I'm an iOS developer which makes me one of the worst kind of apple fanboys apparently but strangely enough I don't hate Android (or other platform for that matter).

When I talk about or teach people iOS development often we start to talk about Android and I always say one thing - I use iOS myself, I make apps for that system but I don't want it to be the only mobile OS out there. I want systems like Android to succeed - even if I won't use it myself there's always something good for me from that - competition will force Apple to make iOS even better, to treat developers better and to try harder in general. That's why I'm often sad that Google made tons of stupid mistakes when they made decisions about Android and its future.

And right now we have 10000 devices, every one of them has different hardware, different screens, different versions of Android. Some get updates, some of them don't and never will (the great pre-iOS  approach to clients - you want new system, buy our new phone). It's a mess and there's not much Google can do about it, at least for now.

Then Amazon came out with their Appstore and I had high hopes. And it turns out - I was right. They made difficult decision of starting their own store but that decision was a good one. Distimo analyzed the situation and - big shocker - for many developers Amazon's small store gives more profit than Google's huge marketplace.

Wow - so people prefer to buy apps from good sources and like to be sure that it will run on their device instead of just hoping that "available for Android" means that their device is on the list of supported devices.. And even developers prefer to feel comfortable and know on which devices and OSes the app will run. If only Google would be smart enough from the beginning instead of just force mass production of Android powered devices - maybe I would be Android developer now (or at least iOS/Android).

It's just a first step, but a really good one. One that is a light at the end of the tunnel. Maybe Google will learn something, maybe Amazon will get more popular and somehow replace Android Marketplace. Maybe in some time there will be good reason to make Android apps. I really hope so.