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CE-Oh no he didn't!: Tim Cook says Google was 'not committed to' money-losing Motorola
Tim Cook might come off as a nice guy with a generous heart, but he's sure not above throwing some serious shade at Apple's staunchest competitor. In a recent interview with the Wall Street Journal, the CEO said he wasn't surprised that Google sold Motorola -- after all, the company usually "gets rid of something that's losing money, something that it's not committed to." To be fair, he also acknowledged that it's "really hard" developing software (which Google's doing good at), services and hardware at the same time. As he used that as a segue to say that Apple's ability to do all those things makes it special, though, it's hard to see that comment as sympathetic. Want to read what he said exactly? Head past the break for his full commentary about Motorola's sale, or check out the the WSJ for the full interview.
CE-Oh no he didn't!: HTC's CMO Ben Ho says the Galaxy S 4 is just 'more of the same'
First it was Apple, then LG, and now we have HTC also trolling Samsung's Galaxy S 4 launch in New York. Before the doors opened at Radio City Music Hall, the Taiwanese company kindly gave out hot cocoa and snacks while showing off the One to folks lined up in the cold outside, as well as to the public in Times Square (see video after the break). This was followed by HTC's complementary entertainment during Samsung's event with a series of surprisingly relentless tweets -- one of which even bore the hash tag "#theNextBigFlop" to mock Samsung's "The Next Big Thing" slogan. Ouch. To wrap up the day, HTC's fresh CMO Ben Ho got in touch (by way of a PR agency) to say that the again-plastic Galaxy S 4 is just "more of the same," and that his company's "all-aluminum unibody HTC One" with "original cutting-edge technology, mouth-watering design and a premium feel" is really what people are after. Here's his full statement: "With a continuation of a plastic body, and a larger screen being the most obvious physical change, Samsung's new Galaxy pales in comparison to the all-aluminum unibody HTC One. "This is more of the same. HTC remains the best option for those people looking for the best technology wrapped in premium design. Our customers want something different from the mainstream, who appear to be the target for the Galaxy. "Our customers want original cutting-edge technology, mouth-watering design and a premium feel from their mobiles, which is why we created the HTC One." Looks like "quietly brilliant" is no more for HTC then? Update: Ben Ho got back to us with another nugget, this time taking a quick jab at the software features on Samsung's latest flagship device. It's short and sweet (and also spicy): "Looking at the software features of the S4, we think Samsung spent more on marketing than innovation."
CE-Oh no he didn't!: Apple's Phil Schiller needles Android's fragmentation, user experience (update: more!)
In an interview curiously timed just ahead of Samsung's Galaxy S 4 shindig tomorrow, Apple senior VP of worldwide marketing Phil Schiller took time out to tell the Wall Street Journal exactly where he believes his company's product outpaces its Android competition. There's no mention of the Korean company or its flagship product by name, but he took care aim at a frequent target of Android foes: fragmentation. Android is often given a free replacement for a feature phone and the experience isn't as good as an iPhone. When you take an Android device out of the box, you have to sign up to nine accounts with different vendors to get the experience iOS comes with...They don't work seamlessly together According to the WSJ, he also shared company data indicating four times as many customers had switched to iPhone from Android during Q4 as the reverse. We'd be interested in seeing what those numbers look like in the quarter of the next Galaxy's release just to follow up, but owners of either product can find more (predictable) talking points at the source link. Update: Had enough? Apparently Phil hasn't, continuing his media tour to Reuters -- did he lose our number? -- rattling the fragmentation saber again, and this time pointing it squarely at rival Samsung. Citing Google's own Android Dashboard data, he pointed out that only 16 percent of users are on Jelly Bean despite it being out for a year. Also called on the carpet is the Galaxy S 4 ahead of its launch, as he said customers will wait for an update yet again after it ships with last year's software. Your move, Samsung.
CE-Oh no he didn't!: Vodafone's Vittorio Colao says 4G is for 'technofreaks'
Prefer the internet to be, um, fast? That puts you outside the norm, according to Vodafone CEO Vittorio Colao. Speaking to investors, he said that he'd visited an EE store to try out 4G LTE speeds for himself and "all I saw [were] technofreaks." As reported by Mobile News, the CEO added that only "early adopters" would notice the difference between LTE and HSPA+ and none of his friends or colleagues have told him "that we need this fast internet." While he may want to start running with a different crowd, EE's already hoisted him on his own petard with a new Twitter campaign -- "EE welcomes technofreaks." See the coverage and image after the fold for more. [Image credit: WikiMedia Commons]
CE-Oh no he didn't!: Steve Ballmer calls Dropbox 'a fine little startup'
Microsoft is no stranger to industry flak, but it's always better to give than to receive, right? Steve Ballmer thinks so, and in a recent Bloomberg interview, he took a second away from talking up the new Office 2013 to smite Dropbox, saying that the 100 million users it boasts "sounds like a pretty small number to me." He recovered slightly by adding "I'm not beating on Dropbox," only to follow it with the finishing blow: "They're a fine little startup and that's great." We doubt anyone else would call Dropbox a startup at this point, but Microsoft's chief can't be seen complimenting a SkyDrive rival now, can he? After having to defend the user stats for Redmond's Yammer, he was also quizzed on the undying native Office for iPad rumor, to which he had "nothing to say," apart from "we'll see what we see in the future." If these snippets aren't quite enough, then head to the source link for the full interview. Ballmer may be a little less shouty these days, but it's good to know he's still capable of delivering the odd high-caliber burn.
