I'm not particularly an Apple fan boy, but I do admire their design decisions. Apple has an _uncanny_ ability to take a block of marble (a set of features for a phone) and grind away at it until what's left is a minimally complete set of features that are (in general) perfect.
I was definitely the first to gripe and complain when the iPhone didn't have cut and paste, but I'll also be the first to admit that they _did_ get it right when they finally released it.
I was also one of the many loud voices complaining that I couldn't run backgrounded apps, but when you look at the HTC phones coming out right now running Android and full backgrounding, and you hear the stories of how the battery runs out by the early afternoon, you start to realize that, it is true, "it is easy to add <feature x>, but it is hard to get it right" (or whatever it was that jobs said in his announcements)
I'm not saying that the features in Android aren't impressive, they very well may be, but Apple's design decisions don't just go after "impressive", they try to go after "perfect", and sometimes getting features perfect means cutting them until you're ready
Your entire post is targetted as "features that developers want" and you're right, you need a healthy ecosystem of developers, and Google is certainly building one. However, you also need a healthy ecosystem of consumers who love the product, and at the end of the day, I really think most developers will go to the platform where they can reach the widest audience. Apple cares about their consumers first, and their developers second (and sometimes it feels like second last), but it seems to work for them...
edit: of course, sometimes apple's PR doesn't respond to consumers as best as it could (i.e. the "you're holding it wrong"), but I'm trying to focus on design/product decisions
"However, you also need a healthy ecosystem of consumers who love the product, and at the end of the day, I really think most developers will go to the platform where they can reach the widest audience."
This is exactly what I was thinking. It is an interesting question- do consumers follow developers or do developers follow consumers? It seems that those agreeing with the OP would argue the former while those disagreeing would argue the latter.
Unix has developers but no consumers. Android is the same. The iPhone was a huge success before it got any developers. The Wii had very few games on launch compared to competing platforms. And the recent resurgence of the Mac seems to have been led by consumers. There were not that many Mac apps in 1998 when the iMac came out.
History seems to suggest that developers (especially those who want to get paid) go where the consumers are.
The only exception is, perhaps, DOS/Windows? I'm not sure I remember the history right though. It could be that consumers switched to Windows because of the cheaper hardware, and developers followed.
Android has no customers? Seriously? There are thousands of Android devices shipping every day. I still see no way that this doesn't end with Android in a (far and away) market dominant position. They're already well on their way.
Do Android users buy even a tenth of the apps that iOS users do? If simply having the greatest number of handsets in circulation supporting a particular platform equalled victory, Java-based feature phones or Symbian handsets would have trounced the iPhone years ago.
Do Android users buy even a tenth of the apps that iOS users do?
Probably not yet.
I'd blame this mostly on the low number of "killer" apps in the android market.
Many good apps have arrived, but the number is nowhere near the appstore, yet.
Here's the kicker, though: This will inevitably change. It is already changing. When you compare the android market today versus a few months ago then you'll notice quite a number of high-profile apps have appeared.
As a developer you can't ignore android anymore. You're not building an iPhone app nowadays, you're building an iPhone app and an android app.
And it won't be long before the priorities reverse.
Once android devices outnumber iPhones by 10:1 the question will be whether you build an iPhone app along with your Android app - not the other way round.
Remember Apple is at its absolute peak today. There's nowhere to go from here in terms of features or polish.
Sure, they can add voice recognition, brush up the hardware even more and perhaps they'll even find another killer-feature or two to add. But HTC and Google are breathing in their neck now, the gap in user experience is closing. From there the primary differentiating factor becomes price. And competing with HTC on price will be tough[1].
Remember Apple is at its absolute peak today. There's nowhere to go from here in terms of features or polish.
Sure, they can add voice recognition, brush up the hardware even more and perhaps they'll even find another killer-feature or two to add.
There's nowhere to go in features or polish unless they add more features or polish more - what kind of argument is that?
From there the primary differentiating factor becomes price.
Because Apple have always been driven out of markets by competitors with lower prices...
I think it works the other way around as well. It's not a coincidence that Apple marketed the 3G and 3GS models with the "There's an app for that" line - the sheer number of (useful) applications in the App Store is a huge selling point for the iPhone and a real asset for Apple.
I was definitely the first to gripe and complain when the iPhone didn't have cut and paste, but I'll also be the first to admit that they _did_ get it right when they finally released it.
I was also one of the many loud voices complaining that I couldn't run backgrounded apps, but when you look at the HTC phones coming out right now running Android and full backgrounding, and you hear the stories of how the battery runs out by the early afternoon, you start to realize that, it is true, "it is easy to add <feature x>, but it is hard to get it right" (or whatever it was that jobs said in his announcements)
I'm not saying that the features in Android aren't impressive, they very well may be, but Apple's design decisions don't just go after "impressive", they try to go after "perfect", and sometimes getting features perfect means cutting them until you're ready
Your entire post is targetted as "features that developers want" and you're right, you need a healthy ecosystem of developers, and Google is certainly building one. However, you also need a healthy ecosystem of consumers who love the product, and at the end of the day, I really think most developers will go to the platform where they can reach the widest audience. Apple cares about their consumers first, and their developers second (and sometimes it feels like second last), but it seems to work for them...
edit: of course, sometimes apple's PR doesn't respond to consumers as best as it could (i.e. the "you're holding it wrong"), but I'm trying to focus on design/product decisions