Google hasn't stopped collecting your personal information, that's for sure. But when it publishes its statistics about how many people use what kind of Android gadgets, on the Android developer dashboard, it now pretends that people who haven't opened up the Google Play app (and digital content) market in the last two weeks don't exist.
Here's why, what happened, and what Google is saying about it.
What information does Google show on the dashboard?
The dashboard is designed to help Android app developers know how many people are using what kind of smartphones. The most important thing on it is its "Platform Versions" chart, which shows how many people are using the latest version of Android and how many are stuck on an earlier one.
What changed about how Google collects it?
According to Google, the charts on its dashboard "are now built using data collected from each device when the user visits the Google Play Store," as opposed to "when the device simply checked-in to Google servers." Google posted a longer explanation on Google+, but even that is not fully clear about what this means. Does it count if you visit Google Play on the Internet from your computer, and remotely install an app on your phone or tablet?
Your Android smartphone or tablet checks for app updates on its own, at any rate, which is why icons appear in your notification area telling you there are updates. This is probably what Google meant by "when the device simply checked-in," or at least part of it.
How did the statistics change after Google did this?
As Droid Life's Kellex put it, "The numbers indicate a pretty dramatic increase for [the] Jelly Bean [version of Android] month over month and now show it as being on 25% of all Android devices." So the stats now show a lot more people using the most modern Android devices, like the Nexus 7 tablet, which came with Jelly Bean preinstalled, and pushed everyone who got it to go shopping on Google Play immediately, which is the behavior Google is tracking.
Why did Google make this change?
"We believe the new data more accurately reflects those users who are most engaged in the Android and Google Play ecosystem," Google said on the dashboard. And as Kellex explained, "these numbers are supposed to be used by developers ... to help [them] target audiences for their apps." Knowing who's actually visiting the store where they'd buy a developer's app is more useful, to that developer, than just knowing who has an Android device which can run it.
Those numbers are also used by many tech media outlets, however (or "silly websites" as Kellex put it), for reporting on how many people are using a given version of Android. So far, those statistics have tended to make Google look bad, partly because the carriers and manufacturers don't usually update their devices in a timely matter and partly because Apple (by contrast) updates its iPhone and iPad devices frequently. Thanks to this change, it has now become harder to tell how many people are still stuck with older versions of Android.
Jared Spurbeck is an open-source software enthusiast, who uses an Android phone and an Ubuntu laptop PC. He has been writing about technology and electronics since 2008.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/googles-way-count-android-users-pretends-many-dont-203300472.html
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