DISQUS

"As you sow, so shall you reap". I hope Microsoft get it in spades... ;-)

I'd say the other key measure is whether as a developer you can make more or similar money off the Nokia Ovi store than you can off the iPhone store. This is THE key fact that decides where as a developer you put your resources - indeed where all developers who are not led by emotions or subjective opinion, put their resources.

Kip's opinion aside from being highly subjective (perhaps he has invested heavily in iPhone development?) ignores the fact that Ovi store will offer vastly vastly vastly (vastly) more potential buyers than iPhone store EVER will (even on S60, but especially with S40 too). Now I'm inclined actually to agree with Kip's implication that Ovi store is currently significantly less good than iPhone store. Cool, fair enough. But you need to offset that, and the point you make Ewan, against first consumer numbers, and secondly the wider range of content you can produce and sell, including the different languages you can develop in for Ovi store. All of this factors into the equation "does it make sense for me as a developer to put my resources into a.) iPhone store or b.) Ovi store?"

I'm hoping they're WinMo based, just to read your reaction ;-)

Ewan,

You're a bit Jeremy Clarkson, in that you see things as black and white, shit or great. Or at the most with one shade of grey.

> those 250 million Symbian handsets are more or less useless to developers.
> most of the 250 million installed base are lost to application developers

I don't accept that's true to the extent you make it out to be, and I suspect you're basing that on gut feeling, and industry experience, and dare I say it, slight hubris, which you're collectively mistaking for fact. Particularly looking forward to the future, as the ripples from increasing app awareness on iPhone reach other platforms, and Nokia Ovi app Store hits and becomes known, I really don't think you can write off the installed base so quickly and easily. But for argument's sake, lets say you write off 85% of it, if it makes you happy :) What's left still equals about the total installed base of iPhones and iPod Touches together (and lots of those never download apps). My point being you can't just say 250 million Symbian installs are inconsequential while the very low millions of Android are. Sure Android potentially has big sales potential (and I mean that as written) if lots of things come together. But really, please don't make the mistake of equating developers wetting their collective pants over an OS that has a string of ifs and maybes between it and sucess, and is really only slightly better technically than S60 (from a developer's point of view - and remembering that all pro-Android comments you've seen from developers does not equal the collective view of all developers), with 250 million actual devices in people's hands. Nokia are dunderheads with some things, we all know that. But I'd say the combination of Ovi Store + Nokia sales figures + S60 installed base has way more potential than Android, and yes - that's even with me agreeing with all the other pro-Android comments to this blog, AND all the other anti-S60 comments.

Also, yes the S60 UI can be argued to be not up to iPhone standards by some way (though I've seen arguments to the contrary, by experienced industry watchers). If your term for that point on the scale is "shit" then fair enough. Again, in Mr Clarkson mode, you're operating in binary and writing it off. Not good enough. The fact of the matter is the millions who now own S60 devices (even just focussing on the newest ones) are not all returning them to shop and saying "this is shit! Money back please, give me an iPhone instead". No, those millions are sticking with and using those S60 handsets, and most quite happily despite being aware of the existence of the iPhone in the same universe they live in. a.) why is that? and b.) who cares why that is - it's a fact whatever the reason. It's ridiculous to suggest that getting an app onto an S60 phone for a normob is anywhere near impossible - that's just simply not true. It may be more difficult than an iPhone, but it's WAY above impossible. And indeed is really quite possible, despite all the hassles.

As a developer I don't want to live in la la fantasy land. And an awful lot of Android developers are there right now. If it proves itself technically, and with sales routes to market that make money, and with getting millions upon millions of devices into people's hands, then as a developer I'll sit up and take notice.

The heart of the matter is that fickle techy geeks get over excited about the latest new tech, and think that it's curtains for everything that came before it. But that's not a sign of maturity or longevity, and many a tech bubble has been grown and then burst from such over-excited zealot's pronunciations.

More power to Android, and I'm not even saying "lets wait and see" - the early bird will catch the worm. But it hasn't caught it yet, and it may not even be worth catching in the end. And while we're on this axiom-spree, two more relevant ones: "A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush" and "Fools rush in where angels fear to tread".

;-)

> Symbian and Windows. Gah.

Look, I love Android as much as you (well, maybe not) - I'm a developer and I've studied the SDK and OS in depth and admire them for sure. But let's just re-skew things back to reality a bit here :) Symbian's really very good these days, is in over a quarter of a billion devices out there vs. Android's few million at very most and can be programmed in multiple languages including widgets, C, J2ME, Python, C, Basic and C++ where Android can only be programmed in Java - and this makes a big difference to prospective developers.

Android is the young upstart here with an insignifcant installed base, an app store that by all accounts is broken and making no significant money for any developers, and really has everything to prove.

Yes, I have high hopes for it too, but there's a need for a reality check in some quarters I'd say ;-)

I'll give you a different perspective to these myopic folk with their iPhone obsession (it's paying their bills, they can't see the wood (reality) for the trees (iPhone hype) so it's forgiveable).

I'm one of those wierdos who as long as the small matter of paying my bills is covered, loves developing software to benefit people - literally as many people as possible, instead of developing to satisfy some insatiable desire for more and more money and material possessions.

The iPhone with it's probably eternal 0.1% global market share of all handsets is as irrelevant to me as it is to the other 99.9% of mobile users in the world. Honestly if a tiny subset of 1st-world developers and media want to get this excited about a handset with 0.1% market share? They're welcome to it, and good luck!

Me? I'll put my efforts into developing where it really matters, where it can really potentially make a difference.

Too right, tooooooo right. The problem with America is they don't realise how far behind they are in mobile - in the sense of what the actual handsets in the hands of the populace can do (iPhone is in the hands of practically no one, %-wise). Nokia has a lot to answer for. Their handsets (even S40 ones) are leagues ahead, but they're in few American hands. iPhone REALLY is not the answer, for the exact reasons implied above. As a mass market commercial proposition it's a pile of ess-aich-one-tee. Compare it with the cheap and cheerful Nokia's in people's hands the rest of the world over, that are WAY more capable than any elitist iPhone.

So, this is America, in mobile. Complete crap, or the iPhone (crap except for the stuff it's good at, and SO not a mass market handset). Even worse is America THINKS it's good at mobile due to it's internet leadership, and simultaneously is too blind and has too much ego to be aware of the real state of affairs in the rest of the world. Oh well, bless em. Let's hope things improve soon.

Apple should base the yes/no process on whether the app contains illegal functionality or content - that's what the law is there for. No other criteria at all. Simplifies and streamlines the whole thing. It's Apple protectionism that's the problem. This is very much like when AOL thought of themselves as the one and only gateway to the internet, and look how much longevity that model had.

> Nokia 6300 ... customers are not going to suddenly develop an appetite for widgets and apps any time soon

Are you sure? Why not? And why should iPhone customers be any different? My point being what if the 6300 (or any other handset) had an exact copy of the iPhone interface - by which I mean app discovery and use was as easy and pleasant as it is on the iPhone? I don't see how you can possibly make your assertion unless you can prove (or convincingly assert) that iPhone customers are drawn from a pool of people pre-destined to try and buy apps.

Sure people are attracted to one handset or another depending on various factors like easy of use, style etc. But if you make it nice enough and easy enough to try and buy apps on ANY phone, you will see significant numbers of people trying and buying. And if you make the actual app experience as good as those on iPhone, then I see no reason these numbers of triers and buyers should not come close or equal to iPhone.

Now, the upshot of all this is that if you have a great (possibly touch) interface to the app store (see the Visiarc deocuments demo video in the recent news on this site for proof S60 can be on a par with iPhone in this regard) then there is no reason something like Ovi Store can not give developers a huge potential userbase. And way above 2%. Of 300-400 million new customers a year. Yes, seriously. If the ingredients are right, the recipe will work. And this is not an all or nothing scenario. If the ingredients are partly right, the recipe will still work partly. And way above 2%.

This 2% thing sounds to me a bit like the boss of IBM saying there would only be a demand for maybe 5 computers in the whole world. Don't underestimate demand if things are presented and done in the right way.

Alex
phonething.com

I know I big up the potential of Ovi store above, but I completely agree with you James. Download! showed how bad Nokia can make things. They really have NO excuse not to make a good job of Ovi Store on either S60 or S40, and quite frankly make it as attractive and easy as iPhone appstore. If they fail on this, they fully deserve the consequences. It'll just be a shame for all the developers, and the potential. But still, lets wait and see.

