Herein you’ll find articles on a very wide variety of topics about technology in the consumer space (mostly) and items of personal interest to me. I have also participated in and created several podcasts most notably Pragmatic and Causality and all of my podcasts can be found at The Engineered Network.
Congratulations Sir Johnny Ive
A quick congratulations to our favourite pommy hardware design guy from Apple, Mr Johnny Ive is no more: he may now be addressed as Sir Johnny Ive. His knighthood was announced in the New Years Honours List not long ago. Congratulations SJI - know now that your achievements are under the close scrutiny of Her Majesty the Queen. No pressure.
When Androids Growth Stalls, Will Apple or Microsoft Take Their Customers?
Note to readers: The following analysis has no bearing on profitability which can be argued has nothing to do with market share and it is not the purpose of this article to suggest that any platform is winning any sort of race or competition.
Today ComScore released US smartphone user data with a sample size of 30,000 users, a 3 month rolling average of phone brands and operating systems. Google’s Android operating system continues its roll onward picking up a respectable 1.2M unit growth however the achievement is put into more perspective when considering previous seven months, of October, September, August and July (go back further if you like at the ComScore website) as tabulated below, also compared with iOS figures:
ComScore Android and iOS Growth Figures (US Only)
| Month | User Base (M) | And-roid % | And-roid Qty (M) | And-roid Gro-wth % | And-roid Gro-wth (M) | iOS % | iOS Qty (M) | iOS Gro-wth % | iOS Gro-wth (M) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apr | 74.6 | 36.4 | 27.2 | 26 | 19.4 | ||||
| May | 76.8 | 38.1 | 29.3 | 7.8 | 2.1 | 26.6 | 20.4 | 5.3 | 1.0 |
| Jun | 78.5 | 40.2 | 31.6 | 7.8 | 2.3 | 26.6 | 20.9 | 2.2 | 0.5 |
| Jul | 82.2 | 41.8 | 34.4 | 8.9 | 2.8 | 27.1 | 22.3 | 6.7 | 1.4 |
| Aug | 84.5 | 43.8 | 37.0 | 7.7 | 2.7 | 27.3 | 23.1 | 3.6 | 0.8 |
| Sep | 87.4 | 44.8 | 39.2 | 5.8 | 2.1 | 27.4 | 23.9 | 3.8 | 0.9 |
| Oct | 90 | 46.3 | 41.7 | 6.4 | 2.5 | 28.1 | 25.3 | 5.6 | 1.3 |
| Nov | 91.4 | 46.9 | 42.9 | 2.9 | 1.2 | 28.7 | 26.2 | 3.7 | 0.9 |
The number of users switching from non-smartphones continues to increase with a notable spike to 3.7M between June and July most likely due to contract renewals, but ignoring this outlier averaging roughly 2.2M subscribers per month. Since smartphone users are changing between platforms as well as between non-smart and smartphones it’s easier to examine the individual growths. For iOS with its regular release schedules it’s more clear with small spikes in growth occurring in July (2-Year contract renewal for iPhone 3GS but more meaningfully the expected release of the iPhone 4S/5) and October (Actual release of iPhone 4S). Androids growth is far less clear with so many different devices released at different times making it difficult to trace the cause of any spikes, however the Millions growth for Android grew June through August but has begun to taper off going into November.
Whilst these figures are fascinating to try and interpret I think it’s inevitable that Android and iOS market share growth at competitors expenses will stall. With Android outpacing iOSs growth nearly two to one in all months shown except November, Android will hit that wall first. The question is will Android users having had a taste of what smartphones can offer, then switch to iOS with its stability and reliability and more consistent user experience? On the other hand will users brought into the smartphone market by Apple on iOS tire of the long list of things that Apple will not let them do and move across to the more configurable Android platform? The wildcard of late is Windows Phone 7 which is not explicitly shown in the ComScore data (WP7 and Windows Mobile 6.5 and below are grouped together under Microsoft) and how many customers it will attract with its innovative approach to grouping apps into hubs for quicker access to personal data?
Apple disrupted the market and rocketed into first place in the smartphone market, but Android took the lead in 2010 and is still well ahead with WP7 trailing both platforms as Nokia/Symbian and RIM slide into obscurity. The question is whether Google/Android can keep its user base happy enough to stick with Android long term. If it can the Apple will find getting first place back in the market share race to be extremely difficult. We are still in the middle of the marathon for this generation of platforms and there is still a great deal of evolution ahead on all of these platforms.
One thing is for certain, the market growth will stall (saturate) and when it becomes the three major modern platforms vying for top position, the true battle for first place will begin.
Unfinished Business
Why are there so many unfinished things in my life? I suspect that it’s not just my life that is the problem. Reality check for most people would suggest there are many “projects” that people start with the best of intentions to finish them but for whatever reason they don’t. Perhaps a self-help book on the subject of motivation is what’s needed. Then again, maybe that’s just another distraction. Perhaps we all just need to knuckle-down and get on with it: tie up the loose ends and finish what we start. Then again, perhaps we should just be more focused in the first place.
What if the problem of so many bits of unfinished business is created by starting too many projects in the first place without truly examining our motivations for starting in the first place?
