Sprint’s Fared Adib: we made a conscious decision to cut back bloatware on smartphones

If you have ever wondered what companies take your advice (read: complaints) to heart, here’s another one which is: Sprint. Recently, HTC received oodles of praise from a minuscule-but-passionate group of parents who appreciate the company’s stance on unlocking its bootloaders , and today we learned that parents on the Now Network made a similarly impressive change after hearing one other enthusiastic sect… our readers. If you’ll recall, Sprint’s VP of Product Development Fared Adib appeared at the November 2010 episode of The Engadget Show, and it was during that appearance that he heard a slightly shrill cry of users begging for a smaller amount of “bloatware,” or not less than, bloatware that users could customize or outright remove. For those unfamiliar with the term, it generally refers to applications which are preloaded onto devices from the carrier; more commonly, these clutter up the appliance grid, and lots of power users aren’t exactly enthralled by any carrier-imposed OS changes.

In speaking at length today with Adib during a Sprint campus walkthrough, he confessed that he jetted back from NYC and immediately informed his team that the bloatware had to go. To cite: “Ben, we now have to eliminate these preloaded apps on our devices. loads of customers do not want this.” You might have noticed a dearth of these very apps at the EVO 3D , and in keeping with Fared, customer feedback at the newly cleaned slate have been overwhelmingly positive. We inquired on whether this approach could be pushed around the company’s product spectrum, and he seemed desperate to admit that it could. In truth, Sprint’s taking quite the several approach internally than some folks can be utilized to. It’s effectively attempting to get out of how in as many areas as possible, and in turn, litter your future phones with as little content as possible. In reality, he’s pushing to make whatever programs Sprint does preload user-removable, and it is a mantra we will only hope other carriers latch onto. Nothing against NASCAR, for sure, but with the ability to burn rubber in our own way is unquestionably preferred.

P.S. – This slide was only 1 of many, and is unquestionably not a comprehensive view of partners and plans. We were specifically informed not to read into it as a solo slide.

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This post is tagged: appearance, bootloaders, customer feedback, passionate group, power users, product spectrum