Android

This is what happens when you succumb to techno AIDS.

But WHY? God I can not understand why someone would willingly use iOS. I have both an Android and iPhone and every time I pick up the iPhone I wonder why anyone would use this willingly.

Idk, these seem to be first world country problems

In rapidly and non rapidly developing countries, we have brands like realmeme(realme), tecnologically braindead(tecno) and xiaomeme(xiaomi) take over

iCrytoSleeps(iPhones) are alright but people here like to be conservative with their money. Ironically they look at good specs since mobile gaming is all the rage here

I personally daily drive a oneplus one, to spite people like the ones mentioned in the post

US teens are stupid.

Welp, I am the only one in class using Android, so I get some laughs. If I am going to drop Android, it will be for full fledged GNU+Linux phone. Postmarket OS already officially supports Android apps via Waydroid.

I don't see how I'd use something as restrictive as iOS. Not even being able to sideload apps without jailbreak, so Apple decides what you install.
There's so much stuff I'd miss, I'd feel like using a modern day feature phone.
How is that cool?

Imagine taking the wall street journal seriously

Great clickbait title from them. This is a US / NA specific issue and thankfully isn't fully reflective everywhere else

Perfect timing for this ~~Apple propaganda~~ "journalism," as Apple is releasing another phone and have openly stated they don't expect it to sell well.

Marketing, and the fact that phones are now super boring, everything is web based, there's no more cool apps, everything is just a frontend for some web service, or a damn webview.

The historical feature gap between Androids and iPhones is mostly gone, and since the tech doesn't matter anymore, marketing can go a long way.

The article is also very us centric, in places where cost matters more, the iPhone is seen as a status symbol, just like every other thing that costs a lot for no reason.

I dont really like android. Symbian and even windows phones performed better on inferior hardware. Their weird lifecycle seems to me wasteful and blurs the line between what's running or not. It only became stable once hardware got way better. It's a shame that every other option failed. because the only thing worse than android is an apple controlled environment.

Ah great, so Apple won. They have a gynormus mass of imbeciles addicted to a logo. Good to know.

This literally translates how dumb kids become by just abstracting everything from them, having little to no digital literacy, having little to no customisation, hands on. Fuck you apple, Fuck you iToddlers

Teens will feel like outcasts if they get an Android phone while their friends still use iMessage because of the green bubbles.

So I've heard this sentiment a lot, and at one point it certainly was true, but are teens still texting these days at all? I swear almost everyone moved to instant messaging over Snapchat, Instagram, Discord, etc.

Mom, I'm tired of having software choices! I need to be locked into an ecosystem immediately!!

You're telling me in 2023, kids are using "Droid" again to refer to Android?

I hadn't heard that since they literally first came out.

Also, this isn't surprising. It was assumed that younger generations, those growing up with PCs, Tablets, Smartphones, etc, would become inherently skilled with their use. Turns out that was entirely false because it also turns out people don't want to learn what they aren't interested in. So if you don't care about anything more than TikTok, Insta, and Snapchat, then you don't learn anything more than what is necessary to operate them. And Apple makes this very easy in terms of not needing to relearn even an iota between their models. Android cannot say the same.

I love ruining your group chats!

Kids are dumb

They must love having to ask their parents for a new phone every couple of years because they can't install apps due to their phone being out of date

My kids both have android phones (cheap ones) and if they demanded iPhones I'd tell them to gtfo. But my kids aren't brats and are content with their phones they have - cheap Samsungs - that are capable of running all the crap they're into - Tiktok, Snapchat, Whatsapp etc. Why would they even need anything more powerful?

Maybe there are private schools where phone snobbery is a thing and rich parents indulge their brats every desire. Maybe in that environment an iPhone holds an allure that an Android cannot match. But there are plenty of weird premium Android phones - flip phones, folding phones etc. so maybe that is nonsense too. If I were a spoiled brat with rich parents I might be demanding mommy & daddy buy me a Z Fold to show off. If my parents were super rich I might be demanding they get me a designer phone like a Vertu.