All too often we look at a problem we are trying to solve and think of obstacles/road blocks in our way. “Oh, if only I had ‘X’ then I’d be able to keep going,” which is promptly followed with either A) giving up or B) obtaining item ‘X’ and subsequently finding yet another (different) obstacle after that.
Triage. I love the concept of medical triage because it puts priority into perspective in a life and death way. If you make a list of everything you have to do and want to do consisting of new projects unstarted, projects underway and moving forward, projects underway but stalled, and projects thought to be finished but defects have arisen, you need to prioritise it somehow: I’d suggest putting it in terms of triage. What items can you live without for a minute, an hour, a day, a week, a month, a year, a few years or perhaps even forever? The value judgement has to be brutal if the list is long. I’d suggest a Root Cause Analysis.
RCA is based on the concept of asking “Why” five times: a method attributed to Sakichi Toyoda and used by Toyota in their day to day business. Whilst I take issue with the use of the number “five” as the number of iterations required the idea is simple enough: take the result and ask the question “Why did this happen?” over and over until the question can’t be broken down any further - be it five or a thousand times. (In reality usually three of four whys is sufficient to reach a reasonable conclusion) The lowest level of breakdown is the level at which you feel comfortable stopping.
An example is a piece of iOS software I was developing in my spare time that is, as of today, still unfinished:
Why didn’t I finish the app? (1) Because it was taking a lot of my spare time.
Why was is taking so much of my spare time? (2) The learning curve was very steep and required more time to learn than I had anticipated.
Why not spend more time learning? (3) [I could also ask why I under-estimated how long it would take but the dead-end answer to that is simply inexperience] I am unable to spend more spare time learning as well as programming.
Why can’t I spend more time than I already am? (4) Because my work and family time would be affected.
Why is that a problem? (5) Work: If I lose my job I will lose my house and risk losing my family. Family: I risk losing my family or at the very least missing out on my children growing up.
At that point I would stop, however you could debate further down the work path:
Why can’t a get I job that takes less time? (6) My skill sets, qualifications and experience lend itself to a specific type of job where shorter hours are difficult to obtain without losing significant income. Loss of income will still threaten losing my house and family.
You could debate further down the family path as well, but I believe the point is made.
There is still the question of why I started writing the app in the first place. To be honest my answers are too personal for this forum so I intend to keep them to myself (sorry). When taking on a new project, you can apply the “Ask Why” method in advance: Why do I want to write this app? (1) Are there alternative apps that others have written? (2) Are there other outlets for this form of creativity? (3) There are many other possible lines of reasoning that are very specific to project under contemplation and your personal wishes and life goals. This line of questioning should (hopefully) weed out flash in the pan ideas that are spurred by incidental conversation, advertising or friendly rivalries to name a few bad reasons for embarking on a project. [That is to say, they are fine if there are other mitigating reasons but alone they are not good reasons]
Whether looking forward or backward at a project what matters is the balance of the factors in the equation. Some people would look at the lines of deduction and conclude that I didn’t care enough about the app as I put my family and my work above the app. If you were to make the creation of the app the key reason for getting out of bed in the morning then sacrifice it all for the app and the equation changes. It comes back to Triage.
For me, the lowest level of breakdown is my family closely followed by the lifestyle I want to have within the bounds of society as it stands today. That is always the driver of my priorities and I understand this. These facts drive my decisions. These aren’t the case for a great many people whose priorities are very different to mine.
If you have a lot of unfinished business, I’d suggest trying to understand what truly drives you and what’s important, make a list and apply triage to it, then start working on the things the matter the most. Be honest with yourself and be brutal.
Brand Loyalty, Fanboyism and Stupidity
Recent conversations between elements on the web (that I refuse to link to, sorry) have brought to mind some fundamental truths I see in consumerism. Those are brand loyalty and fanboyism and their association with stupidity or if that’s too harsh, perhaps simplistic rationalising instead.
We all prefer different things. Some say that’s a good thing because it makes us all unique. We are all individuals that like different aspects of life. When it comes to the products that we, as consumers, want to buy those aspects also differ from person to person. When a product strikes a chord with a big enough segment of the population, for whatever feature or colour or function or gimmick, the product can become a big hit - sell really well and become the product that everyone wants.
The problem occurs at that point: just because everyone wants a product doesn’t mean it’s any good.
The product could have all sorts of flaws, long term reliability issues or be easily breakable. People then begin to associate the company that made this “hit” product with the good feeling they had when they bought or used the product. Several successive “hit” or even “good” products and people begin to feel a brand loyalty and begin to defend any less than satisfactory products or defend the weaknesses of any just “good” products from that company too. This road can lead to a person becoming what many on the internet call fanboys.
The truth is that all products from all companies have problems, good points, bad points, over-design, under-design and lack-lustre features for some users of varying levels of technical nous. Loyalty to a brand above all others is irrational. Allowing yourself to become a fanboy is a waste of your objectivity. Rationalising away the problems with any product, whether it’s Google Android, Apples iOS, Microsofts Windows Phone 7, Apples OSX or Microsofts Windows will only highlight the fact that you have chosen not to be critical or to really think about the issues that annoy you about that product you otherwise love.
Be honest with yourself. Try and be objective. Discuss the relative pros and cons of one product compared to another.
One last thing. If you’ve read this post, it’s likely that you are already a fanboy or one product/company or another.
Stop it.
Stop it now.