I don't think it's realistic to expect any company like Google to tip their hand as to the direction they're going in. The moment Google announce anything Android related you can be sure that Nokia, Motorola, and Apple will be doing a feature comparison check and looking to make sure that they're covering similar functionality.
As with any market independent developers will always run the risk of having some bigger fish come and steal their niche, an app that one person writes may get dominated by an app from a 3 man shop, which in turn may get dominated by a larger software house, and so on. I'm involved with a company which is small (<5 people), has no VC or bank loans, and has at least one direct competitor which has $20 million plus of VC funding, and yet their turnover is growing at over 20% per year and it's making a healthy profit. As with most markets it'll come down to quality and customer service, so even if Google does go head-to-head with an app a developer has written it's not Game Over, it's just a new set of challenges to deal with. Al. JP wrote: > I suppose we all noticed that the elephant in the room has released a > fistful of free apps, Picasa upload, MyMaps for Google Maps come to > mind. All nice work of course, and these apps help lift the quality of > the Market. But is this a good thing? I wonder if this deters > independent developers and firms developing quality apps themselves. > Who knows what Google's up to, and once they release "against" a > similar app that you happen to work on, it's Game Over. > Your thoughts on this? Should Google share their plans for app > development in an effort to mitigate a cannibalization of the Market? > > > > -- ====== Funky Android Limited is registered in England & Wales with the company number 6741909. The registered head office is Kemp House, 152-160 City Road, London, EC1V 2NX, UK. The views expressed in this email are those of the author and not necessarily those of Funky Android Limited, it's associates, or it's subsidiaries. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Android Discuss" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/android-discuss?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
