Is Choice a Problem For Android? 361
New submitter mjone13 writes "Dave Feldman, in a blog posts, says that the problem Android faces is giving consumers too much choice. He cites several studies which state that consumers generally are unhappier when they have too much choice. 'Catering to all individual preferences creates a bloated, bland product. Not to mention a UI that’s impossible to navigate. Furthermore, people are notoriously bad at identifying what we want. And what we do want is influenced heavily by what we know — our expectations are constrained by our experience.' He then goes on to talk about Android fragmentation, app developer problems and bug issues. Finally he says the people who general prefer the choice Android provides are tinkers similar to gear heads who love tinkering with their car. 'I think many who extol Android’s flexibility fall into the tinkerer category, including some tech bloggers. They love all the ways they can customize their phones, not because they’re seeking some perfect setup, but because they can swap in a new launcher every week. That’s fun for them; but they’ve made the mistake of not understanding how their motivation differs from the rest of us.' Is choice really a problem for Android?"
Whether it's a problem depends on what the goals are. Providing a satisfying experience to a bunch of tinkerers is a very different thing from providing a satisfying experience to the multitude of non-tinkerers who buy smartphones.
choice doesn't *require* bad defaults (Score:5, Insightful)
You can have a highly customizable UI without making the default bland and impossible to navigate. Having more customization does make some things more difficult, since you can't assume all users will have the same setup, but it's still compatible with a decent default interface.
SubjectsInCommentsAreStupid (Score:5, Insightful)
My bullshit detector went off the scale.
Re:SubjectsInCommentsAreStupid (Score:4, Insightful)
Not all choice is tinkering (Score:5, Insightful)
Some of us get their phone, install it the way _we_ want it, and then leave it like that (unless something spectacularly new comes along).
I don't change my keyboard weekly - but I did change it a couple of times, find one that suited me, and leave it that way.
Same with SMS, email client, and web browser. I haven't changed any of these in months, but they're all different to the stock version.
the rest of you... (Score:2, Insightful)
I think we understand all too well the rest of you, who don't care about anything. The problem is: we don't care about you. There, you have it. We don't want a device that's dumbed, locked, tailored to noob-level, without a way to customize it. We have a lot of examples for such designs, and they are all too idiotically dumb. You want "simple"? Find one that is dumb enough for you, but do not try to ruin the one mobile OS that' actually usable for power users as well as average joes who are only a bit smarter than a shoelace.
Re:choice doesn't *require* bad defaults (Score:2, Insightful)
Just a click-bait using a old-ass argument (Score:5, Insightful)
Even though I subscribe to the Apple/BlackBerry/GameConsole idea of one optimal OS for one or two device types, I'm still mostly a windows and android user. Trying to make everybody happy with the "one OS for them all" strategy is just impossible plus there are many marketing and development problems associated to it for platform providers, OEMs, developers and users. However to say that the Android(and by extension windows) experiences are crap, is pure BS. Like it or not, Android gets the job done, and the experience is without a doubt what I would call very reasonable . At least that is from my experience with Galaxy and Xperia phones as well as a Transformer Tablet. If you got a $0 chinese phone with a shitty firmware that is your problem, not Android.
Sure if I could get my way, each company would have it's own OS and ecosystem, assuming that all tech companies had a interesting and unique vision for themselves. Too bad that is just unrealistic plus there are plenty of practical problems associated to this philosophy as well, but that is a discussion for another time.
Choice ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:choice doesn't *require* bad defaults (Score:5, Insightful)
Why is everyone talking like there even is a problem? In August Android had almost 80% of the market [techcrunch.com]. Yeah, it must be incredibly boring and horrible to use if so many people want it.
Exactly. Its like the fragmentation argument that is just killing Android. Or how insecure Android is. Its just people writing headlines to attract attention to themselves.
Basically, no. (Score:5, Insightful)
The reason I switched from iOS was because personally, I *want* control over my smartphone. I want the options and customisations, and the ability to decide what keyboard to use and where my music sits. My advice to those who can't handle a few options is "get an iPhone".
Though really, I can't see why both user groups can't be catered for - have sensible defaults and basic options, and put everything else inside an "Advanced settings" button somewhere - no one is forced to tap it.
Here are your choices (Score:2, Insightful)
A)Get an iphone and be trapped in the walls.
B)Get a Windows phone and be trapped in the walls with less to play with.
C)Get an android phone with unlimited possibilites and no walls.
I think it's a no brainer.
Dealing with choice is easy ... (Score:4, Insightful)
Most of the Android fans that I've bumped into choose their device in exactly the same manner as iOS fans: they choose whatever is in fashion at the moment. They also deal with downloading apps in the same fashion as iOS fans: they choose whatever their friends are raving about. They also have a handy way to deal with customization: they usually leave the device as it shipped (perhaps changing wallpapers along the way).
Choice is not making people unhappy, because they usually made up their minds before they ever went shopping.
Irony (Score:5, Insightful)
To be fair, Android is harder to navigate. There are desktop pages (similar to IOS app pages). Then there's a list of apps under the apps button. You can also copy stuff from the apps list to the desktop list.
I find this paradigm very confusing. I've seen Android users get confused on this too.
But, I desperately miss configurability in IOS. Absence of settings has my life very hard in the past... So has the conduit called iTunes. iTunes really sucks when it doesn't work properly, and is clunky when it does work.
Itunes is a nightmare that should have been burned with fire, on Android you do not have this extra layer of complexity at getting content onto your devices.
