Comments on: Kogan Agora Android Phone Hits Major Snag http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/kogan-agora-android-phone-hits-major-snag/ Upgrade Your Lifestyle Tue, 24 Nov 2009 01:10:37 -0800 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.5 hourly 1 By: Kontra http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/kogan-agora-android-phone-hits-major-snag/#comment-58046 Kontra Sun, 18 Jan 2009 22:58:48 +0000 #comment-58046 The iPhone has climbed to the top of the most popular smartphones in the U.S. with a single model. Except for a very small list of obvious hardware differences between the iPhone and iPod touch, Apple's mobile platform by now offers a uniform market of 20+ million users, all carrying an identically configured device. Same industrial design, same OS, same multi-touch UI, same iTunes multimedia content, same DRM, same peripherals, same purchasing process, and same coherency that has already resulted in 10,000+ apps and half a billion downloads at the App Store.<br /> <br /> iPhone developers do not have to worry about differing UIs or device configurations. They don't have to accommodate all kinds of input devices from trackballs to multi-touch to stylus. They don't have to invent their own syncing or notification systems. They don't have to negotiate for different app stores. And as Kogan found out too late, they don't have to worry about "compatibility and interoperability in the near future" in the form of varying screen sizes and resolutions.<br /> <br /> Ironically, if the iPhone platform can fail to dominate the smartphone market because it's too closed, the Android platform may fail because it's too open, as I explain here:<br /> <br /> "Agora phone exposes Android's Achilles Heel"<br /> <a href="http://counternotions.com/2009/01/19/agora/" title="http://counternotions.com/2009/01/19/agora/" target="_blank" ref="nofollow">http://counternotions.com/2009/01/19/agora/</a> The iPhone has climbed to the top of the most popular smartphones in the U.S. with a single model. Except for a very small list of obvious hardware differences between the iPhone and iPod touch, Apple's mobile platform by now offers a uniform market of 20+ million users, all carrying an identically configured device. Same industrial design, same OS, same multi-touch UI, same iTunes multimedia content, same DRM, same peripherals, same purchasing process, and same coherency that has already resulted in 10,000+ apps and half a billion downloads at the App Store.

iPhone developers do not have to worry about differing UIs or device configurations. They don't have to accommodate all kinds of input devices from trackballs to multi-touch to stylus. They don't have to invent their own syncing or notification systems. They don't have to negotiate for different app stores. And as Kogan found out too late, they don't have to worry about “compatibility and interoperability in the near future” in the form of varying screen sizes and resolutions.

Ironically, if the iPhone platform can fail to dominate the smartphone market because it's too closed, the Android platform may fail because it's too open, as I explain here:

“Agora phone exposes Android's Achilles Heel”
http://counternotions.com/2009/01/19/agora/

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