1 in 2 Smartphones will be Running Android by the End of the Year: But the iPhone is More Appealing to Developers.

One in two devices in the rapidly growing smartphone market will be running the Android operating system by the end of 2011, according to research carried out by Kantar Worldpanel ComTech and provided by The Guardian website.

Smartphones are quickly taking over the U.K mobile phone market.

The most recent openly available research carried out in the U.K has seen a dramatic rise of the Android platform, headed by Google, to now cover 45.2% of the U.K market over the 10.7% it covered in the same research carried out in 2010.

The Android platform has seen a dramatic to prominence from July 2010 to July 2011

The research also shows a loss in marketshare for Android's top-two competitors of last year, Nokia's Symbian OS and Apple's iOS, that lost 22% and 12.3% of the market respectively.

Smartphones have appealed to a bigger audience in recent years due to custom applications created by third-party developers that allow users to use a range of functions that simpler 'featurephones' can not provide; these include access to social networking services (e.g Facebook and Twitter), online-retail markets (eBay and Amazon), weather information and news services (to name just a few).

However, it is Apple's iOS platform that sees the biggest number of active developers and applications that are available for its own device, the iPhone.

In the October event held by Apple to announce the latest iteration of it's handset, the iPhone 4S, CEO Tim Cook announced that there over 500,000 available apps are now available in it's iTunes App Store with over 18 billion downloads since it opened in July 2008.

The Apple iTunes App Store has documented a dramatic rise developer involvement AND  user downloads since it's launch in July 2008 (Source: Bradley Wilkinson. Click here to view the original data)

Stu Helm, co-founder of the growing app-development company, Mocha Labs, says, that while both Android and iOS are two very good mobile operating systems, "the reason that we've decided to focus on iOS and not really touch Android is because of the tools and the frameworks Apple provides to their developers. You couldn't really go out  in 30 minutes and code up an app on Android."

"What Apple gives us is a great code library. There are some fantastic APIs (application programming interface) which can do some really clever stuff. But also give you an interface builder which effectively means you can do no UI (user interface) design except your icon which does make things a lot easier [when creating and application]."

To get your iPhone application in to Apple's App Store, it must first go through a submission process which assesses if your code follows the rules set by Apple. Once it is approved, the app is available to download from either a computer installed with iTunes, or on the device directly.

About the terms that developers agree to, Helm explained that, "For paid apps on the App Store, Apple take thirty percent of any revenue you make from an app; so if you make £1, Apple take 30p." 

"That 30p goes towards payment processing (which Apple handles) and the bandwidth for you app. If you have a 10MB application that has sold 100,000 copies, that is a heck of a bandwidth bill to pay, and thats expensive. And Apple at any point can choose to promote your app as a pick".

Many success stories of Apple's App Store have seen applications including the popular game "Angry Birds" into fully-fledged businesses. In 2010, Rovio had sold over 12 million copies of the game on iOS and now have Angry Birds on many other gaming platforms including Android, Windows and PS3 since its launch in December 2009.

"To me thats a good price, some people will say that they dont feel like Apple should take that, but as a developer I can tell you I'm happy Apple take that," Helm said.

In contrast, the last official count Google stated in May at the Google I/O conference, said that there were 200,000 applications in it's store with 4.5 billion downloads. 

Helm also believes that the reason why Android has the majority share of the U.K market is because if you don't have a preference, it is likely that you will come out of the phone shop with an Android phone by default.

"If you want an iPhone, you buy an iPhone. If you go in [to a phone shop] typically what will happen is the salesperson will try and push the cheap Android phones onto you."

"And this is another reason why developing for Android is so difficult, as well as for consumers buying the phones, is because there are literally hundreds, if not thousands, of possible Android devices; possible screen sizes, processors, amouts of memory and that not every phone can run the same version of Android. [Because of this] I don't know what percentage of Android phones will be able to run my app."

Estimates from research2guidance, a german-based research and consultancy firm specialising in the Mobile market, suggest that the number of Apps in the Android Store will match that of Apple's by the end of the year.

Click the "play" button below to hear the extended interview from Stu Helm.

Stu Helm's thoughts on Apple iOS, Apple's App Store and the Fragmentation of Android OS by bradwilks

Local Radio is still Surviving in the 21st Century

91% of the country are listening to the radio each week according to Radio Joint Audience Research (RAJAR), the official body for measuring radio audiences.

In their third-quarter report released on the 27th October, RAJAR have established that 47.1 million members of the U.K population still consume radio content; suggesting that the medium is here to stay for the long-run.

Evidence suggests that the car radio is here to stay for the foreseeable future.

In a more detailed look at the data released, local and regional radio is also holding its own against the national stations.

(Data compiled by Bradley Wilkinson. Click here to see the raw data.)

Of the top five stations broadcasting the North West region, only one has seen a dramatic loss in audience in the last five years, Real Radio North West (formerly known as Century Radio North West), which saw a loss of 315,000 listeners between the years of 2007 and 2009.

In contrast Smooth FM North West has seen a growth of 186,00 listeners in the 5 years studied, from reaching 687,000 listeners in October 2006 to 873,000 listeners as of October this year.

Adam Howes, station manager of Frequency Radio (the University of Central Lancashire's student-run station) believes the reason why local stations are still surviving is because, "the output on local radio is very marketed and very commercialised. Not that national radio isn't, but that is why its so popular."

"Say a mother is taking a child to school she's probably going to hear some song that she likes such as something by One Direction, and that's fine for her. Personally, I don't like local radio."

Another big change that RAJAR has documented is a growth in the number of listeners tuning into radio digitally. Of the stations that were recorded, over a quarter of the share of radio was being tuned in by 28.2%.

About this, Howes said, "thats one really good thing about radio. Obviously from TV you can now access that from different places, but then you have the loading times, the buffering and whether the connection is decent. With radio its a lot easier, because it is just voice; the quality might not be brilliant sometimes, but you can access radio basically from anywhere now."

It is estimated that these digital figures will only grow to point where digital streams of radio will be the majority of how audiences will listen to the radio.

Click the "Play" button to hear Adam Howes' thoughts on local radio and digital streaming:

Adam Howes thoughts on Local Radio and the Accessibility of Radio by bradwilks