Carriers release (or work with manufacturers to release) versions of phones with a bunch of custom stuff added onto a vanilla Android OS.
PC makers also put various crapware on phones and use to do shell replacements. That never stopped anyone from upgrading...
When Google releases a new OS or an important security fix to Android, carriers need to merge this stuff in with all of their custom stuff, assuming that they still care to do so and support that device. As a result, phones running Android can fall years behind on patches.
Microsoft also allowed various carrier changes to Windows Phones but they could still offer upgrades across devices.
Phones sold by carriers but running Apple's OS would also have this problem, but Apple doesn't let anyone else sell phones with their OS.
Microsoft has had a vibrant ecosystem of third parties selling PCs running its OS for decades. The entire idea behind WinHec and Plug and Play in the mid 90s was to solve this very problem. The issue that either Google doesn’t know how to properly run a platform or didn’t make it a priority. You see that Google can architect a system where Google Play Services can be updated across manufacturers. They care enough to keep their spying mechanism updated.
The difference between your computer's patches and your phone's patches is that you are allowed to update your computer's operating system, but your phone has probably been carefully locked down by your carrier to prevent you being able to do this, which is very upsetting but that's a different matter.
That’s only because Apple wrested control from the carriers before any iPhone shipped to keep carrier crap off their phone and to keep control over its devices. Google never cared to. Android is just a badly architected system in this regard. Microsoft solved this problem two decades ago.
> Microsoft also allowed various carrier changes to Windows Phones but they could still offer upgrades across devices.
They definitely didn't update phones quickly when exploits were found for IE and Windows would got a security update.
We had some test Windows Phone/Mobile devices at work, and the cheaper models didn't really get upgrades. I would also guess if you had 7.5/7.8 devices, they stopped getting updates? I'm sure some devices kept getting regular updates.
We also had a cheap 32GB Toshiba tablet, which couldn't upgrade Windows 10 because it lacked drive space (even though it had nothing apart from Windows installed on it - it was for testing touch on Windows browsers).
> Microsoft also allowed various carrier changes to Windows Phones but they could still offer upgrades across devices. ... Microsoft has had a vibrant ecosystem of third parties selling PCs running its OS for decades.
And for all that, they still failed to make a dent in the market. Partly, OEMs and carriers were not as interested in supporting Microsoft's offering precisely because of how they could not put their own stamp on it. In many ways, Microsoft's offering was better on the fundamentals than Android's. So why didn't it succeed? Perhaps because of the very features you are praising.
The only reason Apple was even able to pull it off was because of their first mover advantage, combined with their extreme consumer appeal. Their phones were so much better than anything that was available at the time, but even with all that, they had to enter into an exclusive contract with AT&T for the first couple of years in order to get the control they wanted. Only after they had established a foothold were they able to say "no" to carrier and OEM customization. If they had been second to market, like Android, it's hard to picture them having that level of control and leverage.
It's honestly surprising that people still continue to insist that anyone but Google is responsible for the current state of affairs. It's completely because of Google's business incentives. Google's pivot, from a Blackberry clone to an iPhone clone, was about quickly obtaining market share. That meant ceding control to OEMs and carriers so they could effectively market devices against the iPhone.
Microsoft didn't lose because of those things (it shows how much better they are at being a platform company that they didn't repeat Google's mistakes), they lost solely because Android was free to OEMs. That's entirely a business model question.
PC makers also put various crapware on phones and use to do shell replacements. That never stopped anyone from upgrading...
When Google releases a new OS or an important security fix to Android, carriers need to merge this stuff in with all of their custom stuff, assuming that they still care to do so and support that device. As a result, phones running Android can fall years behind on patches.
Microsoft also allowed various carrier changes to Windows Phones but they could still offer upgrades across devices.
Phones sold by carriers but running Apple's OS would also have this problem, but Apple doesn't let anyone else sell phones with their OS.
Microsoft has had a vibrant ecosystem of third parties selling PCs running its OS for decades. The entire idea behind WinHec and Plug and Play in the mid 90s was to solve this very problem. The issue that either Google doesn’t know how to properly run a platform or didn’t make it a priority. You see that Google can architect a system where Google Play Services can be updated across manufacturers. They care enough to keep their spying mechanism updated.
The difference between your computer's patches and your phone's patches is that you are allowed to update your computer's operating system, but your phone has probably been carefully locked down by your carrier to prevent you being able to do this, which is very upsetting but that's a different matter.
That’s only because Apple wrested control from the carriers before any iPhone shipped to keep carrier crap off their phone and to keep control over its devices. Google never cared to. Android is just a badly architected system in this regard. Microsoft solved this problem two decades ago.