Google’s new advent move into the world of streaming music is exciting. Well, not quite yet… but the idea of some innovation around music delivery (and maybe discovery) can POTENTIALLY be exciting.

What are we looking at here? As most things go – we are looking at Apple delivering over 1M songs per day (do the math) directly into iPod/iPhone etc. Apple also just relieves Ping, their brand new, let’s live inside iTunes social networks that spirals around music (great niche if you ask me).

What can google do that’s creative, innovative and will convince people to use their service and BUY music (at some form) from them? First, is a platform that is built for android based phones where you can interact with your media (discover, stream, share and sync). Second is pricing. Beating Apple’s pricing is tricky and I am not convinced it will be done – there is a better battle ground on platforms. over 200K android based phones are being activated every single day – more than enough for Google to capture a nice market share. Couple this with the advent of Google TV where you will be able to stream your music from droid to the TV, snyc em all over the net, and you have a really tight, head-to-head competition between Google and Apple that will benefit us all.

How can Google make this service better? One answer lies across the pond where a company named Spotify is making big moves and capturing the imagination and pockets of the audience. Spotify is a brilliant combination between iTunes and Pandora. With Spotify you can the choose any song you want to play and it will stream right to the Spotify player. Pretty neat right? With Pandora you can create a playlist based on a song, which will, eventually, be played down the play list. Spotify is instant gratification without the need to pay.

It is says that Spotify has been trying to make a move into the US, but had hit some walls, and/or is working diligently to negotiate the terms and fees and bla bla… long-short, no iphone based spotify nor desktop in the US as of yet.

I hope to hear great news from Goolge in regards to this up and coming service. One way to make it kick ass is add a new layer of interactivity. Think of what MTV did back in the 80s when they added the video to the music. Companies like Lucid Technologies, with their product KOI are doing the same thing, allowing musicians to interact with the songs as musicians and not only listeners.

Apple failed with the TV expenditure. Steve did not show us numbers, but clearly it was a failure. The big changes were sizing, pricing of shows and streaming, as opposed to storing. Is that what the users really want? To a certain degree, yes. Users do not want to worry about storage, they want to pay less for a device and for content. Apple did deliver on this, but it will not be enough, I believe, to be a killer device like the iPhone, and take over the living room with a storm. WHY? Because of the closed eco system and spoon fed experience.

Apple did a great job in educating the users and providing a great user experience across the board. I argue that user experience is what Apple is really selling and why people are using it. Coupled with the motivation to challenge and innovate, and you have a winning strategy.

This does not and will not work for the TV because only Apple fanboys will forget everything they know, and start a fresh with Apple TV, and forget all they know and do with their many years of habit. The TV is one area where users do not want to get the Apple filter applied to. Users don’t mind it with their iPod shuffle. They don’t mind it with their Mac OSX based machines, and to a certain degree they agree to it with their iPhone (mainly because Android did not step up it’s UX game to be considered a worthy competitor. yet).

Apple will gain a small market share and will have to come up with something much better than that to capture the imagination of the bigger market. I believe that can be done by turning the Apple TV into a real entertainment center to compete head to head with the Sony PlayStation and the Nintendo Wii as a console, introducing the iOS appStore for the TV. That can be killer. But even that is not enough. An Apple TV can only be better than, let’s say, a Mac Mini hooked up to a TV, if it is open. By open I mean I can do whatever I want to do, as opposed to whatever Jobs wants me to do (buy his content that he chose for me).

Examples for this behavior are ample and sad. Apple removed Camera+ from the AppStore recently because TapX3 released a hack which allows you to fire up the camera from the volume button. Apple initially declined the feature, claiming it will confuse people. So Apple is stepping up to the plate as our parents (more like a big brother), deciding what is confusing for us. Clearly, releasing the shutter speed in an ergonomic way may confuse us. I feel over estimated, and I do not think it is for Apple to decide for me what’s confusing and what’s not.

