Russell Buckley on The Frustrations of Java ME
This has become a yearly tradition, see The Frustrations of Java ME…
Russell wrote:
According to a Greg Ballard of mobile games maker, Glu, in a recent interview in Mobile Entertainment, their Transformers game needed no less than 25,000 SKUs (or variants). 25,000! This has reached the point of absurdity.
I bet there is misinformation here…
Barbara responded:
For that, the number was 20,000 and included “Transformers content SKUs” including ring tones, wallpapers, games, and so forth for 150 operators in 65 countries. I couldn’t deduce how much of that was a result of Java ME fragmentation issues.
Mobility is complex, yes, all of it: messaging, context, user interfaces, latency, fragmentation, proximity, graphics, multimedia, and whatnot regardless of local, texting, voice or web… No apologies needed, it is the way it is. Embrace it! Find solutions, deliver applications, make it happen, today! Use whatever method makes sense for your product or is requested by your customer. But deliver something…
ceo
Enrique
Thanks for linking.
Just a bit of context here. The article quoted in the comment by Barbara was written as the product was launching, back in June ‘07. Therefore, it was a forecast as to what they expected to see.
The article I quoted was written after the results were known. Therefore, I’d go with the latter figure, which is also a direct quote from Glu’s MD in January ‘08. And he probably knows.
But even if the 20,000 is the correct figure, what difference does it make? If it’s 25,000, 20,000 or 2,000 it’s still far too many and it still cripples innovation and prevents new entrants coming to market. In many cases, it forces companies to abandon Java applications and try to do everything on the mobile web.
This is unacceptable.
As far as embracing and accepting, sure thing. We have to make the best of it. But at the same time, it’s not going to stop me from trying to change things in my own little way – just as it’s incumbent on everyone who works in mobile to strive for a better ecosystem in whatever way they can.
“Reasonable men adapt themselves to the world. Unreasonable men adapt the world to themselves. That’s why all progress depends on unreasonable men.” George Bernard Shaw
Russell
Hi Russell…
There has to be mis-information from them… There is no way there are so many thousands of variations. They have to be talking about other things, such as assets and formats etc. related to sounds, graphics, images, videos, wall-papers, or other, which of course affects both local and web-based applications.
And if they do have thousands, or even hundreds, or even less number of variations w.r.t. code itself, they really should reach-out for some help; I can recommend some companies: Jason’s Paxmodept, and Barbara’s Little Springs Design, and Tom’s Future Platforms, and of course, my own company Artemis Wireless Werks.
I do appreciate your pro-activeness and lead on identifying issues and promoting change; we just have to be careful with mis-information… If there is something that drives me crazy, it is mis-information and inaccuracies, and that stopping others from embracing, and innovating…
Cheers,
ceo
Well said… guys.