What would it take to inspire the Google executive in charge of Android to post his first-ever tweet? A five-minute diatribe about how Android's "fragmented" ecosystem is a "mess," uttered by none other than SteveJobs himself.
Apple's outspoken CEO livened up what would have been another dreary earnings conference call with investors Monday, surprising everyone by dropping in to tout Apple's blockbuster $20 billion quarter, toast the sale of more than 14 million iPhones in the same period, and take a few shots at some of Apple's biggest competitors, starting with BlackBerry maker Research in Motion.
"We've now surpassed RIM, and I don't see them catching up with us in the foreseeable future," Jobs said (as reported in a transcript posted by Seeking Alpha), noting that Apple's quarterly iPhone sales had "handily beat" RIM's total of 12.1 million handsets sold during its previous quarter."I think it's going to be a challenge for them to create a competitive platform and to convince developers to create apps for yet a third software platform after iOS and Android," Jobs continued. "With 300,000 apps on Apple's App Store, RIM has a high mountain ahead of them to climb."
Having had with way with RIM (which, according to a recent Nielsen survey, still enjoys a 31 percent of the U.S. smartphone market, ahead of both Android and the iPhone), Jobs then turned to Google, teeing up his sharpest words.
Sounding a bit stung by reports indicating that Android-based handsets have (as a whole, anyway) beenoutselling the iPhone in recent months, Jobs said that there's "no solid data" on the number of Android phones being sold each quarter, and that Apple's 275,000 daily iPhone activations still tops the 200,000-a-day Android activations claimed by Google CEO Eric Schmidt last week.
Jobs then launched into the "who's more open, Android or Apple?" debate, arguing that the discussion is just a "smokescreen" for the "real issue," which (as Jobs put it) is "what's best for the customer, fragmented versus integrated."
Hoping to turn the wide variety of Android-based handsets on the market into a knock on Google, Jobs attacked Android as a "fragmented" platform with "many Android OEMs"—that's "original equipment manufacturers," a favorite term of industry insiders—that "install proprietary user interfaces to differentiate themselves from the commodity Android experience," leaving it up to users to "figure it all out."
With the iPhone, Jobs added, "every handset works the same." (I suppose that's a plus or a minus, depending on your point of view.)
Jobs went on to claim that the impending launch of three new Android app stores will "be a mess for both users and developers," and used the example of TweetDeck, a popular Twitter client whose developer had to "contend with more than 100 different versions of Android software on 244 handsets," a "daunting challenge" compared with the iPhone's mere "two versions of the software—the current and most recent predecessor—to test against."
Well, maybe. But is developing apps for Android truly a daunting experience? If so, somebody forgot to tell TweetDeck CEO and founder Iain Dodsworth.
"Did we at any point say it was a nightmare developing on Android? Errr nope, no we didn't. It wasn't," Dodsworth tweeted early Tuesday, adding a bit later: "We only have 2 guys developing on Android TweetDeck so that shows how small an issue fragmentation is."
Jobs, who proceeded to slam the idea of a 7-inch tablet (read all about it right here), also drew a tweeted retort from Andy Rubin, Google's VP in charge of Android.
Rubin's cryptic tweet reads: "the definition of open: 'mkdir android ; cd android ; repo init -u git://android.git.kernel.org/platform/manifest.git ; repo sync ; make.'"
Uh, say what? As TechCrunch helpfully explains, "that's Rubin using some geeked-out lingo to explain exactly what open is to Steve Jobs. In other words: Android." (PC Magazine's more technical translation: "Rubin's tweet includes the commands needed to start compiling a copy of Android on a home Linux machine. He's stressing that anyone can develop for, hack, or even create their own version of Android.")
Update [5 p.m. ET]: RIM CEO Jim Bastille has now respond to Jobs as well, countering that "while Apple's attempt to control the ecosystem and maintain a closed platform may be good for Apple, developers want more options and customers want to fully access the overwhelming majority of web sites that use Flash." Oh, and Bastille adds that RIM thinks "many customers are getting tired of being told what to think by Apple." Harsh!
The whole exchange brings to mind the last time Apple's top exec indulged in a lengthy rant against a competitor: Jobs' epic open letter from May explaining why neither the iPad nor the iPhone support Flash, which he slammed as an unreliable battery hog and a "closed system" (hmmm...) that "falls short."
It's worth noting that the latest version of Android—2.2 "Froyo"—supports Flash Player 10.1, the latest Flash player for smartphones and a major selling point for the hottest new Android handsets.
Who's right, then? Is Android a fragmented "mess" that's confusing users and confounding app developers, with the iPhone standing as a paragon of consumer-friendly integration? Or is Android the very model of "open," with variety and choice for all, with Apple's closed iOS a walled-off fortress?
Personally, I think both views are right—and wrong, as well.
Apple decided to keep its iOS platform to itself, building its own devices and insisting that all iOS apps be distributed through Apple's own App Store. It's a simple, unified approach, all right, meaning no long waits for firmware updates (unless you're the owner of an older iPhone who's been left behind) or confusion about where to get apps. But it also means there's only one new iPhone, one new iPad and one new iPod Touch at a time, and if Apple doesn't approve the app you developed, you're out of luck (jailbreaking aside).
Then you've got Google, which made the strategic decision to open its Android OS to any and all handset manufacturers that wanted to build an Android phone. It also rules the Android Market app store—which, as Jobs mentioned, isn't the only place you can buy Android apps—with a far less heavy hand than Apple does with its app storefront. The result? A galaxy of different Android handsets on the market, of all shapes and sizes, not to mention a huge amount of latitude for Android app developers. The downside (as Jobs rightly points out)? Not all Android phones work the same, with Android firmware updates getting rolled out in fits and starts depending on the individual handset.
It's a trade-off, pure and simple, and it's hardly surprising that executives at the two competing smartphone behemoths—which chose very different strategies for taking on the smartphone market—are firing broadsides at each other. But just because there's a lot of yelling going on doesn't necessarily mean that someone has the moral (or technical, or strategic) high ground.
In the end, consumers—that's you and me—have to decide what works best for us. Do you want a platform with a cohesive, unified experience—but only one (new) phone to choose from? Meet the iPhone. Want to pick from a variety of handsets, big, small, with QWERTY or without, designed for business or built mainly for home use—but with the potential for some confusion (and frustration, in terms of staggered firmware updates) in the bargain? You might be an Android.
The choice is yours—and after all, that's what competition is all about, right?
— Ben Patterson is a technology writer for Yahoo! News.
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