Apple’s attempt at social media is probably the most interesting news to date from that event. A social network around music, which is mutually exclusive from Facebook. Did I snore yet again? While I do believe this is a GREAT idea and a fantastic opportunity for Apple to increase sales on iTunes – the segregation is peculiar. Even worse – who wants to live inside iTunes? Though revolutionary, iTunes is hate by many. Looks and feels old and clunky. Navigating through your music sucks and discovery with genius is, well, boring…

Apple’s notion that people will have iTunes open to see what their friends are listening to is optimistic at best. Not web based, not facebook integration. Only one hope – it integrates with iTunes on your mobile device. I cannot imagine myself opening up iTunes when I want to listen to some music, and getting up to speed with what’s going on with my music buddies.

Apple can definitely relax a little. Let go of the grip and think of a more open way to provide users what they do best. Or not. My personal opinion is that they will not do that, and continue to thrive with a small market share that pays hefty sums to be a part of the cult.

man what a couple of weeks we had in the tech world… since the day the ipad was launched, up until the unveiling of the iphone OS 4G, through the new and impressive CS5 by adobe, the plethora of slate devices about hit the market at low prices, with windows 7 going mobile and android making it to tv sets… man.. what a couple of weeks we had in the tech world. not to mention barcelona’s victory over arsenal with 4 goals by messi…

did i forget something? let me think for a second… anything else ground breaking that is worth talking (besides the 100 pages one car write about all listed above?)…. mmmm…. ah yes!! iAd. the new ad delivery service by apple.

seems like apple is right there at vertical integration, from processor to content – full control with an iron fist.

apple was able to piss off way to many people and companies in the last couple of weeks. here is a quick list in case you had missed it:

- iphone OS 4G will not allow cross-compiling apps. this is a big middle finger to both adobe and microsoft and a huge disappointment for their massive developer community. every developer and their sister were dreaming of loading up their flash app in cs5, clicking a few buttons and submitting their app to the appStore. apple says no-no-no.

i can’t really blame apple here.. honestly… flash is as closed a system as the iphone. adobe control and monetize that market for years. now that apple is turning a cold shoulder adobe is pissed? flash can kill the appStore, with infinite amount of games and utilities. the number of developers for flash is significantly larger than cocoa touch…

so what should adobe do? simple. push flash on other platform like windows7 and android. maybe think about developing their own device (i am not sure it is a good idea). everyone wants to take a piece of the pie when it comes to the emerging market of app stores. heck, that market is projected to grow exponentially the next 5 years and top 20 billion downloads in 2012.. who does not want a slice of the pie?

apple is being apple. closed system, total control – an iron fist. today i’ve learned apple is using undocumented web app tools in the ipad user guides (http://www.tuaw.com/2010/04/09/adlib-apples-secret-web-app-weapon/). maybe we will hear about those libraries soon. maybe we won’t. apple is definitely holding all the cards.

BTW, apple’s supposed response to the anti-cross-compiling issue is multi taksing (http://www.tuaw.com/2010/04/09/apple-blocking-flash-built-apps-because-of-multitasking/). essentially apple may argue that wrapping non native code will prohibit multi tasking and the like on the 4G version of the OS…

in my mind this is the time for android to shine. google – get your act together and hire some UX experts. the nexus one feels like a geeky toy next to the iphone. did you not learn that the user experience is KEY? seriously… how do u enter a market with a smart phone that does pretty much all the iphone does, at the same price point with an inferior interface? adoption of the device will take longer than expected. change the UI, make it attractive – and u will win in the long run.

the good news is that apple will not take over the world. this is not microsoft nor google. they are here to take a little slice of heaven – an expensive piece of real estate. in the long run HTML5 will win and the web will triumph and bla bla bla…

a good move by apple is iAd. google is reporting a 30% growth in mobile search. no doubt the market is booming and more people have smart phones than laptops. the desktop is seriously sick and will die soon. why does google continue to push text ads in mobile devices? who is interested in contextual ads when reading a feed? no one! with 90 something percent of revenues streams from ads, google had no other choice but to go head to head with apple. those who control the medium – control the market. it is the device you use to access the internet that matters. the screen size, the operating system, the API’s and abilities to uniquely add advertisement.

google is in a tight spot, just like adobe, only google has much more to loose. i mentioned in a previous post that google should manufacture their own hardware – which they are doing now. but the only difference is the price point is the same. what is your competitive edge? only time will tell.

