In a move to show the benefits of developing for the iOS operating system over Android, Apple has made a sneaky marketing move lampooning Google. Google previously used a pie chart to show the percentages of people using the different versions of their operating system, showing that 29 percent of people use version 4.1, 36.4 percent of people use version 2.3, and even more people use a multitude of other versions of the operating system.
Apple’s pie chart only has three segments – 93 percent of iPhone users use iOS 6, six percent use iOS 5 and only one percent use earlier versions. This goes to show that developers developing for iOS can develop for the most current version of the operating system and reach the most amount of people. On the other hand, developing for Android involves making sure applications work with almost every previous version of the operating system, as users are on both current and outdated versions depending on the phone used.
As Apple shows off more features of iOS 7, they want to prove to developers that developing for the current version of the operating system is always the most effective way to reach the greatest number of people. In contrast, Google’s own graph shows how developing for the most current version of the Android OS actually doesn’t reach as many users as one of the previous versions would, creating a compatibility issue.
Apple knows it has an advantage over Android in that developers generally make more money on iOS than Android, and the company is bent on underscoring that advantage. It’s an important tactic as Android device sales continue to outpace iOS, creating a more attractive development target, at least on the surface. Expect this battle to continue for quite some time.
Source: Apple Insider
