Is it Too Early to Start Designing the Verizon Droid II?

Verizon Wireless starts selling its first Android phone, the Droid (“by Motorola”) today.  I have tested the new phone, and I think that it’s awesome (for a smartphone). The Droid couples impressive hardware with the much-improved Android 2.0 OS, and the result is first Android phone that’s fully worthy of being compared to the iPhone 3GS and Palm’s Pre. (It’s most definitely an example of the class of device that Walt Mossberg calls “super-smart phones.”)

I don’t expect every Verizon customer who’s currently lusting after the iPhone to buy a Droid instead, but I think a meaningful percentage will–and that overall, they’ll be pleased.

But the Droid is hardly above criticism. As I’ve been using one and mostly enjoying the experience, my mind has been racing ahead to…next year’s model. (I’m assuming there will be one: Already, Verizon is releasing another phone in the Droid lineup, the Droid Eris.)

So here’s my quick wishlist for the phone I’m calling the Droid II–the next major collaboration between Verizon, Motorola,and Google.

A better keyboard. I want to like the Droid’s wide QWERTY keyboard, but so far I can’t muster much enthusiasm for its feel–the overall thinness of the phone has resulted in keys without enough travel for truly satisfying typing. (I do like the fact that it frees up all of the handsome screen’s 854-by-480 pixels for content, not virtual keys.)

It’s gotta be possible to squeeze a better keyboard into the space the Droid has–for one thing, the little five-way controller to the right of the keys seems superfluous on a touchscreen device. Dump it, and you could widen the keys and make them more comfy. I’d also be tickled if the Droid II took a cue from the AT&T Tilt I used to carry and angled the screen up when you slid out the keyboard.

 

On the other hand, the Droid’s keyboard is one in a long line of landscape-mode models that have ultimately broken my heart. I keep thinking that wider is better, but the only handset manufacturer that consistently provides good keyboards is RIM–and it squeezes BlackBerry keyboards into a skinny portrait orientation. I’ve come to the conclusion that a narrower keyboard works better for thumb-typing, because it lets you reach any key with one of your thumbs without any unnatural stretching.

With that in mind, what if the Droid II took a cue from the Pre and provided a slide-out portrait mode keyboard? The image above is my crude, ugly mockup of what it might look like; the keyboard is swiped from a BlackBerry Bold. Give the keys a little more travel than on the Droid I, and you might have a keyboard that would make BlackBerry fans comfortable and at least some iPhone owners jealous.

Full-blown multitouch. The Droid’s hardware and operating system both support it–it’s just that neither the OS nor any of the bundled apps use it. Should be easy to fix: The Droid II should use pinching and pulling to adjust magnification in the browser, the photo viewer, and anywhere else that you need to resize your view.

A more streamlined interface. Android 2.0 is pretty pleasing overall, but it’s also a tad ungainly compared to the obsessive minimalism of the iPhone interface: Controlling the phone involves four buttons, a keyboard, a five-way controller, and, of course, a touchscreen. I don’t want to see all of that go away–I like the back button and wish the iPhone had something similar–but let’s put simplification and streamlining on the to-do list for Android 3.0, and hope that it’s ready in time for the Droid II.

A more impressive camera. The Droid I’s model sounds impressive, with five megapixels of resolution and a dual-LED flash. I found that it took nice pictures in adequate sunlight, but that interior shots in dim lighting came out murky. (The iPhone 3GS may have a third less pixels and lack flash, but its autofocus lens and image-processing technology add up to a camera that’s more than the sum of its specs.)

The Droid II doesn’t need any more megapixels, and if the case is going to stay thin there’s a limit to how much better the lens can get. But I’d like to think that improved imaging software could eke better pictures out of the same hardware.

Music syncing. Entertainment is the single area where the iPhone is most strikingly better than the Droid. For starters, the Droid lets you copy music from PC or Mac via USB, but provides no means of syncing tracks so that you don’t have to rummage around in folders to find stuff. The Droid II should avoid Pre-style iTunes-compatibility shenanigans, but there’s no reason why it couldn’t come with a utility to sync the phone with iTunes. Maybe Verizon can just put a custom version of DoubleTwist on the phone.

