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Did Manufacturers Lose $2 BILLION on Android Tablets Last Quarter?

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Strategy Analytics announced today: “Android Captures Record 39 Percent Share of Global Tablet Shipments in Q4 2011”.  Bloggers go nuts with it, headlines such as “Android Grabs 10% Tablet Market Share from Apple in Q4 2011” and “Android tablets gain ground with 10.5 million sales in Q4 2011“.  Here’s a quick fact check: the report was about tablets shipped, not sold.  Sounds like a minor little nit, but it isn’t, and if you’ve never been inside the actual business of hardware before, it’s a fairly common mistake.

Shipping a product implies it’s been manufactured, packaged, and transported into a distribution facility, and in some way allocated by a retailer.  It hasn’t necessarily been purchased by the retailer yet, nor has it been sold to a consumer.  Which means a massive cost was incurred by the manufacturer, with no revenue so far.  Further, even if the retailer has made some form of purchasing agreement/commitment, they typically have many many ways to back out if units aren’t moving.  All, of course, at the expense of the manufacturer.  This is how Logitech lost $100 million on the Revues, as they made a bunch, but couldn’t sell them.  As Seinfeld might’ve put it: “See, you know how to ship the product, you just don’t know how to sell the product and that’s really the most important part of the product, the selling. Anybody can just ship them.”

So let’s go back to that report.  10.5 million Android tablets shipped in Q4.  Not too shabby.  Now Apple did just announce they sold 15.4 million iPads in the same quarter.  So we know we aren’t talking oranges-to-oranges comparisons already.

I’m going to add in a personal observation/anecdote here, take it with a grain of salt.  In the past year, at over 20 conferences, 30 flights, and possibly hundreds of meetings, I’ve seen about 15 android tablets in use “in the wild”.  I’ll go as high as 20.  That’s it.  Not only isn’t it close to 40%, it’s not even close to 1% of the tablets I’ve seen in use, in every major metropolitan area in North America.  But that’s not a fair way to look at it, so I’ll assume I’m off by a few percent, especially including the international market plus the recent hotness of the  Kindle Fire.

But let’s pretend they somehow sell-through 5% of the total tablet market, as defined by iPad sales.  That’s 750,000 units sold.  Maybe a little low, but as I scan the numbers from a bunch of different reports, doesn’t seem too far off the mark (NPD reported a grand total of 1.2 million non-Apple tablets sold between Jan-Oct last year).  Let’s bump it to a cool million, just to seem “fair”.  That leaves manufacturers with 9 million unsold tablets.

According to a variety of reports (best from iSuppli), tablets cost manufacturers between $200-$300 to manufacture, on average.  So again, averaging it all out (which isn’t exactly right, but that’s kind of the theme of my blog anyway, right?) at $250 times 9 million units equals holy crap.

$2,250,000,000

Oh, and this doesn’t include marketing, packaging, shipping, warehousing, taxes, and all the other costs involved.  Please, somebody, show me how I’m wrong!  No, seriously, I don’t actually want to be right here!

Speculating On Motorola + Google TV

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Googorola!

Googorola!

Google is planning to acquire Motorola Mobility, which is a deal about patents and Android, but also one to raise questions on quite a few existing product lines.  What will happen with Moto Droids and the Google Nexus line?  Where do Android tablets go from here?  Is MOTOBlur dead?   (my answers: bye bye Nexus, tbd, and yes).  The other interesting area is Google TV, particularly interesting because the Motorola Mobility dept is the one that makes the set-top boxes (which are, next to refrigerators, one of the least likely products to be mobile in my house, but maybe that’s just me).

I’ve seen tons of speculation this week about what the deal means, as it pertains to Google TV, and have batched together some of the perspectives that are floating around.  Most common theme: now that Google owns the STB business, they can just sprinkle Android into all the next-gen cable boxes…

That gives Google an attractive footprint to leverage on a number of different fronts within the digital home, perhaps with a Trojan Horse strategy of pushing Android-based middleware out to shore up its lacklustre connected TV strategy.

Source: With Motorola, Google gains a big TV strategy | News | Rapid TV News http://www.rapidtvnews.com/index.php/2011081514335/with-motorola-google-gains-a-big-tv-strategy.html#ixzz1VEtbiUZe

Also surmised by Apple Insider, Robert Scoble, CNET, Business Insider, NewTeeVee, and Lost Remote (and others).  Here’s the thing, this isn’t even a topic/issue/option in play, at all.  It’s not exactly like Motorola’s been unable to acquire operating systems to power their set tops, and could easily have chosen Google TV prior to now.  Further, there’s simply no such thing as “sneaking” technology into the cable infrastructure, not even a tiny bit.  We’ve seen (and I’ve worked for) many companies try to accomplish some set of these tasks, and not one shred of success.  Why?  Because the cable industry commissions the hardware and features they want, and not the other way around.

Burger King creepy guy

You Can Have it Your Way. aka 7' tall and creepy.

Another widely spread philosophy is that the only reason Google TV hasn’t caught on yet is due to not having had the right chance/opportunity:

“Google TV has not caught on yet,” wrote AOL journalist Saul Hansell on his personal blog. “This could be the wedge to get it in millions of living rooms.”

