When iOS Becomes the Problem Instead of the Solution

Time for some more developer whining today. We've hit quite a number of situations lately where we have a great idea to support customers better, and while gaming the concept out we hit a wall. And that wall is increasingly becoming iOS.

So many of our products have a significant web component to them now, and it's growing fast. User interfaces, support services, cloud-based registration servers etc etc. And we're actively developing apps for mobile devices that make our products easier to use.

You'll see a lot of opinion on the web about which major ecosystem- iOS or Android- is easier for developers. But what's not always mentioned is the annoying tendency for Apple to say "no way" to your idea. Sometimes it's because it crosses a technical boundary that Apple truly has installed to protect their products and users. I can sympathize with that to some extent.

But so many times it's apparent that the decision comes from a desire to control and point the user only to products that are from Apple. That really stinks. It's hard enough trying to keep my Internet provider from deciding which websites get the most bandwidth to me, and my cellular company from deciding which mobile apps I can use. But in that mix is Apple, holding a hatchet over any innovation that threatens their business model.

One example is WebRTC, which I'll blog a lot more about soon. It's about the most exciting technology to come along in our domain (wideband audio transmission) in a long time. Google's leading the drive, but a host of smaller companies are investing and innovating with it. It's a crazy, wild ride right now.

Except with Apple. WebRTC threatens their control over videoconferencing with FaceTime. So no native WebRTC in iOS browsers.

Anyone trying to innovate in the mobile space needs Apple's support to succeed. There's just so many iProducts out there. Designing only for Android leaves half the market unserved. To their credit, Apple led the charge and created the market for mobile apps. But their absolute control over their ecosystem has doomed a lot of innovative ideas, including a few in our lab. It's getting worse and under normal circumstances I would expect a backlash against this behavior. But users and the press are so enamored with the company and the products it's hard to see that happening soon.