Apple

[fuchikoma]

I've always written long posts. When someone doesn't get what I'm saying, I try to explain. You should see my Kotaku history... or the piracy thread (while I put in way too much effort there, it was actually pretty fun.)

 

Anyway, I've already explained where USB fell short so far, why even some Android phones decided to go beyond it, and how a less common adapter has already lasted through multiple different technology implementations, resulting in fewer connector changes. But if you didn't see that already, or see it and disagree, saying it again won't change anything. *shrug*

 

The funny thing about this is that for questioning some of the things on Android, I seem to be cast as some Apple fanboy, when I never was, and lately I've been thinking more about differences in the two systems than usual because of all the things I'm unhappy with Apple over. But I guess it's unusual not to think in black and white about these things, even these days... I'm willing to admit there are ups and downs to both - but when it comes to connectors and exploits, I'd definitely go with Apple - and believe it or not, when it comes to using the same apps as my friends, it's Apple by a landslide (not fair, but hey, that's how I got a 360 too...) User experience and firmware flexibility? I'd say that's skewing more and more to Android, certainly - especially with the trouble Apple goes to to prevent downgrades lately, and the longstanding tradition that if it's not on the app store, you can't run it without a (very simple, but sometimes thwarted) hack. Apple's updates mostly seem to mess things up after OS 3, while Android gets slicker and more varied interfaces and options. But for me, [REDACTED] - you know what, never mind the conclusion - the main issue that's kept me from Android has been discussed elsewhere already and the responses I got were just as slanted. This is not a place to rationally discuss platforms so I'll just let this stand where it is.

[Mister Jack]

^You could have done that for cheaper and with better sound quality.

 

There may be good alternatives to Apple when it comes to phones, but when it comes to mp3 players and their features, nothing else comes even close.

[Faiblesse Des Sens]

What? Their players don't have many features they just have really great form factors.

 

This is not a place to rationally discuss platforms so I'll just let this stand where it is.

 

Ha, I was going to comment on how that post was a pretty good comparison of the two platforms now that we've discussed the connection aspect to death.

 

Also I'm curious: What do you mean by "using the same apps as your friends"? Most of the stuff I can think of that's socially based is available on more than one platform (Instagram, Facebook, Twitter etc.)

[deanb]

Thing is while there's nothing wrong with changing connector it is kinda silly that with Micro-USB becoming the universally accepted charger/data connection that Apple would change to something completely n utterly propriety still.

 

And yeah using apps with friends implies social connectivity, which is not really tied in with the specific apps but the networks they use. And sharing is shit tons simpler on Android since it's built right into the OS intents (instead of being tied to just FB and Twitter on iOS)

[fuchikoma]

What? Their players don't have many features they just have really great form factors.

I'm kind of inclined to agree here. At first, they had an uncommonly easy browsing interface that they largely lifted from Creative Labs. For playback features, they used to have background playback of movie audio, but took it out. Now their strength is mostly formats - native MP3, MP4 (AAC), WAV, AIFF and ALAC. Decent shuffle, good search, cover art, double speed playback... pause on headphone disconnect. It's nice, but it's not really exceptional.

 

Also I'm curious: What do you mean by "using the same apps as your friends"? Most of the stuff I can think of that's socially based is available on more than one platform (Instagram, Facebook, Twitter etc.)

 

Mainly, if one of them is enjoying an app, I just have to ask the name of it, go on the store, and there it is. Also though, multiplayer games like Real Racing 2, and social features like Game Center. I'm not saying Android doesn't have this, just that if I had one, it'd rarely come up with the people I know.

[Thursday Next]

I tend to use my phone for social/productivity apps rather than games. The games I do have tend to be single player ones for when I am bored and on my own. For me Android does the job and I have more choice in handsets etc. Plus, I'm in the Android ecosystem now and am loathe to re-buy apps by switching to iOS. I'm sure the same is true for iOS users. It's a similar story with Xbox / PS gaming. All my games are on PSN (or rather SEN) so I'm unlikely to switch.

Edited September 24, 2012 by Thursday Next

[Luftwaffles]

Plus, I'm in the Android ecosystem now and am loathe to re-buy apps by switching to iOS.

 

That's how I'm feeling. I'm considering switching to the iPhone 5 when my upgrade window rolls around if there are no decent vanilla Android phones out at the time, but it'll be a little sad to have to rebuy Instapaper, Swiftkey, Fotmob, etc. or their alternatives. That, and no google maps fix = no buy for me, seeing as I moved to a city and am pretty clueless without it.

[Faiblesse Des Sens]

You think formats are a strength of Apple mp3 players? They typically have the least format support. No OGG and no FLAC being the big ones they're always missing. Everything you mentioned but ALAC is standard and expected on other players.

 

but it'll be a little sad to have to rebuy Instapaper, Swiftkey, Fotmob, etc. or their alternatives.

 

SwiftKey? Are you planning on jailbreaking because you can't just download a new keyboard for iPhones like you can with Android.

