HTC’s recently-announced Android handset (dubbed HTC Hero) contains an UI stack of its own – it is dubbed Sense, and is radically different from the current TouchFLO implementations which sit on the Today screen of various WM handsets.
WMPowerUser asked the folks at HTC’s whether TouchFLO is here to stay – and got the following response:
The Hero UI has been created specifically for HTC’s Android-based phones but also represents that three core pillars of HTC Sense. HTC’s future Windows Mobile phones will also be based on HTC Sense, but will enhance Windows Mobile in a way that is as appropriate and valuable to people.
I personally think that their choice makes perfect sense: people think about brands first, and about operating systems only after that. Nokia is as successful as it is as its S40 and S60 handsets share a largely common UI stack, thereby simplifying switching.
HTC gains a lot from unifying their UX: I personally would not be surprised to hear that HTC got thousands of calls from people switching to the G1 and who ended up looking for the Start menu…
Unfortunately, developers will likely end up paying the bill. HTC TouchFLO has already made loads of Today plugins obsolete – the more it does out of the box, the less there is to do for developers.
What do you think?
Related posts:
