Sony Ericsson Head Android Developer Tweets - 'in favor of rooting if we do it right'

[dgstorm]

The head Android developer at Sony Ericsson, Simon Walker, recently made an interesting statement about rooting, via Twitter. He indicated that he is "in favor of it if we do it right." Perhaps this could be the seed of change at Sony Ericsson which leads to easier rooting and custom ROM development. Maybe it could even spark interest for other companies to follow suit. Motorola seems to be flip-flopping on the issue already, as indicated by their recent announcement of the Xoom coming with an unlocked/relockable bootloader. It would be amazing if this turned out to be a start of an industry trend.

Source: Android.net via AndroidCentral

 

[kodiak799]

Saw this and it absolutely made me laugh. I don't think they could have made a more hypocritical statement, considering what is going on with PS3 hacking.

 

[seanjohnja91]

Saw this and it absolutely made me laugh. I don't think they could have made a more hypocritical statement, considering what is going on with PS3 hacking.

He is not apart of Sony Entertainment, he is apart of Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications two different companies. And just because Sony Ericsson or Sony for that fact lock there devices doesn't mean there aren't people who work for the companies that favor it.

 

[kodiak799]

He is not apart of Sony Entertainment, he is apart of Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications two different companies. And just because Sony Ericsson or Sony for that fact lock there devices doesn't mean there aren't people who work for the companies that favor it.

That's a bit facetious given that Sony owns 50% of Sony Ericsson. And when the PS3 came out, Sony embraced the Linux community and indeed it was part of their sales pitch.

Sony might be the most aggressive/litigious protector of its intellectual property out there, and it's a major reason they've locked down the PS3. I don't believe for one second that any business interest of Sony is going to embrace truly open platforms.

 

[billjohnson]

I'm sure all the major players in the Android device market are fully aware of rooting and custom ROMs. However, they don't all seem to accept it as openly. Some reasons I can understand, such as they pay programmers to create a custom UI, but they have to realize many will appreciate the hardware, but not the UI itself. I seriously wish Motorola would embrace it more openly. I think they would increase their market-share exponentially, especially if they released a custom ROM SDK or the like. I really dig the Bionic but anymore I'm not sure Moto will ever make a phone like the OG Droid.....

 

[kodiak799]

I think they would increase their market-share exponentially, especially if they released a custom ROM SDK or the like.

I agree and disagree. People who flash roms are probably less than 1% of the market, which is only 900k globally (assuming 90M Android sales this year). That's nothing to sneeze at, but at least a few phones are/will be open and even then there's no guarantee of capturing all or even most of that 900k, so the incentive simply isn't there.

However, I would agree a savvy company might embrace the rom community and work with developers a bit more closely and they could really up customer service/satisfaction while reducing maintenance costs by pushing some of that off on developers. You make it a very seamless and easy process to flash roms (read: like installing any app from the market) and then you maybe have a strong selling point.

On the other hand, with Google planning to slow down updates to 2 a year it becomes less critical. But I still think it would be in the OEM's interest to take VZW out of the loop, which only serves to add another layer of complexity to the update process.

Root adds some value, and most of these phones can be and are rooted. But to be honest, I don't see a lot of value-add from custom roms, beyond getting the latest version of Android and propping up the underpowered D1 (which is mostly a non-issue with what news phones have under the hood).

 

[SixStringTheory]

There's an intrinsic value to opening up your hardware to devs and seeing what they do. It's a bit of an off-topic analogue but in games like World of Warcraft and WAR which had robust APIs available for UI mods it was VERY common (to the point of almost beings standard practice) for the game developers to adopt variations of user created addons into their stock UI.

Crowd sourcing is nothing to laugh at. And if rooting is easy, and ROMs easily installed, then all these manufacturers are basically getting an extra 1M free developers.

I'm still not 100% sure why things get so locked down. I guess it's about warranties and protecting pre-installed bloatware. Everything's about money so I usually assume some suits that don't really know anything make these decisions. But that doesn't mean that everyone who has a say in a company is 100% aligned with what the company ends up doing.

 

[billjohnson]

I think they would increase their market-share exponentially, especially if they released a custom ROM SDK or the like.

I agree and disagree. People who flash roms are probably less than 1% of the market, which is only 900k globally (assuming 90M Android sales this year). That's nothing to sneeze at, but at least a few phones are/will be open and even then there's no guarantee of capturing all or even most of that 900k, so the incentive simply isn't there.

