know the date but why doesn't google/htc say which phone will or will not be upgraded ?
I am delighted with 1.6 on my Magic but as a google phone, I expect I will get more than just the 1.6 update.
I want to get a nexus but I am waiting to see how google and phone manufacturers will treat their customers.
Might have to go iPhone after all if that's the best they can come up with.
I agree, but the android market is definitely lagging in big name apps.
timeout just launched an iphone app there is a full page advert in the magazine about it. You don't get that on Android so much. Facebook took ages to take notice and the app is lacklustre on Android. Luckily, Spotify and other goodies are becoming more and more available but that will depend a lot on the awareness that google will manage to developp for the platform ...
The buzz they generated was only directed towards the phone and gadget 'enthusiast' public and can't compare to a traditional media launch.
Not surprisingly, I've noticed that there is very little awareness of android around me, the only smartphones everybody knows are iPhones and Blackberries (the with keyboard variety). Certainly not a lot of people even know google launched a phone. We'll see if they do anything differently in the UK.
The more I use my android phone (I am sure it'd be the same with an iPhone), the more I think the PC/MacOS workflow could be seriously improved. HP has done some work around that with their touch screen all-in-ones but it's just an overlay on standard Windows and it's an example of what the PC industry has done for decades : a bit of window dressing here and there, but typically, same old stuff.
The Apple tablet should be a much deeper effort and has now the clout to foster the birth of a new ecosystem, a la iPhone. Wait and see.
Still amazes me that noone implemented that before, apart from some Linux distros (although most never understood the point of hiding libraries and dependencies by default). Thank Jobs for valuing innovation so much.
Even more amazed that Nokia did such a poor implementation, fortunately if you don't like the iphone, Android's got a very nice one
I would have gone for an iphone 3GS but for the same reason as tomjol (too pricey for the minutes and texts and phone you get) I didn't.
I went for the HTC Magic. Certainly it's got failings but email and internet are great on this. I hardly use gmail or thunderbird on my PC anymore. And pretty much every app I've tried work great and the integration is really good, if not perfect. It shines for the same reason that the iPhone shines, if maybe a little less brightly : outstanding usability. My Nokia E71 did more out of the box but despite being a great phone, was a pain to use by comparison. Also the Magic benefits from the same promise of ongoing OS updates as the iPhone but without ever having to connect it to a PC.
Sadly it doesn't look as good as the iphone but much to my liking, doesn't attract much attention.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
