Android Phones are 10: For once, Google won fair and square

Old adage

"It's not what you've got, it's how and where you stick it."

It's like VHS, sure the IOS interface and structure is gorgeous compared to Android but then BetaMax was a slightly better format than VHS but what matters most is not how good something is technically but how easy it is to get hold of and use. VHS was a bit naff but it was good enough and suited what people wanted despite it's failings. Android is good enough, it might not be the best and far from perfect but it's good enough to do the job for now, especialy when you consider that with one click I can get the entire O/S downloaded and pull it apart to see how it works, within a day or two I can have it running on my hardware device. There's very few serious contenders that offer that right now. Sooner or later something better will come but it's good enough for now.

I must admit that I'm a bit tired and jaded from too much Android, and would like to see something fresh and new.

Maybe a *BSD or Ubuntu version instead of Android...

One can only dream...

God I miss the G1

That phone design..

As horrible as people claim it was, it was a godsend for someone like me, who types into SSH from his phone on a regular basis. Seeing all the actual keyboarded phones die up and now all we have is a very derpy attempt at a Blackberry revival, saddened me.

I do admit, the _very first_ release was crap: 192MB of ram, 90 megs of which was shared with the modem, leaving just about enough ram to run 2 apps concurrently without one making the JVM kill the other for resources... 480x320 screen..

That trackball though? So helpful! Single handed operation of a lot of features because of that, and then I could move my other hand to the phone to type. I kept it open, widescreen mode, all the time - simply because it was easy to grab onto, and not drop, in that position.

If some opensource hardware group in the near future comes up with a PCB and new screen that would fit the old shell for a G1, I know it would find buyers. Guy can wish eh?

Android never assumed they'd got it right

When IOS and Android were young, there were all manner of glaring omissions from each platform.

Pinch to zoom, copy & paste, ability to choose your own default apps, choice of screen size, OTA updates etc.

You could bicker in a fan-boy fashion over it, but the gaps are mainly gone - but how they were filled varies massively.

Apple with each successive piece of hardware/OS told their users what they were getting new in a lovely polished silo. Apple knew best and made sure the damn thing did what it said it would.

Android just let people fiddle, alternate apps, rooting, intercept frameworks, custom OS etc. My Android (my side) would always be able to do the latest and greatest things - and quite frequently would be out of action for a day as I tried to work out how to recover the latest bricking my fiddling had caused.

Today - I see less of a difference. I own a Pixel and have never even felt the urge to root it. Conversely though, I can't really think of anything that would prevent me switching to IOS (I seem to have conveniently forgotten my arguments over fixed batteries, removable storage, eye-watering prices).

Isn't it a toolbox for slurping data? ...you are the product yada yada

What phone do you use Mr Orlovski?

Methinks Andrew doth protest too much.

Android phones of all calibre are obsoleted through lack of support after a year or two.

Great for selling new phones, but unnecessary and damaging for the ecosystems, real and commercial.