Year: 2021

Android’s day-one advantages: how many are left?

When I chose my first Android device over an iPhone in 2009, each platform had exactly one device available and the decision of which platform was for me was clear.

Even back then, to those who had been paying attention to the smartphone world, the iPhone arrived as something that wasn’t quite a smartphone. It had an advanced web browser and slick Google Maps app that were both better than anything else available, but lacked a lot of features that existed in previous smartphones—the biggest omission being third-party app development. But the world very quickly forgot how anti-app Steve Jobs’ Apple was at launch, and how the ‘no, you can’t develop for iPhone’ attitude led to web app monstrosities skinned with brushed metal and pinstripes, which people quickly cooked up to look “iPhone native” in the early days.

Of course, the early days didn’t last long. An SDK and the App Store showed up a year later, but for a long time iPhone remained on my “still wouldn’t even consider” list because it was still missing things I considered basic functionality, things that Android got right, right from the start.

But it’s not 2009 anymore! So where are we now? Let’s take a look back and see how many of these Android advantages are still applicable today, 12 years later.

    • Devices available from multiple manufacturers
    • Outside-of-app-store apps available (not a walled-garden)
    • Almost entirely open-source OS
    • Third-party development possible
    • Multitasking
    • Custom input methods/software keyboards
    • Selection of devices with hardware keyboards
    • Cut and paste
    • Extensible, systemwide ‘share’ functionality
    • Not AT&T-exclusive
    • SIM-unlocking actually allowed
    • No desktop client needed for setup
    • Filesystem
    • Casually swappable battery

Things aren’t looking good! Apple (and Google themselves!) has chipped away at Android advantages over the years, though the two that remain on my list remain huge.

But I sometimes gaze jealously at the iOS world and its devices with competent support and five years of updates and wonder if the principles that led me to choose Android are still worth anything.

Wrong: a modest trumpposal

Something occurred to me late in the 2016 presidential race.1 Everybody was like “this guy lies and never faces consequences,” but was going about it in pretty much the least effective way possible.

I’m sure folks who hold this opinion were well-meaning, but they seemed to be coming from a time where being caught lying is the worst thing a public official can do. Slimy politicians are supposed to, what, recoil with shame, mumble an apology and exit the spotlight?

That’s obviously not the playbook now, and it should have been clear to anyone even a little awake in 2016. So can I just propose some slick new language for describing a case where a public statement doesn’t quite match up with reality?

You don’t call it “inaccurate” or “unfactual.” We’re all very impressed that you went to college.

You don’t call it “lying” because that’s what 4D-chess-playing businessmen do when they negotiate, I guess.

The word you’re looking for is “wrong.” They’re wrong, you say they’re wrong.

Wrong helps keep a record. It classifies the statement into a clear category, helping reinforce objective reality in a time where it’s needed.

Wrong is, at the same time, a little soft and assumes the best intentions. Swing and a miss. Good hustle out there, little buddy—you can’t hit ’em all. 

Wrong is, most importantly, universal. You could be a middle school dropout and remember the feeling from, I don’t know, multiplication tables or something. Being wrong isn’t game-over, but each wrong stings a little.

At some point, if anyone’s actually keeping score, consistent wrongness writ large in headlines for years on end makes a case for malpractice. And who the fuck would tie up their identity supporting somebody who’s just so loudly and consistently wrong, in public, all the time?

  1. I know, I’m sorry I kept this to myself.[↩]