I wonder if the difference is that, on the iPhone it’s something new. On Androids, Hangouts is almost surely going to replace Talk (if it hasn’t already).
Forcing users to sign up for something new to keep something existing is a lot different than forcing users to sign up for something new to get something new.
The iPhone app requires a G+ profile. My brother claims the Android app doesn’t but I am not sure if I believe him. He says the only restriction is that he can’t upload photos.
$500 for the pro account with 2 TB of storage. That’s interesting… I am not saying it’s too expensive. Someone who needs 2 TB of storage is a unique customer and should expect to pay a premium. It’s just interesting 1 TB is free with ads and 2 TB is $500.
Either they hope to make a lot of money off of ads or they don’t expect anyone within a few standard deviations of a median user to use anywhere close to 1 TB.
Are you sure Yahoo has the expertise? People seemed confused by Google’s strategy at times, but their main business strategy is simple and has remained constant – hire as many of the world’s best computer scientists as possible.
A big driver of Google’s advantages is the things we never see – the plumbing behind it all. I really have no idea how good Yahoo is at delivering the same (on a technical level)
Pandora is a DMCA compliant service – no license necessary (just royalties). Spotify is not and therefore has to negotiate licenses.
If Apple wanted to launch a Pandora clone, unless they previously signed that they wouldn’t, they could today. They must want to launch a non-DMCA compliant service. (Or want to pay less than a DMCA complaint service would, but that’s unlikely)
