Blang!

Just a quick follow up to my post from yesterday about just how disruptive Android is going to be. I spotted a story today on Engadget that talks about how Motorola is planning to put Android on it’s set top boxesматраци.

As an interesting side note; the article correctly points out that it’s even harder to deal with cable companies than cellular companies. But, keep in mind, cell companies are only now starting to bend since Apple demonstrated it had the power to transform their business.

Cable companies are still arrogant. They sit on their comfortable monopolies printing money paying little attention to emerging trends and doing no innovation. Do they not realize that TV over IP is about to transform broadcast and cable? If we could ever get decent bandwidth, who would need cable?

If anyone had doubts about the impact Google is having on the mobile space, the Mobile World Congress (MWC) should have put those doubts to rest.

Ad revenue from Android phones are the fastest growing segment of the mobile ad space and mobile carriers are starting to make some disturbing pronouncements such as Vodafone chief Vittorio Colao declaring that they may start to charge search engines for access to their network. Cell phone carriers are true “bellheads“. They just can’t fathom a network where they don’t control every aspect of it. I’m just dieing to see what happens when Vodafone cuts off their customers from Google (”What? Your network doesn’t have ‘The Internet’?!?!).

But I digress. The point of this post is that even though the iPhone still gets all the media attention, Google’s Android is the one gaining market share and making the most waves in telecom circles.

And it won’t stop there. Android’s openness is poised to make it the most disruptive technology this decade. Unlike the iPhone which only runs on devices developed, sanctioned and released by Apple, Android can run on anything. Soon it’ll be popping up not only on phones, but netbooks, laptops, TVs, desk phones and absolutely anything that device manufactures want to put an interface on.

Android won’t just challenge the smart phone market, but it has the potential to make inroads into every consumer technology out there; tipping over everyone’s apple cart as it goes.

” Google Inc. is set to offer its free Android mobile-phone operating system for computers, opening a new front in its rivalry with Microsoft Corp. by challenging the dominance of the company’s Windows software. Acer Inc., the world’s second-largest laptop maker, will release a low-cost notebook powered by Android next quarter” [full story]
carrier to noise ratio

Android was a slow starter but is continuing to make waves… Inching closer and closer to that dream system.

MTS released a zinger of a press release today attacking Bell and Telus. Here is a couple of highlights with my comments:

“Granting the Bell and Telus request would also put Canada directly at odds with the emerging international consensus that an open access model is the optimal means for broadening competitive choice for broadband customers.”

Open access?! This must have been written by someone on the Allstream side of the business because you can reset assured nobody at MTS even knows what open access means. But wait! It gets better:

“Compared to most of the industrialized world, Canadians already pay higher prices for slower Internet speeds.”

And nowhere is that more true than in MTS’s home territory. If MTS is so eagar to provide faster, cheaper internet, why don’t they start with Manitoba?

I’m floored by these statements, not because they’re wrong, but because they’re 100% right! MTS continues to be the beast with two heads. The Allstream head is a “nethead” that gets this whole internet thing, and the MTS head is a “bellhead” that represents the worst of “big telco” arragance and poor service.

I’m just glad that someone at Allstream understands what’s at stake and is doing something to counter the rest of the ILECs. Maybe there is hope for Canada after all?

In recent posts I’ve been lamenting the lack of the “perfect device” (one that’s the size of a phone but has capabilities of laptop, including docking to a mouse, keyboard & monitor). I’ve also debated which of the major companies would win this battle (Microsoft, Google, RIM, or Apple). I’m ready to declare a victor.

And the winner is (or will be); Google Andriod!

Even though Andriod has yet to have any major devices make it to market, the momentum is now unmistakable. Motorola, Nokia, and Samsung have phones released or in the works; but more importantly, so do companies like Acer (who just announced that they are working on several Andriod devices) and HP. That’s the critical cross-over that will win this fight. The openness of Andriod means it will dominate the vast majority of devices ending the iPhone and Blackberry dominance.

The only things standing in the way is to crack the Telcom dominance over wireless data.

As predicted, the first netbook running Andriod has been released. The WiFi networking is to be expected, but the real “killer” feature would have been 3G networking. Of course then you’d need an affordable data plan.

Just because I like patting myself on the back, here is a story about a device I predicted earlier this year.

“Hewlett-Packard confirmed Tuesday that it is testing Google’s Android operating system as a possible alternative to Windows in some of its netbook computers.”

Of course there are a couple cautions about this story; It’s April 1st so it could be a joke and it’s only in testing so it may not see the light of day.

Hot on the heels of my posting on the future of mobile devices comes a story on Venture Beat describing how they got the Google operating system Andriod running on an ASUS netbook.

Android’s Linux core seems to be giving it an early advantage due to Linux’s easy portability and vast hardware support. The article doesn’t mention it but some netbooks have support for 3G sim cards which just makes compelte sense.

