Otte: staring into the abyss

Posted Jul 27, 2012 23:10 UTC (Fri) by Company (guest, #57006)
In reply to: Otte: staring into the abyss by jspaleta
Parent article: Otte: staring into the abyss

Now, if what you're saying was true, there would be absolutely nobody who'd use Android. Or Windows, for that matter.

Otte: staring into the abyss

Posted Jul 27, 2012 23:23 UTC (Fri) by jspaleta (subscriber, #50639) [Link] (2 responses)

Did I say use?
No... I'm talking specifically about corporate investment in the development of the UI layer. This has nothing to do with "use"

Google is the corporate backer of the Android UI code at this point. What other corporate entity is contributing back to the UI look and feel of Android? Or for that matter Dalvik as a framework element that makes that UI possible? Is there another software company that is making a sustained and continued investment in Android UI development?

-jef

Otte: staring into the abyss

Posted Jul 28, 2012 12:37 UTC (Sat) by Company (guest, #57006) [Link] (1 responses)

Ok, maybe that was unclear then. I meant that no company would build a product around Android or Windows. But lots of companies do that very successfully. Even though they have no say in the UI they ship. This is true in particular for Android, because Google themselves have bought Motorola to be a direct competitor to all other Android devices.

So your argument about the need to diversify the UI layer falls flat as far as I can see.

Otte: staring into the abyss

Posted Jul 29, 2012 13:58 UTC (Sun) by pboddie (guest, #50784) [Link]

You have plenty of "UI diversification" in Windows-based applications with no shortage of bizarre user interfaces for special purpose applications like digital camera image management tools produced by camera vendors. It would be better for the user if any necessary software were integrated into existing frameworks, but that obviously doesn't provide all the fireworks and spectacle that a heavily branded and poorly integrated program has to do to satisfy the product management.

You also have a lot of widely criticised messing around with user interface shells on top of Android, apparently. None of this work gets contributed to Android because the companies involved want to keep the supposed benefits of such work to themselves.