Google Android, iPhone, and Blackberry
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It’s been a while since I’ve posted, but not too much has changed in the overall IT landscape. Cloud computing has become such a buzzword that it’s hard to know what it is anymore, and I still have deep reservations about the whole model with respect to privacy, security, and flexibility down the road.
In any case, iPhone 2.0 software and its 3G hardware counterpart have been released. Apple’s AppStore seems to be well executed, but they’re getting some very strong pushback on how controlled and arbitrary the approval process is for apps. It still doesn’t have cut/copy/paste, and I still don’t think the typing is great even if it’s good enough.
Google Android has officially entered the scene with the G1 handset. I don’t like T-Mobile so I probably won’t run one until its released on different hardware and carriers, but it’s a very interesting platform and one that has much more depth than the iPhone. Here’s a great article about where Google might be going with it. It’s a lot like Microsoft’s WinCE strategy, but in theory more open. Microsoft has shown openness in supporting a large ecosystem of hardware manufacturers and across carriers, and time will tell if Google takes it one step further by opening the underlying mobile platform on top of it. They have the first part (openness of the platform), but will need to execute on the second (multiple devices) and the third (multiple carriers), to be seen as offering a significantly different alternative to the other players.
Google’s Chrome browser isn’t that innovative other than its javascript performance, but it could be a very interesting piece of the puzzle when combined with Android. Google Gears, Google Gadgets, seamlessly running between Chrome and Android would be killer. Imagine developing Android apps and deploying seamlessly either to Chrome or Android, especially since Android will support Chrome. It’s a heck of a better proposition than having to create a native Blackberry or iPhone application, and it could be that Google pulls off what Apple was hoping to do in the first place by suggesting that developers target the browser as opposed to the native device itself.
In any case, I found the announcement that VISA will support Android a particularly interesting one. Why could they not have done this for the Blackberry a long time ago? The iPhone seems more like a consumer gadget, so it’s possible that Google will move into the “serious” device category even if it’s questionable if that will include the enterprise.
I am no fan of Exchange, but there’s a lot of inertia there, and as tempted as I am by gMail and Google Apps even for the enterprise, the thought that one day all of my or my company’s email in theory could just disappear randomly, is a total non-starter. At least with on-premises solutions I can know, for certain, that my email is physically somewhere and there is 0% chance that I will lose it all. Having been told by the head of Google’s Enterprise App division that they will never, ever, support appliances or virtual appliances, sticking with the multi-tenant model in every case, I can’t consider them a serious contender in the enterprise.
That leads to the other question about the openness of Android. I will begin to tinker with the SDK soon, and it will be interesting to see how clearly it can be de-coupled from Google’s network and services. It’s not just about concern about privacy and all that, but also a question of whether it’s both a level playing field and an open canvas for anything that I could possibly dream up.
On FriendFeed, this post was liked by 0 people and commented on 0 times showPosted on October 3rd, 2008 by David Thomson
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