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Sunday 30 January 2011

vPlayer

I've recently been using the wonderful 'File Expert' app on my Desire, to drag videos straight off the home network and onto my phone. This is great for the tube into work, as while everyone else is standing around looking like they'd punch a lost dog for looking sad, I'm stood there guffawing at Family Guy (which by the way, is the perfect time length for a trip to work, and always lifts the spirits). This week though, the trial version of vPlayer, which I've been using to view said videos ran out, leaving me all at sea. For the full version the makers wanted HK$23 - or £1.82 in Sterling. Now there are other apps out there that I am sure fulfill the same function - my housemate uses Rockplayer, but I've found vPlayer to be a great little app, that is lightweight and plays almost anything you can throw at it. I had no real qualms about shelling out the price of a Sainsburys Tuna Sandwich and a packet of quavers for the app.

My thinking behind this was fourfold.

1. As above, its a great app that just works.
2. Regular updates mean that I'm buying into something that will be updated as new formats arrive etc etc
3. I'll be able to use it on my tablet when Honeycomb finally arrives
4. It'll be ad free.

Unfortunately not all of the above assumptions turned out to be true.

My biggest complaint is that it is simply not ad free. Is it wrong to assume that it would be? Its generally accepted that if you pay for media, whether it be, music (spotify premium), DVDs or games that what you are buying is not also ad supported. I may as well have just downloaded another app that does the same job, and also has ads all over the place. This is a perfect example of how to get things wrong on the Android app market. Some developers have already voiced their concerns about Androids users willingness to pay for things. Its a very delicately balanced situation, and making them pay for an ad supported product does not seem like the way to convince them that your Hong Kong dollars are being well spent.

Regular updates are another thing. Am I right to assume that I am entitled to free updates? This is more of a grey area. I am buying an app based on what it can do, right now, and yes, today it does play video's on my Desire running Android 2.2. But what happens when I inevitable upgrade (every 18 months or so)? Will the app then work on my Nexus S running 2.3 or even, my Honeycomb tablet. Many people may end up owning both a tablet and a phone. Will I end up having to buy a separate video playing app for that? Its an interesting question, given the divergent nature of the Android OS. You are buying apps for your account, they have no resale value whatsoever, so you had better make sure you want something when you buy it. If a developer decides that he has got better things to do than update his app, thats it, for your next phone, you'll have to buy another app that does exactly the same thing as the one you currently own, but is compatible with your new, slightly tweaked OS. I must however, put my hands up and say that I don't know what the solution is here. All I know is that I don't want to have to buy multiple apps that do the same thing for every new phone or tablet I buy.

Friday 28 January 2011

Stuck in the middle

Well here we all are at some kind of mobile half way house. It’s the 28th of January and the dust has finally settled from CES. Past the casinos and the neon lights CES bought so many other exciting things to the table this year. My personal, if somewhat predictable, highlight was the glut of (Android) tablets, mostly powered by ARM CPU’s. Motorola’s Xoom appears to be Googles flagship device, which they hope will go head to head with iPad2. The UI so far looks slick and intuitive. However, there is always the worry that with a company like Apple, they’ll pull something special out of the bag with its 2nd iteration, and its possible the others will look like they are playing catchup. Interestingly, while we saw a number of tablets being demoed, there is still a lot of unknowns when it comes to Honeycomb and any small tidbit still seems to have the tech news sites clamouring for coverage.

HTC – one of Androids pioneers, produced on of the more mystifying things to come out of CES. The ‘Flyer’ a tablet based on 2.3 Froyo. Quite why HTC think anyone would knowingly purchase an Android tablet based on a shoehorned OS just a few months before honeycombs release is beyond me. Maybe they are counting on mainstream consumers not knowing the difference. Perhaps true, but a little insulting all the same. NEC on the other hand, made their claim for the most backwards and forwards tablet in the form of their dual screen Android tablet – imagine a large Nintendo DS. Not a bad way to protect the screen but being limited to 384mb of RAM and Android 2.1 is just asking for negative press and more concerningly for Google at least, a negative user experience. If consumers get hold of devices that are a pain to use, it’s going to push them away from Android for generations to come. It’s all very well Motorola and Google getting Honeycomb right, but if everyone else is getting it wrong, especially in the more mainstream price sectors, then all that hard work is undone. At least once Honeycomb is finally released it should signal the deathknell of tablets running 2.xx.

Just around the corner in February is of course Mobile World Congress – this year being hosted in Barcelona. I expect 4G phones to be prolific but this raises some interesting questions about the technologies penetration outside of the US – or lack of it. It will be very interesting to see how this plays out, especially for Apple, who traditionally release a ‘one size fits all’ iPhone and will be keen to take advantage of the speed increase that 4G offers. Other manufacturers can potentially scoot around the issue a little more easily as they often release different phones for different territories.