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Comment by haseman | Hacker News Reader

The conventional wisdom was exactly the same 2 years ago concerning android phones vrs the iPhone. Android has since moved to match the iPhone for market share. The same will probably happen for tablets. It'll just take a few years. I think the android tablets aren't very good right now, but I felt the same way about the android phones when they first came out.

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>The conventional wisdom was exactly the same 2 years ago concerning android phones vrs the iPhone.

The difference is that the iPad doesn't have the same constraints (namely available only on AT&T) that the iPhone had. Would Android really have had the same success it had if the iPhone was available on Verizon, Sprint & T-Mobile (and assuming Apple could keep up with the volume) from the start?

Anecdote: everyone I know who has an Android phone really wanted an iPhone but didn't want to leave Verizon. Now that the iPhone is on Verizon, most of those folks intend to switch to an iPhone once their contract is up.

(FTR I don't own an iPhone, iPad or an Android device)

> Would Android really have had the same success it had if the iPhone was available on Verizon, Sprint & T-Mobile (and assuming Apple could keep up with the volume) from the start?

That's in the US, what about the rest?

Yes, this is an honest question.

Good question, what are the Android/iPhone market numbers outside the U.S.? I suspect that Android might have a lead in undeveloped countries since there are lower cost models available. I'd love to see the data.

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2675668

According to some numbers I can find for Sweden (which probably doesn't classify as an undeveloped country), Android caught up with iPhone during Q1 of this year (1), and is currently growing faster than iPhone.

(1)http://www.mobil.se/nyheter/android-ifatt-iphone-i-sverige-1...

Not sure how relevant a question that is. Apple explicitly chose to be on AT&T and no-one else. I'm sure Verizon would have put their phone on the network, just not on terms Apple wanted.

Being exclusive to AT&T was as much Apple's choice as Android's was to be on them all.

Yes I'm sure it impacts adoption rates, but we didn't see a huge rush to the Verizon iPhone. But, as you say, the real test won't come until people's contracts end over the next 2 years.

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