 

Though yes, the concept as a whole is annoying but then again sometimes the apps have platform specific features.

 

PS, why not consider W8? Lumia 920 is looking like the best phone coming out period.

[Luftwaffles]

By the time my upgrade rolls around (March), I'm assuming there will be better phones than the 920 out. As for WP8, I'm not sure yet. The hardware looks fantastic, and the internals are, like you said, far better than any other phone on the market at the moment, but the WP8 ecosystem is just so far behind iOS and Android right now that I'm not 100% sure. I don't care about phone gaming, but there's a few notable apps that aren't on W8 that I'd still like to use.

 

As for Swiftkey, yeah, you're right on that one. I was just going down the list of Android apps that I've bought. Honestly, it's a short list.

[fuchikoma]

I'd actually never use FLAC or ALAC. OGG would be nice once in a while though.

 

I've been thinking lately that the Lumia 920 looks really attractive if apps, interoperability with other phones and so on weren't issues. If we could go back to the era before apps, I'd get it in a heartbeat.

 

In fact, we may see about that anyway... Apple has seriously started to play dirty with OS updates this week. It seems OS 6 conveniently put itself onto my phone, waiting to be installed... permanently... so I removed the installer manually with a third party desktop app and blocked it from downloading again with a hack from Cydia's repository, and instead of freeing up space, it seems to have magically used up another 1.5 GB for removing it. A system restore would probably fix that, but that's no longer supported with the current OS version. So... the advantages of iOS are rapidly dwindling here.

Edited September 24, 2012 by fuchikoma

[deanb]

Few days late but here's something that Apple definitely have as non-standard that makes things fun for everyone else:

https://twitter.com/imdph/statuses/251270577371877376

 

[TheMightyEthan]

What's it supposed to look like?

[deanb]

I've no idea what the specific tweet is meant to be, but it's emoji I think so along the lines of http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4976

[fuchikoma]

You must have missed it on the last page, but emoji isn't Apple, it's SoftBank. That's why it has a Japanese name ("picture letters.") Apple added it to the OS in order to support the Japanese carrier that offered the iPhone, and locked it so that other users couldn't access it. Then people started unlocking it via apps people posted on the store. I think for a little while, Apple may have resisted it, but eventually just went "ah well, people like it" and allowed it.

 

Also sort of interesting you only see it was tweeted via iOS if you use an Android - it seems they're serving a different version of the page to each browser.

Edited September 27, 2012 by fuchikoma

[deanb]

The ability to see the client isn't a feature of Android, that's the client I use, Twicca. And I'm aware it's via Softbank, it's still not a standard feature, and it's also on all global versions of iOS (and now even in OSX). By using this non-standard/non-global feature it means that iOS basically end up with a feature they're probably aren't aware isn't compatible with any other phone OS/client/app/browser etc beyond iOS/OSX and whoever has gone out their way to get plug-ins. Which means they post gobbledygook as far as any other user is concerned. Especially when everything supports emoticons, and can turn them into pictures if it's there. Like on Android and this forum.

[Eleven]

Sound like too much nitpicking to me, honestly. They had a good reason to add it for Japan. And people seem to want itvoutside of japan, so they added it, it was already there anyway. It's not like they went out of their way to add a non-standard feature because they're apple, like you seem to be implying...

 

You probably don't hate it as much as i think you do. But your 2nd post feels like nitpicking... Oh well...

[Thursday Next]

It is a nitpick I agree. But it's still a peeve when going through twitter to get a tweet from a friend saying "Such a bad day. Really need a ???" Need a what? Hug? Pint of lager? Coffee? Bath? Chat?

[Faiblesse Des Sens]

I remmber reading that SoftBank emojis weren't even the most used in Japan, they were in 3rd place. It's really something that should be standarized or else you create

fragmentation.

[Eleven]

See, if Apple used a different NFC tech that is incompatible with the one being used on Windows phones or Android phones, then that is a bad thing. This is not.

 

Microsoft Outlook supports a smiley face on html emails. Just type a colon and closing parenthesis and it converts it to a smiley. Reading that mail on thunderbird, what you'll see is a "J". Yahoo messenger supports audibles. And is only played on other yahoo messenger clients. I had a Samsung dumbphone that supported smileys but it didn't display correctly on my Sony Ericsson phone.

 

Apple wanted to support emoji for Japan because Japan wanted emoji. Not all your features have to be standard. You want to read what that is? Get an iphone. It has that feature. Ask twitter to support emoji. Ask google to add emoji support to Android. A quick search shows Android can actually support this feature by installing what i assume to be an app or plugin. Download that.

 

This "issue" should not be lumped to the Apple doesn't use standard tech/features list of complaints.

[fuchikoma]

I'm with eleven on this one. There are lots of legitimate things to criticize Apple for, but it seems even the farthest-reaching, most spurious ones get approval on here, while criticism of Android is just waved off, even when linked to proof of it.