Source: http://news.cnet.com/8301-31001_3-20092451-261/motorola-could-help-cure-ailing-google-tv/#ixzz1VExC7Dqg

Shared feelings from Zatz Not Funny, Lost Remote, NewTeeVee, and more, but not by myself (nor my friend Dan Frommer, though he’s much nicer about it than I would’ve been).  Google TV hasn’t caught on with consumers because it’s the wrong value proposition for consumers, period.  In my ten-plus years of building “connected TV” products, the thing I’ve learned is that the more interaction you throw on the screen, the less you engage and benefit your users.  While there are moments for “lean-forward” activities, they are fleeting.  Google TV is built on the opposite premise.

Maxell dude + Venom

This isn't exactly the lean-back experience I was expecting.

One last comment that I’ve seen making the rounds was that Google just gained a bunch of knowhow regarding building boxes.  This doesn’t much pass the sniff test either, as other than Apple, everybody builds boxes the same, and there’s very little secret sauce here.  If anything, they should consider offloading all hardware production that still gets done internally or dive in deep in fully integrated software/hardware solutions.  More on that in a bit.

So that’s enough about everybody else’s theories, time for a few of my own.

  1. The acquisition was entirely about the patent portfolio, the synergy (or not) between Google TV (G-TV) and Motorola’s STB division (M-STB) is positive, but was coincidental.
  2. Google must demonstrate to current M-STB customers that they will not disband nor change the status quo there in the short term (let’s call it 2-5 years).  If this doesn’t happen quickly, we could see an exodus to the numerous viable competitors.
  3. Google would be better off moving G-TV inside M-STB than vice versa.  M-STB has the requisite business practices savvy for dealing with the cable industry, which is significantly more vital to longevity than any software platform.  In fact, gaining this type of business experience is quite a boon for Google, as its an industry they have historically (dating back pre-YouTube days) not well-understood.
  4. The other massive obstacle that seems underreported is the complete lack of fit between M-STB hardware platforms and G-TV software architecture needs.  One of them will need a rewrite, and that’s costly.
  5. Without a major improvement to the platform itself, this acquisition does not change G-TV’s fate.  No cable company on the planet is simply going to allow technology into their boxes (yes, they buy em, they rent em to customers) without a) control and b) a clear path to revenue/profits.  Granted, there are indications those profits could come, but not with the current platform.

Ultimately, I think this is a fascinating topic.  The nuance of industries involved, the hugeness of capital in play, and the clearly disruptive horizon for the TV business is more exciting than virtually anything I can think of.

Chile Volcano Lightning

Well, almost anything.

Does anyone *really* use Android tablets?

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My friend Harry has done some deep sleuthing (read: he Googled it) and it’s seeming that two of the “user testimonials” in Samsungs latest ads are in fact made by actors:

I did notice, however, that freelance travel writer Joan Hess bears a striking resemblance to New York actress Joan Hess:

And that real estate CEO Joseph Kolinski could be New York actor Joseph Kolinksi‘s twin brother:

Filmmaker Karl Shefelman, on the other hand, looks a lot like…filmmaker Karl Shefelman. Who works for a New York production company. One that’s done work for Samsung.

Don’t fret too much folks, they aren’t the only ones to have faked some reviews.

Now I know I’m a long-time non-fan of Android, and my experience with the Xoom is only exacerbating those feelings, but really, what is going on here?  I wrote a post back in the day explaining why I felt the tablet market was generally doomed, but the iPad proved me wrong.  Or did it?  Is the reality that only Apple can ship a “tablet-like product” successfully?

I think the answer might be something like “for the overwhelming majority of regular people, absolutely yes.”

As far as I can tell, the best use of any Android tablet presently on the market is to develop apps for Android tablets.  Yes, I’m dead serious with that comment.  Laptop mag just did a head-to-head comparison with the Xoom and iPad 2, and somehow actually managed to make it a “close call” – but then again, the guy writing it somehow managed to find the Android interface “better” than the iPads.  If you are technically proficient, interested in widgets, and like coding, I could see that perspective.   If you aren’t, it’s flat out wrong.  But I digress (like usual).

So I come back to the key question here: who is using these things, and to what end?  I’ve *never* seen one in the wild, and I live in the utter mecca of techieness (heck I even see Nooks on the bus to work).  Further, I’ve yet to meet a single person outside of the tech echochamber who is even really aware of these devices, let along truly in the market for one.  Go to the retail stores and try to get demos – there’s typically at most a single person in a store who even knows how to demo them (and yes, I do go to stores and do ask these kinds of questions – and anyone who claims to understand regular consumers and how they use technology should do at least the same)!

I’m working on another post (coming soon) on where I feel there is a market opportunity for HP and the like to bring tablets to market successfully, but if there’s one aspect I’m utterly convinced of – there is virtually no consumer market for non-iPad tablets. And by “virtually none” I’ll go with “about a million in North America, maybe two tops.”

The Verizon iPhone is Not Too Late

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Techmeme directed me to a recent Newsweek article that argues the Verizon iPhone is too late to stop the rise of Android smart phones. Daniel Lyons states that the open nature of the Google platform coupled with recent advances to the Android mobile operating  system make the Google Phone “an unstoppable juggernaut.”

John Gruber offers a smart rebuttal on Daring Fireball that re-frames the open/closed debate in terms of product design.

