Java Not Worth Building In

“Java’s not worth building in. Nobody uses Java anymore. It’s this big heavyweight ball and chain…”

Those were the exact words of Steve Jobs in January of 2007.  You have to keep this statement in context.  Jobs was talking about the portable device market, and the desktop market.  In 2000, Jobs actually made a valiant effort of bringing Java to the desktop with the launch of Mac OSX.  The harsh reality for Java supporters out there is that software developers don’t want to write desktop application in Java.

I mean sure they want to write games, and small applications here and there, but for the most part now, desktop applications are ruled by C, C++, or .net.  For every one (1) Java application released, there are 10 .net, C, or VB applications released.

Java does have its place still in the enterprise market, but they have lost the desktop battle.  The only other “desktop-ish” battle they had a chance to win was the browser battle, but on that battle field, Flash is the master, hands down.  Adobe made a brilliant move in acquiring Macromedia.

When the iPhone is released at the end of the month, it will sport the most sophisticated, well thought user interface ever written for a portable device.  It will not run Java.  This will make the device a hundred times more stable as it will protect people from going to download badly written Java applications onto their mobile phones.  It will force anyone that wants to write an application for the iPhone, to go through Apple.  Here is where many will call fowl, however, I call “hurray!”.  It will start forcing application standards and performance requirements on people!  And this of course is only if Apple decides to open this up.  And they will, once they own the cell phone market and make it the platform for cell phones.

Listen to the D 2007 Conference and watch Steve and Bill chat.  Steve Jobs knows that the mistakes he made in the past were partnerships, or lack thereof. 

“We weren’t so good with partnering with people. Bill and Microsoft were really good at it.”

Look at facebook, they own the social network market (There are others, but for usefulness and most avid users, they win hands down), and have now opened up the development via the facebook API.  This was sheer genius on Mark Zuckerberg’s part!  This will surely catapult facebook into the stratosphere!  Steve Jobs will make the iPhone the cell phone.  Sure there will be others, but the iPhone will capture market share you would not believe when compared to other phones.

At the end of the day, people want great software that is fast, easy to use, and performs the way they expect it.  The iPhone will do this, as the iPod did. 

Now what if Apple decides to sell the iPhone “Operating System” to phone companies once they smell defeat…  This could be Apple’s chance to take a road that was once not taken, and saw Microsoft become what Apple could have been.

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