Where Next, Columbus?

OK, so you have your iSpace app. Now what? Assuming you already have a WAP in place, is the next system Android or Blackberry for that costly application development?

Nielsen Wire has some interesting, and conflicting, advice. In the last six months, Android devices have taken the lead. Over time, the installed base of users is still Blackberry.

With Blackberry's renewed enthusiasm for smart-phone market share, the bet may be to go with the tried and true. The RIM market is business types and high-dollar users.

Android (and more important, the Google mothership behind it) may be the future. The easy answer is: Yes, as in, develop all three applications. That might not be an option for cash-strapped budgets or budget-minded rights holders.

Forcing a call from me? I'd hold for three months until we see Q3 numbers and some key announcements from both cell phone makers and telcos. The Nielsen story only reinforces that we are at a tipping point, and it is a coin-flip choice until the trends reveal more.

The only sure thing here -- as WIRED declared last month -- the future is more app, less HTML. Don't get caught up in the hype line of "the web is dead" and think that's a Luddite position that means you really can pack up this social network silliness and go back to serious things.

If Chris Anderson is right -- and hmm, can anyone remember his last supposedly crazy position: The Long Tail -- this reinforces the need to understand: the future is closed (which could tilt Blackberry along side Apple).