Could the iPhone 4's Verizon release kill Android slowly?

[Krandor]

I never said ALL Android phones are cheap Asian knockoffs, so no need to put words in my mouth and then argue against something I never said. What I actually said is that Android is tempting to those knockoff manufacturers, so while there are indeed some high quality phones being developed, there are also hundreds of me-too varieties, and that's what is driving world market share. Sure, when you flood markets with hundreds of different phone models, and do lots of BOGO offers, you get market share.

The "me-too" phones are what could over time hurt Android's reputation. You will have people who say "I tried an android phone and didn't like X, Y, and Z". However, X, Y, and Z may be things in that carrier's skin and not issues with Android itself, but to the user they are one and the same. Crappy skins can make people blame Android not the people who made the crappy skin.

I think at some point Google is going to have to take more control over Android.

 

[sarcosis]

I agree with all of the people who say no to the death of Android by Verizon CDMA iPhone. I love my iPhone but i recognize that it's my choice. Android is a solid OS built by a solid company. While they have the support of Google, it's a good chance Android isn't going any where. A CDMA iPhone will slow adoption, but won't stop it. It gives us consumers more choice and competition and that is a good thing. Maybe this will help get carriers and manufactures to solve the fragmentation problem that's getting way out of hand.

 

[walie]

You should change the title so that it reflects the situation in the US. The iPhone is available on multiple carriers here in Canada and Android is still doing very well. Come to think about it, RIM is also doing well here

 

[NebulaClash]

The "me-too" phones are what could over time hurt Android's reputation. You will have people who say "I tried an android phone and didn't like X, Y, and Z". However, X, Y, and Z may be things in that carrier's skin and not issues with Android itself, but to the user they are one and the same. Crappy skins can make people blame Android not the people who made the crappy skin.

I think at some point Google is going to have to take more control over Android.

I agree with this. For all the really nice Android phones (and you Android types should thank Steve Jobs and company for creating the iPhone so that Google then responded by changing the look of Android to what you now enjoy), there are a lot of me-too phones.

The problem for Android is that Google does not care. They want to sell ads, and they get that from Android phones (iPhones too) regardless of quality. The ones who care a lot about Android are the cell phone manufacturers ("free OS!") and the service providers ("lock down!"). Google cares about ads, and when you have that mentality, you get the Android marketplace.

This is impossible for people in these forums to see because this is not their experience. They know what they are doing and can work around the limits of the manufacturer and the service providers. But when the majority of your market gets treated as just one more ad-served consumer, the quality of the experience is just not the same. Most people do not look at feature bullet lists, but they do know how their day-to-day experience is.

 

[Rooftop voter]

I'm sure you'll have people switching, but it isn't really going to change much at all.

I think people will be switching on both sides. I'm fairly certain my next phone will be an android powered one, and I know a bunch of people who have switched to android. I also know some people who switched from android to iPhone. Let's not forget, att will start getting more high end androids now, like the motorola atrix.

 

[Savor]

No.

And the release of the Motorola Xoom or Honeycomb won't help change that. iOS is structured in a way where it is closed, is done in one slab form factor, and manufactured only by Apple. Killing off Android would be like killing off a group of OEMs. iPhone is actually on more carriers around the world than Android, and it still didn't stop Android's growth.

And why would anyone try kill off competition to push innovation? Do you want Apple to have a monopoly? I don't. Not everybody thinks the same or wants the same form factor. Not everybody wants to be under Steve Job's spell. Apple would never have the same dominance with cell phones the same way it has for iPod or Microsoft has for Windows. The market is too big and multiple OSes can survive.

 

[boss.king]

It cracks me up whn people assume something like this in the US will have a worldwide effect. No one cares about CDMA iphones cos we have GSM networks. The Verizon iphobe is only a factor in America and wont affect android in other countries.

 

[NebulaClash]

Correct, Apple will never dominate the cell phone market the way they do the iPod market. No one will.

 

[Savor]

CES really brought out the BIG GUNS from the Android army this year.