Movie downloads. The Droid I has a video player, but no features for acquiring content to watch beyond its built-in YouTube content. Man does not live by clips of laughing babies alone, so the Droid II should have a way to rent and buy films and TV shows. Maybe Verizon, Motorola, and/or Google can strike a deal with either Amazon (who supplies the Android music store) or CinemaNow.

A standard task manager. Maybe this is just a hangup of mine–I wish the iPhone had one too–and I’m aware there are third-party solutions, such as the nifty Remember the Milk. But I’d like to see Android get a standard task manager that integrated with Google’s online task service as well as Android’s e-mail and calendar meld with Gmail and Google Calendar.

A real ringer/vibration switch. Unlike the iPhone and the Pre, the Droid makes you look at the screen to set the phone to vibrate. A physical switch would let you silence the phone without taking it out of your pocket and annoying fellow theatergoers.

A screen built for the real world. The iPhone 3GS’s display has been remarkably durable in my experience (I’ve stepped on mine; no damage) and its oleophobic coating does a good job of keeping it desmudged. I’m actually not sure whether the Droid I has comparable features or not. But if it doesn’t, let’s get them on the II.

A bit more speed in certain places. For the most part, the Droid I is a pleasingly snappy performer–that’s one of the reasons it’s the best Android phone to date. There are, however, a few places where a little more optimization would make a world of difference. The phone app, for instance, feels surprisingly sluggish at times.

Even more apps. Android already has 12,000, which is enough to be valuable, but not enough to induce the giddy feeling you can get from iPhone’s 100,000 title App Store. I don’t know how many Android apps will be around by the time the Droid II ships, but I’m confident that it’ll be a healthy improvement on today’s total.

Okay, that’s enough wish-listing for now. Verizon customers (and everyone else, for that matter): Are you tempted to plunk down $199 (after $100 rebate and two-year contract) for today’s Droid?

via Technologizer

RIP: Garmin & TomTom

Rest in peace, Garmin and TomTom – the Android will bleed you dry and eventually kill you… it will be slow and painful.

You’ve been busy spending time developing hardware and software, all of which has fallen very short of perfection. Very few companies (ehhhm, Apple) have been able to do that successfully, and you are not one of them.

You always turn on too slowly, you dont query a server for points of interest (POI’s) and require that I manually upload POI’s or pay for your “premium” services. You have have dated user interfaces and none of you augment my reality or act as my phone…

Well… you try to be my phone:

Anyways, let me save you the trouble and tell you what will happen to you:

1) You will consolidate the marketplace

2) You will develop inferior mobile applications (you don’t know software-not really, even if you do integrate with google maps)

3) You will have to slash prices… and shed manpower

4) And finally, you will slowly but surely shrink out of existence

So say good night, Garmin & TomTom – spend your last few years in quiet dignity.

Google Android real intentions

A while ago I read this interview with Google VP of Engineering Vic Gundotra (read the full version here ). To summarize, Google believes that in the long term all mobile apps will run on the browser and not on native code.

For context, the iPhone has shown us that the mobile device experience boils down to internet browsing and apps. To date, by far the largest winner in mobile apps is still the iphone with 50K apps and counting and over 1B downloads, despite efforts from other players to open up their own app stores, including RIM, Android, Nokia, and oh yeah, Windows Phones. Apps developed for the iPhone are coded in native code, which means they only run on Iphones (or Ipod Touch)

So if you are Android there are two clear choices (maybe there are more, but at the moment I can’t think of any). Either you, a la Microsoft, create your own app environment, open up a store, and attract developers running a sweepstakes (sorry, a contest). Check!

Or you dilute the game a little bit by introducing another marketplace of heft, by doing so creating another viable alternative for developers, diminishing the intrinsic value of each of the other available marketplace one can develop on, and creating confusion. Also, Check!

