Apple's iPhone paves the way for Android

As a telecoms commentator, I always find it's important to get things wrong occasionally. After all, if you were always right it probably just means you've been sitting on the fence or that you write a boring, predictable column. So I'm happy to report that I'm changing my position on both Apple's iPhone and Google's Android mobile platform.

Let me recap. Just before Apple unleashed its iPhone on a suspecting world, I made a bold statement that it would fail, at least in its first incarnation. Perhaps I should have just said I won't be buying one, because I don't like its closed nature and because it lacks 3G. But thanks to the hackers, we now know that there are hundreds of thousands of people around Asia that are willing to snap up an iPhone and, more importantly, they're loving it.

One grey vendor friend of mine that sells unlocked iPhones in both Bangkok and Singapore can't get enough of them to satisfy demand. The other day he managed to get a shipment, told a few friends via email and they were snapped up within the hour. Another friend who had managed to buy one earlier was an instant fan -- and not just because it made him the centre of attention everywhere he dragged it out. It was also because, finally, someone had made the mobile Internet usable. That alone -- making web sites easily viewable on a mobile screen -- should be enough to cement Apple's place in mobile history.

Another interesting stat I came across: Google is apparently getting 50 times more search requests from iPhones than any other mobile handset. That stat, according to the Financial Times, was so extraordinary that Google first thought it had made an error with its data. It hadn't and it just shows how much more people will use the mobile Internet if you make it easier for them.

Which is where Google steps in. There's no doubt that one of the keys to the search giant's success is the way it makes its services easy to use. Presumably, it will bring that talent to its mobile phone efforts. But more importantly, it can harness the immense power and developer base of the open source movement. Already that's happening, with many local software promotion boards across Asia getting behind it and Google offering significant prizes for developers through competitions.

To date, the two dominant smartphone operating systems -- Windows Mobile and Symbian/System 60 -- have not exactly attracted a fanatical user base. Get the open source community behind a mobile OS, however, and that's exactly what you'll have: a growing and fanatical base of users and developers. And as we have seen with Apple, fanaticism can go a long way.

In a recent research note by Saugatuck Technology, they pointed out that Google's Android and other Linux-based mobile initiatives, notably LiMo, are potentially disruptive influences on the mobile space. The main reasons cited were scalability and portability, affordability and maturity. Another significant point was the ability to work with other open software that can be delivered as a service, either from telecom providers or from pure-play SaaS vendors.

In short, Android (and LiMo) have "the ability (and promise) of becoming game-changing influences – and within a very short time," the research house stated.

If the introduction of the iPhone is any guide, users of mobile devices and services are looking for ease of use and better offerings than they have had in the past. Which is why I (now) think that Google's Android also has a great chance of following the iPhone and succeeding. -- Geoff Long

Google shouldn't fear Microsoft!

The iPhone was undoubtedly the tech story of 2007, given the number of column inches and blog posts it managed to generate. And despite only being two months into 2008, it would seem we already have a major candidate for this year's top tech story: Microsoft's planned takeover of Yahoo. Neither Jerry nor Steve has asked me what I think of the proposal, but if they did I'd politely tell them I think it's a dumb idea. If the takeover does go ahead, however, they should at least consider my suggestion for a new business name: "Microsoft!"

Seriously though, what makes Microsoft think it can compete better against Google with the addition of Yahoo? The integration of the various services alone will take more than a year to complete, by which time Google will have enhanced its lead even further, no doubt helped by the addition of the disgruntled top Yahoo talent banging on its door. And lets face it, there's a very simple reason why Google thrives while similar offerings from Yahoo and Microsoft struggle: it simply makes a better product.

It's not just about search either, although I regularly compare each of the big three offerings and end up coming to the same conclusions: Google turns up more, and more relevant, pages. Yahoo and Microsoft also both have comparable web-mail services, yet most of the tech-savvy users I talk to prefer Gmail. Similarly, its products like Google Reader encourage loyalty to the brand because they just work damn well.

Both Microsoft and Yahoo both have the services, but what they need to do is refine them so they work better than anything Google has and encourage users to switch. Again, some unsolicited advice: Imagine what Steve Jobs would do with the service and improve from there. Let's face it, if Jobs got hold of Yahoo you could guarantee that he would create the best user experience on the planet and scare the hell out of Google.

