Linkbait 2

This week’s.

• Qt WebKit announced. See movie for a sample app. I assume we have to ignore the mouse pointer for a touchscreen device, but otherwise it seems Qt WebKit supports WebGL pretty well.
  And yes, this means Symbian phones now have two default browsers: Nokia WebKit and Qt WebKit.
• How Nokia and Intel messed up relations with potential MeeGo developers. Not good for MeeGo as a native-app platform.
• Michael Mace shares his predictions for 2011:
  1. The Mobile Data Market Stops Growing (interesting thought)
  2. Facebook Becomes Passé (bound to happen)
  3. Book Publishing Dies (don’t think so)
  4. The Year of the Tablet Backlash (already?)
• Distimo reports that the Java App store is discontinued. It’s the first in what will be a long, long row. App stores cost shitloads of money without bringing in enough revenue (except for Apple), so they’re going to fall like flies this year.
• How does Opera make money? Engineering/maintenance fees from device vendors, and search engine kickbacks.
  Actually, Opera is pretty unique in this respect. Although they all get search kickbacks, IE, Safari, and Chrome are maintained by large companies and don’t really have to make a profit, while Firefox lacks Opera’s engineering and maintenance fees because Mozilla has ignored the device market.
  As to the mobile browsers, most of them are maintained by a large company, but some, notably Obigo and NetFront, make their money in a similar way as Opera.
• Horace Dediu expects Android users to be less loyal than iOS users. In his terminology, iOS is a lot “stickier” than Android because its uesers have invested more time and money in getting to work with the system.
• Yahoo! Integrates GetJar Apps in Mobile Search Queries. As it says. Might be useful as a discoverability system IF the system keeps track of what kind of phone the user is on and offers only apps that work on that phone.
• Delightful anti-iPhone rant by Ewan MacLeod.
• Talking Points Memo on native vs. web:

  The companies that control the major mobile devices have a big interest in making people think that there's a level of functionality that is possible using proprietary applications -- an iPad app, an Android app, etc. that's not available using open standards or 'the web'.

  And:

  [...] it's really not true that proprietary application platforms like iPhone, iPad or Android can do more than stuff designed on open standards, at least for news sites. To put that in plain language, it's not true that 'apps' you buy on your iPad can do more things than websites you can access on any browser. [...] apps do cooler and more stuff. But that's because of the way the big companies are shaping the media environment; not because there's any inherent reason it needs to be that way.

  Emphasis mine. I never thought about it in quite these terms, but this is definitely an important part of Apple’s strategy.
• Learning WebGL looks like exactly the sort of resource I need to ... well ... learn WebGL.
• The white iPhone IS the Verizon iPhone. This theory is original, even if it’s incorrect.
• Social Media Venn Diagram. Because it’s true.
• And if you’re into the US Civil War, the NY Times’s Disunion is a must-read