CEOh no he didn't!: Rahul Sood heckles HP over strangely named Envy h8 PC
It's no secret that Rahul Sood, who now runs Microsoft's Bing Fund, feels a twinge of bitterness towards his previous employer. Having worked for HP until 2010, and having endowed it with the Envy sub-brand, he's since been forced to watch from the sidelines while the mothership floundered. But it's not the u-turns or bad investments that have jerked Sood's chain this time -- it's actually the slightly awkward (and potentially emotional) branding of a model in HP's desktop range. After seeing details of the product pop up online, he tweeted: "Thought I'd seen everything... then I saw the 'HP ENVY H8' desktop... what the heck guys? Is this code for I give up?" Tom's Hardware reached out to Sood for an explanation and got a carefully-worded response in which he implied that HP has become preoccupied with the "logo on the box" at the expense of "culture" and "community." Meanwhile, the old Pavilion h8 has somehow slipped by unnoticed.
CE-Oh no he didn't!: Valve's Gabe Newell says 'Windows 8 is a catastrophe for everyone'
Always-outspoken Gabe Newell, the big cheese at Valve, made quite a few interesting statements at this year's Casual Connect conference, including the quote above. Gabe believes Microsoft's impending update will drive manufacturers away from the OS and he reiterated Valve's plan to make the entire Steam catalog available on Linux as a "hedging strategy." During the onstage discussion, he also weighed in on the longevity of touch input, which he estimates at a decade, the possibility of tongue control and the future of wearable computers. Other classic quotes include "the next version of Photoshop should look like a free-to-play game," which Adobe apparently didn't quite understand -- and frankly, neither do we.
Sergey Brin clarifies Apple and Facebook critique, says statement was 'distorted'
Sergey Brin wasn't too happy with how his critique of Apple and Facebook was represented in the media following an interview he gave to the Guardian. In a post on Google+ (hey, if he won't use it, who will?) Brin lamented that, "my thoughts got particularly distorted... in a way that distracts from my central tenets." The founder believes that undue attention was given to his complaints about Facebook and Apple's "restrictive" walled gardens, when he sees oppressive governments and state-sanctioned censorship as much larger issues. Of course, while Brin does say he admires his competitors, he never truly backpedals from his criticism or says that it was taken out of context. To let Sergey explain himself, hit up the source link.
Sergey Brin says the internet is under attack by governments, Apple and Facebook
One of the qualifications for scoring a CE-Oh no 'round here is actually being a CEO -- so Sergey Brin does not receive that honor. We will, however, draw attention to what some might call his hyperbolic ramblings. In an interview with the Guardian, Google's cool uncle said he was worried about the state of the internet and that his company could not have flourished in an online ecosystem like today's. According to Brin, the threats are coming from all sides -- most notably governments. While oppressive regimes like those in China and Iran get top billing, the US doesn't escape without criticism thanks to SOPA and PIPA which seemed perilously close to passing with support from the media industry. The co-founder also took shots at Apple and Facebook, which he said have built "really restrictive" walled gardens. For more smack talk from one of the most influential men in the tech industry, hit up the source link. [Image via Thomas Hawk]
CE-Oh no he didn't!: Tony Fadell calls Honeywell out on patent claims
Smart thermostats might not be the cut-throat world of litigation like, say, mobile phones, but that doesn't mean the odd feather doesn't get ruffled from time to time. Nest CEO, Tony Fadell, is understandably protective of his company's product, so when competitor Honeywell laid a stack of patent infringement claims at his door, unsurprisingly he was none too pleased. How displeased? Well, enough for him to drop this clanger: "Honeywell is worse than a patent troll." Then going on to quantify with "They're trying to strangle us, and we're not going to allow that to happen." We think that makes his feelings on the matter pretty clear. Well, when you've been SVP of Apple's iPod division, it's easy to see how patience with such things might wear thin.
