How many payment accounts would you like the average developer to register for? So far we have announcements/releases from T-mobile (in multiple countries, so multiplied out), and Sprint, but hardware coming from 7 different vendors (including Kogan and HTC, not including moko). So that sounds like at least 5-7 different carriers, in a dozen or more countries. [ref:wikipedia, so take it with however much salt you like..]
Apple solved this the easy way - sign up to get paid through their existing iTunes distribution channels, and you can sell in various markets. How would you have google solve this if they were using the potentially-dozens of carrier systems? (Yes, right now they are country-limited. And thats a PITA. But their stated goal still seems to be centralized worldwide sales..) And one thing I forgot earlier - according to the ToS, you get magic unbreakable copy protection free. (..we'll see. But that's what they say.) I don't see a different, realistic way it could have been done. But I'm open to ideas.. (And as far as the API bits, on the one hand it was rushed out the door. On the other hand.. well.. anyone who gets deep into an open source project without making licensing/removal of incompatible code a priority has fallen off the porch one time too many. And to get so far as to -ship- it that way... sigh. With market specifically, I know - from the devs mouth's themselves - they are working to level the playing field there.) On Mon, Jan 5, 2009 at 2:47 PM, Shane Isbell <shane.isb...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > On Mon, Jan 5, 2009 at 11:37 AM, Al Sutton <a...@funkyandroid.com> wrote: > >> >> Disconnect wrote: >> > You realize they could have simply disabled the third-party-installer >> > option, right? (Or not written one to begin with.) They are far more >> > than an application vendor in this space, and if they really wanted to >> > "control the distribution channel for mobile content" they could have. >> > (Also, that "big chunk of revenue" is completely spelled out, and the >> > fingers get pointed at the carriers, not at google. Its the price of >> > getting to be part of the out of box image.) >> > >> They'd have had a hard time explaining disabling third party installers >> on a system they describe as "open" (See point 1 on the OHA web page >> http://www.openhandsetalliance.com/android_overview.html). It's bad >> enough Market uses APIs which aren't available to third party apps, but >> to 3rd party installers all together would have handed the anti-android >> camp a huge amount of ammo in terms of "This openness you speak of, and >> the dislike of the Apple App stores closed policies, how does that >> differ from your plans exactly....?". > > > Yep, Google had to play the openness card. It gets them in the door, on a > "level" playing field. It's now time for them to compete and I expect this > 800 pound Gorilla to be ruthless about it (otherwise it wouldn't have > reached its substantial size). Google could have just hooked up to a carrier > billing system and been offering paid applications last October, but they > didn't. They would have been dependent on the carrier. Instead they are > slowing building out Google Checkout, slowly rolling out paid features for > the Android Market, slowly preparing to control the distribution channel, if > they can. > > Shane > > > > > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Android Developers" group. To post to this group, send email to android-developers@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to android-developers-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/android-developers?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