For the last hour or so, I've been just thinking about getting an Atrix 4G for AT&T and I'm a happy iPhone 4 owner BTW. This could the first phone to truly surpass the iPhone 4 in many ways. So for every Android user converting to iPhone 4 in Verizon, you may have many iPhone users converting to Android with the Atrix at AT&T. The carrier has always been dominated with iPhone and it would be nice if AT&T can spice up their line-up and the Atrix 4G is a great way to start it off this year!

I currently switch off between my laptop and iPhone 4 when it comes to browsing. But my 5-year old VAIO needs to get replaced. I need the bigger screen for browsing, but it gets too hot and the fans is too loud. At first, I wondered if this webtop dock would be useful to me. But it is starting to look very useful to me by the minute. Workable enough, at least. A great travel companion. I can hold off on an internet tablet. Motorola have superior call quality than Apple and the positives still outweigh MotoBlur and a locked boot loader. Forget the Verizon iPhone 4 or iPhone 5. The Motorola Atrix 4G could be the biggest gamechanging phone since the original iPhone.

 

[DeathChill]

CES really brought out the BIG GUNS from the Android army this year.

For the last hour or so, I've been just thinking about getting an Atrix 4G for AT&T and I'm a happy iPhone 4 owner BTW. This could the first phone to truly surpass the iPhone 4 in many ways. So for every Android user converting to iPhone 4 in Verizon, you may have many iPhone users converting to Android with the Atrix at AT&T. The carrier has always been dominated with iPhone and it would be nice if AT&T can spice up their line-up and the Atrix 4G is a great way to start it off this year!

I currently switch off between my laptop and iPhone 4 when it comes to browsing. But my 5-year old VAIO needs to get replaced. I need the bigger screen for browsing, but it gets too hot and the fans is too loud. At first, I wondered if this webtop dock would be useful to me. But it is starting to look very useful to me by the minute. Workable enough, at least. A great travel companion. I can hold off on an internet tablet. Motorola have superior call quality than Apple and the positives still outweigh MotoBlur and a locked boot loader. Forget the Verizon iPhone 4 or iPhone 5. The Motorola Atrix 4G could be the biggest gamechanging phone since the original iPhone.

Really? I'm not sure I've seen you post in a thread besides Android ones where you generally seem to take shots at Apple. Weird.

Also, I don't understand how the Atrix could be a game changer. It has beefy specs but that has never changed the game because people don't give a damn how many gigaflops their phone can do. Even less so when you consider that it will never hit numbers large enough to have a dedicated development community to actually harness the power. Very, very few people are interested in a phone that lets you turn it into a "computer". Is there a laptop shell? Even if there is at that point why wouldn't you want a full laptop or tablet? I will be honest and say that I only saw the video where they docked it and had it hooked up to a regular monitor.

 

[chris975d]

CES really brought out the BIG GUNS from the Android army this year.

For the last hour or so, I've been just thinking about getting an Atrix 4G for AT&T and I'm a happy iPhone 4 owner BTW. This could the first phone to truly surpass the iPhone 4 in many ways. So for every Android user converting to iPhone 4 in Verizon, you may have many iPhone users converting to Android with the Atrix at AT&T. The carrier has always been dominated with iPhone and it would be nice if AT&T can spice up their line-up and the Atrix 4G is a great way to start it off this year!

I currently switch off between my laptop and iPhone 4 when it comes to browsing. But my 5-year old VAIO needs to get replaced. I need the bigger screen for browsing, but it gets too hot and the fans is too loud. At first, I wondered if this webtop dock would be useful to me. But it is starting to look very useful to me by the minute. Workable enough, at least. A great travel companion. I can hold off on an internet tablet. Motorola have superior call quality than Apple and the positives still outweigh MotoBlur and a locked boot loader. Forget the Verizon iPhone 4 or iPhone 5. The Motorola Atrix 4G could be the biggest gamechanging phone since the original iPhone.

