Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

US smartphone shipments fall sharply, but Android more than iPhone

counterpointresearch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

301–310 of 796 posts

Re: US smartphone shipments fall sharply, but Android more than iPhone

#301

Post by kaba0 »

Thrymr wrote: post #216
kaba0 wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s just such a US. American problem that it is honestly, kind of funny in a dumb way from any other part of the world. Like SMS itself is a legacy, insecure tech, it really should not be used at all anymore, unless you really only know their phone number. Knowing that you are not sending SMS when you see a blue bubble, but apple just conveniently put their internet-based message system into the same app is not a…

> Similarly, you can install Telegram, Whatsapp, Messenger, Signal, Element X (which I all have installed besides Whatsapp) and communicate with people available through those application at the utterly tiny inconvenience of having to open that app first. ...and the not insignificant inconvenience of knowing which of these apps each of your contacts uses or prefers. There really is a network effect of most people in…

I have my family on Telegram as well as some close friends, a single friend on Element, most other people who are less tech-aware are using FB’s Messenger so I can’t ditch that unfortunately. That’s not hard to keep in mind, it is not that many people I actively keep in contact with. Though I am no social butterfly, you may have it different.

Re: US smartphone shipments fall sharply, but Android more than iPhone

#302

Post by rjh29 »

JohnFen wrote: post #285
wilsonnb3 wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"there really is no alternative if you want a decent cell phone in 2023" is just plain wrong. I try to avoid lumping all of the android manufacturers together and treat them individually when comparing them to apple. LG, Motorola, and Xiaomi are not as good as apple but Samsung is. Decent argument to be made for OnePlus, Google, and Asus matching apple as well.

> but Samsung is My current phone is a Samsung and I find it disappointing. Perhaps their good ones are limited to specific models?

I also remember Samsung being bad in the past but I got a Fold 4 and the software is fantastic. Very little bloatware and many convenience/productivity features added over stock Android.

Re: US smartphone shipments fall sharply, but Android more than iPhone

#303

Post by abenga »

MildRant wrote: post #287
Angostura wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, they certainly view phones as appliances, rather than general purpose computers. Personally, I’m fine with that

They absolutely view phones as general purpose computers. It's why iOS is slowly turning into OS X.

Isn't it going the other way?

Re: US smartphone shipments fall sharply, but Android more than iPhone

#304

Post by milkytron »

GeekyBear wrote: post #252
djhworld wrote: post #131

I'm thinking of making the switch to iPhone this year once the USB-C model comes out Whether I regret it, not sure, I mean Android isn't _that_ bad really and the Samsung phones are good, but I think Apple have nailed the ecosystem thing a lot better than what google have.

> Android isn't _that_ bad From a support after the sale perspective? Yes it is. The $399 2016 iPhone SE is still getting security updates today. The original Google Pixel is also from 2016 but stopped getting any sort of updates at the end of 2019. If you want a basic phone that will be supported as long as possible after the sale, the support length per dollar spent proposition of the SE models is pretty unbeatable…

I had an iPhone SE 2016 model for about 5 years, really the only thing that caused me to get rid of it was apps no longer supporting the screen size. I wasn't able to use my banking app properly because things would be cut off, amongst various other apps.

Re: US smartphone shipments fall sharply, but Android more than iPhone

#305

Post by silon42 »

martin8412 wrote: post #212
kaba0 wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s just such a US. American problem that it is honestly, kind of funny in a dumb way from any other part of the world. Like SMS itself is a legacy, insecure tech, it really should not be used at all anymore, unless you really only know their phone number. Knowing that you are not sending SMS when you see a blue bubble, but apple just conveniently put their internet-based message system into the same app is not a…

People are just eating what Google says raw. Apple will just need to implement RCS and everything will be better. Don't worry that the only universally available RCS relay is operated by Google and encryption is a part of a non-standard Google extension. So Google wants Apple to hand all messages over to Google. For fun, Apple should propose to implement RCS but only if Google agrees to use the Apple relay. No chance…

Yeah, I'm on android and RCS is not enabled.

