I recently read two articles that underlined my long-time viewpoint on applications, devices and developers.
A lot of factors come in to the decision of whether to develop for a platform. It can be the accessibility to programming interface and talent poll, platform capability, application characteristics, cost and overhead, etc. Nevertheless, the dominant criterion is the volume of shipment. If a platform is sold like hot cakes, it is definitely worth taking a look. But the usefulness of this rule of thumb decreases dramatically from this point. The mystery lies within the percentage of addressable and target demographics among the user base of a particular platform.
As volume shows itself as an absolute number, yet it is a relative term. Look at this article from more than three years ago.
http://www.engadget.com/2008/02/11/whats-an-iphone-14-3m-windows-mobile-phones-sold-in-the-past-s/
I knew it had a wrong argument when I saw it three years ago. But I did not realize how wrong it was. In 2008, Windows Mobile shipped more than 16 million units of smartphones, roughly a quarter of what Nokia had shipped for the same category. Windows Mobile had more developers than iPhone OS or any other smartphone OS at that time. Microsoft was the number two smartphone OS provider and Windows Mobile was the number three smartphone platform. The number however did not carry it further. BlackBerry caught up from behind in 2008 and stood firm as number two smartphone platform (23M units in 2008 and 34M in 2009). It, too, lost momentum.
Many users of BlackBerry and Window Mobile phones are in for the access of corporate email. When the user population is so fixated on getting one thing, how can any application developer add any value to the platform? I had a colleague who said he could not get used to the touch screen of iPhone. He missed the qwerty keyboard of his old phone. When I asked what kind of applications he used on his phone most of the time. Unsurprisingly, it was the email. Being an application developer myself, I would not poll his opinion on user experience of a small device. Such a consumer is not among my target audience. This fact pretty much cut the majority of Microsoft's 16 million or BlackBerry's 23 million of 2008 out of the equation. After that, it hardly represented a volume of interest.
HP/Palm's WebOS would serve as a contrast. It has, in my opinion, an equally capable platform as any other OS, and a set of elegantly designed programming interface. But, alas, it has no volume.
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/48888.php
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9215832/Developers_not_phones_driving_mobile_banking_apps_
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9215832/Developers_not_phones_driving_mobile_banking_apps_
A lot of factors come in to the decision of whether to develop for a platform. It can be the accessibility to programming interface and talent poll, platform capability, application characteristics, cost and overhead, etc. Nevertheless, the dominant criterion is the volume of shipment. If a platform is sold like hot cakes, it is definitely worth taking a look. But the usefulness of this rule of thumb decreases dramatically from this point. The mystery lies within the percentage of addressable and target demographics among the user base of a particular platform.
As volume shows itself as an absolute number, yet it is a relative term. Look at this article from more than three years ago.
http://www.engadget.com/2008/02/11/whats-an-iphone-14-3m-windows-mobile-phones-sold-in-the-past-s/
I knew it had a wrong argument when I saw it three years ago. But I did not realize how wrong it was. In 2008, Windows Mobile shipped more than 16 million units of smartphones, roughly a quarter of what Nokia had shipped for the same category. Windows Mobile had more developers than iPhone OS or any other smartphone OS at that time. Microsoft was the number two smartphone OS provider and Windows Mobile was the number three smartphone platform. The number however did not carry it further. BlackBerry caught up from behind in 2008 and stood firm as number two smartphone platform (23M units in 2008 and 34M in 2009). It, too, lost momentum.
Many users of BlackBerry and Window Mobile phones are in for the access of corporate email. When the user population is so fixated on getting one thing, how can any application developer add any value to the platform? I had a colleague who said he could not get used to the touch screen of iPhone. He missed the qwerty keyboard of his old phone. When I asked what kind of applications he used on his phone most of the time. Unsurprisingly, it was the email. Being an application developer myself, I would not poll his opinion on user experience of a small device. Such a consumer is not among my target audience. This fact pretty much cut the majority of Microsoft's 16 million or BlackBerry's 23 million of 2008 out of the equation. After that, it hardly represented a volume of interest.
HP/Palm's WebOS would serve as a contrast. It has, in my opinion, an equally capable platform as any other OS, and a set of elegantly designed programming interface. But, alas, it has no volume.
