Programmer Joe Hewitt is well known for is work on the Firefox browser and for developing the Facebook iPhone app for Apple’s [NASDAQ:APPL] iOS platform. But more recently he became famous for quitting all software development on the iOS and really slamming Apple for having a closed ecosystem with gatekeepers (the app review process). His quitting the platform was highlighted throughout the tech media and was headlining news for quite some time. Especially because that was the same time when Apple was under a lot of pressure for doing a shoddy job of the review process.

Now, Joe Hewitt is slamming Android, the platform that he is currently working on. According to him, the tools of Android development are really badly designed and he dislikes working with them. According to Joe, it reminds him of Windows constantly. He draws a parallel between them saying that they are both developer-friendly, agnostic and open but are also really badly designed. He cribbed on twitter about having to work with Java — the language that Android uses.

But he then says that it is better to be working on Android because there is no “Big Brother” telling him what to do. This is a reference to Apple and their policy of tight control over their app ecosystem. Joe said that whilst he respects the fact that Apple can run their platform whichever way they want to, he is philosophically opposed to the whole idea of the app review process.

Hence, he is only on Google’s [NASDAQ:GOOG] platform because of its openness and not because he likes it. In fact, from his words, it is pretty clear that is likes almost nothing else about it. Ever since quitting Apple’s platform in November, he have been cited in many debates regarding the validity of Apple’s practices. However, it is clear that openness can ultimately win over the developers but they also need to be kept happy and given good tools to work with.

[via]