What would be best.
If the customer had to go to three different app stores to get what they want or just one.
A fragmented ecosystem can never be a benefit to consumer as it hinders the free flow of information and increases friction.
I did a longer post about digital ecosystems if you are interested
With apps stores, it is the same. You can have your favourite shop, where you do your shopping most of the time. But you have an option to change. Which is important, because the shop owner is also aware of this. As a result, he will not trying to f*ck you so hard, as he would, if you didn't have this option. (If you are locked in and the conditions change to worse, what are you going to do? Accept and submit, that's what.)
If I have an android I have to go to different app stores to get different apps.
With apple I just have one store where I can get all my apps no matter what telco I am on. That is the benefit of the integrated approach.
I have yet to see how apple is exploiting customers. They aren't setting the price, they are allowing free apps.
Aren't you confusing being a developer with being a customer?
No. On Android, you can get most apps in most stores. Some stores are more popular than other (have more customers and more apps). As for now, the most popular is Google Market.
On Apple, you must go through store. Even if you have .ipa on you harddrive, you must go through store.
Apple sets conditions, what an app can and cannot do. Would you accept similar scheme for your computer?
In most businesses, sole supplier is a no-no (if you ever forget, your risk auditors will remind you). There is a reason for that, believing in benevolent dictatorship will get you nowhere.
Setting conditions to streamline and create consistency is good for the consumer not bad.
No one is forcing people to buy apple products. If you want you can just choose android or Nokia. But people want the iphone because it's easy.
Apple isn't sole supplier I don't know why this strawmen keeps getting thrown around.
I think a point that most people are missing is that Android isn't actually hard at all. With the newer devices, we are seeing better and better interfaces. The reason many people think iPhone is better is because the marketing comes from one direction, rather than the diffuse marketing from Android. So iPhone gets cast in a better light. In reality? Not a huge difference.
I do agree that consistency is good for the customer. But so is direct competition and choice. I think what will decide who dominates in the (far) future is which hardware people will develop more for and I can see either one being on top.
I think that if that was the case, there wouldn't be an immediate discussion following Jobs' comment on the same thing. If anything, I think the fact that these remarks have made it all the way to this discussion proves that it isn't such a clear-cut answer.
In fact in many areas I'd disagree with the statement that integrated is better. While in some cases simplicity is great, what the hell is the difference between a store with 170,000 applications versus 90,000? If you're saying that the average consumer can tell the difference, I'd call BS. If you're talking about an above-average user, then the issue is moot because they will know how to get the applications they need without hassle anyway.
Not only that, but fragmentation in itself has many levels. Yeah, everyone that codes iPhone applications has to use (somewhat) similar tools and API. However, what's the main draw for an app-maker? If anything, I think what platform a developer writes for has a lot more to do with his previous experience than the current dominant or integrated platform.
Don't distance the developer from this. Consumers and developers, especially in these kinds of micro-transactions, are intimately tied. Things that affect developers DIRECTLY affect consumers, and I don't think it's so easy to draw the line.
The fact that apple have the most popular ecosystem out there with nothing even close.
The fact that everyone knows how to install an app on the iphone.
The fact that the iPhone helped introduce the idea of an application to the general consumer.
The fact that the iPhone just works and is consistently thought through, the UI is easy to use.
The fact that apple not anyone else solved the GUI for touch screens.
iPod, iPhone, iPad what can I say they all resolve around the most lucrative ecoystem that exist besides the internet itself.
The fact that when you want to write for iPhone you write one an distribute to all devices.
Want to write for Android? Good luck. Ask Tweetdeck how many versions they had to develop to get out on as many android versions as possible.
I am not even talking about the number of apps that each store have.
I am talking about the in my mind pretty simple fact that an android with only one market and one system to develop to is better for both the the consumer and developer than 3 different markets and who knows how many permutations of the android platform that exist out there today.
I'll give you this - writing for iPhone is certainly easier in the sense that you only have to write for one (maybe two) software versions. However, take a look at Tweetdeck's later response to the comments : that they had a team of TWO to deal with versioning. Sure, it's a bit of a hassle, but there are always trade-offs.
That's also not the only consideration. There are many factors - App pricing, prior programming experience, target market, etc. that play into making an application. Not only that, having one market and one system is not necessarily better, and it's definitely not a fact.
It comes back to the issue of competition; I'm not talking about Android vs. iPhone; I mean the competition between developers in putting out applications that are meaningful and easy to use. Neither system (right now) is inherently better, and I think that casting it in the light of integration vs. fragmentation turns the spotlight in the wrong direction.
Yes, why don't you ask them: http://twitter.com/iaindodsworth/status/27813709366
If the customer had to go to three different app stores
to get what they want or just one.
I also have one mall where I make all my shopping and one phone carrier that provides me with what I need.
BUT I CHANGED my phone carrier twice in the last 5 years, and I ended up with one that has better contractual terms and lower prices.
It's not about finding iphone apps but about having to have your credit card info in one store (iphone) vs. having it a different app stores (android)
With regards to changing your phone carrier that actually just proves my point.
With apple telcos can't make their own app store with android they can.
In other words, androids ecosystem will be fragmented, I will have to be a verizon customer or a Amazon customer or a t-mobile customer.
You don't have that problem with Apples app store. And that is the reason why it's better for the customer.
You've also probably been spoiled by the country you live in, but I used to live under a communist system where there was no such thing as consumer choice and competition.
YES, it makes people unhappy to make choices (I've seen the switch in mentality on a large-scale). But it makes their lives better, since a free marketplace that allows choice is driven by natural-selection, with trends like lower and lower prices, better and better service.
That's called a paradox and you're not seeing the forest from the trees, or you're just some shill.
My claim was that multiple app stores isn't a benefit for the consumer. You still haven't told me how that is a benefit to the customer. What is better about the multiple app stores that sells android apps and then the app store from apple.
Pray tell. How is that better today? From a consumers point of view? Is it more expensive? More tedious? So far your sole argument is confusing communism with consumerism.
The I think rather than open vs. free, Android and iPhone could better be compared by choice vs. simplicity. Android gives you choice on just about every bit of the phone (new marketplace, new home screen, new soft keyboard -- all without rooting) whereas on the iPhone it's Steve's way or the high way.
Now Steve's way is pretty damn good and it benefits a ton from the simplicity of not having choices, but it's not really possible to make a "best" choice for everyone, and Android can really hit a wider range of tastes. Whether any of the manufacturers/networks are doing that well now is very debatable.
Also, how the ability to discover apps is not part of the market, having my credit card in only one store is much less important to me than finding good apps. In fact if one store allowed me to use paypal instead of a credit card I would probably use that store.
No one is talking about only one market.