So Amazon just launched a new series of aggressively priced Kindles in the US today. It got me thinking: from a Singaporean’s perspective, what do people do with their devices? Well, I take the MRT from one end of the island to the other, and here’s what I see:

iOS
Using Apps and playing games.

Android
Watching Korean / Hongkong dramas (that might explain why so many aunties buy the Samsung Galaxy Note. Also, it’s so much easier to sideload videos into an Android device)

Kindle
Consuming content (only books, though. Kindle Fires are extremely rare).

Do you agree? Obviously this is an extremely general view based on majorities on the train, extremely unscientific, but good enough for me for now.

Content, content, content

The thing is, it appears to me that at the end of the day it’s still about the content. To me, now that all the other platforms have caught up with regards to the user experience, the highlight of iOS announcements are now about new features that developers can tap on to bring to their users. In the same way, the content consumers can buy also makes a huge difference.

So here’s a look at these same platforms in terms of content:

Amazon
Has a huge library of music, movies, TV shows and ebooks, but available only in a few (admitedly large) markets.

iOS
Has a library that’s arguebly close in size to Amazon, but available in so many more markets (more importantly, Asian markets) around the world (though TV shows and ebooks still need some work).

Android
Has a library too, but not as large as Amazon, and can’t even beat Amazon in terms of market reach. BUT their devices allow extremely easy sideloading of content into devices. 

So since Amazon is not in Singapore, the battle is once again back with Apple vs Google, and I think Google might have an edge here. I love iTunes because I consume English music, and can’t care about Korean dramas, but my guess is that there are a lot more people who do care. And the most “Korean-drama-friendly” devices out there right now are Android devices with their larger screens and ease of side loading content that Singaporeans have no problems “magically” *wink wink* obtaining.

What do you think?