A cosmic conundrum unfolds ...
Communism v. Android
by Peggy Aycinena
Anyone enjoying the 2011 edition of SAME Forum, the Sophia Antipolis Micro-electronics Forum, knows that there is a major debate underway here in the South of France.
That debate can be best summarized by paraphrasing a comment overheard in the hallway this morning: "We all know that in the communist world, there's guaranteed employment and although nobody's particularly thrilled about their lives, they're more or less okay. They're moderately okay, not great, but nobody's abjectly miserable.
"In the free-market world, on the other hand, it's a wild and wooly place. Everybody's free to work hard, everybody's free to make mistakes, and sometimes people suffer as a result.
"You can use those models – communism versus free-market capitalism – to describe the Apple environment versus Android. In the Apple environment that produced the iPhone and the iPad, it's a closed, tightly controlled world that's authoritarian, very communist-like.
"In the Android world, however, it's open source and free-wheeling. You can download a bunch of different apps that have been developed in a much less tightly controlled way than your Apple apps. It's great, but you do run the risk of crashing your mobile phone, because of a mistake in some app you downloaded that was badly designed and poorly vetted. But, that's the price you pay for not being imprisoned by Apple's authoritarianism.
"Having said that, however – as much as I may embrace open systems and free-market dynamics – I far prefer my iPad for its functionality and reliability over my Android phone!"
So, there you go ...
October 13, 2011
Peggy Aycinena owns and operates EDA Confidential:
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