“We’re going to make these decisions for you and offer a limited number of choices” is indeed the company’s philosophy. That’s called design. Apple is indeed more focused on design than its competitors. It’s also been far more successful than its competitors over the past decade, in several lucrative markets.

Gruber’s analysis is more salient here. It is not too late for the Verizon iPhone.

While it is true that recent Android advances like Froyo have made me soften my initial take on Google phones, Apple’s iPhone still has several crucial advantages over Android devices.

iPhones Are Status Symbols

Even in 2011, there is something fun and sexy about the iPhone. Because of design, marketing and advertising, the iPhone has cultural value embedded in its hardware that Droids just can’t match. When people pull an Apple iPhone out in public they belong to an exclusive group that is desirable in society. There are enough people on the Verizon network that covet the social status connected to the iPhone to make it a winner.

iPhones Have The Best Apps

With the exception of Angry Birds, where are the killer apps on Android phones? Apple invented and perfected the mobile app experience (and recently brought apps to desktop computing, as well). The Android App Marketplace, by comparison, is lacking. People still want fun, useful apps on their smart phones and Apple has the industry’s best App Store stocked with the best mobile Apps.

iPhones are Usable

For a number of vocal proponents in the tech space, Android offers a superior smart phone experience.

But for the majority of people, the iPhone is the perfect entry into the smart phone universe. The device is stable, secure and easy to understand. That translates into benefits for average users on the Verizon network. Your Aunt Sally may not quite grok how “Droid Does” but she will understand the iPhone immediately.

The iPhone is not for everyone. But it does its job well and most people find something attractive in the device. I’ve already pre-ordered mine (OK, not yet, but I’ve decided to order one as soon as I can). It’s definitely not too late for the Verizon iPhone.

A Million (free) Angry Birds Downloads Exposes Critical Android Platform Fail

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One of the most popular iPhone games has come to Android, it’s called Angry Birds.  While I’m not personally a big fan (no offense, team Rovio, just not my kind of game), the game has well over 11 million downloads on the iPhone worldwide, and as of August had sold 6.5 million copies.  So if my simple math holds up, at 6.5 million copies at $0.99 per sale, that’s a gross of $6,435,000, and after a 30% cut to Apple, it’s a net of $4,505,500.  Today’s accomplishment of 1 million Android downloads (which truly is impressive, congrats Team Rovio!) results in a net of $0.  But they could make some money down the road if the ad revenue shows up.

I’m not saying Rovio won’t make some decent money off the ad platform, after all Google did blow out revenue last quarter, and is apparently making a cool billion dollars a year on mobile ads already.  But the reality here is this is a weak solution for any developer to bank on.  Ad revenue for a platform game is a highly unproven model so far, and while there will certainly be wins for some, the concept that ads are the only way to make money off Android apps is pathetic.

First, it clutters the experience.
There is no possibility that an ad-laden video game is better than one without ads.  None.  And in the mobile space, where screen real estate is precious, it’s even more impactful.

Second, it’s not bankable.
A video game, even a casual one, is generally a pretty engaging activity.  Imagine lining up your purple bird in the slingshot, ready to take down some well-defended pig to clear the level (finally!), and lo and behold, there’s an ad for something.  What’s it for?  Who knows, because you’re never, ever clicking on it, you’re taking down that pig.

Third, it’s a band-aid at best.
I’ve actually purchased an Android app (Robo Tower Defense – pretty fun actually), just to make sure I’ve gone through the experience.  It is unpleasant to say the least (fanboys who are reading this, please click here prior to commenting, thank you very much).  Did you know there are apps in the Android Market whose price points are listed as, wait for it, approximate amounts!?  Now there is a reason behind it – international developers – but it’s just so awkward to see.  Further, the effort it takes to even find half-decent stuff is painful.  I’ve honestly found the best way to find apps is using the barcode scanner app, and simply won’t bother with paid ones.

Fourth, and most importantly, I don’t see it radically changing, ever.
Android comes from Google, who obviously knows how to monetize spam, SEO, and domain squatters advertising, but just doesn’t get user experience at all (SIX years to let us turn off Conversation View? Really? Really?).  So their DNA, their “mode de vie,” is about enabling ads, not making amazing consumer-facing experiences.  This, coupled with the issue that Android is an “open” operating system, means no single serving method of enabling simple transaction systems.  And, because any carrier and manufacturer can bring any product to market, there’s no single source for developers to work with.

In short (too late): the Android platform cannot possibly offer a one-stop-shop approach to developers wishing to monetize application development, other than advertising.

I’ve been musing a lot on the topic of Android having a “missing link” problem recently.  This may just be a hiccup in the path to having the prime mobile operating system, or it may be a fatal flaw in its ability to have serious legs.  Either Google themselves will need to step in and create a core payment infrastructure to enable developers, carriers, and consumers to all work together – which seems radically unlikely – or we’re going to see even more fragmentation of the Android market, and probably in the short-to-medium term at that.

Quick Hits: Sony Remote Monstrosity, Early Revue Reviews, Android #1?, iPhone-to-TV, Congrats Foundry Group!