I like some of the stuff that Microsoft is doing with its Live offerings but I get confused by the various brands -- why have MSN and Live and Windows Live and Windows Live Mail and Hotmail and so on. And what is Windows Live Spaces? I'd wager the majority of users have no idea. Adding in the various Yahoo services and brands is going to confuse everyone even more.

And we haven't even started on the lead that Google is forging with the integration of its services as well as its software as a service offerings. As I've mentioned in this column before, I now make use of most of the Google online offerings and particularly like the way you can create things such as blogs, email accounts, web sites and so on off your own domain, making use of tools such as Google Analytics, Calendaring, Notebooks and the rest of it. I'm also starting to make use of the online apps like its word processor and spreadsheet offerings.

Microsoft, as many have pointed out, has no real desire to do something similar because of its cash cows in Windows and Office. Let's face it, if Microsoft had been serious about software as a service it could have made a better fist of it by now. It hasn't and it's unlikely to anytime soon. Yahoo, on the other hand, has no such existing market to protect and could have over time done a much better job in competing with Google (and still can), particularly with acquisitions such as Flickr and other Web 2.0 services.

Which all points to Microsoft-Yahoo being a great story but a lousy merger. I do think it's possible for someone to challenge Google's online supremacy, but I also think we'd have better competing services with all three companies in healthy competition. Here's hoping that's an outcome that can still emerge. -- Geoff Long

The Year of Living Online

For my final post of the year, I thought I’d highlight what, for me, was the most significant aspect: the move to working and playing online and taking advantage of many of the new web services out there. I’m not there yet, not by a long shot, but I finally got to experience the promise of broadband.

Key to that has been getting “decent” broadband. While places like Australia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Japan and South Korea are spoilt for choice when it comes to high-speed access, Thailand is like a lot of Asia in that coverage is still sparse, including in the capital Bangkok. So it was with great relief that I welcomed TOT broadband into my part of town this year for the first time.

The first thing to change was that I started using Google and its associated services as they were intended to be used – online. I know there are still many people who prefer to download their Gmail into a traditional email program, but for me it’s a better overall experience doing everything online, from where I can see which other Gmail colleagues and friends are connected and even kickstart a quick chat session when I need some information in a hurry.

It also makes things easier when travelling. Before I had multiple email accounts that I would divert to Gmail, which I considered my roaming account. Now I have ditched the other email accounts and just use predominantly Gmail. If I think I might need a certain document while I’m away, I simply email it to myself knowing that I will be able to retrieve in whatever city I am. I’m sure Yahoo and Hotmail are just as adequate when it comes to this, it’s just I happened to get hooked on Gmail first (although I’m making it a goal to get acquainted with the other services in the new year).

The other thing I like about Google is the associated services and how they’re all starting to work well together. This year I finally put my domain name (notshort.net) to use and parked it with Google Apps. Not only can I give family members their own email account, I’ve also started this blogging thang for the first time. I chose Blogger as my blogging platform mainly because it seemed to pick up more hits on Google’s search engine than other platforms. And thanks to Google Analytics, I can see how few people really visit the said blog.

Sticking to Google, its Reader is the best thing for reading RSS feeds by a long shot. I’d experimented with desktop RSS readers, but doing it online fits in better with the way I’m now working. And again, if I’m overseas I just fire it up and all of my regular feeds are there. I’ve also made limited use of its online word processing and spreadsheet offerings, though mainly to open up files for a quick look – if I want to keep them, I still tend to download them to the desktop.

I haven’t yet made use of any online storage services, but I’m sure that’s going to happen soon for backups.

Now lets get on to the fun stuff. Like a fair chunk of the Internet population, I signed up for Facebook this year. Great if you haven’t got enough procrastination aids at hand. And yes, I did get slightly addicted to begin with, although that addiction is starting to wane. Slightly. Probably the most useful aspect of it is keeping in touch with people in other states or countries. I’m crap at sending personal emails, so this one lets people see what I’m up to and send the occasional message. Not to mention challenging me to a game of Rock, Scissors and Paper, Pass the Soccer Ball and other mindless diversions.

I’m guessing that something bigger than Facebook will arrive in future, particularly a social network that lets you “own” your personal data, but in the meantime it’s probably the hottest social network going and I’ll still be there next year.

I’m also a fan of Live.fm, the music service that allows you to select an artist or group that you like and it finds similar music choices and plays them. Another audio service I’m enjoying is podcasts, particular The Podcast Network, which has hundreds of podcasts and new material coming all the time.

