Where is the Android John Gruber?

http://vintagezen.com/2013/7/23/where-is-the-android-john-gruber

by tmoretti • 13 years ago

21 50 13 years ago

pohl2• 13 years ago

Where in the Android world is the company that has been fun to watch, replete with a long underdog comeback from the brink of bankruptcy? You can't have engaged spectators without someone worth rooting for.

jfb• 13 years ago

Yeah, this. Android hasn't been around long enough for people to develop the sort of attachment that some have with Apple. Nobody's grown up with Android (yet), nobody's gone through their spotty-faced advocacy phase shouting about it, nobody's had to see something they for whatever reason love on the brink of extinction.

Apple has a pretty rich narrative for people to build personae around.

FULL DISCLOSURE: I work at Apple, and have been an Apple fan and user since before the original Macintosh.

tylermac1• 13 years ago

I think there's a lack of a Gruber-esque figurehead in the Android community due to mainly to the general fragmentation of the Android system. When each carrier has their own flavor of Android and their own device lines, it's hard to get a single bearing on a sole "Android" device. With Apple, you have the iPhone and that's it. Android, you have hundreds and hundreds of varying devices.

MBCook2• 13 years ago

I agree, but it's a sad omission. I really like Gruber, but I would love to see someone in a sort of "Android Advocate" role. From the article:

There is no one on the Android side promoting these values and looking at the Android platform with an eye towards something besides simply parroting the feature set of the new HTC Milky Way Swipe Omega Machine IV Redux.

I find this sadly common. I would actually like to know more about Android, but most of the pieces I run across are generic "let's try out some hardware" stories. I see some good analysis when new version of Android come out; but most of the time it's the equivalent to reviews of the new Dell-model-of-the-Week.

Even if the "anti-Gruber" were to pick only one brand to discuss (Samsung being an obvious option due to market share), I would enjoy reading someone point out the hits and misses as they try to get the company to improve. Gruber is certainly known as an Apple fan, but he does criticize Apple when they miss the mark.

danilocampos7• 13 years ago

Apple, aspiring to be exceptional, inspires exceptional zealotry. There is much to chew on for supporters of their products and platforms.

Android aspires to ubiquity – and achieves it. And so it is polluted by handset manufacturers with inept designers and short-sighted leadership. It is beautiful – sometimes. It is mediocre – most of the time. For everything one can celebrate in Android land, there is plenty more to lament.

Because of this, Android doesn't need a Gruber – it needs an anti-Gruber.

A churlish character who, rather than celebrating the excellent, laments the shabby. An irascible voice to scold the masses who value the wrong things. While Gruber is enamored of one party and frustrated by the rest, our Anti-Gruber must be frustrated by all. Annoyed by Apple's approach. Annoyed by the squandered opportunities of his own camp.

If you ever read the work of Ted Dziuba, that'll help you capture the sort of voice I'm imagining. "Jesus Christ Silicon Valley" is a bit over the top, but probably lives in a similar neighborhood:

http://jesuschristsiliconvalley.tumblr.com

This character must be pissed off for reasons, he must elucidate them consistently, and must be relentless in the coverage of his ire. Curmudgeonry is entertaining when it's purposeful – especially when it also serves to educate. Android enthusiasts would link to such blog – some because of its skewering of their preferred platform, others because of their agreement with the presented frustrations. Apple enthusiasts would link because sometimes it agreed with their worldview.

There's room for this character.

voltagex_4• 13 years ago

I am. I'm bloody angry that consumers prioritize tiny/thin phones over a battery that lasts all day.

I hate how Google handles their bug reports.

I hate how low latency audio still isn't a priority on Android. I hate how the bluetooth stack was broken seemingly for no reason at all.

I hate that there's still no Bluetooth LE support. I hate how Google won't let the Commonwealth Bank of Australia implement a Google-wallet style application.

I hate how half the Android OEMs can't be arsed releasing proper sourcecode.