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Sony Remote Monstrosity
Engadget got a sneak peak of the Sony/Google TV remote control.  It’s either hideous, or simply an internal prototype used for them to develop with.  I wish it was the latter, but bet it’s the former.  Over on the Stage Two blog (I’ve been doing a lot more blogging there recently, it’s not just us pushing client work, give it a read!) I go into specifics of what’s wrong with it, and also tangible steps on how to improve it.

Early Revue Reviews
Saw a quick hit on CrunchGear today, I’m in complete disagreement with everything they say that makes it “good”.  My highlight nitpick is their closing remark: “As we said before, the real initial value will come from the camera that Logitech is selling for video chats on the TV.”  The real value of a $299 device is that you can hook up a $149 camera to it to do video chat?  Really?  That is going to move the needle on Revues?  Hint: no way.

Elsewhere, my friend Harry calls it the Swiss Army Knife of Internet TV products.  I’d say that’s a great analogy, but follow up with my biggest concern: the TV is the one place we don’t want something like a Swiss Army Knife. See, those Knives are handy to have around in a pinch, but in every way fall short of being really useful for a long period of time.  Yes, it’s cool to have a philips head screwdriver in your back pocket when camping, but I wouldn’t put together IKEA furniture with one, that’s when you need the actual screwdriver – aka the single purpose product that works really really well.

I’m maintaining my position that Google TV 1.0 is not ready for consumer primetime, and neither the Sony nor Logitech solutions are compelling to the mainstream.  Sorry to my friends who work at those companies, but this just isn’t what it needs to be for a big win.

Android #1?
I saw one of those big flashy attention-grabbing headlines today “Android Most Popular Operating System in U.S. Among Recent Smartphone Buyers”.  Beyond my general disdain for Android (though I will freely admit the HTC Incredible running Android 2.2 is leaps and bounds ahead of my old Eris, but still has lots and lots wrong with it – for another time), I hate headlines like these.  What would be MORE interesting?  What is the popularity of Android specifically on AT&T?  That’s at least apples-to-apples comparison (pun fully intended). Of course Android is going to hit the top spot, this is inevitable, not interesting.

Now what would be interesting?  Well, since this is arguably all about a landgrab for developers to adopt platforms, how about an analysis that talks about which platform is making the most money to developers? Until Android/Google makes the process of buying (and selling) apps easier for everyone, the money is still flowing to Cupertino.

iPhone-to-TV
The newest version of Netflix for iPhone enables watching the movies on a TV, rather than on the phone itself.  Very cool, nice novelty feature.  But when I see a phrase like “Who needs an Apple TV now?” I get reminded of how often people in the industry aren’t thinking these things through very much (no offense to the author of that particular blog post).  To be clear – a phone, even an iPhone, does not replace a TV dedicated device, now or ever.  Wrong device for the wrong purpose.

What if you need to make a phone call mid-movie?

What if your phone runs out of battery?

What if your phone drops the signal (apparently those iPhones are known to do that from time to time)?

What if you want to put the movie on, then sit 8-10′ away from the TV, and, say, pause or rewind the movie?

etc.

Congrats Foundry Group!
Just wanted to take a second to congratulate Brad, Ryan, Jason, and Seth at Foundry Group for raising their latest fund! I’ve had a long history with the guys and a lot of their investments, and since they are one of the few VCs who love the consumer gadget space, wanted to give them a little shout out here.  Keep up the great work, and keep finding the cool gadgets!

The difference between Fragmentation and Disparate Products, a counterpoint

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My friend Louis Gray wrote a piece tonight mostly about the new Apple TV, but focusing on how he believes Apple is introducing fragmentation into their ecosystem.  Go ahead, give it a read.

I was writing the following as a long comment, and just as I was wrapping up I thought it would serve better as a blog post.  Please consider it a counter-point, and you should definitely read Louis’ arguments first.  Go ahead, click there, then read all the way through the comments until you get to…

“I’ve yet to see anybody dispute the facts about each device running a different flavor of the OS, which is the crux of the issue.”

The reason nobody’s disputing it is because it’s not actually an issue.  Apple does not, for the most part, have fragmentation in their platforms (other than tiny exceptions, which I’m sure someone will point out snarkily in the comments).  This is about disparate products, not a fragmented operating system implementation (though I do completely agree that the iTunes experience is woefully out of date within the overall product line Apple sells).

First, all the comparisons about what does/doesn’t play on Apple TV on day 1 of shipping are irrelevant – the wide swath of Americans who will buy the device will pick it up later this year (you know, November-ish), by which time the content library will be different.

Second, it’s not as if there’s any cross-product features, other than the few apps which happen to run both on an iPad and on an iPhone/Touch.   When we talk about Android fragmentation it’s because all the products are being labeled as having a common platform, yet there is MASSIVE discrepancy between user interface, app compatibility, features, etc.

Third, Apple isn’t out there marketing “iOS 4 devices” other than when it needs to in re updating iPads/iPhones.  And even then, it’s highly product-specific.  Android, on the other hand, *is* a promise/value expectation (and I’ll avoid commenting on the quality at this point).  When Google touts new Android features and someone with a Droid Eris (my former, sad sad sad phone) hears about them, they have *NO WAY* of knowing they will never ever get them.