And I couldn’t not mention the other major fun diversion I’ve found online this year: fantasy football. I’m a recent convert to the round ball game, but this web service, which allows you to manage a team made up of players from the English Premier League, is addictive. Especially if you’ve got friends doing it and there’s a small wager involved.

I’ve also been playing around on the mobile Internet as well, as many readers of this column will be aware. As I’ve noticed previously, I think you first need to be on the broadband Internet before you can make use of the various services coming to the mobile Internet, as most (not all) seem to be versions of what you’re doing online already – mobile Gmail, mobile Facebook and mobile Fantasy Football sprint to mind.

And as I’ve also mentioned in the past, I still think mobile phones need to be more user friendly than they currently are. This was really put in focus by yet another new toy I’ve been using – the Linksys iPhone with Skype that is reviewed here. The Skype VoIP phone simply worked. No messing with settings or giving other family members a quick lesson in usage. Maybe that’s the type of experience that other iPhone offers too, although I won’t know until it arrives in Asia. Maybe next year.

In the meantime, have a great New Year and see you back here sometime in 2008. – Geoff Long

Mobile Internet doesn't need Google to succeed

Wow, November 19 and I still haven't posted for the month! Here's the first of a few to come, this one my take on Google's Android open source for mobiles project . . .

We’re entering an interesting time for the mobile Internet sector and I think there are enough encouraging announcements happening that will see it develop into something much more useable in 2008.

As I suggested a few months back, perhaps one of the lasting legacies of Apple’s iPhone is that it will push other players in the market to keep up with its innovation. We’re already seeing that – whether it’s a consequence of Apple or not – with much improved technology coming from all of the major players, whether its Windows Mobile, the Nokia/Symbian camp, RIM and its Blackberry, Apple itself and of course one of the most keenly-waited announcements of all – Google and its open mobile alliance.

Just a small sampling of the announcements that have been encouraging over the last month include Microsoft and Nokia getting together to pre-load Windows Live services on mobiles (not an exclusive deal, by the way), Nokia finally announcing its roadmap for touch-screen phones and a touch-screen user interface built into its Series 60 software, RIM adding new touches such as Facebook support for the Blackberry, and Apple relenting and allowing third-party apps for the iPhone (although only those that it pre-approves).

But the biggest announcement was no doubt from Google last week with its “Android” and the Open Handset Alliance, which features an impressive line-up of founding members. Rather than list who they are, it’s more instructive to list who’s not there: Apple, Microsoft, Nokia, RIM and Sony Ericsson. All powerful players, but then again the likes of China Mobile, Intel, Qualcomm, Samsung, T-mobile and Telecom Italia among the 34 founders of the Open Handset Alliance are not bad allies either (not to mention the mighty Google itself).

According to the Google announcement, the Android platform is (or will be) a fully integrated mobile “software stack” that consists of an operating system, middleware, user-friendly interface and applications, with the first phones based on Android to be available in the second half of 2008.

It said the platform will be made available “under one of the most progressive, developer-friendly open-source licenses, which gives mobile operators and device manufacturers significant freedom and flexibility to design products.” As its first move, the alliance will this week release an early access software development kit to provide developers with the tools necessary to create applications.

It certainly sounds like the real deal, but there are some things worth pointing out. For one thing, late 2008 is still a long way out when we’re talking technology and a lot of new innovations from the rest of the mobile industry will have happened by then. And as a number of people have mentioned that I’ve spoken to recently, bringing out a mobile operating system is no easy feat. Just think how long it took Microsoft to get Windows Mobile relatively stable and established, and even Nokia with Symbian and Series 60 has had more than a few hiccups along the way.

Open source mobile phones are not new, either. Efforts to get Linux on phones have been in the works for a few years now, but there’s nothing serious that has eventuated other than a low-level operating system that is really not that compelling. And those efforts and alliances involving the likes of Motorola still exist.

Another significant mobile device operating system, which is also open and with a massive developer community, is the PalmOS. There are literally thousands of mobile applications for the PalmOS yet it continues to struggle.

Given that it will not appear before the second half of next year, Android is not likely to have much effect in 2008 at all. But in the meantime I expect that the mobile Internet will become a lot more user-friendly. For example, one of the new services I’m trying out now, the Widset platform for bringing widgets, or small applications, to a mobile phone really does improve the user experience when it comes to accessing Internet on the phone. So too do things such as the mobile version of Gmail, which I’ve now downloaded on my mobile.

