About a year ago, in the height of the financial crisis, I was temporarily laid off and I started developing a software product for the open source Android platform which I intended to sell in the Android Market an alternate source of revenue. After doing a first prototype, I discovered that not only were Canadian users of the Android platform shut out of the Android Market, the main store where users can download applications. Canadians could not purchase any apps, but also Canadian developers and businesses were not allowed to sell on this store.
I thought to myself that this was a temporary situation resulting from Google and the Android platform being in its infancy. In the mean time, I ported my app to Apple's iPhone/iPod touch platforms and became relatively successful selling educational software that help students learn anatomy. Even as an independent developer working alone, my apps dominated the medical section of the app store for more than 6 months. At the same time, I was waiting for Google's platform to open to my apps so that I could have a presence and compete there too.
It has been more than a year and the open Android platform is quickly gaining popularity. Canadians can now buy apps in the Android marketplace but Canadian developers and businesses are still shut out of this market.
A year is an eternity in the tech sector and the big players are starting to establish themselves as leading mobile software businesses before Canadians even have access to this market. We are in a situation where Canadian developers are not even able to sell the fruit of their labors to their compatriots who are free to buy apps in Google's store none of which are allowed to be from Canada. Canadians are not able to participate in one of the more rapidly growing and most lucrative facet of this technology. We are left out.
The new mobile devices allow us to communicate, email, tweet, talk and work. In the coming years, they may well become the main computing platform. Canadians are used to be pushed out of leading edge web music and video mediums which often become available years after everyone else in Canada but this time it is preventing our businesses to participate in the greatest innovation in technology since personal computers.
It is very difficult to achieve success when international competitors get a two years head start. Currently countries allowed to sell on the Android store include Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Spain, United Kingdom and the United States.
The window of opportunity is very small for these kinds of technological revolutions and the current climate risks driving the next Canadian Bill Gates out of business.
Benoit Essiambre
http://speedanatomy.com
Benoit Essiambre
http://speedanatomy.com
Hey Benoit,
ReplyDeleteI am not sure how much of that is brought upon Canada by Canada herself. Canada has a very closed business model (which is under review as we speak..finally), but Canada does not allow US to sell American content here in the name of cultural control. Direct foreign investments are forbidden. Examples of this are the telecom sector, Television, Radio, and even Amazon. Amazon has been wanting a bigger presence in Canada, but it is not allowed to open distribution centers here in Canada. Amazon has a much a bigger presence in Europe, where the laws are relaxed.
Canada is one of the last few developed nations which has strict trade policies. And funnily in the last article the person talking against this had the same argument as you (just reverse, that Canada would be potentially banned to sell outside, because it does not allow free trade)
But either way nice post at pin pointing the shortcomings of policies and how with this day and age closed doors policy just makes no sense.
RJS