[PugetSoundSoldier]

In two years from brand-new to number 2. A meteoric rise for Android!

[ShadowAce]

[PugetSoundSoldier]

Android ready to leap from number 3 (behind Symbian and RIM) to number 2, in just the next few months.

[Revolting cat!]

"At this point you would have to pay me a lot of money to work on Symbian," said Chris Haseman, a senior software engineer at doubleTwist Corp., a software development firm. Mr. Haseman works with Android and is learning how to write for the iPhone. "Symbian is just not a big player out there.... I don't feel the same way about it as I do the iPhone, where I feel like I need to know how to write for it," he adds. [...]

In addition to the iPhone, Nokia faces growing competition in the U.S. from phones that operate on Google's Android software. Nokia has refused to adopt Android for its own devices, preferring to stick with Symbian, which developers have criticized as outdated and clunky. The problem, they say, is that the Symbian has been a more difficult and time consuming platform. Symbian takes 15 months or more to master versus less than six months for Android, according to strategy firm VisionMobile. Developers also say that their applications sales from Nokia's Ovi Store generate less revenue than Apple and Google's application stores.

[Revolting cat!]

And then there are the Chinese. Ideos. Smartphone (running Android) under $200.