Fourth, and last, is about the developers.  Ultimately fragmentation is most keenly an issue to them (even more than consumers), as it impacts their livelihood.  So if you are developing for Android, yet your app won’t run on the mega-phone Evo, and runs poorly on a Droid X, but is nice on the HTC Incredible (my current, much better, but still lacking phone), how are you supposed to communicate that to consumers, who will inevitably write poor reviews, not trust your brand, and ultimately not spend money with you.

That’s the problem with fragmentation.  Now let’s look at developers for iOS – they know exactly (1) how big their market potential is, (2) where the money is flowing, (3) how to build apps within the ecosystem, and (4) with 100% certainty, which devices their apps will run on.  A bad user experience is utterly the developers’ faults, not due to some random hardware maker poorly implementing an OS.  And if/when Apple TV gets iOS 4 (my prediction is it doesn’t happen until the next version of the device, but I’m getting a lot of these wrong these days, so who knows???), developers will have a clear path to build whatever apps they can, knowing exactly how they will perform.

The Handy Android Fanboy Detector

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If you are unfamiliar with the term, read my friend Harry’s article for a great piece on “the fanboy“.  Now, onto the piece – which I anticipate bringing me tons of annoyed Android folks (much like my tablet rant did last year).

I started using Android last December with the HTC Droid Eris.  My decision came after watching a friend really enjoy the use, a small amount of personal hands-on time, and the excitement about the platform itself.  Eight months later, and other than the vision of an open platform for smartphones, I have nothing but disdain for the current Android phone landscape.  I find the devices crude and clunky, the product experience weak, and the overall state of the platform in “advanced beta” at best (if enough people clamor in the comments, I’ll write another post on just that topic).  Granted, I am a product purist and I have one of the weaker Android devices on the market, but I’ve had a chance to use every one of the current “state of the art” phones other than the Droid 2, and my opinions remain the same.

Yet they are selling them by the bucketful.  So I can’t possibly be right on this, as 20+ million other people are defying my belief that the phones themselves are lousy and barely usable.  Or can I?  After lots of discussions with Android users, I’ve divided up the Android world into the following buckets:

  • Android Newbies: This group is new to the Android experience, and are probably very happy with their experience, despite lots of frustrating glitches at times.  Why?  Most of them are upgrading from feature phones (the industry term for a non-smartphone), and this is likely their very first experience to having the magic of Interwebbing on their phones.  What’s not to love?  That part comes soon.
  • Android Haters: Having used their Android device for weeks-to-months, they have come to notice all its shortcomings, ranging from inconsistent back button use to awkward keyboards to erratic input sensitivity, all things they failed to really notice during the 30 day window to return the phone with no commitment.  Furthermore, they are likely annoyed that their phone became outdated in less than 90 days since purchase – a phenomenon not well appreciated by tens of millions of people, despite what the tech community thinks. They/we are trapped, waiting, hoping, watching…
  • Android Fanboys: The folks who think Android just freakin’ rocks, man.

What’s wrong with a Fanboy? Nothing at all.  I have nothing but good feelings for anyone who loves any product, platform, service, etc – it’s fun to love stuff.  However, I’m more than a little concerned about (1) more newbies buying products they shouldn’t, (2) building up the “Awesomeness” of the platform to the tech industry, when it’s not really at the same caliber as it could be (and indirectly letting device makers off the hook to build better products), and most importantly – (3) my phone sucks and I’m pissed, so this is my chance to vent.

Here’s some tips how to tell the Fanboys from the rest. Take it all with a grain of salt.

