Motorola Atrix shipped with fingerprint scanning back in 2011. The reason any other device doesn't have that feature ? Apple bought the company that made the scanners and stopped all further support. This even killed support for new android versions on the Atrix. They then took 2 years to implement it on one of their devices.
Also having not used the iphone 5s, you can not blindly say the solution will be market defining or very secure. Any technology like this will consistently work. Your phone will most likely ship with a backup security system that will be used when the phone can't match the finger prints. What would that mean ? Any random person can exceed the number of tries with finger print unlock and then go to the back up system that is no more secure than existing solutions.
> Apple is so far ahead of the competition it's ridiculous - maybe Google can compete in the medium-term, I'm not sure
This line just reeks of Apple fan boyism. There is literally nothing on the ios now that is ahead of android. Infact for the last couple of releases ios has been catching up with android (notifications, quick settings etc). It still does not have intents, widgets, default apps that can be replaced. But yes, live inside your own bubble and drool at everything apple.
The fingerprint scanner on the Atrix was of the primitive kind, where you have to swipe your thumb and hope it scanned. Half the time it didn't. The reason it took Apple 2 years to implement it was because they waited for a better solution to come up. Their implementation is less of a hassle than previous fingerprint scanners were for consumer devices. This is where Apple shines: execution.
Also having not used the iphone 5s, you can not blindly say the solution will be market defining or very secure. Any technology like this will consistently work. Your phone will most likely ship with a backup security system that will be used when the phone can't match the finger prints. What would that mean ? Any random person can exceed the number of tries with finger print unlock and then go to the back up system that is no more secure than existing solutions.
> Apple is so far ahead of the competition it's ridiculous - maybe Google can compete in the medium-term, I'm not sure
This line just reeks of Apple fan boyism. There is literally nothing on the ios now that is ahead of android. Infact for the last couple of releases ios has been catching up with android (notifications, quick settings etc). It still does not have intents, widgets, default apps that can be replaced. But yes, live inside your own bubble and drool at everything apple.