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I beg to differ. The fact that the biggest sites out there have adopted these standards means a huge chunk of the web is moving forwards. Remember that those bigger sites account for huge swathes of traffic, not to mention how their competitors will surely make the same moves, if they haven’t already.
And every day more sites are being revamped with support for new tech, and most new sites being created have that support built in. It’s telling when web developer sites like Smashing Mag are talking all the time about how to leverage HTML5 and other modern standards.
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You're missing the point! There are still sites that use Flash, so I want it on my phone. Flash may well be a bag of shite, but having it is still better than not having it. And you can criticise it for being buggy and inefficient, but it's only being buggy and inefficient whilst it's opening those sites. The rest of the time my phone is unaffected.
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Every time browsers update they add more support. Webkit browsers are in the lead currently because they’ve historically had faster and more frequent update cycles, but we can already see that changing. The latest Firefox has added further support (such that the Beercamp sites I linked to now display identically), IE10 has added further support, and Chrome is basically the developer’s choice when it comes to support (don’t know how many times I’ve seen tech demos marked with “best viewed in a Webkit browser”).
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What's your point? They may be working on it, but it's still not there yet.
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Apple’s philosophy has made them the darling of tech reviewers, tech awards and consumers. They excel at coming up with simple, intuitive interfaces which people get, and I don’t think the Android ecosystem offers that in the same respect.
Yeah Steve Jobs was never the most charming guy on the block but to dismiss him and Apple as full of shit is to ignore exactly how well-received their efforts have been.
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I didn't say that Apple don't make good interfaces. I'm criticising the 'It's my way or the highway' philosophy. There's never just one way to solve any problem.
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It’s not just about internal consistency though, is it? I’m talking about ecosystems.
Android excels at giving users choice, but that gets taken to ridiculous extremes. Every damn phone has a different handset design with vastly different specs (which often manifests in sluggish, irritating low-end phones); every manufacturer sees fit to ship their phone with their own custom UI; and a staggering amount are either running outdated versions of the operating system or won’t receive OS updates at all.
One of the most confusing things in the world is having to use someone else’s phone. Everyone has different apps, different home screen layouts, different customisations, different operating systems, different interfaces. That confusion is minimized if there are similarities – for example, if your friend uses the same OS as you you’ll be more immediately familiar. But Android’s ecosystem is so rife fragmentation that this is not even a guarantee.
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It's seriously not as bad as your describing. And I really don't see the problem with what you're describing. I like having that variety. And I'm not an idiot, so I can generally work out how any app works within a minute or two. And it's a moot point anyway, as I never use anyone else's phone.
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No, I wasn’t talking about apps, although I do think that having a set of user interface guidelines like Apple does can greatly improve an ecosystem’s user-friendliness.
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Errr... Android does have UI guidelines. And they're followed just as closely as the Apple ones are, by which I mean they're a mixed bag.
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Well I hadn’t heard about that, will be interesting to see where the case goes now. Let’s not forget, though, that the case didn’t just cover that one patent – other software patents, hardware patents and trade dress were also involved.
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Yes, of course. I was specifically responding to your comments about design patents.