  • They preach about openness.  The Android fanboy will tell you multiple times about how the platform is open and how that’s a great benefit to everyone. Let’s be totally blunt for a second: the average technology user cares about “open” products roughly zero.  If they did, then companies like Microsoft, Apple, etc would never have become the behemoths they are.  Openness is great in theory, and in very specific instances can be a huge factor, but it is not, in and of itself, a “benefit”.  My “open” phone has a lousy app marketplace, requires third-party software to be regularly usable, has no inherent easy way to play media files, and actually shipped with not one, but two different native email applications (one of which actually disappeared on its own during the last software update).
  • They show you widgets. “Look ma, its the weather! On my Phone!” Android devices are capable of displaying widgets, which are unquestionably one of the coolest things about Android.  But there’s only a few really useful widgets, and they do not, in any way, make up for the rest of the Android experience.  I have a widget called “Agenda”.  When I view it, it takes up to 5 seconds to show me my agenda (during which it doesn’t say “loading agenda”, it says “NO agenda”.).  Ditto for my Stocks widget, Mail widget, etc.  Don’t get me wrong, I love the widgets, but they alone do not a good phone make.
  • They ignore the little details. My “send text message to my wife” shortcut on my home screen is very cool (shortcuts, after widgets, are a very cool element of Android).  But when I click on it, it brings me to a “send message” screen, with my cursor highlighting the “To” field, resulting in me starting to write my text in the wrong place (it should be the “message” field).  Not a big deal, right?  There’s tons of them. Now compound that little experience to all experiences and you’ll get a better picture.  It’s as if every edge possible could be the rough version.  But Fanboys don’t care, they’ll trivialize these nuances or tell you they’ll be fixed in an upcoming version (more on that in a moment).  Here’s the thing: it’s the little things that matter when it comes to product experience!  If every single time I send a text message I have to go through an inconvenience, how on earth can this be “awesome”?
  • They know the difference between Android versions and implementations. For those unaware, Android is a rapidly evolving platform, which at the surface sounds really great.  But it isn’t great to most consumers who are buying phones for their use now, and who don’t want to have to think about things getting fixed in the future.   I’d make the analogy to early days of Windows, except when you buy a Dell or an HP (or, shudder, a Vaio – wow, been a while since I went there!), you get a product that works consistently, with some extremely subtle nuance in specific applications.  In Android, a Froyo with Sense is different than an Eclair with Blur.  Yup, that was a technically accurate statement. The problem here is the very core, the baseline experience simply isn’t good enough, and Google is trying to fight the very upstream battle in mobile of getting manufacturers to not differentiate against each other.  Lastly, since there’s upgrades coming all the time, it’s impossible to know if the phone you buy today will do the things Android is promised to one day do.
  • They justify carrying huge phones. Have you seen the Evo or Droid X?  Massive.  Practically as big as my iPad (no, not really, calm down).  Maybe if the platform included a great video delivery experience (translated: or any video experience) this would make sense.  Instead, you get a huge brick and are left to figure out what to do with it on your own. Worst of all, the bigger phones are the “good” ones, leaving consumers with the awkward decision between buying something convenient versus a house phone. The moment a device isn’t pocket-sized, it’s competing against non-phones, but yet the Fanboys overlook this every time.  And if carnies can’t hold it, I don’t want it either.  And while I’m at it, can someone explain how 2-3 hours of use with a fully charged battery is considered acceptable??
  • They make a big deal out of commonplace stuff. Here’s a recent review of the HTC Hero, which used no fewer than three sentences to praise the headphone jack.  Yes, the headphone jack.  And so you don’t have to read it, just know – it’s just a headphone jack!  In the words of a fanboy: Woot!1!!
  • They get excited about hot-sounding but generally impractical features. Translating voice into text messages?  Sounds awesome.  Now use it.  This piece sums it all up nicely.  In all truth, you really can build some amazing things with Android, I don’t deny that at all.  But if you don’t have the basics working amazingly well, it doesn’t matter.  It’s like having sprinkles on your hot fudge sauce on your ice cream on your 7 layer cake only to find out the cake is liver-flavored.

And now for the clincher

They compare against the iPhone, all the time.  Greatness is defined by what you are, not by what something else is or isn’t.  I wrote this entire post without referencing the iPhone (until now), as I have no interest in comparing the two (I personally have never owned an iPhone, for the record).  I have no idea what Android does “better” than an iPhone, I don’t care, as it doesn’t improve my experience one bit.  But Fanboys do.  Fanboys can’t not bash the iPhone to make a point (here’s an article with 18 references to the iPhone alone). The iPhone being a closed system doesn’t help me decipher bizarre icons littering my experience.  The iPhone dropping calls doesn’t help me accidentally hang up on callers because the logic to process touch events handles them after rendering new activities (translation: I am clicking a button on the screen, a call comes in, and the place I had just clicked was “ignore call”, and the phone decides that my click was to ignore the call, not whatever I was doing before.  This is poor design).  The iPhone having a death grip doesn’t make my onscreen keyboard more usable.  So I’ll say it again: Greatness is defined by what you are, not by what something else is or isn’t.

Google TV vs Apple TV? I don't think so…

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My guest on Fox News' Gadgets and Games is online!

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Big thanks to Clayton Morris for having me on his show last week.  We talked a lot about Google TV, as well as some iPad cases and some Android chat.  I had a few Skype/headset technical difficulties, but overall it seemed to work quite well!  Was on with esteemed guests Ross Rubin, Dan Costa, and Jeff Pulver.

Thinking about Googling my TV

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Google, Intel, and Sony have apparently teamed up (and Logitech too) to develop an Android-based platform for interactive television. Let me start my post with some important background points and disclosure:

  • I was a cofounder of Mediabolic, a startup who built a platform for connected devices.  While there I designed about a dozen “convergence” products (one won a best-of-CES award), and the company eventually got acquired by Macrovision.
  • I was an early employee at Sling Media, where I was responsible for developing the Slingbox (another best-of-CES award).
  • I once interviewed at Google for a position in a “google TV” role, but didn’t feel it was a really great fit for me personally (not to mention the commute).
  • I am currently involved with Boxee.TV, a startup in a highly-related field. There is some amount of overlap here, though that is in no way related to this blog post.
  • I’ve also worked with VUDU, Clicker.com, DivX, and others on “future of TV” systems, services, and products.
  • I was on the original working group committees for UPnP (AV) as well as DLNA (even before it was called that).

Through the above experiences, I have seen a lot of failure and some success in the “connected TV” space.  But mostly failure.

It’s a space where techies dream, entrepreneurs try, and companies fail. The list of failed convergence companies is notably longer than the list of successes. It’s a field where even Apple, the current king of the world when it comes to entertainment technology, can’t get a reasonable foothold in the home.

Most of the failure is due to deeply entrenched systems heavily controlled by huge corporations with little interest or need to innovate.  While we can yell and scream about how bad a job the Cable/Satellite companies are doing at future planning, the blunt reality is it’s hard to argue that it’s necessitated.  These megacorporations can drag their feet, and deploy mediocre DVRs and HD services, and consumers (for the most part) are satisfied with their experiences.  Further, due to their current business structures, the concept of opening up the market to third-party devices, content, services, or applications is not just daunting, but likely unprofitable.

