[Thine Wonk]

I have been observing a trend recently and I think a couple of tech shows / streams have lead me to think that the following 2 things are likely to happen over the next couple of years.

Android to decline as many are moving away from Samsung, generally Android devices in developed countries will not grow, whereas Apple seem to have finally come up to speed and now have big screens, and features that IOS had previously been missing.

We don't need any more RAM past 3-4GB on a phone
We don't need anything more than a 4k screen, you simply can't see the difference in pixels by going higher on such a small device
CPU is as far as it needs to go for the next couple of years

Trends over the next 2-3 years I think:-
Material design and customisation becoming much more important over specs
Battery life will remain important
Android market share won't go anywhere except in developing countries

[Stereo Steve]

I don't quite get this. Android will have to be replaced by something won't it? Are you saying we will all go iOS? Not going to happen. Android has become bloated and I think they should have kept it pure and not let all these job lotters put crap all over it. So maybe Android is done for, I'll give you that. But we are not going to all iOS. I use Android but don't really like it. It works. I worry about security and that's not nice.

Problem is that all phone makers seem to think they are smarter and that their overlays will add to base Android. They are all wrong and should save their energy. Or Google should just stop them from doing it. If every phone had pure Android, a lot of issues about security, updates, VoLTE compatibility, WiFi calling compatibility and 1000 other things would go away. Lunatics running the asylum as usual.

[barker71]

My current concerns are that android seems to only get decent updates/patches if you own a nexus device.

The current nexus 6 was too pricey so hoping that the new 5 (2015) is better priced. The other issue is that the nexus battery life and cameras generally isnt very good (current nexus 4 owner).

This leaves me with a bit of a dilemma, iphones whilst expensive are well supported for at least 2 years. The battery life is generally good and the cameras better than most android phones.

I really want a windows phone as most of the lumias £200+ have decent cameras compared to similar priced android phones and the os appears to be better supported, but windows platform is in a state of flux so unsure about that too.

It does appear clear that apple really do have the smartphone segment tied up very well at the moment indeed.

[oilman]

Until IOS come up with phones that are sub £200 with an open architecture, android is here to stay.

Actually, the bigger potential threat to android is windows 10 phones, if it catches people's imagination.

[enapace]

I completely agree with this Samsung have not done anything good since really the S4 last couple of years has just been a minor increase in spec for no real additional improvement. Android is so bloated this days it's not real and is so fractured that it doesn't work properly. Lack of updates no uniformity etc is just some of the reasons I switched to iOS. Open architecture isn't truly needed on a phone it's not like a PC for vast majority of people they like iOS because it properly works and android need to do the same.

[omnidirectional]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Stereo Steve

I don't quite get this. Android will have to be replaced by something won't it? Are you saying we will all go iOS? Not going to happen. Android has become bloated and I think they should have kept it pure and not let all these job lotters put crap all over it.

Yes, that is a problem. I like Samsung products and I like Android.. but I'd never have a Samsung phone because of their TouchWiz system. I think that has done more harm than good for Android. Equally I avoid HTC and others who pile a load of bloat on to their phones.

I wish you could choose when setting up a phone whether to use stock Android or the manufacturer's customised version, which is usually just bloated rubbish.

[Thine Wonk]

Quote:

Originally Posted by oilman

Until IOS come up with phones that are sub £200 with an open architecture, android is here to stay.

Actually, the bigger potential threat to android is windows 10 phones, if it catches people's imagination.

I'm not saying it's going to go away entirely, but that in developed countries the sale of Android devices is going to stabilize or even decline and that Apple will be the beneficiary.

Leo Laporte said last week "Samsung killed Android" and I can't help but agree, in part. It's not going to disappear, but I think we'll see some decline.

[ThisGuysGood]

If it's not an iPhone, it's not an iPhone...

[barbeler]

This is bad news to me, because I absolutely hate my Nokia Lumia with Windows and was planning to get a Samsung Galaxy S3 Mini as soon as my contract ended (not fussed about whether it's S3 or S4).

I wouldn't be seen dead with anything made by Apple.

[klendathu]

The random lottery of Android updates is the biggest issue .

Some people are still stuck on Kit Kat FFS .