with apple pissing off everyone, we – the consumers, can relax and be happy. this competition will drive prices down, introduce new and exciting applications and innovation, will allow the eco system to grow globally, investors will start taking more risks, and the supply for smart phones and slates will rise while prices drop. a sure winner if you ask me.

as the google moto goes, and now it may be a good time to apply to to apple: apple – don’t be evil!

today i got an email from this service which, supposedly, had found a mentioning of “pengas” in it. when i opened the link (Lucky in Love: A Flower for My Hair), i did not find any pengas. what i did find is penga. more specifically: “…I basically followed the tutorial Penga from Convention of a…”.

so what is going on here? my alert is for “pengas”, and here i am with a result of “penga”…
my guess is google is using a rule engine to better understand a word. gramatically, pengas can also be penga’s. for example, think of the game “pengas’s peril” which is everywhere. i get notifications about it as well.

so for google’s engine penga and penga’s are related, hence, i get both results if i omit the apostrophe. but what google doesn’t get, is that i am not making any abbreviations. pengas is my fully qualified last name.

here is where i believe the semantic web will make a difference. by using metadata to describe the essence of the word (or context) i will be able to instruct google that pengas is NOT penga’s. it CAN be pengas’ (for singular or plural), but please don’t waist my time with redundant results.

unfortunately google is lagging behind it’s services in other areas as well…
take a look at this page…

this is has 54 map locations that i have created on a google docs spreadsheet. using the map gadget, i’ve put them all on a map and published it as a web page and then embedded it into the site.

this page take over a minute to load on certain browsers. on chrome (mac version) it does not load at all.

absolutely ridiculous. i actually published this issue in the google docs help forum

as u can probably see i got not answer since november of last year.

long-short. google needs to stay on it’s tows and get things together. it is these little things that will separate them from their competition. search sites like wolfram alpha.

]]> http://pengas.com/2010/01/08/microsoft-googles-nexus-one-will-hurt-android/feed/ 0 http://pengas.com/2009/12/21/in-search-for-the-iphone-killer/ http://pengas.com/2009/12/21/in-search-for-the-iphone-killer/#comments Mon, 21 Dec 2009 22:34:10 +0000 Nir Pengas http://pengas.com/?p=303 since jobs introduced the iphone the world has gone crazy, hasn’t it?

people are now connected to the cloud 24/7, with push access to their emails, calendar, sharing locations with the GPS data, streaming music and videos, playing fantastic games where ever they are, and overall living a better world, while having a copy of their digital life and a serious access point to the world in their pocket.

what can i say?

for the 6 years i have been in the US, i used the same shitty phone i got as a part of the deal from t-mobile when joined. it never really made sense to switch because nothing made sense to me. i remember playing with a palm pilot back in the day. my college roommate showed it off, pulling the stylus out, managing his calendar and notes. i thought it was boring. what a clunky big device that i need to carry on top of my desktop (did not have a laptop back then, they were too expensive) and cell phone… i need to sync my note with that cradle thing only when connected, and the worst of it all, i had to pull out that silly stylus and practice the letters which corresponded to the alphabet.

yes, hard to believe, a hard core techie such as my self, using an old nokia for so many years… i did not jump on the blackberry wagon when it came out. did not understand why i needed to pay so much and use such a huge device. i was waiting patiantly until a device came along that could do more, that would make sense, that will be existent in the cloud as possible and will be a true companion.

the iphone did and still does all of that for me. and then some.

first, i read 90% of all my feeds through the iphone, it is quick and efficient. i sync my calendar over the air (over 11 different ones) which i share with people all over the world, i do voice recording, follow my stock portfolio, weather, get instant directions based on my location, find the magnetic north, measure short distances with a sonar, measure BPM, play strategy games, stream my personalized radio stations from pandora, tether my data plan, study musical chords, connect with the vark community, listen to police radio, follow global financial trends, retouch my images, shop and eat healthy and “locavorilly”, tune my guitar, search for metals, play the ocarina, wire money, search for flights, tweet, skype, tether my nikon DSLR, learn about the universe, search for sexual offenders, post to my blog and more.

