What is Digg?165 Comments
- metaphysical, on 07/20/2008, -10/+200its
- colonelxc, on 07/20/2008, -6/+68"... the applications being developed for Android were probably all created by people looking to make some quick cash from the contest — which may have impacted the quality of submissions."
Oh... so in order to win contests you have to do a mediocre job?
Many people like the iPhone and that's great, but it is not the right phone for me. Even if it doesn't release with all the wizbang features the iPhone has, It'll be good for competition, and it'll be good for cell phone innovation. So STFU. - wolferz, on 07/20/2008, -5/+65It has always been a profit driven company... they have just done a better job of making people think they aren't
- johnpaul191, on 07/20/2008, -1/+34i think they were just less invasive about how they did it. when companies were abusing pop-ups and pop-unders, google put their search ads in a little sidebar. most importantly, the ads worked. companies seemed to get the desired results, google made money, and users were generally not offended.
- cashmonkey, on 07/20/2008, -24/+56I still trust Google much more then the average company but I fear they will end up just a typical profit driven company in the end.
- AttackingHobo, on 07/20/2008, -1/+32It has not launched yet. After the launch if this is still they same, then you can complain.
- inactive, on 07/20/2008, -4/+33Give it more time, its not over yet
- Lancelot9201, on 07/20/2008, -2/+27Just goes to prove how tough it is to design, build & market in today's cellular market.
I just hope they get their second wind & get this phone finished & working well.
I'm so tired of overpriced phones & cellular plans.. - CollinCusce, on 07/20/2008, -0/+18It's is a contraction meaning "it is"
Its is the possessive form of it.
Things are that way to prevent confusion between the two meanings.
It's losing its steam while it's still finding its way along. - 32bytes, on 07/20/2008, -0/+17My, Your, His, Her, Its, ours, theirs.
!=
I am - You are - He is - She is - It is - We are - They are
==
I'm - You're - He's - She's - It's We're They're.
I'm not a native speker but this is basic english for god sake.
If in doubt answer this question:
Where's the verb ? - stefpet, on 07/20/2008, -1/+17Just substituting two words you'll get another sentence that ain't so far from the truth...
"... the applications being developed for App Store were probably all created by people looking to make some quick cash from the launch — which may have impacted the quality of submissions." - inactive, on 07/20/2008, -10/+21I knew this was going to happen the moment that Google announced the whole consortium of companies that it was working with. And the whole ad scheme just didn't make any sense. Ads on your phone? Who the hell wants that? It all sounded like such a stupid idea. But of course everyone was enamored about the platform being "open," whatever that means.
Google has never truly been an open source company, despite their use of Linux and edict to "do no evil." They guard their search algorithms and ad relevance technology, as well as the source code to Google Earth and Maps, Gmail, etc, tetc, just as closely as Microsoft or Apple. - johnpaul191, on 07/20/2008, -0/+11Wait till Android launches. It's way too soon to tell. The best thing for the consumers is for Android and the iPhone to be successful (and Palm!). They may be a viable alternative smartphones, and choices fuel competition and that's great for all of us. I'm not really counting Blackberry because they seem to focus on enterprise. That's a situation where one person makes a decision to buy a thousand units, and the cool things about iPhone/Android do not equal selling points in that world.
- inactive, on 07/20/2008, -2/+12I disagree with you there. There's an iPhone developer named Mark Terry who wrote an app called "Band" in his spare time. He's already a millionaire and the iPhone has only been out 10 days at the time of my writing this.
If it comes to making money with the iPhone OS and NOT making money with Android, many developers will fall on the side of "making money," no matter how much they claim to love and support open source. So Google better get their act together before it's too late. - BushIs12thCylon, on 07/20/2008, -0/+10The iPhone store is suffering from the same problem. Software released with multiple spaces in front of the name, cheesy quick-hack rip-off software, dozens of releases by single developers who build one small function into each app, reviews by users who think that anything over $1 is a rip-off, reviews by users who didn't even buy the product, etc.
It takes time for quality software to rise to the top. Google's problem is their method of artificially boosting good software chose a small slice of mediocre stuff that was 'good as is' rather than undeveloped software showing real potential. They should have just left the SDK open. - cougar618, on 07/20/2008, -1/+11replace "it's" with "it is"
- joel8x, on 07/20/2008, -0/+9The only way Android can become king is if it offers an easier way than iTunes for the average person (and by person I mean someone who does not read digg, reddit, slashdot, etc) to sync it to their computer.
- gquaglia, on 07/20/2008, -0/+9It would be ashame if this dies. With the exception of WM [sucks] and Symbian [sorry, not big in the US] there aren't any multi platform mobile OSs out there. The 2 best right now BB and iphone are locked to their devices and in the case of the iphone locked to a single carrier.
- hamishmacdonald, on 07/20/2008, -1/+10In this case, the word IS "it's", unlike in the headline.
This is the most misused word on the Internet. Oh, Internet, I wish I could quit you. - BushIs12thCylon, on 07/20/2008, -1/+9Android is neither a phone nor a cellular plan. It's an open-source mobile OS that won't change either phone pricing or cellular plan pricing.
