Random thought of the day #1

The whole iOS vs Android thing has taught the world many lessons, but one I noticed today was a simple one:

It’s easier to become more open than less open.

Like I’ve written before, companies have the greatest positive impact on the world when they arrive at “open enough”. When it comes to platforms, it’s finding those areas where a company can do better than anyone else, and produce a highly integrated and standardized experience, while allowing an ecosystem to thrive and add meaningful choices and functionality for customers.

Apple started with an extremely closed system, and gradually opened. People yelled at them for being so closed, but they were still successful because they made the best phone at the time.

Google started with an extremely open system, but they’re slowly backing away, because they’re paying all of the costs of being too open.

In the grand scheme though, I think Google’s getting more shit for their actions then Apple did back in the day. Google has not only it’s customers and users to convince — it’s also taking a way an established revenue and differentiation path from it’s device and carrier partners. However right the overall decision is, it’s a lot harder to giveth then taketh away, than to not have givethed at all 😉