The iPHONE 5 UNDERMINES western DEMOCRACY: 5 reasons why Thinking of buying a new iPhone 5 after it gets announced later today? Don't. Owning it will mark you out as an easily-led simpleton - and worse, the purchase will undermine western democracy. Our last digest along these lines was published prior to iPhone Day last year, but as it turned out - and who are we to say just why - …
Well it seems that the whole "Flash" argument has finally dissolved, who remembers all the fuss that used to generate on here.
In fact, it's a limitation now, the iOS version of iPlayer lets you download lots of programmes to watch when you want (30 days to watch). The Android version still uses Flash, so you can only stream with a data connection, not much good abroad or on the plane.
You'd think that but given android is the work of communists and offer no way for honest hard working artists to secure their content so the thieves can't get at it, that means the BBC can't do anything until android allows someone other than one advertiser to make money on the platform.
You can still put as much video, audio, etc. as you want on a removable SD card and watch it on your Android, then swap the battery with a fresh one when it becomes low due to watching all that media... And you can choose what player you want to use too.
I deal with iPhones every day at work. They've become all the rage and our company is phasing out Blackberry devices. After the buzz wears off, our users find that hey, even their old, crappy Blackberry does email, calling, and texting better in an enterprise environment than their shiny new toy does. To say nothing of battery life.
Seriously, the more iPhones I deal with, and the more Apple user accounts I have to set up, the happier I am with my Android device. Apple may "just work" (though often it doesn't), but Android just works better.
No ability to set up a shared Wifi Hotspot, that's reason I dropped my iPhone and went Android.
Worked out great on holiday when I had my daughter and my wife, both Apple users and both desperate for a little net access. Oh dear, what to do. Well let me just flip this here toggle on my phone and voila, I'll let you both use my much derided ( in my house at least ) but now venerated Android phone with it's valuable wifi hotspot! They were both happily sponging off my Android SGS2 hotspot, both at the same time while I was browsing using my ASUS tablet.
Apple tech is nice but I want my tech to do stuff not just look nice thanks!
Huh? Course there is! Something called Personal Hotspot that's been there since the iP4 came out. And it works over Bluetooth/USB.
Anyway, I'm sure the BBC made the clear cut decision from their usage stats to show that Apple devices hit iPlayer the most. Common sense says you update the iOS app first.
Apple tech is very nice. Better than anything else IMHO :).
"Anyway, I'm sure the BBC made the clear cut decision from their usage stats to show that Apple devices hit iPlayer the most. Common sense says you update the iOS app first."
I suspect more people are likely to use a service when that service has been optimised for their hardware. Unless you can present these fictional stats though you're talking crap.
It's long been suspected that the main reason the iPlayer better supports iOS than Android is because most of the Media Studies BA types who work for the beeb use iPhones.
I use my iPhone to provide wifi to my tablet and laptop every day. What on earth are you talking about no ability to set up shared Wifi Hotspot? I can share with up to five different devices simultaneously. I'd say it's your service provider, cause it's definitely not the iPhone, providing it's an iPhone made within the last 3 years.
Indeed ... I consider it a duty to quote Mencken as often as possible ...
"The only good bureaucrat is one with a pistol at his head. Put it in his hand and it's good-bye to the Bill of Rights."
"Puritanism: The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy"
"Laws are no longer made by a rational process of public discussion; they are made by a process of blackmail and intimidation, and they are executed in the same manner."
weird - of all the iPhones i've owned, i've never, ever, had a need to swap the battery.
i dunno why you lot get so hung up on it as a feature.
It used to be, before Apple came on the scene, that if you had a small pocket computer then you or anyone else could write programs for it and you could run them on your machine that you owned without asking the people who had made it.
you know, you can get the SDK for free. you can write apps for yourself to your hearts content.
Most iPhones I purchase for my company are replaced annually because of battery fails. They are also the devices that cause most crap because the sort of people that request them over Android are morons, and need baby sitting through every aspect of interfacing with a piece of technology.
I guess sort of people you mean are non-geeks? there's a whole bunch of people out there who really don't give a toss how things work, they don't care about ini files, registries or databases.
Have you noticed most people just drive cars? they don't repair them or know how they work?
Some people have hobbies like history, literature and so on. Their hobbies don't include computers and therefore they don't wish to know any more than the knowledge required to do a task.
Try thinking outside of the 'geek' box once in a while.
"Have you noticed most people just drive cars? they don't repair them or know how they work?"
Shirley, no one's given a license to drive a car without being able to perform at least BASIC maintenance on it: learning how to check the oil, top off the basic fluids, knowing where the jack and the spare tire are in the boot (in case you get a flat in the middle of nowhere)? Similarly, there are things about electronics (or anything else) which should be considered "basic maintenance" and are considered part of the cost of having the device.