You talk about reconfigurability and settings...or the absence of them. Ignoring the irony of arguing for additional complexity at the cost of customisability, or that Apple copied the look of this with iOS 7 from Android, you argue that having a desktop(sic) that you can only add applications to is better than one you can add widgets to.
I don't think you really understand your own argument.
Re: what I want to say is, (Score:2, Insightful)
Yep and Apple was a very formidable, entrenched competitor who was the previous market leader and had decades of history.
Android supplanted them in a few short years.
Android's biggest problem is fucking retarded articles like these.
Re: choice doesn't *require* bad defaults (Score:3, Insightful)
People don't like Android.
People like cheap.
See Walmart as an example.
Re:choice doesn't *require* bad defaults (Score:4, Insightful)
> just I know dev teams and most of them wont support Android
Then you've just declared an interesting paradox.
Android is the most widespread platform despite this persistent FUD that you are trying to spread here. It's certainly an obvious contradiction and somewhat of a puzzle.
Given the state of Blackberry, I can't imagine any developer being eager to develop for it.
Re: choice doesn't *require* bad defaults (Score:3, Insightful)
If that were true, why does everyone (even people I know don't make much money) seem to have an S3/S4? They're in the same price bracket as iPhones.
Re:choice doesn't *require* bad defaults (Score:4, Insightful)
That 80% market share hasn't translated into more profits for app developers, or more apps being available for Android than the iPhone. The fact that a lot of cheap phones happen to run Android doesn't mean that the people who own those phones are buying apps.
It's the Xbox/PS3 vs. Wii argument. Sure the Wii outsold the Xbox and PS3, and judged by that metric alone, it clearly "won" the previous console generation. Yet where were all the good games and developer effort going? They were going into the Xbox and PS3 because developers quickly realized that the people buying all those Wii's WEREN'T buying games. So, while more Wii's were out there, they were sitting in closets gathering dust while the PS3 or Xbox was hooked up to the TV and being used. And that's what defines the REAL winner in the end.
Re:iOS-exclusive apps (Score:3, Insightful)
What? Their definition of 'Must-Have' is rediculous. You must be able to apply textures to your photos? You must be able to browse KickStarter without using their website? You must play Plants v Zombies 2? You must have information regarding airport lounges?
Maybe these specific apps aren't available on Android, but suitable alternatives certainly are for most of them. I have absolutely no use for most of these, so I don't know, for example, the best Android twitter app or photo manipulation app. Cool Reader has a completely customisable interface, as a replacement for MegaReader. Also the main 'feature' of 'iA Writer' seems to be that it has punctuation keys on the main screen so you don't have to change keyboard modes - Android allows you to use a different keyboard anywhere you want, so just choose one with punctuation visible on the main screen and use it with any text editor you like.
I can't be bothered to search for the rest, but I've seen many apps that can scan business cards like the LinkedIn one, and there are several KickStarter apps.
The only thing on their list which offers something unique and novel seems to be IFTTT.
Ironically Choice over Cost is the Answer (Score:4, Insightful)
Being the cheapest in the market usually gets you the most market share. That doesn't mean people *want* to use it.
Ironically *expensive* features like high resolution; large screens and waterproofing is why android is 80% of the market, The iphones low cost low resolution; small screen water adverse with massive mark-up is why its profitable but unpopular.
Re:Testing for 123 versions is a real pain (Score:4, Insightful)
What counted as a different configurations?
I think if they decided on some minimum requirements such as Android 4, then they'd only really have to deal with differing screen sizes, since there are already APIs to handle finding your current location for example. There probably still are a lot of Android 2 devices out there, but you have to draw the line somewhere. They could start off making a decent Android 4 app, and then port it back to older versions if they're worried about compatibility issues.
Re:choice doesn't *require* bad defaults (Score:4, Insightful)
Yet Apple's profit was greater than the other's combined
Which provides evidence on how overpriced Apple products are, and how many idiots will pay far too much to get nothing extra in return.
Overpriced is in the eye of the beholder. Apple clearly provides enough value for their customers to be willing to pay Apple's price. If they didn't find more value in Apple's offerings than its competitors Apple wouldn't be in the position it us today. It also shows that Apple is probably much better at managing supply chain cost to maintain profit margins.
Re:choice doesn't *require* bad defaults (Score:4, Insightful)
Yet Apple's profit was greater than the other's combined
By the same metric: 1) Windows Server is absolutely killing Linux in the server market
2) IIS is absolutely trouncing Apache in the web server market
3) Visual Studio is the only winner in IDEs etc.
4) ???
5) Profit
Re: choice doesn't *require* bad defaults (Score:3, Insightful)
Apparently anecdotal evidence is now data. Everyone I see has an iPhone. Does my anecdotal evidence trump yours?
Re:The iPhone's pretty reasonable... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:choice doesn't *require* bad defaults (Score:4, Insightful)
You realize what you are saying is equivalent to saying a new windows app needs to be test on every version of windows, and on every machine combination, right?
As the main build guy at a small software company, I can attest that this is necessary.
We run automated testing on XP, Vista, Windows 7, and Windows 8. As far as "every machine combination," yes and no. If your software is built for 32 and 64 bit systems, you need to test XP32, XP64, Vista32, Vista64, Win7-32, Win7-64, etc.
We also run on Linux and test on every distribution we support. Here, it's mainly glibc differences that cause the breaks. We build to the lowest common denominator, and you'd be surprised how often something works fine on RHEL4 but is broken on RHEL6 due to library differences.
We have seen lots of issues from the same code that are only reproducible on one version of Windows or one version of Linux.
If you're doing it seriously, test seriously or your product will suffer.