[tomschlick]

This is what is wrong with android. If device manufacturers/carriers want to add shit to the OS it should be done in the form of downloadable applications that are presented as options when setting up the phone. The OS experience is way too fragmented when moving from phone to phone. This leads to older phones never getting core OS updates because they would have to update sense for the 40 phones they produced in the last few years which will never happen.

[ayuvar]

At the very least, this year we seem to be over the hump and the vast majority of new activations are 2.2 or higher, which at least takes some pressure off the fragmentation debate:

http://pxldot.com/post/18281312362/android-measuring-stick

I'm not sure Google expected that there would be so many phones stuck on 1.5/1.6 or 2.1 - I wouldn't be surprised if you can still buy a new phone running a really non-representative version of Android. Can't be good for the platform reputation in terms of UX or security.

[cageface]

Luckily for Android, iOS 5 was playing catchup to 2.3 in many ways and the two platforms are now fairly comparable in terms of core features. However, if ICS uptake remains as slow as its been so far Apple could leap out ahead with iOS 6, particularly if things like TouchWiz continue to defeat Google's attempts to refine the UI.