"Shirley, no one's given a license to drive a car without being able to perform at least BASIC maintenance on it"
I hope you are being sarcastic. Obtaining a DL here in PA entails 1) answering test questions like "what is this octagonal sign with STOP on it?" 2) driving around a parking lot and maybe around a block if the DMV person is feeling adventurous, and 3) parking the vehicle in a school-bus-sized spot. If they started asking maintenance questions we would have a 90% failure rate and that would be bad for business. Same reason why there can't be any tests to qualify for owning a gun, let alone a computer or a phone.
The "you must be a mechanic fallacy".
You don't have to be a mechanic to benefit from the fact that the guy next to you can be one. The fact that you can be means that he can be and he can do all of the hard work for you.
Although more than anything, a product that isn't "geek hostile" is likely to have more thought put into it. The demanding user will be considered. It doesn't have to be a "geek". It could just be someone that puts the product through it's paces. You can do that without being a "geek" or a "mechanic".
Apple's "let's lower the bar" mentality is what led me to hack and jailbreak my iPhone. It should not have been necessary but it was. It was just a reflection of Apple ignoring the serious user. This made an iPhone more of a bother than an Android.
"Weird...
Most iPhones I purchase for my company are replaced annually because of battery fails. They are also the devices that cause most crap because the sort of people that request them over Android are morons, and need baby sitting through every aspect of interfacing with a piece of technology."
E X A C T L E Y!!
The oh so clever becuase I own an idiotPhone always need their hands held when talking about tech. The simplest of things, explained in the simplest of ways, for the simplest of people.
Own an idiotPhone and be seen as an idiot! Can't put it simpler than that!
Yeah, fandroids are the ones who need to change their phone every year, oh wait no sorry my mistake, it's fanbois who need to have the latest iThing the day it comes out.
"I can't believe it, I asked for a new iPhone and my *insert family member here* got me a 4 instead of 4s, I might as well slit my wrists right now"
The only problem with androids are when you get the branded versions and the pre-installed crap from orange or *insert vendor here* and even then just root it and it's gone.
That's the other point, jailbreak an iPhone you can install your own aps on there, but you're still on an iPhone 3. root a gingerbread handset and you can upgrade to ICS. Just because the company who made it doesn't give an update to your handset, doesn't mean you can't find one online you can install.
"If you believe the Fandroids on here then a phone becomes unusable after a year or two anyway because the screen is too small, it doesn't have 1GB of RAM or it doesn't have a quad core CPU."
Only the high end devices have these specs (which are in essence only 5 or 6 devices being sold). The majority are far less equipped. Android runs pretty well on these less equipped devices too.
"What do you do when it locks up tighter than a nun's knickers?"
Hold POWER+HOME until it powers off. Although this combo is detected by the OS if operational, after 10 seconds it's a hardware reset switch which cannot be prevented regardless of what's locked up. I imagine it's implemented this way *because* you can't just pull the battery.
I've had to do this a few times to a jailbroken iPod Touch.
I've never owned a second battery for a phone. Unless you work in the desert, it's not hard at all to top up a phone at some point in the day. It's even easier with USB leads being standard so you can charge up on PCs and not worry about being caught out using someone's power socket.
A second battery seems like a waste of money unless you work in a remote place and happen to talk a lot or play games rather than working.
"Unless you work in the desert, it's not hard at all to top up a phone at some point in the day. It's even easier with USB leads being standard so you can charge up on PCs and not worry about being caught out using someone's power socket."
Or you could just carry the spare battery (you can get them for less than £10 btw) and not have to top up at all during the day. Seems easier than carrying a 1 metre USB lead + 30 pin adaptor + 3 pin mains adaptor and then having to hunt down a power socket you can use for free without getting into trouble.
A few years ago I was using a basic Nokia 6310 phone. I think that's the model number. Anyway, it had pretty good standby time for the most part--probably about 2.5 days. The big problem with it, though, was that if it went out of coverage it meant that it ramped up the power to the GSM radio so if I forgot to turn it off or keep it on charge during the day (we had very bad coverage where I worked), I'd have a flat phone by the end of the day. That's the first reason people want a replaceable battery--as a backup in case they get caught with a flat battery and no easy way to recharge once they notice it.
The second reason is that batteries deteriorate over time. A three-year old phone won't last as long as the day you bought it. I agree totally with the article here--it does seem like a very cynical ploy by Apple to keep you on the upgrade cycle to the next shiny, when really all that's wrong with the 3-year old phone is that it needs a new battery.