 

The iPhone was carried by SoftBank, so to support their features, they implemented a standard feature of the carrier. If they didn't, people would be saying "what's with Apple? They can't even do emoji! This doesn't meet my needs - Americans don't get the phone market in Japan." If it's unlocked by default now, that's because everyone with a little bit of tech savvy already went out and got utilities to unlock it and used it anyway, so they decided to stop restricting their users. But I suppose if Apple hunted out and removed all emoji unlocker apps from the app store, you guys would be saying "look at their heavy-handed policies! It's not hurting anyone - users have no freedom on iOS!" They can't win for losing with some people.

 

They also support a whole slew of languages, but if I were to enter something in Japanese or Korean on my phone, a lot of PC users would just see a bunch of squares. I guess they shouldn't support that either.

[fuchikoma]

And I agree with FDS that emoji standardization would be nice. I don't know about the history of them well enough to say why it's fragmented, or how much overlap there is. DoCoMo would almost certainly be the leader for adoption rates, then maybe KDDI? But they weren't really a major GSM carrier, and that was what the iPhone was, so the carriers who could have it were limited - much like how Rogers/Fido was the only option in Canada until they started supporting HSDPA. So it's obvious the version Apple supported would be the one for the carrier that supported Apple.

 

(Need to proofread. I was murdering verb tense here.)

Edited September 27, 2012 by fuchikoma

[TheMightyEthan]

I think the obvious "standardization" is just to support the already-agreed upon text smileys, like colon-capital-D, and various apps can render them however they want, rather than actually translating it into proprietary code.

[Faiblesse Des Sens]

See, if Apple used a different NFC tech that is incompatible with the one being used on Windows phones or Android phones, then that is a bad thing. This is not.

 

Microsoft Outlook supports a smiley face on html emails. Just type a colon and closing parenthesis and it converts it to a smiley. Reading that mail on thunderbird, what you'll see is a "J". Yahoo messenger supports audibles. And is only played on other yahoo messenger clients. I had a Samsung dumbphone that supported smileys but it didn't display correctly on my Sony Ericsson phone.

 

Apple wanted to support emoji for Japan because Japan wanted emoji. Not all your features have to be standard. You want to read what that is? Get an iphone. It has that feature. Ask twitter to support emoji. Ask google to add emoji support to Android. A quick search shows Android can actually support this feature by installing what i assume to be an app or plugin. Download that.

 

This "issue" should not be lumped to the Apple doesn't use standard tech/features list of complaints.

 

But it actually is something that could be a standard. You send text messages between phones. I also think it's annoying that Outlook has so much "Outlook" stuff. Though that's because I think Outlook is a piece of shit in general whereas I can actually think of reasons to use an iPhone.

 

I just don't get your attitude. Why wouldn't you want something to be universally adopted? Why did Apple go with Softbank instead of something else to begin with? There are two other emoji variants they could have used. I think it's scary as fuck that people are so casually brushing this off as not a problem. Unite people. Don't divide them. Adding emoji support to Android is not that simple FYI. Your carrier has to support it to begin with. Mine doesn't.

 

Oh and apparently Apple is doing their own emoji now and not even using Sofbank. Da fuq. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emoji#Apple_Encoding

 

I think the obvious "standardization" is just to support the already-agreed upon text smileys, like colon-capital-D, and various apps can render them however they want, rather than actually translating it into proprietary code.

 

Emojis are more complex than that. You're talking about emoticons and how something can interpret them.

[Eleven]

Because it's trivial bullshit, that's why. Fuck yeah, emoticons. Get angry.

 

I never said i don't want this to be universally adopted. Apple is doing it this way. Android doesn't even have emoji. And now Apple needs to change their ways so that Android can get in on the fun, because it's difficult to do it in Android? Why don't they just do it so that it gets unversally adopted? My point is that it's just an iOS feature. Why drop it if others can't support it? It's not like they're losing anything. Yes it's part of SMS. But it's not an integral part. It's just an enhancement, for iOS users to enjoy. It's there because iOS users want it, they even expanded it on iOS6 i think. Why hold back on something that makes your phone fun to use just because others cannot or will not find the time to implement it?

 

Hey, if you're really bothered by lack of emoticon standardization why don't you make a petition? I'll sign it with you.

 

Not really.

[Faiblesse Des Sens]

Actually, Jelly Bean has it, but I have no idea if it's compatible.

 

And now Apple needs to change their ways so that Android can get in on the fun, because it's difficult to do it in Android?

 

Thanks for making this about Apple vs. Android, tard. This is making it work for everyone. Windows Phone, Blackberry, Boot2Gecko, Symbian, etc. If you get the cellphone companies to agree on this (which isn't going to happen because they don't even agree on it in the country emojis originate from) then everyone wins.

 

The issue is that iOS users can communicate with non-iOS users. This causes issues with things like emojis and group texts. There's even the twitter example.

 

I don't know why you're saying that I want it held back. Then again, you also seem to think this is an Android vs. iOS issue so you're not exactly viewing this clearly. I just want somethign adopted that doesn't restrict anything for anyone. When you communicate between devices I think this is important. As for stuff that never leaves the phone? Entirely different story.