So perhaps the underlying operating system is not that much of an issue anyway – the real groundbreaking developments are those that are happening on the Internet. And I expect that they will have moved ahead rapidly by the time Android makes its debut. – Geoff Long

Google turns 10! (Trust me, it's true)

You might have read about Google's latest push for the enterprise space - beefed up email security and added compliance services for users of its Google Apps Premier Edition thanks to technology from the Postini acquisition. It also follows last month's news that consultancy firm Capgemini would start offering Google's online software to its business customers. Yet another sign that Google is serious about the enterprise sector, and some might argue a sign that the company is maturing.

It's funny you should mention that because a little-known milestone passed on September 15 that strangely got very little coverage - Google's 10^th Birthday. Actually it probably passed without notice because Google wasn't celebrating it. In fact, they prefer to say they're only nine years old, as they highlighted via their search page logo a few weeks ago.

But by my reckoning they're 10. That's because September 15, 1997 was the day Larry Page and Sergey Brin, two 24-year-old Stanford University students, registered the "google.com" domain name. A year later they incorporated the company, but given that it's an Internet company I reckon it's appropriate to mark the anniversary on the day the domain name was registered.

Perhaps they were not keen to celebrate because in the technology industry, 10 years is a long time. Many users still think of Google as the fresh newcomer that reminded the old-timers, most notably Microsoft, that every company reaches its peak and that it's downhill from there. Let's face it, nobody likes the sudden realisation that they're approaching middle age (trust me), yet that's precisely where Microsoft and its peers (the likes of Oracle and SAP) are today.

Now that it's 10, Google also needs to deal with its new maturity. Perhaps one of the reasons why it's sometimes compared with some of the more prominent startups, such as Facebook, is that nothing seems to ever get out of "beta". Take Gmail - I've been relying on it for a couple of years now yet it's still a beta project. So is the Google Calendar and others in the growing list of hosted applications that I (and I suspect many others) have now incorporated into business life.

Keeping something like Gmail in perpetual beta is a mistake. Why? Because these days Google is seriously courting the enterprise space, as demonstrated by the announcements referred to earlier, and many enterprises are not going to adopt a beta product. They want something that's been tested, then tested some more and that comes with a water-tight guarantee that it works. A system that proudly advertises that it's still in beta is not what the newly-appointed compliance manager wants to see.

It also explains why not everyone is convinced of Google's enterprise credentials. According to Burton Group analyst Guy Creese, while Google is making a major contribution to the adoption of SaaS solutions within the IT sector, he said its application suite has weaknesses that large enterprises cannot ignore, such as the product's lack of user roles, no departmental categories, and minimal records management as examples.

"Burton Group believes many enterprises will begin investigating SaaS offerings for collaboration and content due to Google's industry influence, but recommends organisations wait for market maturity, or look to more sophisticated offerings," he said.

And there's that word again: maturity. So let's not pretend Google is a fresh-faced startup. It's a 10-year-old company and it should not be keeping its products in perpetual beta, particularly if it wants to be taken seriously in the enterprise space. In the meantime, congratulations Google on a remarkable first decade! -- Geoff Long

Blog update

Well, I've been at this blogging thing for about two weeks now and got some things sorted. I actually tried it out under various names and platforms at the same time. While I really like Wordpress I've ended up on Blogger.

Why?

Mainly because of the intergration with Google. I found that when it came to searching for stuff that I'd written (exactly the same article), the posts in Blogger were easier to find on Google than those done via Wordpress. Don't know if they manipulate things to be that way, but that's the way it is.

Other areas that are easier because of Google owning Blogger are the way you can park your domain for free using Google Apps and it's very easy for Blogger to use it. I know you can do this with WordPress, but it's just easier in Blogger.

Another example is the "shared items" widget I just added to the blog today. I'm an avid Google Reader user, so when they had a tip on posting your shared items to your blog, I thought I'd give it a try. Basically you just press the "add to Blogger" button and it's all done magically. Quite impressive.

And before I get accused of being a Google lackey, please read my Time to reign in Google? piece.

Other stuff I've learned in my two weeks of blogging: It's damn addictive, a great procrastination aid when you've got deadlines looming, it's a lot of work but it's a lot of fun.

If you're still reading: A BIG THANKS!