- Myonosken, on 07/20/2008, -4/+12The Zune hasn't caught on because Microsoft were dumb enough to not release it outside of North America.
- Myonosken, on 07/20/2008, -0/+7Since when has it been a requisite for a good company to be open source?
- bbliss17, on 07/20/2008, -4/+11give it time
- repjackson, on 07/20/2008, -1/+8open means a lot, and hopefully it means we can finally have a standard cell phone software platform that anyone can develop and edit.
i dont know about the ads, but if they are somehow as unobtrusive as the web ads they might pass and cheapen the device immensly.
because everyone isnt open, no one can be entirely open. google is a hybrid company- knocking them is like knocking the prius for not being completely electronic. they are the best out there. - thcobbs, on 07/20/2008, -0/+7"Trusting" any company is a foolish idea.
- Theli, on 07/20/2008, -5/+12I doubt people will leave Android for the iPhone OS (a far more locked down platform) or Windows Mobile, over "SDK build 84853" and Gtalk. That's not to say that these decisions don't warrant an explanation from Google, but I don't think they will bring about the apocalypse many are hoping for.
I'd personally wait a couple of years before passing my judgment on which platform will come out on top. - oriondr, on 07/20/2008, -0/+6That's *****.
If you dont like GTalk you can use pure sockets. - rishid, on 07/20/2008, -5/+11Android will be a huge win for the consumers I believe. I cannot understand how people still comply with the POS phone software Verizon uses on all their phones.
Development phones should be broken down just like the PC Industry.
-Cell Phone Manufacturers - focus on building good hardware
-Microsoft / Google / Open Source - make the O/S
-AT&T / Verizon / etc.. - provide their overpriced service
And then you have Apple building their own hardware and O/S. (Which is why I think the same thing will happen with Mac OS will happen again once WinMobile / Android to them just like when Windows came out on PCs) - tomz17, on 07/20/2008, -1/+7I actually kinda like WM... It has a ton of great apps that are either free or cheap, and the platform is almost completely open for many phones! It works well right out of the box, but it's also much less "fisher price" than the iphone so it's perfect for anyone more technically inclined than a banana slug.
#1 : It's popular, so there are a ton of great apps (and all of the most popular ones get ported). For instance, google maps with cell tower triangulation is now available natively... and you can bet than anything that is even modestly successful on another platform will be promptly ported to WM.
#2 : It does everything that the Jesus phone does and more. Some things it does better, others it does worse... but if you look back in history, WM devices probably did it earlier!
#3 : The SDK is free, well understood, and well documented, so you can write your own apps. Even if you don't want to do that, you can go dig around in the registry and tweak the system thousands of ways (which is WAY more useful than I would have ever imagined).
#4 : If you pick the right device, there may be a big enthusiast community surrounding it. For instance, the popular HTC devices have been pretty much completely figured out. There are several groups now cooking their own custom WM6 ROMS and even radio firmware for these devices!
#5 : It's not locked to a single carrier. EVERYONE sells WM6 devices. Most even sell unlocked devices. --and-- even the ones that are traditionally locked (cdma carriers like verizon/sprint), can often be reflashed with a cdma competitors firmware (and ESN changed to allow activation, shhh). - BossKey, on 07/20/2008, -0/+6Yeah, it's a tough industry. Just in the last two days I've seen damning reviews of both OpenMoko and now Android. Leaving the iPhone still on top, but, this morning I was reading...on Apple fan sites...about how infuriatingly buggy iPhone 2.0 software is. I hope these are all merely signs that the mobile industry still hasn't quite matured, and that 5 years from now we'll have at least three strong competitors with mature, stable, usable OSs.
The OpenMoko grilling I saw:
http://www.vimeo.com/1366042?pg=embed&sec=1366042 - peaceninja, on 07/20/2008, -0/+6coming from someone who had applied to the android challenge, the android sdk is very inconsistent and not well documented. it was like google rushed it out in some mad panic to compete with the iphone. I am now waiting for my open moko freerunner to come in the mail since as a hobbyist developer i have lost faith in the android platform and want to see what opportunities there are for open moko sans android.
- philhatesyou, on 07/20/2008, -1/+6Everyone I know with a WM phone agrees with gquaglia: they crash and crash a lot.
- wolferz, on 07/20/2008, -1/+6your analogy is a failure. The prius is hybrid because of technical limitations, not political and economic reasons. An all electric car... while possible, is infeasible because it would significantly reduce the max range of the vehicle. Hybrids are more efficient than pure electrics... because gasoline stores and releases its energy more efficiently than batteries.
Google on the other hand could be completely open... but they would suffer the same problems that the Soviet Union and China (until they accepted capitalism) did... slow steady decline and eventual collapse. And before Mozilla is brought into this I just want to point out that Mozilla get's by on donations, donated code, and a low overhead business model... and don't charge a dime because they aren't trying to make money.
