Wireless Carrier Meddling Will Keep Apple Ahead In Wireless

Over at Engadget, Michael Gartenberg has a great article on how wireless carriers are crapifying Android.  Replacing Google search with Bing, removing free navigation, etc.  (Link).  That's the problem with open source: anyone can screw it up.

From Engadget: An Android Phone with Bing search...weird, huh?

With Android, while the product gains share, innovations trickle out in haphazard manner, unlinked to carriers or hardware innovations.  Apple, on the other hand, is able to launch coordinated surges of innovation - linking hardware, software, and services together.  The result: big leaps, not a steady drip.

For the moment, this will keep Apple ahead, and it could be a sustainable advantage for some time.  Beyond that, as Gartenberg points out, the carriers will need to decide if they are going to keep things clean and consumer friendly or keep crapifying the product.

I will add one prediction to Gartenberg's article: I think we'll see a vibrant market for unlocked Android devices in prepaid - something that could have a big competitive impact on the market.