[ShaunIOW]

I moved from Android to Blackberry recently and love its security and customisation (and the desktop software is superb - Samsung/Apple take note), the fact I can also run all Android Apps on it without any bloatware and a lot of Googles snoopping is also a bonus eg. Skype says it needs Google Play Services to run, but just dismiss the warning and it works anyway. I just wish Blackberry would make more of the fact you can access both Blackberry and Android apps as I'm sure their popularity would soar, and bring out a slightly better phone than the Leap as I think they look and feel better without a physical keyboard.

[Thine Wonk]

I have been on Android since about '09, but even I'm not sure if my next phone will have the Android OS.

A lot of people think Samsung / Touchwiz is Android and they don't even realise there are cleaner, simpler and nicer UI's which are kept up to date but those Android native devices like the Nexus are really only sold in relatively small numbers to developer or tech types.

[barbeler]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ShaunIOW

I moved from Android to Blackberry recently and love its security and customisation (and the desktop software is superb - Samsung/Apple take note), the fact I can also run all Android Apps on it without any bloatware...

Thanks for the tip. I'd actually forgotten about Blackberry, but will certainly investigate further.

One think I really detest about Android is the stupid naming of their updates. Do they think all their users are 5-year-old kids?

[enapace]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thine Wonk

I have been on Android since about '09, but even I'm not sure if my next phone will have the Android OS.

A lot of people think Samsung / Touchwiz is Android and they don't even realise there are cleaner, simpler and nicer UI's which are kept up to date but those Android native devices like the Nexus are really only sold in relatively small numbers to developer or tech types.

And that is death of android right there Google should never of allowed these UI Skins they are absolutely awful I haven't seen one which works completely perfectly. I remember the S5 running a quad core and it was still laggy as hell because of poor optimisation and that is same across many android devices.

I'm not an Apple Fanboy I know sometimes it appears that I am but it's more actually down to fact I want an enjoyable mobile phone experience and iPhones deliver that at present the best of what I've seen.

[oilman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thine Wonk

I'm not saying it's going to go away entirely, but that in developed countries the sale of Android devices is going to stabilize or even decline and that Apple will be the beneficiary.

Leo Laporte said last week "Samsung killed Android" and I can't help but agree, in part. It's not going to disappear, but I think we'll see some decline.

Every technology reaches a maximum point, and declines (gas lamps, vhs, cds etc).
In time android will decline. This is not a supposition, but a cast iron certainty.

You may not be old enough to remember the classic betamax versus vhs war. VHS was an inferior technology, but won the war because it was cheap.

Thus, I have to disagree that Apple will be the beneficiary, partly due to basic market economics, and partly because they are locked into the same technological topology trap as Android.

The inevitable future will belong to the entrepreneurs who break the mould (eg a thought controlled operating system - ok scifi here yet but in my life I have seen staggering developments).

[Thine Wonk]

Quote:

Originally Posted by oilman

Every technology reaches a maximum point, and declines (gas lamps, vhs, cds etc).
In time android will decline. This is not a supposition, but a cast iron certainty.

You may not be old enough to remember the classic betamax versus vhs war. VHS was an inferior technology, but won the war because it was cheap.

Thus, I have to disagree that Apple will be the beneficiary, partly due to basic market economics, and partly because they are locked into the same technological topology trap as Android.

The inevitable future will belong to the entrepreneurs who break the mould (eg a thought controlled operating system - ok scifi here yet but in my life I have seen staggering developments).

Well actually betamax wasn't long enough to put a movie on unless you put it in long play which lowered the quality to below VHS I believe? Therefore it was substandard to consumers. Much too late they brought out a longer play format, but by then the VHS marketing was so strong, expensive licensing costs for Betamax were another factor.

I'm not sure the same principle applies for software OS, Linux, Windows and OSX are all around and have been for years, decades. Android and IOS will be around but I think generally Apple is gaining from Samsung's loss and generally there seems to be a suggestion that Android is struggling a bit in developed markets at the moment and there isn't a positive vibe about Android, especially the custom skins of it by the biggest device makers.

Fragmentation, security issues, ship and then dump approach and very variable custom skins like Touchwiz with bundled software and bloat all seem to be things consumers are turning against.

[ThisGuysGood]

In my opinion you have an Android when your maybe 10-17 years old. Then once you grow and need a proper sensible device that just works as you need it to then you switch to iOS and Apple.