When I consider the opportunity in the digital home, I am convinced it cannot come about by directly competing with traditional broadcast models. Broadcast TV, and all the services with it, are generally easy to use, convenient to pay for, and effectively “good enough” for most people – making “better than current TV” offerings a significant challenge to bring to market.  Historically, the only thing to attract the attention of consumers beyond their existing entertainment solutions are:

  • Transformative content playback experiences. From VCR to DVD was one example, and from standard definition to HDTV is another.  The key word here is transformative – it can’t just be “better quality”, as evidenced by virtually all other introduced formats and technologies based around content.
  • Notably difference content offerings. Again, moving up to HDTV-enabled set-top boxes was a natural flow, game consoles are the other shining example of a successful category.  Boxes that simply deliver “more of the same” or “stuff you can get elsewhere, now get it here (e.g. digital pictures)” are typically not big hits.  Consumers have to see some kind of service that’s worth the extra money.

Everything else has failed to make a dent.  Most “Internet Set Top Boxes” have been, and will be failures.  The typical logic that brings these products to market goes something like “consumers are about to cut the cables for their Internet content, and really hate watching it on their computers.”  The evidence behind this claim?  It’s in the same folder with the WMD evidence the government started a war for (zing!).

I’m very curious as to the potential from Google, Intel, and Sony.  Intel has wanted in on the “connected TV” for a long time (disclosure: they were an investor in Mediabolic), and has never really executed very well.  It’s not to say they can’t, but it’s safe to say the space is far far away from their core DNA.  Sony too has stumbled frequently in this space (here’s their version of a convergence device). Logitech? See Sony. And then there’s Google.

Part of me thinks Google believes that all devices are effectively the same, and their (limited) success in the phone market implies opportunity in the TV market.  Another part of me thinks Google is just so big they take on any sector they see opportunity in.  But most of me thinks Google wants to get firmly entrenched in the biggest advertising market there is – television.  And as hard as doing phones might be, doing TV boxes is much much harder.  Here’s why:

  • Phones play highly restricted media types.  Converged TV devices are expected to play all media types.  This topic alone is probably worthy of a blog post, but trust me when I say – it’s hard.
  • Consumers buy new phones on a recurring basis (multiple times a year in some countries). Consumers replace TVs infrequently, and buy TV “accessory” devices only a couple of times per decade. While the market is huge, it’s hard to get new devices into the home.
  • Carriers are motivated to push new devices and services into the hands of their customers, it’s part of their business model.  TV service providers are not motivated to do so (as discussed above).
  • As much as phones are “closed systems”, a manufacturer is able to purchase equipment and get a device certified and get it on the network without too much involvement by a carrier.  While the path is actually similar (CableCard Tru2Way certification), the realities for both the manufacturer and, more importantly, consumer are much much worse.
  • Again, as stated above, consumers are generally dissatisfied with their phones (a problem unlikely to go away) and are excited about new ones.  Consumers literally dread changing equipment in their living room – even us geeky dads with cool quadrophonic sound.

Now with all that said, I’m truly excited about the future of converged entertainment in (and out) of the home. I remain mostly cynical about seeing any real change anytime soon.  I think there are a few companies who have built the right foundation to make some inroads, but I’m hoping everyone involved is prepared to win their “realist” and “slow and steady wins the race”  badges over the next few years-to-decade (or longer).  Can Google be the catalyst of change, or will they just be the next in the long list of companies who tried and missed the mark?

How Google Can (and Must) Fix the Android Market Experience

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The Android Market (droid’s equivalent to the iPhone App Store) is fundamentally broken. It’s a poor experience from start to finish, and exemplifies the grace with which Apple builds hardware and software products.  Unfortunately there’s no easy way to take screenshots directly on the device, so I’ve scraped around the ‘net to find images to reflect the issues I have.

Part 1: Finding Apps

Like most sites/services, finding apps works via Search and Browse.  You can Search for something by word/term, and see apps that match – it works “ok” but not super impressive.  Browse, on the other hand, is weak. The world is divided into Applications and Games.  Games has the following categories: “All”, “Arcade & Action”, “Brain & Puzzle”, “Cards & Casino”, and “Casual” – no sports, racing, music, RPG, strategy, or pretty much anything after the letter C. Once browsing, you must sort, either by Most Popular or Newest. This means that once popular, something will stay popular.  There’s no way to sort, or filter, or even view simple things like “most popular this week”, or “highest rated” or anything else. This dramatically impacts a user’s ability to find new good apps, since there’s just no view for that.  And this is from Google, the uber-kings of data.

Once you find an app that seems interesting, the next step is trying to decide if you want it / it will work.  Every app has a name, publisher, # of ratings, # of downloads, description, and comments.  NO SCREENSHOTS or anything, but a description.  The comments are sometimes useful, but typically not, as you’ll often see “crashed on my droid” or “new version seems unstable” or some other complaint.  The problem with these kinds of complaints is because of all the different Droid configurations, there’s no way to tell if the comments/ratings apply to your own device.

What Should Google do?

