After watching a number of videos on the Motorola droid, I can see Android 2 is quite powerful and adds a lot of functionality. I can see Google is really working hard to push it out there, and it is undenyable that we are seeing a big number of devices adopting this operating system, which can only help it forward.

However, my opinion is that eventually one of the two main "open" projects will have to eat the market of the other, as I don´t see enough revenue in researching and developing these small yet powerful devices unless sales are good. Aside from that, the iPhone is very well positioned and popular now, so I think one of these two will have an easier time eating share market from the other than from the iPhone (even if Motorola is clearly aiming at Apple´s throat)

Anyways, which of the two OS´s (Maemo and Android, of course) future looks brighter to you? Each has its own strengths and weaknesses, so which one you see stronger and better positioned for the future?

My vote goes for Android, if only for the huge set of applications Google has out there, as well as for those still to come, and obviously because of its masterful marketing tactics.

Android will eventually have the dominant marketshare but Apple and Nokia will have sizable marketshare too. Kinda like how Windows dominates the PC OS but OSX has its own sizable marketshare.

Not to mention that with android around I can see google apps we've all come to depend on lag on competition's platforms (symbian, maemo, iphone)

This assumes that mobile computing is a zero sum game--i.e., that one OS can only survive by "killing" all the other OSs. But look at the desktop PC environment during the 90s and early 2000s. Even though Windows dominated the PC market, both Mac OS and the Linux desktop survived in niche markets.

Right now there is obviously a huge amount of R&D that goes into making mobile devices, and the companies that produce them are understandably keen to secure a return on their investment. But eventually, as I see it, handheld devices will become as cheap and ubiquitous as netbooks, thus undercutting the current subsidy + 2 yr contract deals that U.S. telecoms offer in order to make the hardware seem cheap enough.

BTW, I'm old enough to remember the days when a home laser printer cost several thousand dollars --- and now they can be had for < 100. I'm also old enough to remember when laughably underpowered laptops were $2000-4000, or when portable CD players were $300. My first 2 MP digital camera was almost $1000. That the mobile market is already starting so low shows you how cheap hardware has become.

In the mobile arena, I think you'll see the following:

1) Android will dominate. It will be installed on a variety of "generic" hardware, just as Windows was installed on every conceivable PC in the 90s. IMO, Android is going to eat up Symbian's market share.

2) Apple will continue to cater to a market that likes highly polished products and tight hardware/software integration. Except that that market is larger now than it was in the 90s.

3) Mobile Linux OSs for hackers will thrive as a geek phenomenon. Perhaps Maemo or Mer will lead the way---or some fork of them. But eventually, I imagine you'll have a lot of people working to install fully-functional Linux distros on handhelds.

Maemo's place in all this seems unclear to me. Perhaps #3. Or perhaps high end Nokia products that occupy a similar niche as the iPhone. Or perhaps Nokia is still big enough internationally to turn Maemo into a genuine competitor for Android. Who knows.

I just realize that my scenario above is exactly the same that has existed in the desktop world, except that Android replaces Windows.

Interesting view...

In my opinion, the iPhone was probably the one to hit first, and that gives it a pretty good advantage. At this stage, even with the improvements in Android 2 and Maemo 5, I think both are far from the iPhone in terms of how easy and intuitive its GUI is, and I think people appreciate and value that in a phone much more than in a computer.

However, I am not sure I agree about sharing marketshare. I think Mac OS, Unix, Windows and even Linux were born in an era when things moved slower. Macintosh had time to convince many users about its advantages over its competitors and specially in the US, even had many users who started using Macs for their personal computing. What I am trying to say is that back then, many people had the time to get used to certain OS, and when Windows took over, they were not willing to give up on their initial choice.

When it comes to handheld devices, things have moved so quickly that I don´t think anybody will stick to any choice, as they are all almost offering the same thing. Most options fall within very similar price ranges, offer similar performance features and even the interfaces are incredibly similar. In other words, whatever sentimental reasons were there for Mac to keep its niche in the computer world, don´t apply this time around, I think.