But this second choice, which was reviewed on Saul Hansell’s article in the NY Times last week, is far more insidious than what meets the eye. By lowering the intrinsic value of all native code marketplaces, Google props up the value of cross-platform alternatives, ie the browser. Which brings us back full circle to Vic’s comments.

As it turns out, the browser is Google’s house. Google rules the browser, it is its native environment. So as Tsun Tsu would say (and I am sure if he didn’t he probably did not get to it), by wooing apps to the browser Google will fight in familiar territory. In it, Google will turn on its monetization engine and the game will be over.

However there are a few hurdles to overcome. First of which, if mobile follows the PC, browser-based games (ie flash games, etc) tend to be good as casual games, which is also the type of game downloaded on the mobile (over 80% of downloaded apps are games). Also the ecosystem only supports $.99 apps, for which only casual games can be developed. But if the mobile phone is to evolved the way the PC did, games on the phone will soon become more complex, graphics will be better and the experience will trend towards immersive. In this scenario, browser games have not done well – just look at the PC.
As for the rest of the apps, the jury is also out. Latency, security, and other issues will, at least in the short and medium term, prevent browser-based apps to flourish to its full potential.

On a subsequent post we will analyze what do the winners look like in this market dynamics.

Use of iPhone apps - some figures

Some interesting facts & figures from JournalduNet (Aug. 2009):

An iPhone user downloads on average 10 mobile apps per month. An iPod Touch user almost double.

Most users find their apps “by coincidence”.  Searching a specific app, usually because of word of mouth, only comes second place.

iPhone users are more willing to pay for their apps than Android users.

An iPhone user spends on average 9,49 USD per month on apps.

Almost 6 out of 10 iPhone users downloads between 1 and 3 paying apps per month.  5%  buys more than 20.

Half of the users spends less than 5 USD per month on apps. One out of 4 pays between 6 and 10 USD. 

More Gmail Problems - Slowness

This is part 5 of a short story of personal exploration and development by one new to the daily employment of Gmail, long resisted, long desired, and eventually brought to conversion by an Android.

Part 5: To Resist

Recently our journey began. From the humble origins of Outlook to the portable synchronicity of the Windows Mobile platform, I did travel, did evolve, as needs, desires, and demands of communication and productivity so evolved and changed. Through the darkness of masked potential so emerged new and exciting opportunities. But, to fully grasp this fortune, these new degrees of productivity, it is important to pause, take measure of, and understand the crux at the heart at the core of the resistance to Gmail.

I am often asked, more so in the days since my recent conversion to Gmail, what is was, specifically, precisely, that caused me to build up such a strong aversion to a product such as this. And, the final piece, pieces, that made whole, almost immutable, my resistance to this conversion were the slowness, and the abundance of the little things.

Slow Play

The slow ticking, deafening to one waiting for the anticipated. Uncomfortable, the overbearing beating experienced, slowly. For far too often, especially when compared with its (Gmail’s) client-based counterparts, the tortuous drip of the less than instant search…

…as well as the much lamented loading and screen transitions …

…that seem, even to this day, to reassert themselves and do cause the reluctant reassessment, of reversion from this conversion. And, impediments enough prior to that, too fostered, bolstered the overall aversion.

Thus Be Slow

This product, whose existence in my heart was a duality of contradiction, both courted and simultaneously resisted, placed further strains on this relationship that was still yet to be through its exhibition of yet another form of slow, adding unnecessary ballast to an already firmly cemented resistance.

This flame, with whom I oft flirted and fled, constantly tempted me, showing me a directional inclination to meet my needs and address my concerns. Such innovations were Gmail’s enchantments.

Dressed in exciting and alluring features befitting many a niche market and wanton suitor, myself not excluded, Gmail showed off such items as inline Netflix — great for that quick, one-time thrill; directionally appealing, but not enough upon which to build a long term relationship.

My family is a small one, but with everyone having their role and doing their part, up to now always getting along. Sure, there’s the occasional spat. But, in the end the family has always come together, harmony reached, OneNote sharing with Outlook, email and notes kindly cooperating and linking up with calendar, etc.

