11–20 of 211 posts
Kind of strikes me as similar to writing "Why I bought an American car, junked it and bought a BMW M5" - the american car part isn't half as important as which one specifically.
While I love love love my Android phone, it's definitely a geek's phone that offers a much more capable mobile platform, but at the tradeoff of more exposed complexity. And most of the additional capability are things that most people don't care about (yay! I can add more home screens, and I have a tricorder app! and I've hacked my phone to run emacs!) vs. having access to more and higher quality consumer oriented apps.
I know that the BB platform is also complex, but most people just use it as a phone with a nice email client and one or two very basic (and very common) apps -- like facebook. That's really all they want.
When they buy a phone and it's loaded with crap, and they don't know how to get rid of it (or they can't for some idiotic reason that only the carrier could ever explain), they get turned off. When they go to the Apple store they can get a phone with just the main stuff they were looking for on the screen, and it's relatively easy to get their facebook app or whatever and be done with the entire experience.
That was pretty misleading. Not Android was the culprit, but the carrier's crapware. I never understood why people would not actually buy their phones and then decide on a contract or prepaid to go with it? I even bought mine off Ebay in excellent condition and almost full warranty (2 years in Germany) so much cheaper that I still have not reached the difference to the "normal full or subsidized price" with my monthl…
From what I understand, the mobile phone system in the EU works differently than in the US. In the US, almost all phones are bought at carrier-subsidized prices - i.e. much cheaper than buying the phone standalone. The catch is that you have to sign for a 2-year contract with that carrier to get the subsidized prices. The prices for mobile phone plans in the US are much higher because they include the phone subsidy.…
More popular still are pay-as-you-go deals where the handset is purchased at full price, though this is more popular in the feature phone segment.
I bought my Epic (Sprint) at Radio Shack, and left the store with an activated phone. I deleted the minimal crapware at home and have no complaints.
Worse still, it's not just removing stock apps and loading Samsung ones, they've gone and removed the stock Android keyboard too.
My girlfriend hates the Samsung keyboard, and the only other alternative on the phone is Swype which she hates even more.
As a direct result of the keyboard not being the one she knew and loved her use of the phone has plummeted.
She still uses the phone, but not for anything that involves touching the keyboard. So SMS, email, web... all useless in her eyes. She uses maps still to see where she is, and she reads Twitter (but will wait until she's home to respond to things), but that's about it.
This current top of the range Android phone, with it's carrier dictated keyboard, has made the smartphone a paperweight that she lugs around just in case someone calls. She's even asked me if we can dig out the old Blackberry gathering dust in the shed just so that she can be in touch with people again.
I searched the Marketplace, but the Android stock keyboard isn't on there. So until I can afford a replacement for her, it looks like she'll just do all of her communication when she gets home each evening.
The big problem: As much as I explain this is the fault of Samsung, she just associates it to being an Android issue.
I'm just hoping it won't be too long before Cyanogen Mod is available for the S2 so that I can fix it for her.
The Android brand is being diluted and sullied by experiences like this and Apple is benefiting with its insistence on one model per device type. Google needs to tackle this very soon. If they get a bad reputation the markets in Asia will suffer. Android is expected to sell tons of phones in Asia and any bad reputation couple with Apple's growing image as a high end phone will be bad for Android.
That was pretty misleading. Not Android was the culprit, but the carrier's crapware. I never understood why people would not actually buy their phones and then decide on a contract or prepaid to go with it? I even bought mine off Ebay in excellent condition and almost full warranty (2 years in Germany) so much cheaper that I still have not reached the difference to the "normal full or subsidized price" with my monthl…
From what I understand, the mobile phone system in the EU works differently than in the US. In the US, almost all phones are bought at carrier-subsidized prices - i.e. much cheaper than buying the phone standalone. The catch is that you have to sign for a 2-year contract with that carrier to get the subsidized prices. The prices for mobile phone plans in the US are much higher because they include the phone subsidy.…
When I was looking a few months ago, T-Mobile was the only carrier that actually gave you cheaper plans if you brought your own phone (i.e., they were sane). That's why I'm on T-Mobile now, and couldn't be happier. It's too bad about the AT&T deal...
The real issue here is not the hardware and not Android, but what device manufacturers and network providers cram down the throats of their customers. Custom UI enhancements/replacements, useless bundled apps that can't be removed, and the removal of standard, OS-delivered features. None of this should have been new or a surprise to the writer's mom, who was coming to Android from a feature phone. Feature phones have…
I can confirm that the Samsung Galaxy S2 also suffers from this. Worse still, it's not just removing stock apps and loading Samsung ones, they've gone and removed the stock Android keyboard too. My girlfriend hates the Samsung keyboard, and the only other alternative on the phone is Swype which she hates even more. As a direct result of the keyboard not being the one she knew and loved her use of the phone has plumme…
As a Galaxy S user, I definitely agree that the default Samsung Keyboard is pretty much useless to type on, but doesn't the SII also come with Swype like the S?