Eric Schmidt: 'Android will be bigger than iOS'
Eric Schmidt was addressing the crowd at Le Web in Paris and recounted a tale when an Android user asked why apps were often written for iOS first, and then ported over to Google's OS. His response? "My prediction is that six months from now, you'll say the opposite." After the uncomfortable silence had died down, he added that Android's "open" model meant the company had volume on its side -- and volume is what he feels will attract developers. He added that Ice Cream Sandwich would redress Android's device fragmentation and the sheer number of hardware makers would ensure that 2012 would be Google's year. At which point, everyone in the audience probably went back to their iPads to read Twitter.
CE-Oh no he didn't!: Stephen Elop says 'Apple created Android,' the conditions necessary for its existence
Nokia's freshman CEO is speaking at the Open Mobile Summit right now. As expected, he's covering the same ol' ground, explaining why Nokia ditched Symbian and MeeGo to build the "third ecosystem" with Microsoft -- you know, after totally dominating the high-end smartphone market just three years ago. He's also being credited with the following quote: "Apple created Android, or at least created the conditions necessary for Android to come into being" We're on to you, Mr. Elop. It's a classic diversionary tactic. Get the one and two smartphone / tablet OS vendors squabbling and then execute a flanking maneuver while nobody's watching. Why else would the Nokia CEO make such an emotive claim? Unless it's true?
CE-Oh no he didn't!: BMW exec says electric vehicles 'won't work,' but would love to sell you one anyway
Jim O'Donnell, CEO and chairman of BMW North America, recently sat down with the Detroit News to discuss the ActiveE -- an electric version of BMW's 1 Series coupe, available for lease in the US this fall. Most CEOs would've probably used the opportunity to wax PR poetic about their company's bold, forward-looking ethos, because that's what CEOs do. O'Donnell, however, used the occasion to let us in on a dirty little secret: EVs don't actually work. According to O'Donnell's undoubtedly robust calculations, EVs won't work for "at least 90-percent" of the human population, at current battery ranges. The situation is so dire, in fact, that the US government shouldn't even bother wasting its $7,500 tax credits on frivolous things like innovation, national security and clean air. "I believe in a free economy. I think we should abolish all tax credits. What they are doing is putting a bet on technology, which is not appropriate. As a taxpayer, I am not sure this is the right way to go." O'Donnell went on to say he's "far more optimistic" about diesel's chances of increasing BMW's US market share -- because, you know, it's not like the oil industry gets any tax breaks, or anything. And it's not like diverting some money away from oil subsidies and putting it toward EV technology would create the "level playing field" that O'Donnell and his company so desperately need. No siree, the US energy market is just as pure and fair as it's always been -- and it certainly doesn't deserve to be corrupted by an EV tax credit pestilence. That said, O'Donnell would still really appreciate it if we buy the battery-powered i3 when it launches in 2013. Who knows? He may even throw in a free bridge, too.
CE-Oh no he didn't!: Sony's Jack Tretton says Nintendo makes 'babysitting tools'
Sony does what Nintendon't? That's the general sentiment from a brief interview that PlayStation chief Jack Tretton gave to Fortune this week, in which he talked up Sony's strengths and played down (some may even say belittled) its competitors, and Nintendo in particular. That began with the relatively tame assertion that Sony's decision to go high-end with PlayStation 3 is just now beginning to pay off while the other consoles are "starting to run out of steam," before he took aim at Nintendo's handheld business. According to Tretton, Nintendo's handhelds all offer what he calls a "Game Boy experience," something that's great as a "babysitting tool," but that "no self-respecting twenty-something is going to be sitting on an airplane with one of those." Yow. Any self-respecting twenty-somethings beg to differ? Let us know in the comments below. [Thanks, Robert C]
CE-Oh no he didn't!: NGP will be 'dead on arrival,' says ngmoco boss
In all honesty, you would expect the leader of a team concerned exclusively with producing games for smartphone platforms like iOS and Android to be dismissive of a new dedicated handheld console's chances, but it's still jarring to hear such a strident dismissal of the Sony NGP's chances. In an interview at GDC this year -- yes, the same place where we were treated to some very impressive demos of the NGP's performance -- ngmoco CEO Neil Young has expressed his belief that Sony's next PSP will be "dead on arrival." Claiming that the new portable will be incapable of competing with the rich ecosystems and affordable pricing models that smartphones now offer, Young says not even the crazy specs or PS3-like gaming will help the NGP survive. This echoes comments from Satoru Iwata last year saying that Apple, not Sony, is the "enemy of the future" for handheld consoles, though Young does close off on a positive note, saying that he sees brighter prospects for the 3DS thanks to Nintendo's rich collection of own-brand franchises and reserves of fan loyalty. So that's it, folks, better start selling those Sony shares while they're still worth something! Or not, it's up to you. [Thanks, Dominick]
CE-Oh no he didn't!: Steve Jobs misquotes Samsung, asks what you're gonna do about it
Hey, remember all the fun last month when Samsung's Lee Young-hee said that Galaxy Tab sales were "quite smooth" but everyone heard "quite small?" Yeah, well, Steve Jobs doesn't. Before unveiling the iPad 2 today the man in black and denim listed that early misquote -- which was widely and officially corrected -- as evidence to prove that the iPad's competition was floundering. Admittedly that isn't far from the truth, but there's no need to go putting words in other executives' mouths to make a point.