I've had my eye on the Atrix as well. It's the first Android phone that I've been truly excited about, and I've had both the Motorola Droid and Droid 2 Global on my Verizon line (primary line is an iPhone 4 with AT&T). It's the first really good Android phone that AT&T has offered (the Samsung Captivate doesn't count, as Samsung is absolutely horrible with Android updates...it's still on 2.1 for goodness sakes!). It's probably going to get me to move from my iPhone 4, as I really like Android, and my experience with the Motorola phones I've had (hardware-wise) is that they are of exceptional build quality. I don't know if I would call the Atrix "game changing", however, but I think it'll definitely be the biggest selling Android handset on AT&T. I've had friends and employees who aren't even "tech nerds" at all (but know that I am) and who don't even know what CES is ask me if I've seen the new Atrix coming from Motorola yet. If non-techie people in this rural part of Georgia know about it, it might be a better selling phone than some Apple fans are thinking.

Really? I'm not sure I've seen you post in a thread besides Android ones where you generally seem to take shots at Apple. Weird.

Also, I don't understand how the Atrix could be a game changer. It has beefy specs but that has never changed the game because people don't give a damn how many gigaflops their phone can do. Even less so when you consider that it will never hit numbers large enough to have a dedicated development community to satually harness the power. Very, very few people are interested in a phone that lets you turn it into a "computer". Is there a laptop shell? Even if there is at that point why wouldn't you want a full laptop or tablet? I will be honest and say that I only saw the video where they docked it and had it hooked up to a regular monitor.

Yes, there is a laptop shell for it. The thing about that that seems to be exciting the people I've heard from about it is that you are carrying one device that can "become" either a laptop or desktop computer, without the need for files spread out/duplicated over several devices. The concept is very interesting. And with it being one of the premier Android devices on AT&T, I'm sure that there will be a huge developer/hacker community for it at XDA. Most Motorola Android devices are heavily supported there, and the custom ROMs can often times be amazingly well built compared to even the stock factory ROMs (look at how good the XDA guys have made the Samsung Captivate, and it's pretty crappy out of the box).

 

[dwd3885]

Android isn't going away. And as an iPhone user, you shouldn't want it to. A lot of Apple's recent decisions regarding the iPhone are likely because Android has caught up and surpassed the iPhone in US marketshare. So the competition is definitely good for Apple. A lot of 'fan boys' like to think Apple is awesome and want them to crush all, but I tell you, if it wasn't for Android coming on, Apple wouldn't have implemented many features.

Also, I've seen misinformation in this thread. Android is open source, so manufacturers do not have to pay for the code. What they do have to pay for is the Android Market. That's why you see some Android tablets, Nook, etc. that don't have the Market on them at all.

Also, Google has decided that Android is an open OS, part of AOSP. Because of this, they can't force manufacturers to do much like update the OS timely, or remove possibly unnecessary UI skins.

My feeling is that if you like iPhone but are put off by some of the iOS decisions, then Samsung's Galaxy S phones are a great way to go. If only because the TouchWiz UI is very close to the iPhone's UI.

I do think Android sales on Verizon will take a hit when iPhone 4 comes out on Verizon, but I think they will only take an initial hit and will bounce back shortly. It'll end up being where the iPhone will take up probably 20% of the market, and Android will get upwards 35-40%.

 

[NebulaClash]

Apple competes against itself, so this canard about competition being good for Apple is just not accurate. That principle applies in tired markets where change in incremental. Think Windows. Competition for Windows would make Microsoft work harder.

But Apple is moving ahead regardless of what other folks do. They make very successful iPod models, and then kill them in favor of different models. They don't ride success into the ground.

They come up with a phone that causes the entire smart phone industry to reboot.

They invent a tablet computer that just makes everyone else look stupid.

The only real competition is with Steve Jobs, Ives, and company trying to get to a future that they can foresee but can't quite build yet. But they keep trying. And Android playing me-too in the marketplace has very little impact other than perhaps speeding up decision in the U.S. for more cell provider partners. But the innovation at Apple does not depend on Android. That would require looking in the rear view mirror, and Steve would rather look at where the puck is going.

