Fragmentation will not effect Android

Talk to anyone in the tech community in the last year and they will tell you that google has been making a big mistake with allowing the fragmentation of android to get this out of hand. They argue that developers won’t want to invest in software for android because all the different devices make it impossible to penetrate. Every six months there is a bomb shell article showing just how fragmented Android is and how bad it all is. All of these articles fail to take into consideration one key thing. Android is selling, in big numbers, in a big way.

Source: comScore Inc.

Let’s be clear the fragmentation of android is not overall a good thing, I’m just saying it is not a deciding factor for the success of the operating system. When I purchased my android phone back in May I made a conscious decision to choose the device I thought would be most likely get the next version of android and their was a huge uncertainty in that decision making process. 6 months prior I had to make the same decision with a 7 inch tablet/reader and I chose wrong and it left me with a less than stellar user experience. That said at the end of the day I still bought an android phone.

What is Fragmentation?

The one of the reasons fragmentation doesn’t matter is because the average consumer doesn’t even know what fragmentation means. Only people with vested interest seem to talk about it, meaning tech reporters and iphone owners who want to validate their purchases. For the uninitiated though I will spend the rest of the paragraph navigating the complicated mess of android fragmentation. (If you don’t care please see the next paragraph for more reasons why none of what follows matters.) Android fragmentation can be separated into two categories, the first is software fragmentation, the second is hardware fragmentation. Software fragmentation refers to the fact that there are 7 major versions of android, all with silly dessert names: cupcake, donut, eclair, froyo, gingerbread, honeycomb, and ice cream sandwich. Currently most devices only run froyo and gingerbread. Honeycomb is restricted to tablets. Ice cream sandwich (ICS) is the newest version and will run on both phones and tablets, but currently is officially only on two phones both made by Samsung but most devices in the future will be running ICS. Hardware fragmentation refers to the fact there are virtually an infinite number of hardware configurations for android. This is just a partial list of possible features on an android phone: screen sizes ranging from 1”-7”, bluetooth 2.0, 3.0, 4.0, slide out keyboards, fixed keyboards, one camera, two cameras, 3D, dual screens, NFC, HDMI out, expandable sd memory, and docks that turn it into a laptop. Android fragmentation is real and really irrelevant.

The superior refined interface

Tech reporters like to wax poetic about consumers desires for flawless user experiences, and their desire for the newest and best tech money can buy. If this were true Coby Electronics would never sell a product again. People are far more accepting of partial compatibility then tech reporters realize, as long as their smartphone makes phone calls, allows people to check Facebook, plays angry birds and takes a reasonably good picture the average user will deal with the quirks of their phone.

Would someone please think of the poor developers

Software makers go to where there is the largest installed user base of paying customers. This is the reason Macs never became big gaming machines, and why consoles have replaced PCs as the place for modern gaming. Ease of programing has little to do with it. The Playstation 2 was notoriously difficult to program for but it’s large user base made it financially prudent to build for it. Over the past year the the market for android applications has matured greatly and many developers have gotten over their initial hesitations and are more often than not releasing apps on IOS and android.

The future of Android and fragmentation
What people fail to consider is how new the mainstream smartphone industry is. Apple turned what was essentially a business only industry into a consumer franchise. It piqued the interest of everyone who wanted their phone to do more. Much of the fragmentation of android comes as a result of phone manufacturers treating smartphones like regular cellphones. 5 years ago personalizing your phone meant picking out the cellphone that looked like it matched your character. Shopping for a cell phone was like shopping for a pair of woman’s shoes. Manufactures have been operating with this mentality, as a result you have phones of all shapes and sizes. Smartphones make personalization a job for software. Manufacturers are beginning to realize this and several have announced they will be reducing the variety of phones to focus on a few quality devices. The first company to get this right will be rewarded with sales. And this is the point ultimately sales will solve the fragmentation problem. There are a lot of cellphone manufacturers out there, if fragmentation becomes such a problem that android phones stop selling because of it fragmentation will immediately stop, all the while android will continue as a major force in the smart phone industry.