This is directed at all of the manufacturers who are developing products that use the Android platform. Do you guys want to beat Apple once and for all? You are poised to do it, there are only a few simple things that you all have to do;
Stop F*cking up Android with your crappy crippled interpretations of the OS. Lets face it, Google is making a badass system. If you guys want to toss a skin/launcher (whatever you want to call it) on top of Android and load it up with bloatware, go for it! But like any desktop PC, allow the end users to get rid of ALL of it if they want to! Stop locking yourselves into boxes and thinking of these devices as phones. They are not just phones any more. They are computers that have phone function. Treat them like it.
If I buy a brand name computer at any retailer it will come with a base of the current incarnation of Windows with the manufacturers skin on it and loaded to the gills with bloatware, advertising, trial versions, etc. This is perfect for the less advanced newbie uses who want to just plug it in and see all nifty stuff it does. But me? The minute I take that computer out of the box, I format it with a fresh install of the OS without all of the crap in it and I suddenly have a great computer that is what *I* want it to be. Why cant our Android devices be just like this? Get your new Droid X home, dont like Blur with all the bloatware? Format that sucker with a fresh install of Froyo directly from Google and you are off to the races. Stop screwing around locking bootloaders and adding efuses! Encourage people to develop new roms for your devices, learn from what they change and make your next device better! Then when Google releases an Android update, we dont have to wait for months for you to lock it down, add your skin and bloatware that we dont want anyway, etc. You are freed up to develop new HARDWARE and your users are freed up to use their device how they want to. Embrace the open nature of Linux that Android is built around, release your customers to do what they want and as a result, crush your competition.
I am using Moto as an example here, but I am talking to ALL of you (HTC, Samsung, Dell, etc). By all means, sell us your devices loaded up with all of the crap you want us to have. All of the stuff your advertisers are paying you to add. But let us get rid of it if we dont want it! Let us upgrade our OS when Google has an update! We are buying these devices, let us use them how we want. If your skin is so amazing, put it up in the app market and let us decide if we want it or not.
This model works well for Desktop PCs, why shouldn't it work for our handheld devices just as well?
While I hate Microsoft for many of their practices, their recent Windows 7 ad campaign is genius. Telling users that they listened to suggestions and made the OS the users wanted. Take a tip from the old boys on the block, give us the hardware we want, let Google give us the software we want. Throw that in Apples face and let them try and compete with ALL of you rather than you competing with each other.
/end soapbox rant
Stop F*cking up Android with your crappy crippled interpretations of the OS. Lets face it, Google is making a badass system. If you guys want to toss a skin/launcher (whatever you want to call it) on top of Android and load it up with bloatware, go for it! But like any desktop PC, allow the end users to get rid of ALL of it if they want to! Stop locking yourselves into boxes and thinking of these devices as phones. They are not just phones any more. They are computers that have phone function. Treat them like it.
If I buy a brand name computer at any retailer it will come with a base of the current incarnation of Windows with the manufacturers skin on it and loaded to the gills with bloatware, advertising, trial versions, etc. This is perfect for the less advanced newbie uses who want to just plug it in and see all nifty stuff it does. But me? The minute I take that computer out of the box, I format it with a fresh install of the OS without all of the crap in it and I suddenly have a great computer that is what *I* want it to be. Why cant our Android devices be just like this? Get your new Droid X home, dont like Blur with all the bloatware? Format that sucker with a fresh install of Froyo directly from Google and you are off to the races. Stop screwing around locking bootloaders and adding efuses! Encourage people to develop new roms for your devices, learn from what they change and make your next device better! Then when Google releases an Android update, we dont have to wait for months for you to lock it down, add your skin and bloatware that we dont want anyway, etc. You are freed up to develop new HARDWARE and your users are freed up to use their device how they want to. Embrace the open nature of Linux that Android is built around, release your customers to do what they want and as a result, crush your competition.
I am using Moto as an example here, but I am talking to ALL of you (HTC, Samsung, Dell, etc). By all means, sell us your devices loaded up with all of the crap you want us to have. All of the stuff your advertisers are paying you to add. But let us get rid of it if we dont want it! Let us upgrade our OS when Google has an update! We are buying these devices, let us use them how we want. If your skin is so amazing, put it up in the app market and let us decide if we want it or not.
This model works well for Desktop PCs, why shouldn't it work for our handheld devices just as well?
While I hate Microsoft for many of their practices, their recent Windows 7 ad campaign is genius. Telling users that they listened to suggestions and made the OS the users wanted. Take a tip from the old boys on the block, give us the hardware we want, let Google give us the software we want. Throw that in Apples face and let them try and compete with ALL of you rather than you competing with each other.
/end soapbox rant