You're missing this: http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/09/03/07/w...
and this: http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2009/03/apple...

and (in this article) you're ignoring the promise of Ovi store to at least be available on 300-400 million phones new a year (ignoring all the existing users that will be able to install the store) and offer multiple advantages over iPhone, e.g. not being limited to just apps.

And say I as a developer make some AMAZING new app, and drop it into the ocean of the iPhone app store - care to tell me how exactly any significant amount of people are ever going to find it, without me spending lots of money on marketing? Money I haven't yet had from the app which you promised me was going to be so successful? ;-)
I propose the motion that only a very very few iPhone app developers make any significant money (e.g. enough to pay the bills) from iPhone appstore these days.

I've been confused about this power issue for ages. OK, the iPhone has a major design flaw with a non-removable battery. But the phones that the other 99.9% of the world use (and that's an actual stat, not a figure of speech) have removable batteries. Which in my case means I carry a spare literally-£4-off-ebay battery which I literally don't notice in my pocket (I forget it's there) and just swap it in when needed. No need for clever but completely unnecessary 3rd party devices allowing me to use an AA battery. Or whatever.

Seriously - what IS the issue with battery power?

Ewan, yes totally agree with all you say about operator app stores. Clearly the numbers touted by them are outright lies (e.g. the 50 million), even if they don't realise that, they're just towing the party line.

It has got to be one of the biggest ironies in the world today that mobile network operators are among the people who understand mobile the least, or rather what mobile has become. (Heresy! Burn me at the stake!). They think it's about network interfaces, and voice calls. Yeah, sure it is. But it's also about mobiles being the next gen of personal computer, about software and services - that work, that are open, that are easy, that are accessible to developers (to develop) and users (to use) alike. And operators REALLY don't get this. People within them do, but not as a whole corporate mindset that actually changes things. I mean, just on the mobile web front, the amount of transcoder abuse that seriously damages developer efforts and user experience, is INCREASING. Despite the cries of developers and users.

Anyway. Agreed on the platform priorities - for today. iPhone 1st, then Ovi (but not launched yet), then Android. But it will not be long before Ovi will be unreachably out in front. The numbers alone across S40 and S60 will make Ovi store vastly more rewarding than iPhone. Based on what we know of Ovi store today.

One solution for operators will be for the existing big name app stores who know what they're doing, to run the operator app stores. So T-Mobile in the UK have the right idea with their recent announcement that Nokia's Ovi Store will power (or be rebranded as) the T-Mobile UK app store. That's more like it. If this works, other operators should follow the same model - and actually specifically use Ovi Store as that will net the greatest rewards.

Finally, it would be a real fallacy to think that all is bright and breezy in iPhone apps land. Cos it really, really isn't. And discoverability is part of the problem. There are now so many apps in the app store, that most developers have a real struggle to be found. In your example, you *knew the name* and what the app did, so of course you found it quickly. Most apps are not already known by most of their potential users. That's Huge Problem 1. Huge Problem 2 is Apple's app approval process is now completely out of control and collapsing rapidly.
Read this:
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/09/03/07/w...
and this:
http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2009/03/apple...

in short, new apps have a monumental struggle to even get in the iPhone app store. Let alone be discovered somehow. And if an app can't be discovered in the iPhone app store without being super popular already, or the name known, then a developer is looking at a huge and expensive marketing campaign. And where's the money coming from for that?

iPhone app store is not the goose that lays the golden eggs that you and others think it is I'm afraid Ewan. As a developer I'm betting on Ovi app store, as the numbers alone (300-400 million new *potential* customers a year, for content that's not just apps) mean far greater chance of success, and ROI.

Alex
phonething.com

Wow, sounds like an incomplete description of any Nokia Nseries or ESeries to me ;-)

We're quibbling about semantics here :)

The point is, and I don't see how you can deny it, for the forseeable future there will be hundreds of millions of S60, or S60-compatible phones (no way will any future merger ditch S60 compatibility given the current user base and technology investment). Compared with the low double digit millions of iPhones. I know which is the more important software platform by far ;-)

> Though the argument about S60 being deployed on hundreds of millions devices is a dud. Nobody'll be using S60 FP1,2,3 phones in 3 years so there goes all these 100ds of millions... And this was FP5...

So you're assuming all those owners of S60 FP1, 2 and 3 will definitely not replace them with handsets running a later S60 release, that all or most will go to a completely different OS from other manufacturers? Hmmmm.....interesting theory.... (!?!??)