I think this time around functionality and marketing will decide who wins. In terms of applications, integration with the cloud and many more leading projects out there and coming, Google is the contender to beat.

The good news is that Android is much better than windows in its foundation and semi-open characteristics.

You can't talk about marketshare with mobile OSes until you talk scope. There are currently over 4 billion people which use a mobile device. Symbian sits with over 40+% of those users.

Platforms such as Maemo and Android will start eating away at other folks before hitting the majors (Symbian, RIM, Linux).

Android is positioned to take the aged Windows Mobile market, and to be a "best choice" solution for those companies looking to maximize internal development resources, without needing to build the entire OS from scratch. This puts Android in a position to be the cheap, commodized, connected mobile platform - exactly what carriers need in the mid and low-ranges of *all* mobile users to stay relevant.

Maemo will hit a slightly different niche, and depending on how polished Nokia's execution is, it will (within about 3-5yrs time) take place as a major vertical OS for Nokia. It will take over much of Symbian's high-end aspirations for Nokia, but at the same time, stay just enough off-centered that it will not appeal for many of the carriers that want Nokia, but want more control over their devices. Maemo is just as much an innovation engine as it is a developer platform. Watch this space, Apple is going the same route, and RIM is probably considering it too.

Is there a compairson between Maemo and Android, yes, to a degree. However, its the aims of each which are quite different (right now) and how Google is going scattershot with this approach and Nokia is going at it with more of a single-shot sniper rifle. Both will be successful, the key is execution and the services (analytics within these produce data which can be sold/researched/resold, turning people and their relationships into the $$$ that fund the platforms). Google has a considerable lead here, but Nokia isn't as far behind as some would think.

Your forgetting about the things that each company does and offers though. Android's benefit is that it can run on almost anything but there is no unified experience. Applications written for Android are generally written for the mass level thus they may not use your device's hardware to its fully extent. While devices like the iPhone or n900 will (plus Apple has its marketing department which can blind almost everyone but those who know deeply about technology). That's the reason why Verizon is attacking the iPhone through catchy advertisements.

For Maemo, it's the aspect of it being open and being able to do whatever you want without having to load custom ROMs or hack the device for root access. Now of course for most people this won't matter, but in that case they're more likely to get an iPhone than Android due to the tied usability and interface between Apple's hardware and Apple's OS. In fact some of the initial reactions to Droid's marketing is "I never used that [multitasking] or why do I care about open development".

Like I said, I have no doubts that Android will be the one with the most marketshare, but I still think there will be an Apple marketshare and some other marketshare (whether it's Nokia with Maemo who knows). But Apple is for certain simply based on the way they create and market products. That is as long as Steve Jobs is alive (though I'm hoping that Apple learned from their mistake the last time Jobs left and the company almost collapsed by having understudies study Jobs).

I think it mostly depends on how nokia handles maemo. I see linux as the fast racer who started with a handicap: it began serious development later, but is coming up fast, thanks to a large mass of developers taking it wherever they see fit (and generating choice), instead of a large corporation deciding for its users
In the pc world, windows has been a monopoly ever since pc's become popular. Because it had the head start, everyone learned windows first and never looked further. In the mobile world, nobody has such a monopoly yet (and possibly never will), so now linux-based OSes have their chance. Seeing how fast Maemo grows (i only discovered it recently, but researched its history a little), it may be a real contender. Again, how well it does depends on how well nokia manages it, especially through publicity

I'm seeing Maemo's oft-touted 'features' here as long term enabler than as (ready) features.

Open source, open platform, open distribution.. those are key concepts that can potentially bring good stuffs (tm) to the platform. But it's up to the developer community to make use of them well, to bring what the mass wants.

Even something as basic and obvious as multitasking needs good content (apps) to make them shine.

A significant but unpredictable factor in this question is the involvement of the US and EU governments in anticompetitive actions. Google has finally found the eye of the US government on them; they were denied a seemingly innocuous deal with Yahoo and ever since have been reeling in the awareness of their own vulnerability. Both Apple and Google are susceptible to this kind of intervention at the moment, and i think how, when and if that actually occurs will have a big influence on their mobile OS's trajectory.