Also once a new Android phone hits the shops within day's the makers are already touting the next version. It seems to suffer a release it / sell it / forget it mentality from manufacturers.

[nafanny29]

Apple for show, Android for a pro.

[oilman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ThisGuysGood

In my opinion you have an Android when your maybe 10-17 years old. Then once you grow and need a proper sensible device that just works as you need it to then you switch to iOS and Apple.


Also once a new Android phone hits the shops within day's the makers are already touting the next version. It seems to suffer a release it / sell it / forget it mentality from manufacturers.

Re first comment - what absolute tosh.

[oilman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ThisGuysGood

In my opinion you have an Android when your maybe 10-17 years old. Then once you grow and need a proper sensible device that just works as you need it to then you switch to iOS and Apple.


Also once a new Android phone hits the shops within day's the makers are already touting the next version. It seems to suffer a release it / sell it / forget it mentality from manufacturers.

Re first comment - how can you make such a statement. I would love to see your source of demographic statistics to back this up - in my opinion, this is complete tosh.

[Thine Wonk]

This wasn't intended to be one of those threads, just people's thoughts on where Android is heading and what people think about the possible move away from specs wars in favour of design and customisation as there's not a lot of need to push the specs boundaries much further at the moment.

[gardensleeper]

Quote:

Originally Posted by nafanny29

Apple for show, Android for a pro.

How so?


By the way, i'm loving this thread. Really informartive and with well reasoned, powerful arguments

Let the tech wars continue!

Btw, worth clarifying whether this debate has any geographical bias? Eg very likely for Apple to dominate in the richer higher gdp countires, with Andriod dominating in more emerging economies.

[Mass Corona]

Quote:

Originally Posted by klendathu

The random lottery of Android updates is the biggest issue .

Some people are still stuck on Kit Kat FFS .

I agree! If all phones were more standardised in their operating system and then things added on top by the manufacturers then one update could go out to all phones like Windows 10.

I'm on Kit-kat and it's very unlikely there will ever be an update for my unknown phone.

There is nothing that annoys more people than feeling like they are being fleeced into buying a new phone every 5 minutes and the worry that when you spend all that money on the latest phone, you have no idea how long it will be before it's out of date with no hope of an update.

[Deep_Thought]

Quote:

Originally Posted by oilman

Every technology reaches a maximum point, and declines (gas lamps, vhs, cds etc).
In time android will decline. This is not a supposition, but a cast iron certainty.

You may not be old enough to remember the classic betamax versus vhs war. VHS was an inferior technology, but won the war because it was cheap.

Thus, I have to disagree that Apple will be the beneficiary, partly due to basic market economics, and partly because they are locked into the same technological topology trap as Android.

The inevitable future will belong to the entrepreneurs who break the mould (eg a thought controlled operating system - ok scifi here yet but in my life I have seen staggering developments).

Yes and in more recent times there was the Blu Ray vs HD DVD. I was surprised Blu Ray won that format war, but as with the VHS / Betamax, it pays to sit on the sidelines sometimes.

Remember Sony Minidisc? Only knew one guy who bought into that format.

How long before we have to replace our Blu-rays with Red-rays I wonder?

Back to the subject in hand, I'd bet Android over Iphone purely because I know dozens of people with a PC and no one with an Apple Mac.

[Thine Wonk]

The problem is an OS isn't a format and I think the VHS vs Betamax assumes there would be 1 deciding platform. It is a really bad comparison as we were looking back at the days when video shops or Woolworths would be selling content on 2 different sized boxes to effectively play video media. The whole operating system software platforms is another, we've had 30 years of Microsoft Apple and Linux platforms without the need to have a decider. Whilst a standard app format might happen, the OS is more platform than format.

A great example of the sentence above is browser extensions / plugins, Firefox has just announced that they are going to be moving over to the Chrome standard (which EDGE & Opera has also chosen), meaning that most extensions can be written once with very little alterations in code between browsers. So in the future the different add-on formats will disappear in favour of 1 format, but the browsers will still be separate platforms bringing separate experiences and functionality, performance, UI.

There won't be OS that wins, there will always be a few for the foreseeable future or until technology changes significantly, but I think Android is on the back foot at the moment and has had a setback because of the likes of Samsung and some of the recent issues.