Gmail looked like it may someday get along with the whole family. However and again, its slowness came into play. Oh, sure, it worked hard in demonstrating the desire to improve and move in this direction, but lacking in facility, and those of which to bring home to and boast about.

But, for sealing the deal, a broader, some more whole approach, more generally appealing would be needed.

Separations

Passionate reunions were, over this long courtship, ignited…

I waited, just outside, for what seemed, maybe even was, an eternity, to be able to take Gmail out and offline. But, while the time did eventually come, and did go a long way in wearing down my long established resistance, freeing myself and Gmail in our travels, enjoying our time in the park, on the plane, in far off places, places where WiFi had yet to reach.

… but, each and every time ending in disappointment, each subsequent breakup more disheartening than the last.

And, while dazzling, this flame, with whom I flirted, was a slow burning one. The evidence of aforementioned inclinations dwindled, giving rise to apprehensions of illusions, concerns of progress in ways most fitting to the needs most relevant, most pertinent to my resistance.

Little Things & The Resistance

But, what of the other reasons for my resistance, which managed to be sustained from the early days of the private Gmail beta to the most recent of but few weeks passed? What sort of little things could have kept me apart from Gmail for so long a time? For surely there must be more to such a stalwart position as has been held by me, and I am sure many others still, for, for them, the resistance most definitely continues. And, indeed there are. In addition to…

Exiguous Encouragement,
Inescapable IO (Information Overload), and
Suffersome Slowness

… there too are the staunch galvanizers of resistance …

Tiny Things.

The Next

And, these propellants of reluctance, delayers of adoption, the fundamental causes of my resistance to what would eventually be overshadowed and forced aside, through the coercion of an Android to my conversion to the ways of Gmail, will, my friends, have to wait until next week.

Subscribe now (click here) to make sure you don’t miss any part of this series exploring the eventual adoption of Gmail in one’s daily life, by one once thoroughly addicted to, dependent on, the primarily client-based solution of Microsoft’s Outlook,

what brought about this conversion, (1) (2)
why it took so long, and (3) (4) (5) (6) (7)
what should be done to encourage greater Gmail adoption. (8)

Enjoy & Tweet!

Jeremy Horn
The Product Guy

Add to Social Bookmarks:

Newspapers for Android

Wow, this is a jolly good application for the Android platform. For a miserly 99pence you get access to more than 20 newspapers from mainly UK and USA. Some give better content than others but the idea is good and it is quicker than going to the websites. I bought the “full” version as it enables you to save “favourites” for quicker access but there is a free version that does everything else except the favourites bit. I hope there is something like this available for the Pre sometime soon….

Navigasi gratis untuk GPS disediakan Google untuk android

Google menyediakan aplikasi navigasi berbasis GPS (global positioning system) gratis untuk smartphone yang menggunakan platform Android. Aplikasi yang dinamai Google Maps Navigation tersebut akan tersedia pertama kali di Motorola Droid yang akan dirilis Verizon di AS, 6 November 2009.

Dibandingkan aplikasi navigasi pada umumnya, Google Maps Navigation punya sejumlah kelebihan. Aplikasi yang baru bisa bekerja di sistem operasi Android 2.0 itu tidak hanya menyediakan sejumlah fitur standar aplikasi navigasi GPS seperti tampilan peta tiga dimensi dan panduan arah dengan suara.

Namun, aplikasi tersebut juga menyediakan fitur lain seperti pencarian dengan suara, informasi lalu lintas, peta satelit, “street view”, hingga foto objek tujuan. Bahkan, dengan aplikasi ini, pengguna bisa mengetahui rute perjalanan ke sejumlah lokasi penting seperti SPBU atau restoran.

Kehadiran Google Maps Navigation ini diperkirakan akan menjadi pesaing utama solusi navigasi yang sudah banyak tersedia di pasaran. Misalnya aplikasi buatan Garmin atau TomTom. Dengan aplikasi itu salah satunya, Verizon menyebut0nyebut Motorola Droid sebagai penantang iPhone buatan Apple dan BlackBerry buatan Research In Motion.

sumber : kompas.com