yes, there are over 100K apps in the app store, and a big challenge is interfacing the good ones. Lots of people got rich, lots of people are about to get rich, and us, the consumers are the biggest winners here.

the iphone did what no other phone could (yet many had tried, and still trying), revolutionize the way we interact with technology on daily basis. finally, we found ourselves connected to each other 24/7, and all is within a couple of finger swipes away. thank you apple.

many companies have been looking at apple take the lead. many had seen apple’s stock more than double itself. when jobs previewed the iphone i bought apple stock for the first time. they were less than $80 back then. easy bet wasn’t it?

the question that troubles CEOs around the world is, what is next? what can match up the success of the iphone?

at the moment there is only one answer i can think of: android.

i am a linux user and fan from the slackware days. you know, those days when installing linux meant using 7 floppy discs to boot the kernel. the days when u were able to install linux u were a guru.

android is one of the best thing, in my eyes, that could happen to this industry and google’s support in created an affordable device is spot on: give us something affordable that works. well, android does more than just that, and google’s tailored in services make it a great operating system. the real questions is: can the hardware manufacturers step up to the plate and provide quality phones?

in a recent post i had discussed google’s need to produce hardware lest it ends up where microsoft is: lagging behind, too big a ship to turn and respond (that article is here). there is something to be said about software licensing as opposed to full vertical integration (in the case of apple some horizontal as well). i said much in that article so give it a read if you find that topic interesting.

sooooooooo…. what is an iphone killer… is the droid an iphone killer?

sadly no in my eyes. sadly, because i am a firm believer in competition and capitalism. the free market creates such competition that we, the buyers, benefit from the most. but no, the droid is not an iphone killer because the hardware just doesn’t just cut it. first (and the debate can actually stop there), the battery cover keeps falling off. that my friends can be so annoying that the droid may find itself smashed on a wall.

but let’s ask this question from a different angle. what is missing on the iphone?

good questions, u answer… what is missing in the iphone indeed?
well, one thing is affordable (i.e. free) turn by turn voice commanded navigation system.

droid has that, and google made a bald move there, which came highly appreciated by consumers. clearly an app that is worth getting the phone for.

well… yes and no.

yes, it is a great app and i would love to have it available on my iphone, and certainly it is worth considering.. but no, because the iphone does so much more, and so elegantly, with gesture man, with multi touch gestures..

okay.. back to the last question: what does the iphone DOESN’T have?

it doesn’t have flash. yeah man. it doesn’t have flash…

WHY?

so many posts out there try to understand what is going on.. seems that adobe got pissed lately with apple and produced this message just to let us know that apple is holding all the cards…

in this post i am not going to dive into the details of how good the iphone processor is and what are the demands from flash are etc. what i do want to discuss (after quite an intro) is adobe flash 10.1 and air v2 that were released november 11th.

an iphone killer will have flash available to it, that can scale down to the needs of the phone, and will allow diligent development of creative apps, and especially especially games. think about it. the core developers for flash is much much bigger than the core developers for the iphone. while more developers out there are taking the cocoa framework challenge, there is still many of them out there who did wonders with the iphone. a quick mention would be “N the way of the ninja“, one of my old time favorite games build with action scripts.

now that air supports multi touch i can vision a rapid development of apps for an enabled phone. check out this video right here.

there are actually a ton of features that you can look into right here.

the iphone will have decent competition when a serious hardware will be developed AND an already available development platform is used (i.e. webOS or FLASH). i for one would love to see some serious competition for the iphone, and i hope the google phone will deliver it, so we can start enjoying better and smarter phones, and hopefully a much much reduced rate for our plans (white space unlimited data plan anyone?).

heck, maybe we WILL have an xPhone one of these days: check it out.