Clearly we're speaking different languages... ;-)

> The iPhone *does* offer a better UI experience than *anything* S60 have ever done.

I wouldn't go that far, but I'd agree with your general gist, as regards the system UI. My point is *THE APP*. It's easily up to iPhone UI standards, even over GPRS. Thus showing it can be done on S60. Thus showing others can do it too, with decent design and engineering. Thus showing there's no excuse for Nokia not to be able to do it on the system UI.

Yes, on the 5800. As this site you write for just demonstrated. In the video. Above. ;-)

Isn't it more likely to be a case of how shit your provider's infrastructure is, and in that case why don't you switch? Also are you perhaps connected into an overloaded local exchange? Just wondering how representative your experience is of other people's experiences. I know in Wimbledon on Virgin Broadband I get better rates than this. Why not try Be Internet - they're supposed to be great aren't they?

> Secondly because anyone might think that an application significantly improves the UI to the point of being better than an iPhone.

You're right, it doesn't improve the overall UI to being better than an iPhone, how could it? - I almost think you're deliberately misreading the comments ;-)

But it does show that an iPhone level of UI experience is perfectly possible on other platforms - i.e. the IPhone is the current standard setter, and this app is now a standard setter on S60 Touch, proving iPhone like experiences are possible, that the iPhone is not automatically always better and with an incomparable UI experience, and that other apps, and indeed the general system UI on S60 touch, have no real excuse for not matching an iPhone level of UI experience. It's about design and engineering rather than being fundamentally impossible. Which S60 touch owners should be pleased about, app vendors pleased but challenged by, and Apple nervous about (as the UI is rapidly becoming the only significant thing the iPhone has going for it vs. other platforms).

Excellent - like all good stuff it just works, and gets out of the way.

So nice to see this on what will be by far the biggest touch platform in the world, S60 Touch. I also can't imagine the experience being any better on an iPhone (sorry but being able to pinch zoom is not significant enough), so it knocks the argument that iPhone offers a better UI experience.

With deployed S60 handsets in the hundreds of millions (rather than the 17 million of iPhone) these guys should do well :)

I reckon they should offer higher res TV out from NSeries (e.g. 640 X 480) - which those devices are capable of, and then Bluetooth mouse support in S60, and a clip on LCD screen, and together with bluetooth keyboards you have all the makings of a laptop - NSeries are easily powerful enough.

No need for a whole separate standalone laptop, they should leverage the compute power already in people's pockets.

Yeah, can't fault the iPhone's user experience, it really is fantastic. As an S60 user though I have always thought it was such a shame that Apple pointlessly ditched all those other features like J2ME, Flash, proper bluetooth, proper GPS/sat nav, multitasking, copy and paste etc. All those COULD easily have been integrated and not in any way negatively impacted the multitudes of normobs. And the camera really is an atrocity. It really, really is. No argument. I for one hate lots of gadgets - I want everything in one package. My Nokia N82 gives me a superb camera and video camera (yes - by standalone standards), as well as everything else, in one neat little package. For me, this outweighs the lovely iPhone UI.

It's just a big shame that Apple couldn't have seen fit to give us both - I would gladly have ditched my Nokia. As it is, my Nokia completely wipes the floor with the iPhone in all the areas I have mentioned.

And also - just a small dose of reality - 0.1% of phones in the world are iPhones. Lets not forget the literally 99.9% of other phone users in the world, eh? :)

Seen John live at a number of shows, always talks sense.

iPhone = 0.1% of all mobiles. Now we're talking. I love a hefty dose of reality :)

Yeah sorry you're absolutely right, it was a typo on my part, I meant to say "Fact is if you're a contract, or especially PAYG user and *without a flat rate data plan*, and you even dare think..." but didn't realise until after I'd submitted.

Anyway, agreed, there is some room for maneuver depending on a plan. But most/many people aren't on flat rate plans and even more have a fear of large billshock whether founded or not. And if you go abroad it's magnified 10 fold (the problem and the perception).

This all needs to change radically, which won't happen because it's operators we're dealing with here...

Further to my comment above, I was looking at CloudMade http://www.cloudmade.com and OpenStreetMap http://www.openstreetmap.org - both from the same guys, but the former is a commercial enterprise.

These guys seem to be really where it's at, at least in terms of good, open, reliable services. You should do an article on them Ewan :-)