CE-Oh no he didn't!: INQ chief says Android is too geeky for 'pretty girls'
Take one dose of improper generalization, mix it in with a heaping of condescension, and then add a pinch of good old sexism. What do you get? This quote, coming from Frank Meehan, CEO of the Android handset-making INQ: "If you go to a nightclub in any city in the world, the pretty girl has an iPhone or a BlackBerry. She doesn't have an Android phone. She has no emotional attachment to an Android phone. It's too complicated. It's a geek device, it's all wrong." Now, before you go emailing him photos of the Android tattoo girl, there is undeniably some smidgen of truth to the man's words. Android is a geek's dream ecosystem and it's not necessarily the most accessible platform in the world, but to completely write it off for the nightclub-going lady demographic doesn't strike us -- or Justin Timberlake, or Chad Ochocinco -- as the most astute idea in the world. [Thanks, AC]
CE-Oh no he didn't!: Netgear boss calls 'game over' for Microsoft, Jobs' 'ego' reason iPhone doesn't support Flash (updated)
Can't say that Patrick Lo is a name that immediately rang any bells around here. He's certainly not as recognizable as Netgear, the company that he chairs and rules supreme. But boy did he hit our radar screens this morning. Lo had plenty of criticism to spread around the Microsoft and Apple camps today during a press lunch in Sydney. Oh where to even begin? Let's start with Microsoft, and Lo's claim that, "Microsoft is over -- game over, from my point of view," when comparing Windows Phone 7's chance to compete with Android and the iPhone. Doubtful, not with Redmond's Windows 7 and MS Office cash cows fueling Microsoft's intense desire to execute on its new mobile strategy. Lo then turned his sights on Apple, having this to say on the topic of Steve Jobs' refusal to support Adobe Flash on Apple's mobile devices: "What's the reason for him to trash Flash? There's no reason other than ego." Funny, we thought it was due to performance, security, and power consumption issues. Lo later added, "Once Steve Jobs goes away, which is probably not far away, then Apple will have to make a strategic decision on whether to open up the platform." Classy. Hit the source link below if you're just dying to hear how "closed" systems are inferior to "open" systems all over again. Update: We just received an email from Patrick Lo. While he continues to support his opinions expressed on open standards, he is backtracking from some of the comments. Notably, he regrets some of the words chosen, particularly those that seem related to Steve Jobs' health. Full apology after the break.
Apple on iPad competition: Windows is 'big and heavy,' next-gen Android tablets are still vapor
Apple's COO (and current Steve Jobs stand-in) Tim Cook thinks "there's not much" competition to the company's iPad tablet. When queried about Apple's view on what the rest of the market offers, Cook was brutally candid in describing Windows-driven machines as generally being big, heavy and expensive, while current generations of Android-based slates are in his opinion merely "scaled-up smartphones." While we agree that Windows 7 isn't a terribly touch-friendly affair, we don't know that Cook's comments on Android are quite so pertinent now that Google's tablet-savvy Honeycomb iteration has been unveiled. Then again, he has something to say about the next generation of Android tablets as well, noting that the ones announced at CES lack pricing and release schedules, leading him to conclude that "today they're vapor." Ouch. As a parting shot, Tim took a moment to reaffirm Apple's belief that its integrated approach will always trump the fragmented nature of Android and its plurality of app stores. Hear his comments in full after the break.
CE Oh no he didn't!: Time Warner chief likens Netflix threat to Albanian army
Think the relationship between Netflix and cable and content executives is amicable? Not. Even. Close. Certainly not after Netflix CEO Reed Hastings blazed a trail into the living room on the strength of the company's streaming television and movie content originally made possible by a shrewd 2008 deal with Starz. A move that netted streaming access rights to Sony and Disney content for an estimated $25 million -- next to nothing compared to the traditional licensing fees charged to cable operators. That deal is set to expire in 2011 and could cost Netflix as much as $250 million a year to renew. Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes thinks that Netflix's days at the top are numbered having been made possible by an era of experimentation that's now ending. "It's a little bit like, is the Albanian army going to take over the world?" said Bewkes, "I don't think so." According to the New York Times, the comments were made last week as UBS sponsored a media conference in New York that it says turned into a "platform for executives to express their grievances and emphasize that they will now aggressively try to tilt the economic balance between Netflix and content creators back toward the media conglomerates." Wow. Don't worry though Netflix subscribers, we're sure that the implied collusion is the good kind.
