anotherfandroid

A lot of people on this forum continue to defend android with arguments related to cosmetics vs. functionality, multitasking, open-source advantages, and customizability and at the same time dismiss the BGR article using the fanboy label, along with a misunderstanding of BGR’s statements regarding Tweetie 2, VLC paid app, and implied emotional attachment to the phone.


I wish to make a few arguments to those who continue defending android.


On BGR’s emotional stuff with respect to smart phones:
People!!! All he was trying to say is this: iphone and blackberry users love their phones because they use them daily to perform multiple essential tasks related to communicating with the world. Because these phones are so good, easy to use, smooth and effective at these few essential communicative tasks, people who use them tend to get extremely attached to them. Madonna sleeps with her blackberry under the side of her pillow. My brother sleeps next to his iphone. While there are many people on this forum who do the same with their android phones, I would imagine that most android users in the real world don’t have that kind of connection towards their phones; I say this because when you see and talk to the average people who purchase the mt3g, the droid, and the hero, you realize that they are just seeking an iphone substitute; most would have purchased an iphone if they had the chance, the money, or At&T; soon enough, they realize that android is hard to get used to and does not do these essential tasks as easy as the other smart phones.

For example, for the average t-mobile customer who has no idea that better keyboard and touchpal exist and does not have the time or the resourcefulness that enable the scouring of android user forums, essential tasks like text messaging become difficult with any android phone because of the mediocre VK and the ugly UI. The smooth UI of the iphone makes it a joy to text message; this encourages the user to text message. The clunky, ugly, and slow VK of android makes it a hassle to type. This discourages the user, especially when one wants to type a long message. This prevents the kind of “bond” that BGR is talking about. Blackberry people find it very easy to do e-mail. The same can be said about them. Note that these are examples of how design/looks are connected to function.

The other day I told my brother (iphone user) that a 4th G iphone is looming; he was indifferent. I asked him if he would upgrade. He said “no” because “I cannot see how 3gs could be improved because it is perfect the way it is” Off course, 3gs has a lot of flaws and could be improved in many ways but the fact that my brother feels that it’s flawless tells you that the iphone fulfills the requirements of an average person. In fact, any iphone user can probably list at least 5 areas in which the iphone is flawless and not in need of any improvement. I highly doubt that any android user can list even three. This is why average people love their iphones and blackberries but don’t feel that way towards their mt3g. Personally, I have become neutral towards my mt3g.


On the pitiful android market:
Again, BGR is not concerned with quantity. In fact, given the age of android, the number of android apps is pretty impressive. It is quality that’s the issue, and you folks know this; many, including myself, have pointed out the ghastliness, mediocrity, and clumsiness of the grand majority of android’s apps. Consider face book and twitter silly and superficial if you wish but it remains a fact that the average person uses those more than they use Google sky and Google voice, and hence the lack of a decent app for either program is nothing short of shameful. It is shameful and unacceptable!

But the decrepitude of the android market goes beyond that: Why was I not able to find a timer app for my mt3g? Why? Is it that hard to come up with a functional timer app? People say android has thousands of apps. Well, forget thousands. How about one timer app that works? One, not more! Am I being too needy by requiring a timer for my “Smartphone”?
Besides, while apple’s imperious stance with respect to its app store and app content is annoying, Google’s laissez-faire free for all attitude is not a better alternative. The apple app store is like a club for which a membership ought to be earned through an approval process. The android market is like a noisome public bathroom for anyone who wants to defecate or urinate without flushing after themselves. I would not be surprised if at some point fraud is committed through the android market due to lack of oversight.

So what if most android apps are free while apple’s are not? A costly app that combines form and function is superior to a cheap or free app that has neither. And when you realize that the best apps are those developed by Google itself and that the popular 3d party apps today are the same ones that were popular at the time of the G1 phone, you come to one logical conclusion: the android market is simply NOT THRIVING.

When BGR mentions tweetie 2, it’s not because tweeting is paramount; it’s to set an example of quality and indicate the absence of usable android apps with respect to popular websites such as twitter.
Now when it comes to gaming, I am not even going to go there….


On fragmentation:
Why must I spend 5-10 minutes on a Wednesday morning updating a whooping list of 10 or 20 apps just because you got a Motorola cliq? Why? It’s annoying, battery, and time-consuming. Also it must be irking to developers to have to update their apps every time a new phone comes out; no wonder why their work is half-hearted. What’s up with these manufacturer custom ROMs? Do people really think that just because you got sense UI, you’re no longer going to interact with stock android? No matter how great the manufacturer’s ROM is, stock android will eventually rear its ugly head. You can run from android but you cannot hide.