Nexus One Hardware Running List | These are the Droids.

here is the thing that popped up very quickly. this phone is designed for right handed people almost exclusively. bummer. no big surprise, but a bummer. as you will see, the keyboard has a navigation pad at the right side of it, for you to use with your right thumb.

this is a normal situation for all left handed people out there (yours truly included). from the door handle and direction it opens to cameras, scissors, pens and cell phones.

while this phone is very impressive and it definitely seems that it is worth checking out and maybe it will be able to bite into the iphone’s market share, i cannot help but think about the 10% of us who are left handed. not only our life expectancy is ~8 years less than right handed poeple, we are also singled out when it comes to consumer electronics. we are just not an important enough a market, sorry, let me rephrase that: we are not a profitable enough a market to create a whole new manufacturing chain for.

so what we have done for years is learn how to use equipment as right handed people do. is it a big deal? i think it is. as an amateur photographer i need to hold and snap with my right hand. only some guitars are made for lefties, and internal designers rarely ask their client if they are left handed, and then go about adjusting all the nitty gritty details to accommodate that.

how can this problem be solved?

i understand the manufacturing cost, and the fact that the left handed market is not big enough to produce phones for. one option is to create a neutral phone, one that caters to neither camps. another, is to make the differences software adjustable. for example: the iphone. i can re-arrange the apps as i see fit, so they are within the comfortable reach of my left hand thumb.

so far i have not seen a worthy left handed smart device besides the ihpone, which still does not really cater for us lefties. the address book scroling, the maps button layout etc.

here is a crazy idea: why not create two separate layout for each application (developers pay attention pls), where i define the left/right setting from the preferences menu. each application checks for the value there (0 for right and 1 for left) and uses a different layout to match my preference.

can that work?

in any event, enjoy the new phone’s preview in the link below and expect greater things from this market in the very near future.

Motorola DROID first hands-on! update: video, impressions, more pics.

the comparison with microsoft is important and relevant in my eyes. microsoft established itself as the king of licensed software, growing to be the top company on the planet who gave the personal computer revolution exactly what it needed: a usable, eye-candy operating system than manages a computer properly. how is microsoft doing these days? fine thank you. there is a lot of cash under the mattress and microsoft can, and is, competing with almost every player out there.

and where is apple in all this you probably ask by now? well, apple took a different course. since his early days when steve jobs was selling hand assembled computers from the back of his pickup, many solar panels have been installed in silicon valley. job’s vision was clear throughout: vertically integrate his operations to create a high end brand. this means developing software and hardware. the rest again is history. though it took jobs many decades to become the empire apple is today, with luck and pitfalls that could have buried apple to the ground, his vision is key:  have some style for crying out loud.

apple is successful for a handful of reasons. for me, their success is the fact they write their own software and develop their own hardware. they have quality control of what bares their name, not like microsoft who pimped windows to anyone who was willing to pay their licensing fees.

where does that leave us the consumer? when it comes to microsoft based products we are left with a lot of garbage computers, from cheap to expensive, from ugly to cute, from large to small – the choice is yours. choice is wonderful. choice represents north america for me. in microsoft’s case what it boiled down to is a lot of offers, little quality and very little branding.

so why do i care? well, i would be sad to see google walking the same path as microsoft. i already see it’s struggle with android and the different devices developed throughout, and it seems as if they are going the same way.

let’s think about this together for a moment. why isn’t google developing their own phones? strategically they develop software. why not develop and sell their own hardware and have the quality control needed to establish their brand. why settle for licensing and ads integrated into their applications when u have the potential, the momentum, and the brand name (to date) to leverage sales, operations and overall customer satisfaction.

here is one scenario for you. google keeps up with software only. in 10 years they are as out of date and hated as microsoft. why? because other cool product are out there. because apple is now on top of it all (recent posts show apple bought a company that is the equivalent of google maps).

google has the momentum and brand name to match apple at the moment. they are cool and hip and are leading the industry. why not create the right hardware to match their brand? have the same level of quality we are used to, AND have the consumers pay a premium for it, just as the consumer pays for apple products.

what will that mean for google? more expenses, more revenue, vertical integration for their product, hence quality control. happy customers and a serious competition from apple. face it, apple is making the coolest computers on earth, the coolest and most advanced smart phone (the iphone), they re-invented the walkman with the ipod and are currently continuing hard to branch out to every aspect of usage of their product. from software to hardware. from cables, chargers, flat screens, to music and video editing tools for novices and pros.

so… is it time for google to start manufacturing their own hardware?