BTW, I would like to point out how I keep finding communism to be an excellent analogy to open source. Both are overly idealistic. Both can only really function in a world that completely open source/communist. Both rely on dictatorial measures to enforce their core principles (GPLv3/insistence on open source drivers) and in doing so alienate their constituents (open source devs, embeded device manufacturers, computer hardware manufacturers/communist citizens, allies). Don't get me wrong, communism is a great idea... on paper. - bubba9999, on 07/20/2008, -2/+7Google made a huge stumble with the SDK thing, but it still has time to correct the course. Lets hope that they choose to do so.
- Anonymous3, on 07/20/2008, -0/+5"Google's Android Losing It. Is Mojo Fast?"
- Aitese, on 07/20/2008, -0/+5Because "Google's Android Losing It Is Mojo Fast" doesn't make any sense.
- Paulish, on 07/20/2008, -0/+5What are they driven by now? Fluffy teddy bears and a warm feeling inside when they release a new product?
- Ratatosk, on 07/20/2008, -1/+6"no distribution system and no way of selling applications"
uhm, where would you like to have your distrubution system if the thing is not even out yet? Do you think google won't make some kind of "app store"?
Andy Rubin said that they wouldn't be doing their job if they hadn't thought about it.... just cause google and their partners have not announced the distrubution model yet doesn't mean that there isn't gonna be one - loconet, on 07/20/2008, -2/+7ehh This article seems to be lacking a lot of substance. First he makes the assumption that people who entered in the Android contest just wanted to make a quick buck. I have seen the entries and also seen the applications in Apple's app store and I'm not sure where he is getting the idea that, compared with the Apple's app store, the Android entries are just "average". There are some very cool innovative entries in the Android contest. Way better than just "average". This guy then seems run out of material to add to his criticism and randomly throws in a portion about the latest Android hiccup on the "hidden" SDK. Seems like just about anyone can write random crap on znet blogs.
Fanboy & Troll IMO. I hope Steve is paying him per word written. - inactive, on 07/20/2008, -0/+5It's correct in the headline of the article itself.
The submitter actually went out of his way to introduce the error. Jesus Christ. - wolferz, on 07/20/2008, -2/+7Since being closed source became evil. And yes it's just that arbitrary and retarded.
- MacParrot, on 07/20/2008, -0/+4Android potentially has the same problem that Linux has. As an open source OS, there will be no definitive version of it. Every cell company using it (especially in the US) will most likely put their mark on it. Enable or disable features to suit their offerings. Once that starts happening, you won't be able to have just one app store that will be guaranteed to work with every model.
If Google really is going to be serious about Android, they're going to have to put the foot down initially and come up with a standard code set that cannot be screwed with by any cell provider or it just won't work - Aitese, on 07/20/2008, -1/+5This article chooses to hold Google up to a standard it conveniently fails to hold Apple up to. Will the platform fail on it's openness? Yes that was one of the main selling points, but to what extent does it have to be "open" to remain open at all? Gtalk is itself built on Jabber, an open platform. The OS will not be restricted to any hardware or service provider. The apps have full access to all the hardware and can run concurrently with only restriction on the memory available.
The fuss over the SDK is also a fuss over nothing as they were sending out a test build that was probably buggy to the strongest coders...everyone would have access to it eventually. It seems that sort of control over software/hardware is only commended when Apple does it. - SuicideMouse, on 07/20/2008, -1/+5Personally, I got a wave of "Hey, maybe I should be a little wary of these guys" when the Google desktop search came out. A company that knows almost everything you search for on the internet now wants to catalog the contents of my HDs? I don't think so. It may be paranoid but unless I'm looking at the code and can see it isn't calling back home, I'm not letting it scan my HDs.
People always say "Oh but I have nothing to hide", really? I know I do, my personal family photos, my work files, my writing, my taste in porn, etc...
Not to mention the fact that I'd like to remain as anonymous as possible whenever I can.
I'm sure the product works quite nicely, I've never used it, but I have open-source stuff that does the same (or similar) things. I trust the code. - minorthreat, on 07/20/2008, -0/+4"Apple's genius is that their hardware and software work together to create a good user experience."
I hardly call that genius, more like a standard that all computer based systems strive to meet. - Ratatosk, on 07/20/2008, -0/+3Alright, in about 10 days the 2nd round of the first contest will be over... They might release this version of the SDK that they gave to the 50 teams to the public then...
And you wouldn't want a new SDK every other week either, or else you had to adjust your stuff far too many times. So let's hope for the 5th of august.
For the rest of it: give it time... it's still on track, and I am glad there is gonna be a competitive platform... a single phone like the iphone is cool and everything, but not everyone wants exactly THIS phone - BushIs12thCylon, on 07/20/2008, -1/+4Yup. The iPhone is not only publically available, it has a profit oriented software distribution model and an already huge userbase.
Android has no users, no distribution system and no way of selling applications. If you're into mobile development and you're only on Android then you're probably not a serious developer. - DjArcadian, on 07/20/2008, -1/+4The voting system is part of Google Labs I believe or is at least in limited release. I played with it once but didn't like it so I removed it. You're either part of a testing group or somehow activated it through Google Labs.
- inactive, on 07/20/2008, -2/+5But I thought Android was open source?
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