Tag Archives | Google Android

The End of the Zero-Sum Game

Posted by Harry McCracken on January 27, 2011 at 8:50 am

“It is not enough that I win. Everyone else must lose.”
–famous quote variously attributed to Attila the Hun, Genghis Kahn, Don King, Larry Ellison, and Ross Webster (the villain in Superman III)

Back in the 1990s, in the world of technology, it certainly seemed that if one company was a winner, everyone else was by definition a loser. It’s a concept known as the zero-sum game. And back then, nobody played it better than Microsoft.

When Office got popular, 1-2-3, WordPerfect, Harvard Graphics, and other programs fizzled. Internet Explorer surpassed 90 percent market share in the browser business, reducing Netscape Navigator to a has-been. Windows boomed, and the Mac’s market share went in only one direction: down.

Continue Reading →

19 comments

Android 3.0 Multitasking is More iPad than Playbook

Posted by Jared Newman on January 26, 2011 at 2:45 pm

At last, Google has posted platform highlights for Android 3.0, the version of its OS designed with tablets in mind.

The short version: Android 3.0 has software-based navigation instead of physical buttons, tabbed web browsing, big-screen Google apps and developer tools for creating modular, panel based apps that work on tablets or phones.

But most of these features are old news if you saw Google’s teaser video and Motorola’s Xoom announcement at CES. The real revelation in this documentation is how Android 3.0 handles multitasking. In Google’s words, with my emphasis:

As users launch applications to handle various tasks, they can use the Recent Apps list in the System Bar to see the tasks underway and quickly jump from one application context to another. To help users rapidly identify the task associated with each app, the list shows a snapshot of its actual state when the user last viewed it.

This makes me think Android tablets’ approach to multitasking will more closely resemble the iPad than RIM’s Blackberry Playbook.

Continue Reading →

8 comments

Kongregate Arcade Saga Concludes With Crippled Android App

Posted by Jared Newman on January 26, 2011 at 8:59 am

Hopefully this will be the last story I write about Kongregate Arcade, the Flash game compilation that Google removed from the Android Market last week.

The background: Kongregate Arcade is a portal for roughly 300 of the Kongregate website’s mobile-friendly Flash games. It has user reviews, recommendations, offline play and badges that carry over to the desktop version of the site. Almost immediately, Google yanked the app from the Android Market because it looked too much like a competing app store.

Now it’s back with a couple crippling changes.

Continue Reading →

No comments

Where Are the Cheap Tablets?

Posted by Harry McCracken on January 24, 2011 at 11:32 am

Motorola’s upcoming Xoom tablet is going to cost $699. Or maybe $799. Both prices are rumors rather than confirmed realities, but they seem to point to the Xoom starting at a much higher price than the iPad, which costs $499 in its most minimalist configuration (16GB of storage and no 3G).

If the Xoom goes for $699–or maybe even $799–it’s not because Motorola has grossly overpriced the thing. Specswise, it’s a far more potent device than the iPad, with a dual-core processor, four times as much RAM (1GB vs. 256GB), a slightly larger screen with more pixels, two cameras vs. no cameras, a MicroSD slot, and a standard 3G data connection that will be upgradable to 4G for free. Motorola clearly decided to err on the side of making the Xoom beefier than the current iPad–an entirely logical strategy given that it will surely compete with an iPad 2 that boasts some of the same specs that it does. But anyone who hasn’t bought an iPad because $499 sounds like a lot of money is even less likely to spring for a Xoom.

Continue Reading →

18 comments

More on Google's Puzzling Decision to Oust Kongregate from the Android Market

Posted by Jared Newman on January 20, 2011 at 12:24 pm

Kongregate Arcade’s rejection from the Android Market just got more interesting now that Google has explained itself.

Earlier this week, Flash gaming portal Kongregate released an Android app that’s basically an extension of the full website. Kongregate Arcade provided recommendations and user reviews for more than 300 phone-friendly Flash games, along with badges for in-game achievements.

It also allowed users to cache Flash games for offline play. And that, apparently, is what upset Google enough to remove the app. (You can still get it from Kongregate’s website.) The Android Market does not allow developers to distribute their own app stores, and offline caching led Google to view Kongregate Arcade as a self-contained app storefront.

But in explaining its logic to GigaOM, Google has exposed both a double standard for video games and an instance where Apple, oddly enough, is more liberal.

Continue Reading →

5 comments

Bump: iOS 4 Has 90% Adoption Rate, Android 2.3 Only .4%

Posted by Ed Oswald on January 18, 2011 at 1:38 pm

One of the biggest differences between Android and iOS continues to be the fact that by nature, iOS users continue to far outpace their Android counterparts in keeping their devices updated. According the makers of the popular app Bump, nearly 90 percent of its users are running iOS 4 or newer.

What’s even more interesting is the fact that the latest iOS release, 4.2.1, is used by about 53% of its users. That means over half of all iOS users are fully up to date. Now compare this to Android’s latest release — 2.3 — who only has a measly 0.4 percent adoption rate.

As MG Siegler pointed out over at TechCrunch, we should be fair and compare Android 2.2 and iOS 4 against one another, since Android 2.3 is currently available only on Google’s own Nexus S handset (although Android 2.2  has been out much longer than iOS 4) . Google doesn’t fare much better here: 52 percent.
Continue Reading →

7 comments

Kongregate Gives Android a Proper Flash Gaming Portal

Posted by Jared Newman on January 18, 2011 at 10:14 am

[UPDATE: Google has pulled this app from the Android Market for “unknown reasons.” You can now get it directly from Kongregate’s website.]

The arrival of Adobe Flash games on Android phones last May was dampened by two factors: Most of the games weren’t that great, and there was no obvious way to filter the good stuff from the bad.

Kongregate, the Flash game portal owned by GameStop, hopes to change all that with Kongregate Arcade, an app for Android phones running version 2.2 and above. It’s kind of like OpenFeint’s awesome game discovery app for iPhone and Android, with recommendations, user ratings and screenshots, but instead of routing users back to the App Store or Android Market, it links to Flash games on Kongregate’s own mobile site.

Other perks include badges (with user profiles that sync between the desktop and mobile sites) and offline support for a select number of games.

Without the app, Kongregate’s mobile site is just a running list of games, with no descriptions or added features. It isn’t much different from competing sites, such as Armor Games, and certainly isn’t very inviting. The native app, by comparison, looks more like Kongregate’s full website, and it could be just what Kongregate needs to make Flash gaming more popular on Android phones.

I haven’t had a chance to try the new app yet (it’ll have to wait until my wife gets home with her Droid Incredible). I’d love to add some impressions when I get a chance. In the meantime, I hope Kongregate users start helping the good mobile Flash games rise to the top.

One comment