And speaking of Android phones, would someone please fill me in on when the anti-Apple propaganda playbook said we were supposed to switch from "iPhones are a tiny part of the phone market" to "iPhones are the dominant slice in the phone market, but now Android has surpassed them"? The anti-Apple folks can't keep their stories straight. Either Apple has no chance, or they are the big bully that can be overthrown. Steve Jobs said he would be happy with a small percentage of the enormous phone market. He got it. So why is he suddenly supposed to be panicky because hundreds of Android models put together can just barely outsell the iPhone?

 

[sicmac]

Woz: Apple Almost Launched A Phone In 2004, Android Will “Win The Race”

http://techcrunch.com/2010/11/18/wo...ed-a-phone-in-2004-android-will-win-the-race/

History repeats. And old story with PC will repeat in future. Just remember this story: Apple vs Microsoft on PC market. Apple started PC market and lost competition, because of inflexible and expensive platforms.

The same will happen with iPhone in 5-10 years. Droid will offer thousands of phones with different: brands, designs, prices and unflexible, "locked" iPhone will fall

Don't forget google is #1 internet company with the best service and great impact on WWW. With further development of Internet based services it would be another great plus for droid.

 

[NebulaClash]

He likens Android’s success to that of Microsoft’s Windows operating system, along with the flaws and challenges of that model

That's the key. Nobody ever, ever, ever suggested that the iPhone would be the dominant phone in the market. It's madness to suggest that unless the iPhone has the overall #1 position, it's a failure. That's not how the phone market works. No one company will ever hold the same market share that Microsoft did the OS market. And there's no need to hold that type of market share.

I realize we have lots of folks coming here hoping for an Apple failure. But they are going to be disappointed. The iPhone will do quite well no matter how much Android models flood the market with quality phones and cheap phones and awful phones and stupid knockoff phones, all running various versions of Android at the cell provider's pleasure.

Apple has sold 160 million iOS devices. That's a market that isn't going to suffer any time soon.

 

[Krandor]

The same will happen with iPhone in 5-10 years. Droid will offer thousands of phones with different: brands, designs, prices and unflexible, "locked" iPhone will fall

Just like "locked" Mac failied and isn't made anymore?

Android may (and probably will) beat apple in overall market share, but that does not equate to failure.

 

[Tarzanman]

Just like "locked" Mac failied and isn't made anymore?

Android may (and probably will) beat apple in overall market share, but that does not equate to failure.

Honestly, not to knock Mac as a computing platform, but i would say that 1 out of every 10 Mac owners I know is what I would call 'computer literate'.

Every product has its niche, and Mac's niche for the most part are people who by & large do not know any better and gravitate to pretty, shiny things.

Its working for them, but the peril in being a fad or trendy is that trends inevitably change. One day, it won't be considered 'cool' to pull out your macbook at the local starbucks and Mac will have to compete on its strength as a computing platform (instead of case design).

I used to think that people with Apple/Mac car decals back in the 90's were individuals and cool. Nowadays, I see a soccer-parent pull out their Mac at the local eatery and my first supposition is that the person is very likely a self-absorbed, technological novice.

Times have changed.

 

[RebeccaL]

Apple is a hardware company. iOS is there just to sell iPhones it's like OSX whose purpose is to sell Macs [OSX is just $30].

It would make more sense to compare Apple to Rim, Samsung and motorola. Comparing iPhone to Android is comparing a single manufacturer with one phone to many manufacturers with various phones.

And my previous coment about Android phones not getting the latest update: Someone said the older iPhones don't have iOS 4.x. I was talking about current supported models like the Galaxy S compared to supported iphones.

I have a PC and I can get the latest OS directly from MS, no middle man. With Android you have to wait for manufacturers to release the updates to the carriers or resort to custom firmware which many people don't know how to find or thrust.

In sumarry what I'm saying is that it would be better and faster if Android updates came directly from google whithout crappy skins and stuff.

Finally the link I posted was an article in Lifehacker [a respected tech site] NOT my personal opinion.