But I think the Nexus 4 is one of the best devices I own...

danilocampos7• 13 years ago

If you can channel that frustration into entertainment and education, you, too, can sell outrageously lucrative feed sponsorships.

statictype2• 13 years ago

I find your ideas fascinating and would like to subscribe to your newsletter.

So please make one.

eco• 13 years ago

I hate that there's still no Bluetooth LE support.

I believe tomorrow's expected 4.3 announcement adds Bluetooth LE (and all around improved Bluetooth).

omonra• 13 years ago

For your #1 - I use a zero lemon battery with my S3. Lasts 2 days of VERY heavy usage - http://www.zerolemon.com/.

That's the best part about Android - you choose whether you want to have a thin phone or one that lasts a long time.

recuter2• 13 years ago

When the iPhone was introduced in 2007, Steve boasted that it is 5 years ahead of the competition. It wasn't hyperbole.

Ever since, the jailbreakers and Android tinkerers have provided a fertile testing ground for half baked ideas. Apple kept iterating, filling the gaps, and adopting the best things poorly done by the aforementioned to boot.

It is 2013 -- I can't even think of a good reason to jailbreak anymore. The low hanging fruit are gone and there's not much left to be OCD about. There's no room for this character, this stuff is now officially boring. It comes down to the old choice between running OS X or some Linux distro.

skeletonjelly2• 13 years ago

It is 2013 -- I can't even think of a good reason to jailbreak anymore. The low hanging fruit are gone and there's not much left to be OCD about

What about removing that bookshelf icon permanently? Customising the UI? These are all visual things people who subscribe to self-diagnised OCD obsess with.

ok_craig• 13 years ago

Gruber already does lament the shabby doesn't he? So what'd be the difference? In addition to calling out Google / Microsoft / Samsung, he also calls out Apple? Doesn't really seem like a big diff, except maybe for being slightly more objective.

danilocampos7• 13 years ago

So what'd be the difference?

I think the big difference would be hating everyone equally. Gruber laments the shabby with a song in his heart and a spring in his step because Steve Jobs was brilliant, Jony Ive satisfies and Stanley Kubrick was a master filmmaker.

This guy? "Fuck everyone, that's why." That's his schtick. So on the odd days when the sun comes out, you pay very close attention. The rest of the time, wry smiles.

BadassFractal• 13 years ago

Love that blog, thank you for the share.

corresation2• 13 years ago

This is a remarkably charitable take on the values that John Gruber stands for. A more cynical person would say that Gruber's fame grew on the backs of his maniacal defense of all things Apple(1), and his raw contempt for any who went against Apple in any way. That his draw was that he pandered to an audience that constantly needed to be reassured and reaffirmed, perhaps due to some sort of shell-shock from the days when Apple was an underdog or something.

This doesn't exist in the Android space because...well who wants to read that? A few authors do the growling anti-Apple/pro-Google spiel and see little uptake because that just isn't interesting. That John Gruber gained such an audience on the schtick that he engaged in remains a mystery, and is something you won't often see repeated.

It comes to me now that the one other industry where you see that is in sports writers. That John Gruber is the technology industry parallel to the guy writing about how the Red Sox are the absolute bestest and the players on all of the other teams are mugs and...

(1) I should mention that Gruber has reduced the bravado lately, and is less hysterical about every random internet commentator who happens to have a unkind word about Apple.

danilocampos7• 13 years ago

Hysterical is an amusing choice of words given your tone:

"grew on the backs of his maniacal defense...raw contempt for any...pandered to an audience that constantly needed to be reassured...is less hysterical about every random internet commentator..."

Gruber's greatest gift is his ability to inspire haters. I don't think he could be successful without being able to draw a screed like yours. Grist for the outside discussion that draws traffic.

corresation2• 13 years ago

I'm unsure what your point is: I chose every word purposefully and with meaning, and I find it a bit odd if you think that's a "screed".