  • Explicitly add and require screenshots of all apps
  • Allow sorting by more fields (Recently popular, Highest Rated, Most Downloaded, etc)
  • Create more categories and/or sub-categories
  • Require developers, commentors, and all other data fields to be governed by device type (i.e. allow me to see top-rated apps specifically voted on by Droid Eris users, not all Android users)
  • Clean up the Featured Apps interface, as it is really poorly done
  • Make the Android Market Website have a “send to my Droid” button (as opposed to the current site, which is inherently worthless)

Part 2: Installing & Updating Apps

The installation process itself is fairly straightforward, once you find an app, you click the big Install button, then you are shown a cryptic screen with a bunch of warnings that you rapidly learn to ignore, then click OK.  My big complaint on this process is the aforementioned “car alarm” warnings.  I make the car alarm analogy because, much like the loud annoying car alarms we hear on random streets at random times, we pay them absolutely no attention anymore.  Which is inherently the opposite objective of a warning!  But with phrases like “Your personal information – read contact data” and “Phone calls – modify phone state”, there’s just no sense behind it.  It might as well show “PC Load Letter” and have the same amount of effectiveness.

My other gripe is on updating apps.  Since we’re still in the early stage of Droid application development, a lot of programmers are pushing frequent updates to their apps. This is great from a “shiny new toy” perspective, but getting annoying from a “stop showing me lots of alerts” perspective.  Also, there’s no way to update multiple apps simultaneously, nor auto-update an app.  And, since most developers at present are not displaying changelogs it’s hard to figure out if the update is worthwhile or not.  Further, it’s very unclear as to whether or not the comments/rating on an app are relative to the most current version or not. Lastly, and most dominant in the category of “how I know this is a Droid and not an iPhone experience,” every time I update an app, I see the warnings about that app. Every. Time.

What Should Google Do?

  • Make the warnings less technical sounding and more clear/comprehensible. “Modify phone state” is virtually meaningless to me, whereas “Make a phone call automatically” is pretty clear English.
  • Remove all the warnings that are “commonplace” – I inherently assume an app is capable of doing things like connect to the Internet, prevent my phone from sleeping, etc.
  • Allow users to “skip” an update, or enable auto-update for any given app.  Also allow users to update all apps.
  • Require that all upgrades/new releases of apps have explicit lists of what’s changed since prior version
  • Have ratings/comments be associated with both the “overall app” as well as the “current version”.
  • Only show the warnings screen when the new version of the app does (important) things that the previous version did not do.  In other words, if I’ve already installed Google Voice, which is capable of Making Phone Calls, and there’s an update to it, I don’t need to re-confirm that I want to allow it to Make More Phone Calls.

Part 3: Buying, Rating, and Uninstalling Apps

For the complaints I’d read, I was surprised at the overall seamlessness of purchasing an app through the Android Marketplace/Google Checkout process. Other than some confusing messaging, the step-by-step process worked the first time through it.  That said, I was disappointed it didn’t autofill any of my personal information (not even my name).  Also, there was a lack of clarity with regards to the fact that my credit card was “saved” by Google Checkout, with no clear way as to how to only do a one-time purchase.

Rating applications is easy, but per my aforementioned comments, needs more criteria.  My rating should get tied to the specific version of the app, and the platform I’m using as well.  Overall the rating/comment system is fairly thin, and could use improvement.

Uninstalling applications from an Android device is one of the more awkward experiences of the system.  There’s no “uninstaller”, instead you navigate back into the Market, find the app in My Downloads, then uninstall from there.  This is mostly awkward because everything else in Droid is either a click-and-drag or a long-click – so the navigation/usage paradigm you learn by using the system all of a sudden doesn’t come into play.  Now in reality I’m being a little dramatic, as once you’ve learned it, it’s easy, but it’s just another example of the kluge-like nature of the marketplace. Then again, if it’s so easy why does it take 9 steps on an eHow page (they don’t show the same path I use, but that’s also kind of the point)?

What Should Google Do?

  • Enable one-time payments that do not require saving credit card data!
  • Enable payments directly through mobile carriers (this should go straight to my Verizon bill) and/or third parties who work with carriers (for example BOKU, who is one of Stage Two‘s clients, but if anyone thinks I’d write this long a post just to reference a client in parentheses of another point, you clearly have too much time on your hands).
  • Moderate user interface “cleanup” and optimization for the checkout process
  • Again, fix the rating/comment system.  Include the “this comment was/wasn’t helpful” feature as well
  • Put an Uninstaller “app” inside Android, and let the user click-and-hold an app to invoke a menu (would make more sense than the current method anyway)

Conclusion

To be clear: There are some great apps in the Android market (current fave’s: Amazon, Evernote, Twidroid, wpToGo, Shazam, Robo Defense, Advanced Task Killer, Lookout) .  Droid is not a terrible platform. But there are some major user experience gaps today, and based on the seemingly endless list of new Droid devices slated to ship in 2010, improvement must happen soon.  I’m also not a fan of the numerous versions of Droid and the various enhancements built by Motorola, HTC, etc.

While Apple might get criticism for their closed-system nature, it most certainly allows them to build devices with consistently known experiences. Either Google or their manufacturers will need to do the same if they truly want to compete in the SuperDuperSmartyPantsPhone category.