Are Android Tablets really cheaper?
Doug Drinkwater has a very interesting article over at the TabTimes. He points out that while the initial prices of Android devices are lower, the real question is what is the price per month of use and the quality of that use.
1) Unlike Apple, Android devices don't have their operating systems updated when new versions of Android come out. The problem then is that many of the newest Apps may only run on the newest versions of Android. Android devices thus become obsolete much faster.
2) Androids generally just aren't as useful as iPads. "iPad continues to dominate for mobile browsing and mobile commerce. There are three possible interpretations of this: These tablets are being bought in emerging markets (but not China, since Chinese devices generally aren't activated and so won't be in these numbers) and not using western sites. They're being bought in developed markets and being used much less, or not at all. They're being bought and not used for the internet - they're cheap kids' tablets, baby monitors, points of sale devices..."
1) Unlike Apple, Android devices don't have their operating systems updated when new versions of Android come out. The problem then is that many of the newest Apps may only run on the newest versions of Android. Android devices thus become obsolete much faster.
2) Androids generally just aren't as useful as iPads. "iPad continues to dominate for mobile browsing and mobile commerce. There are three possible interpretations of this: These tablets are being bought in emerging markets (but not China, since Chinese devices generally aren't activated and so won't be in these numbers) and not using western sites. They're being bought in developed markets and being used much less, or not at all. They're being bought and not used for the internet - they're cheap kids' tablets, baby monitors, points of sale devices..."
posted by John Lott at 1:03 AM
2 Comments:
About the OS battles that have been going on since OS were invented, I recommend Jonathan Zittrain's The Future of The Internet - And How to Stop It -
http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/futureoftheinternet/files/2013/06/ZittrainTheFutureoftheInternet.pdf
I guess my Android phone and Kindle tablet didn't know they weren't supposed to get updated to successively newer versions of Android.
Also, I didn't realize I wasn't supposed to be using them on the internet. I should really use them for baby monitors, but I just can't break myself of the habit of using them to plan my astronomy observing sessions, read physics preprints at arxiv.org, check my email and my bank and credit card accounts, and shop at Amazon, etc. Now that I know my Android devices aren't really useful, I don't know what I'll do.
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