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Update from the CEO

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Re: Update from the CEO

#141

Post by thechut »

recoiledsnake wrote: post #79
technotony wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Device fragmentation on Android is nothing like fragmentation used to be. At least on Android you can write one app and then tweak it to work on different devices, previously you had to write apps as different as Android/iOS/Windows for each device - and often individual manufacturers even had multiple platforms to write for. And don't even get me started on distribution. You used to have to negotiate with carriers i…

>At least on Android you can write one app and then tweak it to work on different devices, previously you had to write apps as different as Android/iOS/Windows for each device - and often individual manufacturers even had multiple platforms to write for. >So I think we owe Google some congratulations. Before Android, you could write a Windows Mobile app and have it run pretty much on every Windows Mobile device and t…

This is clearly the comment of someone who has not used Android recently, and only occasionally reads articles about what is going on in the space. Enjoy your koolaid...

Re: Update from the CEO

#142

Post by Evbn »

cooldeal wrote: post #96
MatthewPhillips wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are missing the point of Android. Android starts with the premise "fragmentation exists, how do we make the best of it?" and goes from there. The idea that every person on the planet is going to use the same phone with the same capabilities and the same size screen is a fantasy world iOS developers live in.

>fragmentation exists, how do we make the best of it? >The idea that every person on the planet is going to use the same phone with the same capabilities and the same size screen is a fantasy world iOS developers live in. There are a billion plus PCs running Windows with various hardware, screen sizes and even different form factors. Yet fragmentation is not as big a problem as on Android. The primary problem comes w…

Microsoft required an illegal monopoly in order to obtain the incredible resources needed to certify Windows on all that hardware. And the prices were astronomical, for PCs, peripherals, etc.

Re: Update from the CEO

#143

Post by Evbn »

dguido wrote: post #16

Andy Rubin was the major factor responsible for insecure Android devices. He thought it was impossible to be both secure and 'X' for any 'X'. Meanwhile, Andy Rubin's replacement is Sundar Pichai, SVP for Chrome and ChromeOS. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sundar_Pichai If you care at all about the security of Android mobile devices, this is probably a good sign. EDIT: I wonder if this helped move Andy out the door? htt…

Chrome has the same security issues as Android, but it isn't obvious until Chrome becomes the whole UX. Which it is now.

Re: Update from the CEO

#145

Post by Evbn »

duaneb wrote: post #137
hhw wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's not wrong. There's always a tradeoff between security and usability. http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2009/08/security_vs_us... The key is finding the right balance.

Surely some security comes for "free". My iPhone has military grade encryption, but all I see is a 4 digit passcode. If I shut it off, however, and have the 10 max attempts, then it's virtually impossible to break in (without other data, e.g. smudges where the passcode numbers are). In any case, it should be a tradeoff the user controls. People have drastically different needs, think OpenBSD versus Windows for a usab…

You are aware the jail breaking exists, right? So iPhones aren't so secure.

Re: Update from the CEO

#146

Post by Evbn »

jmillikin wrote: post #64
laureny wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not to mention that Chrome has figured out how to push updates, while a majority of Androids are still running a version released over two years ago. The reason for the hold out is the carriers, not Google. Google is very good at pushing updates to phones when it's not limited by the carriers (and Android implemented over the air updates years before anyone else did. iPhones still require cables to be updated).

> The reason for the hold out is the carriers, not > Google. Google is very good at pushing updates to > phones when it's not limited by the carriers I didn't imply it had to be a technical solution. If users can't update their phones that run Google's operating system because Google isn't leaning hard enough on the carriers, then Google needs to fix that. Apple has managed to strong-arm the carriers into letting it…

Google is responsible for pushing updates to some other company's customers against that company's will?

Google's customers get updates just fine.

Re: Update from the CEO

#147

Post by lnanek2 »

recoiledsnake wrote: post #79
technotony wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Device fragmentation on Android is nothing like fragmentation used to be. At least on Android you can write one app and then tweak it to work on different devices, previously you had to write apps as different as Android/iOS/Windows for each device - and often individual manufacturers even had multiple platforms to write for. And don't even get me started on distribution. You used to have to negotiate with carriers i…

>At least on Android you can write one app and then tweak it to work on different devices, previously you had to write apps as different as Android/iOS/Windows for each device - and often individual manufacturers even had multiple platforms to write for. >So I think we owe Google some congratulations. Before Android, you could write a Windows Mobile app and have it run pretty much on every Windows Mobile device and t…

There weren't a lot of Windows Mobile devices. What usually happened back then was an app would get written once, then outsourcing companies would be hired to port it to the 50 popular feature phones or whatever that made the majority of the market.

Re: Update from the CEO

#148

Post by jholman »

pinaceae wrote: post #115
jholman wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are lots of Indians in top Google management, definitely, but they're hardly the majority. Maybe 25% of "key divisional leads", maybe 25% of SVPs (a group that greatly overlaps with "key divisional leads"). First of all, there's no "key divisional lead" of "engineering". That's not a division at the top level. That'd be a pretty stupid top-level division, in a company which is mostly engineering (I'm deliberate…

http://ben-evans.com/ thanks for clearing this up, hard to find the real org chart of google.

Yeah, I too can find no publicly available org chart. I was careful to restrict myself to public information in that comment (except, I guess, "engineering is not a top-level division").

Several easy searches, like google.com/search?q=google+management or "google svp", lead to this page: http://www.google.com/about/company/facts/management/

You also get some media reports from 2011, which discuss several key players from that era.

I admit that doesn't tell you about "key divisional leads", but it does give you a list of who Google thinks is worth publishing about.

As for Ben Evans's tweet, he just made some random shit up. Again, 3/4 of the people he mentions as being Indian are NOT INDIAN.

Re: Update from the CEO

#150

Post by cpeterso »

laureny wrote: post #30
recoiledsnake wrote: post #11

Since Sundar Pichai is the head of ChromeOS, perhaps this move is part of a larger move to unify Android and ChromeOS.

> Since Sundar Pichai is the head of ChromeOS, perhaps this move is part of a larger move to unify Android and ChromeOS. I can't see both exist at the same time for much longer, and Android is encroaching on ChromeOS' domain much faster than the other way around. I'm predicting that ChromeOS will be shut down within a couple of years.

I believe Chrome will exist as a unifying brand. ChromeOS will probably be web apps running alongside a "native" Android apps on an Android foundation. Over the last year, Google has been downplaying the Android brand and differentiating its own Google-branded devices.
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