However, I would agree a savvy company might embrace the rom community and work with developers a bit more closely and they could really up customer service/satisfaction while reducing maintenance costs by pushing some of that off on developers. You make it a very seamless and easy process to flash roms (read: like installing any app from the market) and then you maybe have a strong selling point.

On the other hand, with Google planning to slow down updates to 2 a year it becomes less critical. But I still think it would be in the OEM's interest to take VZW out of the loop, which only serves to add another layer of complexity to the update process.

Root adds some value, and most of these phones can be and are rooted. But to be honest, I don't see a lot of value-add from custom roms, beyond getting the latest version of Android and propping up the underpowered D1 (which is mostly a non-issue with what news phones have under the hood).

Right. I agree. Especially with leaving VZW totally out of it as all they do is f#$@! up Android's OS. Bing for example. Nonetheless I'm waiting to see what all is offered before I upgrade. I'm probably gonna jump on the Thunderbolt bandwagon just because of the screen size but the Incredible 2 would be sick.....

There's an intrinsic value to opening up your hardware to devs and seeing what they do. It's a bit of an off-topic analogue but in games like World of Warcraft and WAR which had robust APIs available for UI mods it was VERY common (to the point of almost beings standard practice) for the game developers to adopt variations of user created addons into their stock UI.

Crowd sourcing is nothing to laugh at. And if rooting is easy, and ROMs easily installed, then all these manufacturers are basically getting an extra 1M free developers.

I'm still not 100% sure why things get so locked down. I guess it's about warranties and protecting pre-installed bloatware. Everything's about money so I usually assume some suits that don't really know anything make these decisions. But that doesn't mean that everyone who has a say in a company is 100% aligned with what the company ends up doing.

I'm with you on the crowdsourcing. As my degree is a dual-major with one major in Administrative Business Analysis, crowdsourcing in my opinion (depending on the situation) can be the best option for a new software implementation as everyone feels like they shared their part.

 

[SixStringTheory]

Exactly. Plus people that work for Sony Ericsson work for Sony Ericsson. For better or worse their vision will be somewhat confined to that particular environment. Mod developers will definitely see things differently than engineers at a SE office. Not better or worse, but just different.

And in an era where innovation often equates into profits having as varied a culture as possible is always a good thing. But that's hard to get when you're relying on a small group of employees compared to thousands of independent minds.

 

[kodiak799]

The main reason I suspect OEM's are locking down bootloaders is they want to own the UI and some specialized apps. Competition is going to drive down margins on the hardware, and it's already very difficult to differentiate on hardware. That's why I don't really see them "outsourcing" the UI and letting go of that opportunity for differentiation. This is partly why Apple doesn't license IOS or OSX and probably never will.

Everyone clamoring for the OEM's to embrace truly open and unlocked are asking them to accept a future of 5% margins. While it may be inevitable, don't expect them to go without a fight.

 

[SixStringTheory]

I wonder if this is what the Desktop OS scene would be like if Windows and Mac fell out of favor and Linux was mainstream? Interesting to think about.

 

[billjohnson]

Tru dat. Obviously that is impossible but it's nice to theorize about.

 

[Xf53vfs3]

i pray for the day

 

[Xf53vfs3]

I wonder if this is what the Desktop OS scene would be like if Windows and Mac fell out of favor and Linux was mainstream? Interesting to think about.

Being a Linux user myself i would love for that to happen, and i feel as though if people were to adopt Linux and try it out they would find that it isn't as difficult as its stereotyped to be. (assuming the user doesn't decide to go with Gentoo and compile the whole OS from source)

Tru dat. Obviously that is impossible but it's nice to theorize about.

I don't know about impossible... i believe that open source is the future of technology, but thats just my two cents. Like i said above if one begins with Ubuntu or openSUSE at first, they don't ever have to touch the command line if they don't want too (assuming that that is their greatest fear, of course). Any Linux distribution can be as *easy* or as *difficult* as any other operating system, But just like OS X and Windows, there is a learning curve one must pass first and with a distro like Ubuntu, that learning curve is often short and well documented (Ubuntu Forums).

Good points, guys.

 

[billjohnson]

I'm a pretty hardcore Linux user myself and there's many applications where it fits in the corporate environment. But I've also been in corporate IT long enough to understand the Linux will always be objective and never nab the entire desktop marketshare. I honestly believe at some point (just to stay on topic) that Android will replace iOS and RIM in the corporate smartphone market. But most businesses aren't willing to take the risks that come with pushing an Open Source OS into a mission-critical environment. As for me, Imma dual-boot Linux tell I die yo.