The mobile phone ecosystem is sick, and I don't see it getting better.
The fact that there is not a third choice is maddening. Even in the worst parts of the Microsoft era we had Apple as the underdog. Apple products had issues, but Apple die-hards at least could rest easy knowing that they were buying into a company who stood for something.
In the mobile space the underdog is Google; a company who sees dealing with people as an unfortunately necessity on the way to get to gobbling up more data.
I can't but feel that Android has sucked the oxygen of the space. I can't go out and buy a Tizen or Windows phone in large part because of Google's pathological Android licensing. Google force carriers to choose between their, supposedly open, ecosystem and shipping alternative OSes.
You are blaming the wrong company. Qualcomm is the company that makes it hard to do alternative software platforms for mobile. Even apple still licenses their solutions (they are working on their own modem but have not shipped that yet). The issue is to get your hardware + software solution certified for use on mobile networks. That's very hard and it's not a very fair game. It requires a nod of approval from operators and intellectual property from Qualcomm.
Apple simply plays the FOMO factor. They do deals with operators. And the deal is typically "take it or leave it and watch your customers jump to your competitors". When they first did that, a few operators were smart enough to say yes. The rest has since learned to do as Apple says. But even so, Apple pays the Qualcomm tax.
The rest of the phone industry plays this game by just sharing a lot of components (Google's Android, Qualcomm's hardware, Samsung screens, Sony camera sensors, etc.). Google has tried to get into that market directly by buying Motorola at some point and by doing their Nexus and Pixel phones. But they never really became a dominant manufacturer. Google is a supplier of mostly software in this space.
Out of all that stuff, Qualcomm is the one that has the keys to the ecosystem. You need 4G/5G compatibility, which they provide via their hardware and software. And you need to get your solution certified. Without that you have an interesting device that does not talk to a mobile network. Even if you manage to build your own version of that (which is hard, but e.g. Apple is doing it), you still need to get it certified and then after you succeed with that, you need to license a lot of patents from Qualcomm to actually ship it. The price of entry to the market is very high. Long story short, there are not a lot of alternatives in the market and a few that have issues being allowed in mainstream markets like the US for IP licensing reasons.
>>“I can't go out and buy a Tizen or Windows phone in large part because of Google's pathological Android licensing. Google force carriers to choose between their, supposedly open, ecosystem and shipping alternative OSes.”
I don’t understand how such a licence can be legal. Surely it is monopolistic practices? Yes, Apple exists at a consumer level, but at the level of phone manufacturers google has a monopoly on licensing mobile OS to manufacturers. This is abuse of their dominance to prevent competition from android forks.
Could the difficulty be around the duopoly? We mostly have laws about monopolies, there can be some push-back against monopolies, but with a duopoly everything "seems" right.
I see so many discussions on the internet, also on HN, following the same ritual. Apple does something bad, and people say "Just choose something from the competition, like Google". Then Google does something bad and people say "Just choose something from the competition, like Apple".
Writing legislation is hard enough for a monopoly, it’s probably near impossible for a duopoly. Especially when the consumers want to use what everyone else is using and network effects come in play.
I actually meant ignoring the consumer level and look at the manufactures as the customer. If you are looking for an OS to put on your new phone you are manufacturing, what choice do you have? Apple doesn’t license iOS. Linux isn’t a feasible product yet, Windows is out. That means surely Android is a monopoly at this level no?
How much is Google still investing in Android? The Android ecosystem feels stagnant since at least 2 years. It seems Google is content with Apple taking most of the hardware profits and them taking the ad dollars.
I wonder if this will backfire soon. Wasn't LG the OEM for some of their Pixels? Who is replacing them?
What about Apple's mobile processors outclassing Android?
The fact that there is not a third choice is maddening. Even in the worst parts of the Microsoft era we had Apple as the underdog. Apple products had issues, but Apple die-hards at least could rest easy knowing that they were buying into a company who stood for something.
In the mobile space the underdog is Google; a company who sees dealing with people as an unfortunately necessity on the way to get to gobbling up more data.
I can't but feel that Android has sucked the oxygen of the space. I can't go out and buy a Tizen or Windows phone in large part because of Google's pathological Android licensing. Google force carriers to choose between their, supposedly open, ecosystem and shipping alternative OSes.