Ubuntu Likely Won't Appear On Phones Until 2015

[Andrecorreia]

why not?

they don t need more than 1% of share to make profit. i want firefox os, ubuntu phone, ios, android, tizen, etc etc in market, more is better for us

[sarmad]

Misleading title. Ubuntu Phones are still coming in 2014, only not from major OEM. Heck, they have already signed a deal to sell the first phone in China and there are already videos of that phone running Ubuntu.

But I think Ubuntu TV is dead. I think any linux with XBMC on it will be better than Ubuntu TV.

[zanny]

Well written.

I would go as far as to say that they have not yet shown that they have the technical ability to finish the product they are describing. The vision is great and I support it fully - which is why I was one of the very first backers for Ubuntu Edge - but if they are already pushing back the release date to 2015... I simply don't now.

By 2015 they will be 6 years too late to the Smartphone market. Samsung will have their own OS out, and they will be competing against them, Android, iOS, WinPhone, Jolla and Blackberry. I don't think the market can support so many different players. Blackberry is dying, WinPhone and iOS have flatlined - it's way too competitive.

And don't forget Firefox OS should dominate the low cost phone market between feature phones and entry level smartphones that would be running Tizen or Sailfish.

[Krysto]

Disappointing. Too bad Sony isn't going to run with it. They should've tried to work with Sony which seemed interested in trying out other OS's for some time, including testing out Firefox OS, according to some rumors. Instead it now looks like it will be picking up WP8. Shame.

At least, I hope it will be ARMv8-only, if they are going to launch it in 2015. At least use that for marketing, as the "first 64-bit only phone" or something, although I'm not sure it will do much at that point.

It would be very interesting if it was one of the first phones with the 16nm FinFET Tegra K2/M1 (Denver/Maxwell), since Nvidia will probably still have issues with selling its chips to many OEMs, so that could definitely set them apart, but they need to do it as soon as the chip is available.

[Delgarde]

The key difference is that there is already an established user base for Ubuntu. It is clearly up for debate as to whether or not that translates into a viable mobile market. I think anyone that says "definitely no" is either naive or heavily biased against Canonical. The opposite is true for anyone saying "definitely yes" too.

I'd say that sounds a very similar position to the one Microsoft is in - they have a huge desktop user base, but they've had no end of difficulty convincing people to take their mobile offerings. Which suggests that Canonical can't rely on their established user base when moving to a vastly different market...

[Gusar]

The key difference is that there is already an established user base for Ubuntu. It is clearly up for debate as to whether or not that translates into a viable mobile market.

For me it's not really up to debate, it's a quite clear "no". And no, I'm not naive or biased against Canonical. My reasoning is simple: Downloading a free iso and installing it on a computer, quite likely next to an existing OS, is one thing. Shelling out money for a new phone is quite another.
A little story: When Nokia came out with their "internet tablets", the N770 and N800, I was like "whoa, duuuudes, put that system on a phone, put it on a phone! and I'll buy it". The system was Maemo. And Nokia did eventually put it on a phone, the N900. Did I buy it? Nope. Why? I couldn't justify shelling out big bucks when the phone I already had at the time served me well.

Now I realize anecdotal evidence is no evidence, but I believe my original point is fully valid - just because someone downloaded an iso, does not mean they'll be shelling out big bucks for a new gadget.

The next point is just my personal view, but I think it has some merit: I don't buy the convergence thing. Desktops and phones are simply too different. On a desktop, I want full-fledged, feature-rich applications. You absolutely can't put such applications on a phone, there's simply no real-estate to accommodate the GUI. So you make simpler applications for the phone. Where's the convergence here? Microsoft did it, but their approach was gimping the desktop. No way would I use Metro apps on a desktop. And I'm not the only one, Win8 hasn't exactly been a success. And there's several third-party start menu replacements, so there's clearly a demand where people want their desktop to be... a desktop. How's that for convergence? It's the "in" thing nowadays, but in practice it has yet to deliver, and I doubt it's even doable.

[akincer]

But I think Ubuntu TV is dead. I think any linux with XBMC on it will be better than Ubuntu TV.

With HDMI inputs on TVs and adapters for phones, it's really a waste of time when people want their media on the go anyway.

Shelling out money for a new phone is quite another.

If you're already getting ready to buy a new phone and Ubuntu is an option, your point makes no sense. At all. You're already spending the money. It's not an unplanned expenditure.

[zanny]

With HDMI inputs on TVs and adapters for phones, it's really a waste of time when people want their media on the go anyway.

Especially with Miracast and other wireless display technologies on the horizon (side note: is there an open standard initiative for cross-device arbitrary video streaming, ie windows / cameras / desktops / video files, that doesn't require wifi direct?)

[eidolon]

When the phone and tablet work is done we will converge the desktop and then get to TV.

"One experience for everything in your life."

[Gusar]

If you're already getting ready to buy a new phone and Ubuntu is an option, your point makes no sense. At all.

Yeah, *if*. How can my point not make sense "at all" when its rebuttal depends on an *if*? So UbuntuPhone's success depends on current Ubuntu users just happening to be in the market for a new phone when it launches? That's not good prospects. Well, of course UbuntuPhone's success does not depend on just that, but this is how your argumentation is going.