Daring Fireball has been one of the most negative, hateful, bitter (do those words offend you? Mightn't you italicize them for me, declaring them "ironic"?) sites on the net. It has absolutely taken a turn for the better over the past year, but Gruber's rise absolutely came because he essentially took up arms for all Apple Believers everywhere. I don't even think he particularly believed the things he wrote -- and I have a raw sense that he is a eminently likable person -- but he knew what drew the eyeballs and padded the subscribers, so for that the more power to him.

To your edit of your reply, regarding your purported endless amusement, I too am having a laugh at your continued, and rather futile, attempts to try to imbue emotions that don't actually exist into this conversation (two posts in a row, so you really are desperate for this approach to work). That's a boring BBS-era tactic that...well it just embarrasses us all. You have nothing to say to this but to attempt to laughably diminish the speaker so move along.

general_failure• 13 years ago

Gruber became insanely popular because he was credited by Steve Jobs in one of his emails. Before that, I had never heard of him.

Ologn2• 13 years ago

From the blog post:

I recently wrote about Apple’s overall philosophy and distilled it to, "Revolution, Great Products, Delight." Basically, they are one of the few corporations where money is second to the greater purpose of creating revolutionary products, that are exceptionally great, and which ultimately delight consumers.

From an e-mail "activist shareholder" David Einhorn of Greenlight Capital sent two months ago:

In the end, the judge sided with us, and AAPL withdrew the proposal from consideration...AAPL announced that it will return $100 billion to shareholders by the end of 2015 and will evaluate returning additional capital annually. This vastly more shareholder-friendly capital allocation policy is a dramatic shift from where AAPL stood just a few months ago.

m0nastic• 13 years ago

Do people wonder about why there is no General Motors John Gruber?

Apple has a lot of people who write about them because they check off all of the boxes in the type of person who would write about them. Just having a product (or an ecosystem in the case of Android) doesn't necessitate any of those things.

Apple is appealing to typography people, product design people, elitists and snobs, creative people, "creative" people, etc. A lot of those people are their customers.

They're also a single company, which serves to focus all of that ephemeral chatter into a more palatable narrative.

There are other companies who have a similar level of scuttlebutt about them, but all of the ones I can think of are video game companies (like Bungie, or id software), and it's certainly not to the same scope, even if it's of similar temperament.

badman_ting• 13 years ago

AKA the Hacker News "talk shit about John Gruber" free-for-all thread. Have at it, though.

parennoob2• 13 years ago

There isn't an Android John Gruber, and that's great news.

(Please don't take the rest of this too seriously)

This is the Windows and MacOS fight played all over in the product space. Apple is the Cathedral. They have one device, one OS, and say "take it or leave it. We will give you these features and this UI. If you don't like it, bugger off". Gruber reinforces that worldview. A lot of people have horrible experiences with Apple customer service, but their complaints get swept beneath the benevolent "We have gorgeous typography and know what's good for you" image.

Android, on the other hand, is the Bazaar. Rife with a bunch of cheaper devices, some of which are top-notch systems stamped with Google's seal of approval which can more or less match the iPhone, and others that are miserable tiny pieces of junk, but can somehow still run Android 1.3. You won't have anyone talking about them, but you will have people running them. They may be miserable running them, but the price point and the "good enough" quality keeps them going to Android.

There's two possible outcomes -- either Apple succeeds, and we all start using iApproved iDevices, or Android succeeds, in which case we will all be using vastly different devices, but running various versions of basically the same OS, which Google will have to add massive backward compatibility to.

Which do you want?

</pseudovisionaryrant>

MBCook2• 13 years ago

Is it really great news?

Android is definitely the bazaar, different OEMs try just about everything under the sun. There is lots of choice.

But that doesn't mean there can't be someone out there clearly advocating for their view of Android's future direction. Not everyone needs to (or possibly should) follow it, but it does seem odd to me that there doesn't seem to be a person with some consensus around them trying to influence the platform.