Google’s poor management:
What’s up with these updates, every few months, released unpredictably, bringing only minor improvements to android? This is annoying to users and carriers trying to get the latest version and to developers having to update an app they had just updated a month ago because some new phone came out. Also, here’s a quote from the BGR article:
“Beleaguered Android developers are voicing their annoyance that end users have received the 2.1 version of the operating system before they did, with no SDK having been released as yet. This means devs are unable to test their software against the latest update without buying a Nexus One, and this is already proving an issue with developers receiving complaints that their software is having issues on Android 2.1 – and they’re unable even to test it.”
I don’t know if I should criticize android’s devs for shabby apps or commiserate them.


The myth of customizability:
Supposedly android is customizable; on paper I agree. In practice I am not so sure. The iphone too has a customizable home screen and home screen background. Therefore, it can be reasonably inferred that the special customizability that android apologists refer too is what a phandroid member coined as “system replacement apps” (SRAs); these are apps like handcent, meridian, steel, superdial, phonebook, pictureviewer…etc, that can customize how android performs essential tasks like dialing, web-browsing, messaging…etc. the premise is that these SRAs have more functionality and better looks.

When I first got mt3g, I spent hours over three weeks customizing it with SRAs because I thought it was fun and cool. But these SRAs slowed the phone and the apps themselves are slow. Native apps are much faster. For instance, after having spent hours downloading contact pics and cropping them--so that the pic appears when the contact calls or when I roam through the contact list of phonebook—it got very disheartening and disappointing to see that the pics lag or fail to appear in phonebook and only appear half of the times when the contact calls. You feel that you wasted your time. In conclusion, these SRAs undermine the phone’s performance and don’t increase functionality as they are supposed to.
The disregard that devs and Google have towards overall design results in a tacky color mosaic. In conclusion, SRAs don’t improve the looks.
The frequency of updates is annoying. I mean how many times do I have to download a handcent update? Seriously….enough font packs for handcent; how about faster performance?

Android, due to its mediocrity, does not observe the user’s choice. Every time you tell android what to use as default, it once again, an hour later, asks you “complete action using…..” at some point I was about to cry and found myself talking to my phone, begging it to stop asking me “complete action using…..” it’s like my android phone tells me “ok, are you done crying? Now complete action using……” In conclusion, android’s functional flaws preclude you from enjoying SRAs.
I wish I could show you my mt3g today; it has no SRAs, as I uninstalled all of them to rid myself of all the headache that comes from them; I only have Google and a few 3d party apps (layar, ringdroid, g maps, places directory, shazam….total is no more than 10). What really bothers me is the fact that I wasted precious time installing and tweaking the SRAs only to end up uninstalling them; mind you, I could have used these hours to read a good book, go out on a date, or go to the gym. Android and its “customizability” are a waste of precious time. Give me back my lost time.


To those who feel that android is still in its infancy and hence Google should not be vituperated for it, I have a couple of things to say:

None of android critics on this forum is unwilling to consider the infancy factor. After all, if we were unwilling to do so, we would have not bought android phones in the first place. We all knew that android was new; we bought android phones because we believed in it; we liked its idea. The issue here is not infancy; it is the stunted growth! How long are we going to have to wait for this infant to walk on two? It’s been more than 1.5 years but this infant is developing at an alarmingly languid pace.
People! Android’s problem is not infancy; it’s a clear case of failure to thrive.

Moreover, even if it’s still ok for it to be infantile, how come webOS is still in version 1 and yet it runs circles around android? It is far more functional, intuitive, and polished than android; go check out the 10 minute palm pre video at phone arena if you don’t believe me. Palm could teach Google a lesson or two on multitasking and how to use “cards.” Palm’s catalog has only 1000 apps but make no mistake; the quality is superior to that of android’s useless apps.

Before the droid, android’s apologists used to blame hardware for android’s poor performance; now that android has the best hardware in the world, they are blaming infancy. How about the truth?


To those who say that Google cannot make or does not care about pretty stuff:

People! Nothing is further from the truth. Google does care about looks and presentation; just image-Google Google headquarters and see for yourselves. It’s all modern and classy looking. After all, Google has a lot of preppy young employees who care about aesthetics. Google can make pretty things: look at Google’s main search page; it is simple, handsome, yet the Google logo is florid and changes according to the current events, all done in class. Look at Gmail and how handsome it is; it’s the most pleasant looking e-mail app; it’s a work of art, combining both form and function. When you’re in Gmail, look how cool the M in Gmail is; it’s trivial but it shows that Google can make cool things. Look at Google’s apps; they are handsome and refined.


