Wednesday, July 4, 2012

Android Pride

Apple managed to ban Galaxy Nexus sales in US. It is not the newest device (it is 7 months old), so why Galaxy Nexus and why now?

Only recent events where Google I/O, where Nexus 7 tablet was announced, and launch of Samsung Galaxy S III. One of those is probable target. I'm betting on Nexus 7. Smartphone market is relatively stable while tablet market is in similar situation like smartphone market couple of years ago: Apple's dominance with barbarians at the gates.

But that's not what I wanted to write about. As regular Google+ visitor, I noticed rise of "boycott Apple" movement. Apple did unpopular things before, but without causing such call for vendetta. It is not about this single event. Droids had enough from Apple and its followers.

Relationship between the two reminds me of Underworld, Apple underlings being vampires and Droids being werewolves. For them, Android OS and devices are cheap ripoff of Apple's products. Not just that they are ripoffs; they are bad ones. OS is badly designed, screen sizes are wrong, and devices look cheap. They read Macworld's Macalope, Cult of Mac and Marco Arment's blog. They feed on the writings of the other members of their closed community. They endlessly discuss faults of the "other" platform without trying to understand or use it. Typical example would be theory how back button functionality is broken, while people who actually use it think of it as best idea since the sliced bread.

Mac users consider themselves creative, and by creative they mean artistic. Creativity is not restricted to expressing yourself to other's senses, it is also the key ingredient of engineering. Do you think that amazing creations of human kind come purely from applying the right formulas? Do you think that great minds of Renaissance were both artist and scientist because it was fashionable?

I can't understand why people so much into creativity are also in one-size-fits-all mentality. They have the same design, same size, and same look-and-feel. OK - you don't feel like expressing yourself through tech, but want tech to "just work" so you can express yourself in the way that fits you most? That's fine. I like to express myself through technology. Please respect that.

Boycotting Apple is wrong. It is just company trying to make money within legal limits. Bigger win would be to become equal in eyes of their users. Let's teach them who we are. We must show them Android pride. One day, Wikipedia will describe it like this:
Android pride is the positive stance against discrimination and violence toward Android people to promote their self-affirmation, equality rights, increase their visibility as a social group, build community, and celebrate operating system diversity and screen size variance. Pride, as opposed to shame and social stigma, is the predominant outlook that bolsters most Android rights movements throughout the world.

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