Re: US smartphone shipments fall sharply, but Android more than iPhone

#306

Post by OO000oo »

tyfon wrote: post #258
sb057 wrote: post #223

I'm part of this statistic. I've been an Android user my entire adult life, but it really has been a constant downward spiral over these past several years. My previous three phones from LG, Motorola, and Xiaomi all had major software bugs that were never fixed, the biggest being just incredibly poor network connectivity (across multiple carriers, mind you) resulting in at least several calls just not connecting to m…

I kind of went the other way, I have had androids since 2010ish, then tried an iphone at the beginning of corona since my old sony phone couldn't run teams properly. Had it for 2 years and hated it so much I went back to android. I couldn't even install a separate browser like firefox that was not just a skin and the ad-block on safari drove me crazy. It only prevented items from being displayed but not the network r…

Yeah, I don't see how Apple can claim to prioritize privacy when they won't even allow real ad blocking.

Re: US smartphone shipments fall sharply, but Android more than iPhone

#307

Post by Jtsummers »

partiallypro wrote: post #199
Jtsummers wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Market share alone is not why MS was sued for anti-trust violations. It was how they got into that position, what they did to maintain that position, and what they did with that position.

This isn't in contradiction of what I just said. If anything, it supports it, because 55% isn't a "monopoly" but their behavior is anti-competitive, and they have been propelled into this position in part because of that behavior.

App store and browser, I'll agree with you on. The arguments around RCS vs iMessage and USB-C vs Lightning are very weak, though, and largely based on an ahistorical/atemporal understanding of the world. USB-C wasn't even available when Lightning came about so it wasn't an alternative until after the fact. You can be annoyed with the length of the transition, but it was inevitable and pretty much every Apple device but the iPhone has already transitioned as of last year (wireless mouse and keyboard still use it to charge, IIRC).

RCS was a poor solution to a carrier problem (non-carrier locked messaging platforms let people move more easily between carriers) that Google only endorsed to make themselves look better after fucking up their dozen messaging platforms in a dozen years (not sure if a dozen is too many or too few, I lost track a while ago). I still don't get why a technical crowd wants RCS given it's carrier locked like MMS/SMS and has poor E2EE without any guarantees of E2EE (if your carrier doesn't support it, you don't get it).

Re: US smartphone shipments fall sharply, but Android more than iPhone

#308

Post by zvmaz »

sb057 wrote: post #223

I'm part of this statistic. I've been an Android user my entire adult life, but it really has been a constant downward spiral over these past several years. My previous three phones from LG, Motorola, and Xiaomi all had major software bugs that were never fixed, the biggest being just incredibly poor network connectivity (across multiple carriers, mind you) resulting in at least several calls just not connecting to m…

I mainly used Samsung phones with KISS launcher and very few apps (not even Google Play); it has been more or less stable throughout the years.

Re: US smartphone shipments fall sharply, but Android more than iPhone

#309

Post by rjh29 »

wilsonnb3 wrote: post #297
kube-system wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What lock-in do iPhones have that isn't a thing on Android? Honestly curious.

iMessage and FaceTime are the biggest ones, leaving the ecosystem will make the experience of talking to you worse for anyone using an iPhone still.

Thankfully only the US is afflicted with this stupidity.

Re: US smartphone shipments fall sharply, but Android more than iPhone

#310

Post by inversetelecine »

wilsonnb3 wrote: post #283
GeekyBear wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Android isn't _that_ bad From a support after the sale perspective? Yes it is. The $399 2016 iPhone SE is still getting security updates today. The original Google Pixel is also from 2016 but stopped getting any sort of updates at the end of 2019. If you want a basic phone that will be supported as long as possible after the sale, the support length per dollar spent proposition of the SE models is pretty unbeatable…

> I think this is a major factor that is driving market share towards iPhone. Few people outside of the tech nerd bubble care about this.

Yes. I'd argue most people hate or are annoyed by updates. "Ugh, another update??" I hear this all the time. Or "X company updated my phone and everything is different, I hate updates!"
Post reply on HN