Always wondered this, if the IOS-Android war went far enough, do you think google will ever pull its services from iOS, so, for example; the iPhone couldn't use google maps, youtube, or google talk?
This is only an academic discussion as we both agree - neither company would do this as it is detrimental to both businesses... Google has no dependency on Apple for anything. Apple, on the other hand, relies on Google for compelling apps and content on their iOS devices. If Apple replaced all of Google's apps, their iOS devices would suffer. If Google blocked access to iOS devices - like Apple does to Flash - Apple would suffer.@ kharrigan As for as Apple needing Google more, you need to explain that as it makes no sense.
As was pointed out, Google relies in revenue from advertising. More and more revenue is being derived from the mobile space, and the iPhone is a MAJOR player in that space. They'd be foolish to pull significant revenue generators from iOS.
With that said, we've seen a drastic shift over the last 6-8 months of Apple, Google, Microsoft and RIM all turning the majority of their attention inward. As time goes on, I certainly think that we'll find ourselves more deeply tied to the native and proprietary services on the phone than we are now.
This is what I think is happening.Apple is already making moves to usurp Google on the iPhone.
Her name is Siri.
If apple can get people to use Siri more often like they are they will eventually skip the need for google.
Think of the kinds of mobile searches that are done right now.
on google maps i type in pizza, and it shows me google places results for the pizzas near my location.
but on iPhone 4s.
"Siri, where is the nearest pizza" and what pops yup is not a google places result but a yelp result,
take it further into future revisions of Siri, when more apps have api access: "Siri, remind me to buy a coat for my wife", this could skip a google search for coats and go straight to a site or app that sells coats.
I'm probably giving some bad examples here, but imagine if you don't need to do a google search on your phone anymore, you could just go straight to your answer.