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Comment by kenjackson | Hacker News Reader

Actually I think the opposite. Google and MS will exert more control over carriers. MS in particular.

The problem with Apple is that they signed an exclusivity agreement with a single carrier. I'm sure that if Google told Verizon, "The only place an Android phone will be for the next four years is Verizon", Verizon would jump through hoops for them.

But by getting the phone on all carriers, yet still doing 90% of what Apple is doing on a single carrier is impressive.

And MS has taken this a step further with the hardware requirements and no skinning, and one centralized market. Yet, they're doing this across all carriers.

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You make it sound easy. Apple would have loved for nothing more than having their phone on every carrier. But at the time they were a nobody in the mobile arena, and not only was their phone a huge departure but they also wanted to keep the look and feel untouched and have the carrier implement some ad hoc changes for things like visual voicemail.

By the time Google had to make a deal, Verizon was seeing their customers moving to AT&T and needed something to rival the iPhone. Before the iPhone Verizon is said to have told Apple that its contract (to have a Verizon iPhone) were not acceptable. I doubt Verizon would have replied like that had the roles been inverted.

Anyway, the exclusivity will hopefully end soon. What will be your stance at that point?

I'm not sure where I said it was easy, or implied it. I'm not even sure what you think I believe is easy.

In any case, my point is simply that exclusivity of a phone OS to a single carrier IMO is not a net win.

And my additional point was that MS is getting most of the win that Apple has today, but is applying it across all carriers.

I think Apple ending the exclusivity will be a great thing. You seem to imply that I'd think otherwise.

But you are comparing apple and oranges. You are comparing Microsoft today with Apple in 2007. There were a _lot_ of people doubting Apple would succeed if they ever tried to move into the phone market. And carriers (at least in the US) had a solid grip on the market.

Nowadays the situation is completely different. Apple had showed that their vision of smartphone is successful: Microsoft (or Google) don't need to prove that anymore. Also carriers have lost a bit of their power, and are more afraid of ending up with a world controlled by one company than before.

The point of the exclusivity is that if it runs out in a few months as many expect, that's pretty much when the new MS phones will come out (give or take a couple of months). So I don't see what damage Apple made.

No, I'm comparing Apple today with MS today. What Apple did in 2007 was great. But the exclusivity that exists to this day, is not, IMO.

I never said that Apple damaged the market. Someone made this comment, "Apple is going to exert the power to control the carriers. Apple is about the only company that can, or will, exert this kind of power."

I said I thought the opposite. That the power to control the carriers will be stronger with Google and MS. Largely because they will be on all the carriers, and while imposing looser requirements on the carriers, capture the core requirements (again, MS in particular -- Google less so).

Lets be clear. I'm not saying Apple has done anything bad, but I do think that their impact has been weakened with their exclusivity for four years on ATT. I find it hard to believe that Apple couldn't have negotiated a shorter exclusivity deal, while losing almost nothing.

Oh, I definitely agree that their impact was weakened by the exclusivity... for a start because Android would have been less popular.

My guess (and it's purely that) is that the deal was extended (maybe one year... dunno) in exchange for the iPad deal. Not a great move, I agree.

Finally, I agree MS stands in a strong position too. But not Google. As long as Android is open, and as long as there are many manufacturers of Android phones, you have a situation where the very few phone companies have an oligopoly on demand and hence have the upperhand: if Motorola doesn't play along, they can go to Sony, or HTC, or Samsung, or LG... and others are coming up soon. Then Motorola can either lose a lucrative business without little harm to the carrier or is forced to oblige.

That said if one particular brand would become the most appealing for some reason, that company would definitely regain some bargaining power.

Apple created real smartphone competition in the form of high quality UI linked to an unlimited data plan. They only needed to get AT&T to move a little before competition forced Verizon etc to keep up.

  And MS has taken this a step further with the hardware
  requirements and no skinning, and one centralized market.
  Yet, they're doing this across all carriers.

And what leverage MS can use? MS first have to convince phone makers to use their OS instead of Android.

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