14 DAY TRIAL // The mobile market seems to be saturated with products and software, and that includes operating systems. The people are pretty much divided into Android, iOS, and Windows Phone users. There are some scraps at the table, but that's pretty much it. Where will Ubuntu for phones fit in this tight-knit ecosystem?
Canonical is making a mobile version of Ubuntu, or better yet, they are making a new Ubuntu version that’s going to influence the desktop flavor. It's a bold move and it will be very hard for the company to break through the known stubbornness of the customers and provide something that is more than appealing, something that users must have.
Android has a pretty firm grip on the market and their latest iterations of the operating system, names aside, have been very successful. People tend to forget that most phones are still powered by Jelly Bean (4.1.x and 4.2.x), Gingerbread (2.3.3 - 2.3.7), and Ice Cream Sandwich (4.0.3 - 4.0.4). The latest Kit Kat is not even in the top three.
On the other front, iOS is a little bit better placed and more people are using the newer versions of the operating system than the old ones, but the main reason for that is the fact that it's one company and one set of devices.
Windows Phone is having pretty much the same problem as Android, with more people using the old version than the new one, but that's an issue that's getting fixed and now it's in the hands of the carriers.
What's so special about Ubuntu
Canonical designed Ubuntu to be a little bit different. First of all, this is an open source project (for the most part) and it's easy to see what's being done, what the problems are, and it's even possible to talk with the developers directly or to submit bugs that actually get fixed (yes, I'm pointing at you, Google).
One of the nice features that very few people talk about is that Ubuntu will have the same version across all platforms, regardless of what the carriers are doing. Sure enough, if Ubuntu is successful, there will be some users with phones too old to run new software, and that's inevitable, but if the user has a phone that can run the latest Ubuntu version, he will get it right away.
The update process of the phone has been decoupled from the carrier/software side. Whenever Canonical releases an update for the phone, you get it no matter what carrier you are using.
Ubuntu is different from everything else and you will love it for this
I can only give my example and that means that it's a study of one. I am tired of Android, iOS, and I don't even like Windows Phone. The first two are no longer exciting and everything about them is just tedious. Windows Phone is just annoying, with way too many steps to do anything.
Ubuntu is different and it shows that is has heart. The developers are committed to making it better and you can see that from what they are trying to accomplish every day. You can actually see what they have been working in the last 24 hours. It's an operating system that's inviting you to discover it.
It will seem weird at first to use a system without buttons, but you will soon ask yourself why this feature isn't used by everyone. Android had some attempts at various swipe-from-margins implementations, but they are still pretty far off.
Ubuntu is still a gamble, and there is no certainty that it will make it. It will have to fight for its place on the market, but if it does make it, Ubuntu will be the only mobile operating system with a heart. Everything else will be just mindless drones.