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Harry McCracken (Time Mag) thinks iOS won the app wars

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  Harry McCracken (Time Mag) thinks iOS won the app wars RS Wood  <rswood@therandymon.com> - 2014-02-25 10:16 +0000

#898 — Harry McCracken (Time Mag) thinks iOS won the app wars

From the "the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat" department:
Title: The Smartphone App Wars Are Over, and Apple Won
Author: Harry McCracken
Date: Fri, 21 Feb 2014 17:48:39 -0500
Link: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/timeblogs/nerd_world/~3/eYSLW9j1FWE/
Podcast Download URL: http://1.gravatar.com/avatar/d00b8afbf4bba3a317a55a6b0fae46e3?s=96&d=http%3A%2F%2F1.gravatar.com%2Favatar%2Fad516503a11cd5ca435acc9bb6523536%3Fs%3D96&r=G

Every month or two, I perform a little ritual: I remove the SIM card from
whatever phone I’m using at the moment and pop it into a different model. My
goal is to get plenty of hands-on experience with all the major mobile
platforms — a mandatory qualification for anyone in my line of work, as far
as I’m concerned. Whenever I land back on Android, as I did when I switched
from my iPhone 5 to an HTC One this week, I’m reminded of the things I like
about Google’s mobile operating system. It’s far more customizable than iOS,
letting me do things such as opting for a third-party keyboard like Swype.
It’s neatly integrated with Google services such as Gmail and Google Maps.
Its overall level of polish, once so crude, is now at least in the same ZIP
code as iOS. But… Actually depending on Android to do real work reminds me
that even though both iOS and Android have over a million apps, they haven’t
reached parity when it comes to the ones I’m most interested in using.
Leaving iOS behind means doing without Secret and Facebook’s Paper, for
instance. And racing Anki’s amazing little cars is no longer an option. In
some cases, an Android app is available, but lacks key features: The one for
TiVo, for instance, lets you manage your DVR’s recordings but doesn’t, like,
let you watch them. In other instances, an Android version is
feature-complete but not as elegant as its iOS counterpart, such as with
Instagram, which doesn’t let you pinch to zoom in and out of an image you’re
posting, Now, it’s rare for the creators of a significant app to simply
ignore Android altogether. Secret, for example, is apparently trying to hire
someone to work on an Android version even as we speak, judging from its job
listings. But for many companies, the Android version is what you get to work
on after you’ve shipped the iOS one, leaving Google’s ecosystem in a mode of
permanent catch-up. Even though[image 1][image 2]

Links:
[1]: http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=techland.time.com&blog=5290478&post=181725&subd=timenerdworld&ref=&feed=1 (image)
[2]: http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/timeblogs/nerd_world/~4/eYSLW9j1FWE (image)

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