About a week and a half ago, at the OpenStack summit, I was lucky enough to win a new Kindle Fire HD from the awesome folks at InkTank, which was quite serendipitous since I had a wish for a tablet for some time. The [frustrating] experience of using this device, on top of the already frustrating experience with the iPhone, made me curious to understand the state of the cloud, devices, and where this is all going. I got so curious that I also picked up Google's current flagship device, the Nexus 7, for the sake of comparison.
It seems that in the emerging post-PC era, several walled gardens are emerging, and that they are becoming more and more hostile towards each other. I really think this is much to the detriment of the consumers. I, for one, am becoming rather annoyed at the restrictions imposed on me, in the attempt to keep me inside one walled garden or another.
Since iOS and Android are different operating systems, there is fragmentation at that level, since an app must be written for one platform. But why are they so locked down?
Apple iDevices are totally locked down, so one cannot install apps except from the Apple appstore. Android devices, for now, seem to be less locked down; at least one can install apps from sources other than the default app store. (On that note, I'm actually a bit surprised that Amazon allows installs from 3rd party appstores.)
Even so, the user experience is not great. Using Google services on the iPhone is a frustrating experience. The google account is not a first class citizen on the iPhone, as it is on Android. The result being that one has to login with one's google account separately for every app. Google services are entirely absent from the Kindle. (I managed to install Chrome and Maps from a 3rd party appstore, but the functionality is far from ideal; the google account services cannot be installed unless one has root access, so the account management is missing.)
The catalyst for the lockdown might have been the appstore, which is brilliant but also evil. The appstore concept gives total control over the apps available; the platform users are a captive audience. When the Apple App Store was started, it really made the experience of using a smartphone into an awesome experience. Does anyone remember how ridiculously difficult it was to load software onto a Windows Mobile phone? The App Store made that all go away, as well as increased our 'security' ,supposedly, by protecting us from bad apps. The cost, however, is pretty damn high, when Apple, Google, or Amazon, charge a 30% commission! We have to assume that at least part of that cost, and probably most of it, is passed onto the consumers.
There is also a huge fragmentation of services, which is probably more worrisome. Apple removed Google Maps from the iOS. Amazon eschewed google services from the Kindle; no google maps, so instead they endorse some lame Nokia app; no google search, so they use Microsoft Bing, but for how long, we don't know. Amazon, Google, and Microsoft each have their own cloud storage systems, which is a pretty big lock-in once one has tens of gigabytes of personal documents and content on one of these. What is the logical conclusion of this trend? Will each of these walled gardens have to independently implement all of the required services?
How feasible is it for each of these companies to successfully execute quality services in such disparate areas as search, maps, email, cloud storage, etc? Not to mention the content distribution services for eBooks, music, video, movies, online courses, textbooks, etc?
Each of the competitor companies has its own strengths and weaknesses. Some of Apple's services, like maps and mail, are not very good, and it's unclear if they will ever match Google's or Microsoft's. Consuming content from the Google Play Store is not a great experience compared to Amazon's Kindle store. Apple has good educational content, much better than others. Google doesn't even offer music as far as I can tell. Amazon doesn't have its own maps, but has tried to build them before, see A9.
Why can't the users have the choice of using the best of breed service for each function, without jumping through hoops and achieving a suboptimal experience. What happened to using open standards so that these services can interoperate?
What we have to remember is that these devices are becoming extensions of their respective clouds; they are not general purpose computers. The cost of switching ecosystems is high, and is becoming higher. There is the cost of investment in apps, and there is also the data that is trapped in services in the cloud. How are consumers supposed to choose? The choice isn't just of the device, iPhone 5 vs Galaxy S III, but about the entire ecosystem! Is there even such a thing as the optimal choice?
Anyway, there's my rant. I'm very concerned about where this will all lead.
