Comments on: Phone wars

By: crenquis

crenquis — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 23:18:00 +0000

If your phone wasn’t made by Ma Bell in the 60′s or 70′s, then it’s crap!

By: Donald Petersen

Donald Petersen — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 21:27:00 +0000

Man after me own heart.

By: Donald Petersen

Donald Petersen — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 21:26:00 +0000

Heh. See above.

By: teapot

teapot — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 00:53:00 +0000

The “wildly different philosophies” is marketing guff that is fooling you and many others into marketing apples/googles products FOR them. This is what Honan is getting at, and a point that you and all the other butthurt commenters here are missing. It actually doesn’t matter any more (if it even ever mattered).

Please name a single significant issue caused by “fragmentation” (sounding a little like Schiller there) or a problem caused by Apple’s closed environment? None of these things are even talking points anymore… What is ANYTHING that cannot be done any phone platform now.

By: teapot

teapot — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 00:05:00 +0000

Such objective differences are largely related to the price of the phone. If you buy a decent phone of any sort it will probably be able to organise your life fine. A look at the spec sheet will usually tell you more about a device than 20 pages of idiotic forum discussion.

By: teapot

teapot — Sun, 24 Mar 2013 23:51:00 +0000

Ha, you went there anyway. The reality is that, like sports teams, phones these days can all pretty much do the same thing.

By: teapot

teapot — Sun, 24 Mar 2013 23:46:00 +0000

stfu you fanboi trolls!

Everyone knows iOS invented driving!!!!1!

By: Diogenes

Diogenes — Sun, 24 Mar 2013 17:15:00 +0000

I get the phones, not the numbers, silly!

By: Polyorchnid Octopunch

Polyorchnid Octopunch — Sun, 24 Mar 2013 14:54:00 +0000

This really reminds me of the desktop wars in the nineties. The Winders people were so happy they won, which gave their heroes Gates and Ballmer the ability to charge them quintuple the money for their product via the OEM channel. That really showed those Apple, IBM, and linux users!

Apple/Android fanbois are the Winvangelists of the oughts and teens, and just as dumb and manipulable.

By: Eugene Medvedev

Eugene Medvedev — Sun, 24 Mar 2013 11:31:00 +0000

Well, let’s say “rationally motivated” rather than “rationally executed” — but it’s irrationally executed precisely because it’s not conscious.

By: Thad Boyd

Thad Boyd — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 23:53:00 +0000

I was tired of The Argument when I was 9 and it was Nintendo versus Sega.

I’ve opted to go the Android route for a variety of reasons, but I think a rational person can find plenty to like AND plenty to dislike from both Apple AND Google. …and MS and RIM, if you’ve actually used either product long enough to form an opinion.

…and I can see my NES and my Genesis from here.

By: mickcollins

mickcollins — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 23:37:00 +0000

IMHO it’s good to talk about their differences, there are real differences, but what is needed is to strive for referring to objective differences so others can make their choices in the clear. Pro-choice!

By: mickcollins

mickcollins — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 23:31:00 +0000

I agree, tré (including the iPhone), however, just because it’s best for me doesn’t mean it’s best for someone else, even for someone I know well and especially someone I don’t know well or at all.

By: Haz 0

Haz 0 — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 23:29:00 +0000

Not to mention the oft overlooked differences in manufacturing, which some companies do far more ethically and justly than others.

By: mickcollins

mickcollins — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 23:26:00 +0000

Never a Chevord!

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 22:06:00 +0000

Does that result in erroneous booty calls?

By: Diogenes

Diogenes — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 21:34:00 +0000

I just get the hand-me-downs from my kids.

By: Diogenes

Diogenes — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 21:33:00 +0000

Oh, aren’t we fancy! The real question is current vs. static.

By: Diogenes

Diogenes — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 21:30:00 +0000

Doesn’t that almost describe the NFL?

By: jerwin

jerwin — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 17:41:00 +0000

That’s how I understood the OSWars– my childhood computer was an Apple //e, upgraded to a IIgs.
Nothing was standard, and it was important that developers didn’t standardize on something you didn’t have. The signs were there, though. Porters routinely ignored the Amiga style graphics in favor of ugly EGA style artwork; the sound chip was relegated to obscurity, and the GUI looked downright primitive compared to a Mac.

By: Gilbert Wham

Gilbert Wham — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 16:42:00 +0000

Conflating anti-war protests with fanboi phone brand squabbles is a bit of a stretch, though.

By: GentleGiant

GentleGiant — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 16:38:00 +0000

Agreed. Honan could almost start all his “insightful” essays with “I’m kind of a tool, and not all that smart, but please listen to my earnest plea…”

By: Gilbert Wham

Gilbert Wham — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 16:37:00 +0000

Chinese will sell you just such a device quite happily (Android wristwatch phone) for less than two hundred bucks.

By: Gilbert Wham

Gilbert Wham — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 16:35:00 +0000

That is genius. I am going to incorporate this into my ‘Nationalise stadium sports’ plan* if I may borrow your splendid notion that is.

*to be enacted when I am finally (as is my due) gifted with the job of ‘President for Life’.

By: heinzelman

heinzelman — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 15:44:00 +0000

I have the same request for Mat-with-one-t, shut up. Complaining about people complaining is an attention seeking ploy at best. Congratulations you’re on Boing Boing, now mind your own business.

By: princessalex

princessalex — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 15:30:00 +0000

Unless we try to grow beyond it. I really don’t care what choices other people make. I don’t attach that level of brand loyalty to purchases I make or things I do. I don’t pretend that the decisions I make for myself are the same decisions that other people should make for themselves. People generally don’t ask me which something-or-other they should buy, because I always answer with, “It depends on your needs/wants.” We can’t just say it’s ingrained in our nature to want to be better than others, and refuse to rise above it.

By: tré

tré — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 15:19:00 +0000

Who cares? Let’s get to the heart of the matter- DC or AC?

By: tré

tré — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 15:18:00 +0000

Right. Except, though I love ‘em, the Packers don’t affect the goings-on of my day-to-day life nearly as much as my iPhone. If anything, I feel a deep appreciation for the advantages of one phone over another is more appropriate than the same appreciation for one team over another.

By: princessalex

princessalex — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 15:05:00 +0000

But, would you rather PUSH your Ford than DRIVE a Chevy? ;-)

By: Paul Renault

Paul Renault — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 14:36:00 +0000

Is Matt Honan saying that, unless you work for one of the manufacturers of phones or phone software, you shouldn’t express an opinion?

Hmm.. Too bad he didn’t heed his advice about expressing an opinion about computer security and passwords…
Of course, it’s possible that I’m not aware that he works for RSA, Microsoft, MIT, LastPass…take your pick.

/ Does he have the same idea about expressing political opinions if you’re not part of the Cabinet?

// While people were protesting about the Vietnam War, the goverment kept telling the protestors to shut up, because they didn’t understand the subtle geo-political aspects of crossing the seas and killing people who never attacked or threatened the USA. Y’know, like Bush and Blair did in Iraq.