Hacker News Reader

Comment by elefanten | Hacker News Reader

Curious about the frequency of this negative feedback. The dessert-themed releases were iconic. Anecdotally, international folks generally seemed to love it even when they didn't understand a given name. Google campus has a neat collection of statues representing each one...

This really feels like letting the cart lead the horse. Someone will be unhappy with any choice. They could've added secondary designations (included in preferences and packaging) to solve most of the confusion problems.

But this anodyne, sterile style seems to be the best Google can muster these days.

Another example: I've watched their Stadia Connect videos in which they attempt to pitch their upcoming gaming service to the consumers. They too have come across completely sanitized and robotic -- reminds me of corporate entertainment news doing formulaic red carpet interviews.

View on HN

The dessert-themed releases were iconic

I'm not an Android user, but I always had a passing interest in what the new version would be called.

While going to a numbering scheme like iOS is good for Spock, I just can't get behind yet another example of how the world of technology is becoming more boring and bland compared to the way it used to be. Often, in the name of "internationalization."

Unusual words, or novel uses of existing words, used to be part of the whole intellectual curiosity of the tech sphere.

For example, I learned about Maxwell's Demon[1] because of the Unix daemon. Today it would be called something boring like "system auto-task" that doesn't really do it justice.

It seems like the more corporate technology companies become, the more boring they become. And since tech companies influence so much of the world, they make the real world boring.

Remember when computer keyboards had red and blue and yellow keys? Modifier keys were labeled "meta," "super," and "hyper?"

And it's not just Google. Hey, Apple! Can I get the little Apple logos on my keyboard, and the light up beacon on the back of my laptop again?

Why is there this constant need within tech companies to make their products less special?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maxwell%27s_demon

I think it's tough when it's an annual thing. One comment in this thread is, "Do you have Oreo?" "Don't know, let me check", but in Settings/About/Version it would show "7.0". Then I would need to Google what number Oreo is.

I use macOS and only started having that problem after they went to annual releases (or maybe I started making desktop maintenance less of a priority?) even though it does show both Mojave and 10.14 in the About.

Although, I do wish there was more whimsy in tech.

Maybe the better solution is for Android to list "7.0 Oreo" in its Version box, like macOS shows "macOS Mojave Version 10.14.15" in its About This Mac box.

It's still a problem for me in macOS and it wasn't 10+ years ago. I think it's the frequency of releases, not the naming.

Apple: Lets name our OS releases after random places in California, including some that aren't very well known

Google: We need to discontinue our naming scheme because Pie isn't a dessert in some countries.

This just seems like a bland corporate decision. Blaming it on cultural sensitivity and inclusivity seems almost insulting. Someone isn't going to refuse to use an Android version just because they're accustomed to savory pies instead of sweet ones.

To play devil's advocate, I can see the version numbering scheme contributing more attention to the lack of updates from OEMs from the average user. Although I have no empirical data to support it, I can imagine there's a lot of people that don't see new Android versions as "updates", but rather "editions" due to the dessert naming scheme. It's not immediately obvious to some of the people I know that their Galaxy phone, as an example, doesn't have the latest version of Android. Not too long ago, I've literally heard a friend say they have the "Lollipop edition of Android" and they were completely unaware they were two versions behind. They thought Pie and Oreo were simply alternative editions, depending on manufacturer.

I think the numbering scheme will be more obvious to the average user that they are behind from latest version of Android and that might add more pressure to OEMs (and carriers) to put more effort into updates.

Or Play Services could just pop up a notification that says "your phone hasn't received any security updates in 27 months and it's running a 3-year-old version of Android". Nah, that's too easy.

This comparison is a bit biased, you could compare IOS and Android naming which will be the same from now on "name - version number".

I think the cultural argument is not the most important one for this decision, the important point is that old naming is confusing to newcomers and customers since Android has a lot of disparities between devices and supported versions[1] whereas Apple can count on a very high rate of adoption for their new versions[2].

It is for sure a marketing move even if it hurts Android users who used to love this naming convention.

[1] https://gs.statcounter.com/os-version-market-share/android/m... [2] https://gs.statcounter.com/os-version-market-share/macos/des...

> Pie isn't a dessert in some countries

"Pie" means foot in Spanish and it's pronounced something like "pee eh"

Edit: not sure why I'm being downvoted...

Also, Mexicans use "pay" to refer to a pie (not a foot).

To be fair, Apple's California naming is off-putting even for people in the US.

How so?

I use Apple products at work, and am otherwise not very invested in the world of Apple. I frequently will have to look up how to accomplish a task or get a particular piece of software working, and the author will assume that I'm familiar with where macOS <some place name> fits in the chronology vs. macOS <some other place name>, requiring me to look it up.

Worse for me than the Android dessert names were, since at least those were ordered.

People laughed at me when I mispronounced Mojave.

Didn't Chicken Pot Pie consumers boycott Android Pie?

I agree. I haven't used Android since the ICS days, but ending the dessert themed names does feel like the end of an era.

Also how many people really didn't know Lollipop came after KitKat? I get that not everyone uses the Western A-Z alphabet, but in this globalized aged I'd expect most humans over the age of 8 to be able to recite it in order...

Maybe so, but how many people knew that the names were assigned in order?

Perhaps some meaningful alliteration like Karmic KitKat and Lucid Lollipop would have helped?

I'm not an Android user and I had no idea they ordered them alphabetically, never gave it any thought.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com