BlindReason submits: This is another way of asking, which is better- an open architecture where choice and technology prevail or a closed architecture where quality and user experience are cultivated?
A lot of people now look at the Apple (
AAPL) "ecosystem" and argue that it's so powerful and so appealing it will be impossible to unseat. I don't think that's the likely outcome of the mobile OS wars.
No question, I use Apple products and plan to keep using them but I think their market power has peaked. On average if you look at the NPD numbers, the average Apple product sells for 2.7 times the average PC cost. A PC with even the exact same components sells for far less than the same components with the Apple moniker. That's a historically high premium, even for a "product of the decade".
But with early adoption, people will always value a more controlled user experience. Carriers, hardware and software makers and consumers are all fascinated with the App store and want to build their own as a method to replicate Apple's success. Well, in the beginning of any technology adoption cycle people want structure and the App store was a big part of preserving quality.
I'd argue however, that the smartphone experience is rapidly becoming mass market and main stream and as that trend continues, people will want more choice, more hardware and performance. In short, in early cycles, Apple's strategy of control is usually going to be superior but as a technology becomes mainstream, it fails.
We've seen the model for this in Apple's early years, where people favored Apple over the PC. People thought Apple was unbeatable but they were eventually driven to the point where people starting looking at the cash value on the balance sheet.
Eventually as people became comfortable with the PC World, they didn't want to be controlled anymore. Even the least savvy technical users wanted more choice in hardware and applications as their comfort level rose.
That's exactly what Android represents, and is why my bet is on Android over not just Apple, but Blackberry, Symbian, Windows and Palm (
PALM).
To appease the disclosure gods, I am long Google, Motorola and Apple. Still short Research in Motion.
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