To those who argue that android’s issues are “cosmetic” and not functional, when compared to the iphone:

I beg to differ. Forget that form and function are related, which they are btw. Let’s just talk function.
Here I go: unresponsiveness (black home screen and complete action using….. are good examples); force closing (happens very frequently even with home screen); lag (I don’t need to expound on this and for those who have N1, enjoy the speed while it lasts and while you’re at it, thank the snappy chip, not android; in a fortnight from today, the performance will change after downloading a certain number of apps). Mediocre VK is unacceptable at this point (in a phone that has no physical K, the VK is critical; how long will it take Google to develop a decent VK? How long? Better keyboard lags and you know it. Touchpal is almost paralyzed when you’re on the browser and you know it). Poor touch screen performance (choppy scrolling and less sensitivity and accuracy) No Outlook syncing; no media sync; mediocre browser; poorly implemented multitasking; no multitouch (MT) with native android (at this point, “OEM model” and “personally I don’t like MT” are simply unacceptable). Markets respond to consumers; we buy the phones and we want native MT so Google: give us what we want!

No! MT with cooked up ROMs and 3d party apps is not as smooth as native; we don’t want second rate MT.
Yes, it is clear that legalities preclude Google from enabling native MT but palm does so. Well, people explain this by saying that apple itself has copied some of palm’s ideas and so there is an unspoken agreement between the two. I guess such an agreement does not exist between Google and apple. Well, in that case Google should start paying apple and hence enable MT without fear of legal action. If Google truly cares about their customers, then it should not be a problem to give up a smidgen of their profits.


On multitasking….
This aspect of a Smartphone’s performance is important but tricky; when it is properly implemented, it’s an asset, otherwise it’s a liability. Multitasking in the palm pre is an asset. In android phones it’s a liability because the user’s difficulty in monitoring and controlling what’s running in the background slows down the system.
Yes, the back button is supposed to close the running app; usually it does, but not always. It is the beleaguered user’s responsibility to know when the back button is malfunctioning or when the app itself is known to be not-closable by the back button; this is stressful and time-consuming. The user’s experience becomes less about enjoying the phone and more about figuring out memory and advanced task management. Apps like taskiller don’t help and they are hideous; the user also needs to tell these apps which background apps are to be ignored. Again, it’s complicated.
With Android, multitasking’s liability outweighs its assets.


On Google…..
May I remind everyone that android users have been clamoring for a native task management method since the day the G1 was born? Finally, with android 2.1 we get cards; alas, the cards are for current screens, not tasks! How lame. How sad.
I have already mentioned Google’s responsiveness when it comes to MT demands by android users. And then there is the scruffy media player. Again, Google ignores the users’ plea for a more functional and less repulsive media player. Meridian is ugly, imeem is makeshift and we just can’t keep waiting for diggin’s mercy.

When it comes to Google, it seems like it is one way communication. They ignore our grievances and now, how much effort can we expect them to put on android when they are busy with another OS (chrome), a tablet, nexus one customer service, and nexus two?! Google seems to be better at starting projects than optimizing them; I suppose chrome OS might be just as unpolished as android--if that’s even possible. The tablet might wind up just as problematic as the N1 (poor screen build quality, poor speaker, poor ringer, trackball issues, antenna issues, daylight visibility, button responsiveness, live wall screen and notification light issues, and quick charge drainage).

Now before android enthusiasts whip out their blades to slash my jugular vein, I have to remind everyone that I am an android user. I spent $200 on my mt3g because I subscribed to the idea of android. I had all sorts of ideas running through my head about android’s promised customizability, openness, freedom, and multitasking capability; I spent more than a total of $100 on android market because I wanted to encourage devs to develop better apps; when there were two versions of an app, I purposely went to the paid version to support the android cause. My primary e-mail is Gmail and my searches are only through Google. I am neither an android nor a Google hater; ours (android critics) is a serious case of resentment and disenchantment over failed yet realistic expectations.

In conclusion, Android has been a crock and hence every new android phone turns out to be a lemon. We don’t need another android lemon; rich hardware that’s outdated the minute it’s released in our quickly advancing tech world does not compensate for poor software and pitiful app collection. Why must we live with second rate OS, second rate apps, second rate games, second rate multitouch, and second rate everything? Android is not thriving and Google is not listening.

In less than a fortnight, apple will announce the 4th generation iphone, which will blow everyone’s mind and once again position apple as the innovation leader that everyone else futilely tries to follow.

Apologies for the long post but I had to let it out of my system for once and for all.

Last edited by anotherfandroid; January 14th, 2010 at 12:08 PM.