You all know that I’m primarily an Apple person and that I like their hardware and the way their various devices work together more or less seamlessly. Even so, I’m not a Fan Boy and as in most things I’m very much a different strokes for different folks kind of guy.
If you want to use an Android phone, I fine with that. I might be puzzled but it’s not, after all, a moral decision and your choice of phone is your business not mine. Still, every once in while I come across an article on the iPhone/Android wars so stupid that I can’t let it pass.
Such is the case with the Lifehacker article Why You Should Just Switch to Android Already. Jake Peterson starts out with a litany of all the problems you’ll encounter when you switch from an iPhone to an Android phone but then says. So what? Be free! Get that cool Android phone. Of course you’ll have to try to convince all your friends to switch to some third party text messaging app. He recommends WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger, two apps by a company not even your Aunt Millie would be naive enough to have anything to do with.
The whole article is like that. Reason after reason that changing will be hard but not a single reason—other than the apocryphal “cool” Android phone—for switching. I seriously considered that it might be a satirical piece.
Of course, there’s not going to be a tsunami of iPhone users switching to Android. Why is that? There are two main reasons I think. First, I believe Apple makes better hardware—more expensive, but better. That is, I suppose arguable and some very smart people do dispute it but at least iPhones don’t explode or fall apart after a couple of days. I believe their software is better too but that’s even more subjective.
The better reason—and one that’s inarguable—is that the iPhone is safer and better respects your privacy. One of the big complaints about iOS is that it doesn’t allow side loading but that’s a big part of what makes the iPhone safer. Yes, you can’t download any old app you want, and yes, malware does get into Apple’s App Store but Apple’s policies make using their phone much safer.
As for privacy, there’s no controversy at all. Google/Android vacuum up all your data for use with Google’s advertising business. Apple doesn’t. Maybe you don’t care about that but many of us do and for that reason alone wouldn’t consider using an Android phone.
Even so, if you want that cool Android phone, don’t let Irreal stop you. Neither I nor the minions will think less of you.