I'm in class now, so I cannot read through the 35 pages until later tonight, so if this has been said, I apologize in advance.
I love this idea. I really do. However, I worry that it would hit a speed bump with "bloatware" that is put on the phones, especially with Verizon. Those companies pay for their apps to be integrated into the phones, without a way to take them off (without rooting). Personally, that's always been one of my hang ups, and a large reason for me rooting in the first place. I think, legally, that those companies such as Netflix, Verizon's services, etc. may very well argue against something like this. Unless the "unlocked" phones still have the "bloatware" on them. Which, honestly, would make me look for a way to root outside of what Verizon may offer...
Just my .02
I am glad you brought this up, because regarding bloatware, I have yet to state anything that directly deals/addresses with this issue.
Verizon undoubtedly gets paid hand over fist to fill these devices with bloatware so this is a topic I simply can't ignore. Here is what I have been thinking:
Both the sponsors and Verizon clearly have financial interest in maintaining their bloatware agreement, so if this plan suggested anything that would somehow jeopardize an already successful and mutually beneficial business arrangement then this would assuredly hurt the cause. Anything of the sort would effectively put a bullet right through the plan and ruin the validity of any evidence/assertions indicative of financial gains. Profits could be fully maximized in all other sectors, but if the monetary gains currently attributed to allowing direct investments from bloatware sponsors were to be eliminated altogether, there simply would be no way to;
- justify the substantial loss in capital
- mask the overall detrimental effects on future business
- or provide any credible reasoning to backup the claim that adopting a developer plan in this manner would actually be worthwhile.
So, what to do?
I began thinking about bloatware more objectively from the perspective of the sponsors and what I realized truly helped me in reorienting my approach. Fundamentally, bloatware is really no different from any other basic advertising scheme whatsoever; the objectives are simple, for the end-user to be exposed content/message, for the content/message to be powerful/influential enough to gain the end-users interest, and for the end-users new interest to then be exploited for business/profit.
But the question I would like to propose is; do you really think that these bloatware sponsors have financial interest in ensuring that their software remains on your device indefinitely?
From a marketing standpoint, I would have to disagree. Just because stock unrooted end users are not capable of actually removing the bloatware off their devices, I believe that this restriction is actually superfluous towards the sponsors achieving their advertising efforts. Why? Because although the entire point of targeting a customer in the first place, is simply to try and get them to buy something; repeatedly advertising the same content over and over again, will not prove to be an effective strategy when the customer quickly reaches their decision threshold. In the world of apps that we live in today, customers come to a realization regarding how useful and/or relevant they perceive an app to be, almost instantaneously. The first time a customer checks out a bloat app, they open it, realize weather or not its not its relevant or useful to them and based on this decision either close the app or begin to utilize it. If the customer initial impression was bad, then the chances of them ever opening that app again is drastically reduced. I believe, that after the first bad experience, the user may attempt to validate/confirm their initial impression maybe 2-5 more times max, but after this basic confirmation stage, no matter how many more times they are forced to see the app in their app drawer, it will no longer have any positive advertising effects at all; if anything, its permanence will actually begin to have a negative effect and ruin the users impression of the sponsor and their brand association. For these reasons, I really don't see any benefits of having a select amount of permanently installed bloatware apps when the user will have effectively made up their mind regarding their relative usefulness after the first day - three days tops.
What I do believe however, is that controlled trial periods would prove to be equally effective, if not more so for the bloatware investors, because it would present the user with the app, expose them to its uses, let the user decide weather they like it or not, and then provide some extra time for them to change their mind. What I propose, is that during the 15 day lock down, your device has LOTS of bloatware. This way Verizon can branch out and make more deals regarding bloat, because root users will know by day 15 that if they don't like it, they can remove it. The part of this plan that gives it the most merit, is when looking at it from the perspective of the bloatware investors, they actually are in a better position to succeed at their goals. Why? Because the more bloatware that's actually preloaded onto the device, the probability that out of all the apps, the end user will actually decide they like a few of them will increase dramatically. Also, because the 15 day window is clearly defined, the user will have less negative feelings regarding bloat than the way its perceived. Rather than it being about permanence it becomes more so of a a controlled app evaluation period. I believe the net effect will actually more beneficial to both parties involved:
More bloatware = more money for Verizon,
15 day instead of permanence = advertisement is better received because its less intrusive
Having more bloatware to cipher through = higher % chance of the user not defining all of it as bloat, and keeping it after root.
{{ WugFresh }}
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