It seems like a gap in the blog market.

parennoob2• 13 years ago

I feel like blogs about community ROMs, running Android on random devices, running other stuff on Nexus devices, etc. are the blog market. Just like Android devices are varied in their capabilities and what people use them for, blogs about them are scattered and varied. Ever heard of a coffee machine running iOS? http://www.yankodesign.com/2010/06/10/android-based-coffee-b...

Chaos is the Android philosophy, and absolute order is the Apple one. Gruber is akin to the high priest of Apple's philosophy, while Android by definition has none.

Kylekramer• 13 years ago

I think the answer is pretty simple and has nothing to do with a philosophy about simplicity and quality. The reason is money. People tend to forget how Gruber makes his money and how that affects his blog. It requires companies with products that can profit after spending over $8000 on one ad to an audience of less than a million. Apple is a very popular brand, but the people who seek out daily information about Apple are the rich. Some may dispute that, saying that Apple makes products comparable to similar products from other companies/it is worth the money it saves in the long term. That is rich people thinking. Look around any major city and compare where you see the iPhone ads and where you see the Boost Mobile/Cricket ads. That should give you some idea of the differences in audiences.

Android has a philosophy, but the reason there isn't an Android Gruber is there isn't room in Android news/punditry for a writer exclusively for the rich. You aren't part of a special group for owning an Android. They give away Androids with haircuts and don't sell 'em with fancy ads about how it was designed by pretty people in California. The app market for Android trends towards free with ads without the Instapaper/Loren Brichter niche of paid apps. A guy like Gruber is useless in the Android world for multiple reasons. There is very little mystique about Android, so the Kremlinology Gruber provides is pointless. You don't need an unaffiliated spokesperson when Google+ is essentially a public discussion forum for those working on Android. It is hard to get excited about an insider when anyone who cares can know nearly everything of interest. The philosophy of Android does have a whiff of open source about it so by nature means the culture will be diffused and fractured into separate camps that won't appoint a figurehead like Gruber. Most importantly, Gruber's audience is too small for the smurfberry/ad funded apps and not large enough to justify dropping four figures for the low conversion Android would have on paid apps.

statictype2• 13 years ago

It's not enough to just be deep into a given platform. You also have to be an excellent writer.

I find much of the content Gruber writes about to be pandering to Apple.

But. I still read everything he writes because he's obviously thoughtful and an excellent writer.

In fact, take out Gruber and I don't see the Apple tech writers/bloggers to be any better than anyone else.

Siracusa doesn't write much (unfortunately). Marco Arment is flame-batey with his opinions. Is there anyone out there at the level of Gruber in terms of writing skills?

rglullis• 13 years ago

No, please. It is unbelievably sad when people let the brand of their phone/videogame/car/clothes become part of their identity. The last thing we need is to have yet another force pushing for division of people into camps.

Android is doing fine as it is, and it doesn't need to win any kind of war. Having a John Gruber or a Marco Arment could be great for marketing, but it does not bring actual progress/improvements to the product. They are great tools for Apple, but it's nothing more than marketing, and let's not forget that the very essence of marketing is to fabricate demand. Nothing else. John Gruber may be great for the tech hipsters that need to find some fuel to validate their consumer habits, but the others don't really care. They will buy Apple if it suits them, or Android, or whatever.

swamp40• 13 years ago

I've always wondered why Google, seeing the problem of manufacturers diluting the "pure" Android experience and turning it into 50 shades of grey, doesn't clamp down on the terms of usage and force the phone mfgs to provide a single user experience, like Apple excels in.

They are ultimately holding all the cards. Don't like our terms of service? Go license Nokia's OS.

mkr-hn• 13 years ago

Why would Google do that?

benihana• 13 years ago

There are a couple of things here. First, Apple isn't a unique company. It's modeled on car companies like Porsche and BMW and watch companies like Rolex. It provides luxury items and is ridiculously protective of its brand. I think a better question would be: are there similar characters for those brands? And if no, why not? And if so, there's no story.

The second thing is that comments here are mostly missing the main reason that Gruber has so many readers. It's not because he's a ridiculous Apple zealot and blind Apple fanbois are love suckling from his gushing Apple teat. It's the same reason that Marco Arment has so many readers: Because he's a good writer, and his predictions and analyses are almost always spot on. Most of his writing is little tidbits or links to other people's writing. But his long articles are usually excellent; well-written and well-thought-out and as I said before, typically right on point.

Ologn2• 13 years ago

From the blog post:

But what does Android stand for? They don’t seem to have any coherent philosophy or aesthetic. Maybe you could argue that Android stands for “openness.”

I've been almost totally focused on Android since spring 2011. It's openness is what drew me in as a programmer. It's openness is also what drew manufacturers in as well.

In its newer Android versions, Google added something called an ActionBar. While Google backports some things to older Android versions, they did not backport the ActionBar. A programmer named Jake Wharton dug in to the Google source code and did a back port of the ActionBar. Now 10% of installed apps use his third-party backport. Even the Facebook app ( http://www.appbrain.com/stats/libraries/details/sherlock/act... ).

There is a cross-platform library called the Simple DirectMedia Library (SDL). It is used by many commercial and open source games and applications. I ported two popular and pretty cool GPL games to Android that use it ( http://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.panaceasupp... and http://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.panaceasupp... ). Apple's App Store doesn't allow apps licensed under the GPL, so those apps can't go onto the App Store.

Only time will tell whether the "centralized and closed" or "decentralized and open" model will dominate. Both have advantages and disadvantages. IDC said in 2013 Q1, Android had 75% market share and iOS had 17.3% for worldwide smartphone shipments. For every iPhone shipped, over four Android phones shipped.

Yhippa• 13 years ago

I would rather Android not have a John Gruber than have one. He says some negative and snarky things on his blog about non-Apple manufactured products and rarely positive things about them. I am potentially flawed but I have a difficult time trusting someone who can't be objective. Android is better off not having someone like that.

dkrich• 13 years ago

This strikes me as an odd comparison. Apple to Android seems about as arbitrary as Apple to Windows or Apple to Dell or Apple to Samsung.

Point being that Apple makes a whole host of products in several categories- OS's, productivity software, desktops, laptops, and phones. Why there isn't an Android John Gruber is the wrong question because he reviews all categories of Apple products, not just the mobile OS. The closest company is probably Microsoft, and I can say that there are PLENTY of MS fanboys and bloggers. You can find them in any software shop that run a .Net stack.

scheff• 13 years ago

One of the key differences between Apple and Android - for me - is that people who buy Apple generally buy into the hype created around Apple. And the reverse - people who buy Android don't buy into the hype. I can't say I have seen a single Android advertisement like I have seen iPod/iPhone/iPad ones. So there is no need for an Android John Gruber; all of the hype of "The Smartphone" has already been done. People know what's on offer, and base their decisions now on utility and price.

iliaznk• 13 years ago

A question is - does Android need one? I don't think so. It's not a religion.

gibbitz• 13 years ago

I have to disagree with the statement that apple is about quality products first and money second. I believe you've confused Apple with Steve Jobs. Since his death, every decision Apple has made seems to be about money. OS changes to make their products more similar to their competition, or to benefit only new hardware. Less focus on the developer set. A new Mac Pro that is less upgeadable than previous versions. New macbooks with soldered in RAM and no expansion slots (want a RAM upgrade? Buy a new computer for 10x the cost, from us only!). I was so into Apple in 2007, when the statement was true. Now they're just the new Microsoft. The thing is, there will likely be no Apple-like competitor that comes after them. There will be thousands of smaller companies that take their sales away one abandoned niche at a time.

Where is the Android John Gruber?

Related Stories