14 DAY TRIAL // Google recently hired prominent software developer formerly doing work for Oracle and Sun Microsystems, Tim Bray. The developer wrote on his personal blog that he would “enjoy competing with Apple,” as he hated the iPhone from a mobile Internet perspective.
“The reason I’m here is mostly Android,” Bray writes on his blog, as soon as he is done outlining the key points in his career that led him to choose Google as his employer. “Which seems to me about as unambiguously a good thing as the tangled wrinkly human texture of the Net can sustain just now,” he adds, and then proceeds to explain why. Bray sums up his reasons as follows:
· It’s not good to be on the Net at all times, but it’s very good to have the Net available at all times. · Google needs, and is committed to, Android; it’s not just a hobby. · The Android user experience is very good and, more important, getting better fast. · It’s developer-friendly; the barriers to entry are very low for the several million people on the planet who are comfy with the Java programming language. · The APIs are pretty good in my experience, and even more important, complete. Near as I can tell, there’s nothing interesting the phones can do that’s not exposed through some API or other. · Anyone can build any hardware they want around the Android software; no approval required. · Anyone can sell any program they write via the Android Market; no approval required. · It’s open-source. · The smartphone arena where Android plays is extra interesting right now, with space for radical experimentation both on the technology and business fronts. · The mobile space has had a huge impact in the emerging economies of the less-developed world and I think that’s just getting started. I want to be part of that story and Android seems like the right software platform for it. · I’ll enjoy competing with Apple.
Weighing in on this last line of text, Bray asserts that, “The iPhone vision of the mobile Internet’s future […] includes strict limits on who can know what and who can say what. It’s a sterile Disney-fied walled garden surrounded by sharp-toothed lawyers.” “The people who create the apps serve at the landlord’s pleasure and fear his anger. I hate it,” he boasts.
Bray does admit that he likes the iPhone hardware and software, but continues to dislike Apple’s overall business model surrounding the device, “because freedom’s not just another word for anything, nor is it an optional ingredient.” He concludes (this topic) by saying, “I think they’re wrong and see this job as a chance to help prove it.”