I want to point out that a 3G enabled netbook running Android is still not the dream device I’m looking for but it’s getting close. The essential component of the dream device is the hardware. It must be cell phone sized but when docked, become a fully functional workstation (keyboard, mouse, full sized monitor etc.)

Netbooks aren’t the hardware solution. he netbooks are really just crappy laptops. Too big to carry around and with few of the “mobile” featuers that a smart phone would have.

They key aspect of the article is the discussion about how many manufacturers see Andriod as a replacement operating system to Microsoft based systems.

I’m waiting… Up until now I’ve been patient but I’m starting to get antsy. This should not be that difficult!

Apple’s iPhone, Google’s Android, the Blackberry whatever-is-out-now, blah! They all show the occasional flash of brilliance but in the end they all have the same fatal flaw. No matter how good they are at doing their thing while “mobile”, they all are horrible at non-mobile computing.

Not just mediocre. They are truly, sincerely, abysmal at anything approaching a desktop replacement and that means no matter what device you own, you are forced to own at least one other system where you do the bulk of your computing.

Therefore I make the following prediction: The first device maker who comes out with a mobile device that also has a docking station that supports an external monitor, keyboard and mouse, will blow the rest of the competition out of the market and control the path of computing for the next 5 years. (As a side-effect, the operating system on this device will become the dominate OS).

Picture it, a device the size of an iPhone that you plug into a docking station and instantly you get a full-size display, mouse, keyboard, audio headset, Ethernet, the works! It’s effectively a laptop the size of a phone.

I no longer need any other device! No desktop, no laptop, not even a desk phone. My one device does it all. And when I pull it out of its base, it still does it all (albeit on a smaller display).

Who could it be?

Apple? No. Ironically, I don’t think this device will come from Apple. They are stuck with the iPhone and unless they have some super-secret plan to merge OSX and the iPhone they are firmly rooted in the two separate worlds; Desktop & Wireless. This is about merging and I see no sign of it from Apple.

Google? Maybe. Android has some great things going for it and it has Linux at its core. This implies that it might be possible to come up with a full Android desktop operating system. It certainly has possibilities but Android is still in its infancy and even though most hardware makers announced they will back it, there hasn’t exactly been a deluge of hardware devices. Still, Google has no legacy baggage to deal with and can easily continue to develop Android until it becomes a fully functional desktop operating system. It also has the advantage of an open architecture which means the platform could improve very rapidly.

Microsoft? Not Likely. From an OS perspective Microsoft actually has a better shot at merging the two worlds than Apple by leveraging their existing desktop and mobile platforms which have always been designed to be similar. But unfortunately Microsoft doesn’t make hardware which means they would have to rely on one of their hardware partners to come up with the device and none of them ever do anything cutting edge. And besides, nothing kills innovative buzz better than a Microsoft Logo.

RIM? No. Blackberries are for mobile computing, period. RIM has never made any noise about desktops and while their devices do what they are designed for very well, they have zero chance of transitioning that into a full-blow open operating system that works on the desktop.

Someone else? No. The key to success is convincing people that they device has the backing to become a new standard. Only the above mentioned companies command enough respect from the buying public to convince people to change their entire daily computing lives.

Can you actually imagine a day when the only device you use does not run any Microsoft software? Surprisingly, most people can’t. Yet many people are very close to it now with thier Blackberries and iPhones without even realizing it.

A recently released report details the idea that consumers may be better off if they own their own fibre.

The CBC story has some more details. Of course the funniest part of the CBC stories are always the quotes from Bell defender Mark Goldberg:

“I can buy a water heater for a couple hundred bucks from Home Depot but I don’t want the problem of it,” says telecommunications industry consultant Mark Goldberg. “If I rent it, it’s not my problem.”

It’s the TUBES Mark! The TUBES! If you rent them then when they get clogged up it’s not your problem!

Maybe, rather than having enough capacity, the water company should “throttle” the flow to certain people depending on what they are using the water for?

And do people still rent water heaters? That’s an idea straight out of the 70s… Which probably explains why Mark is so comfortable with it. Why buy something when you can pay many more times it’s actual cost to rent it and get crappy service as a bonus!

By the way, I shouldn’t make it sound like I think this experiment will work. It won’t. Not because people won’t be interested but because they will still be stuck buying connectivity from the same providers! Just because you own your own fibre, even in a community network you still have to connect it to the internet and since Canada has no real competition, they will probably end up with Bell or one of the cable companies as their provider and what is the point of that?

Update (I posted these comments on the CBC Story): For anyone posting saying “I’m in!”, you haven’t read the story. The service doesn’t exist and will not exist because even if you own your own fibre you still have to buy internet service from someone and guess what? The ONLY providers are Rogers and Bell who will ensure it is priced so prohibitively it will never be competitive.

The foreign companies thought the ownership rules would continue to be relaxed but it didn’t happen and they gave up and sold their investments to the incumbents. So now we sit with companies who have figured out it’s much cheaper to throttle than to add capacity.