MacDailyNews - Where Mac news comes first

Nov 06, 09 - 09:02 am Comment from: JadisOne

Tsk tsk tsk. Shame on Verizon. No wonder they are raising fees. When real people get their hands on this device, they are going to want their money back and switch to the network with a real phone.

Gulp. Sorry sis.

I guess I shouldn't have emailed my sister and told her about the Droid. Doesn't sound much better than her LG Dare.

She can't switch to ATT because she has multiple people on her family plan.

Nov 06, 09 - 09:26 am Comment from: blah blah blah...

It's pretty bad at the start when you have to compare yourself to another product an set yourself up for disaster. Verizon should of never tried to compare Droid to iPhone.

Hate to say it but google has gone the route of MS in the phone business and OS business. As many machines as possible with out any true quality control.

Nov 06, 09 - 09:28 am Comment from: Ray

MDN picked a very good word there niche.....Android is filling the temporary niche of selling smart phones to wireless carriers that do not have iPhone at the moment.

just my $0.02

Nov 06, 09 - 09:30 am Comment from: silverhawk

Mr.Pogue writes "Droid has its weak spots, and some of them are heartbreaking...." Heartbreaking? It's a freaking cell phone!! Come on David.

Nov 06, 09 - 09:32 am Comment from: blah blah blah...

He forgot to mention the universe of products for any other phone. Cheap batteries that may or may not work or pay those wonderful OEM prices, memory chips in all sizes with different read speeds and security, special wired headset connectors, lots of open and closed door hatches to get out your card, charge, plug headphones. Replacements for battery covers.

I leave anything out?

Nov 06, 09 - 09:41 am Comment from: qka

What is Google's business model for Android? (Hint: There isn't one.)

A worthwhile, if circumlocutory explanation from Daniel Eran Dilger @ Roughly Drafted

http://www.roughlydrafted.com/2009/10/26/google-fans-fail-to-contemplate-why-android-is-free/

Nov 06, 09 - 09:58 am Comment from: Dick

The only good feature of the Droid is that it is NOT on AT&T;.

I have zero AT&T;bars here - and I can get a Verizon signal with the fillings in my teeth.

Nov 06, 09 - 09:59 am Comment from: 84 Mac Guy

Another iPhone killer come and gone.

This is like watching a Western where one wannabe after another comes to town to try to win a shootout with the legendary sheriff. In the end, each gunfighter is left in a pool of blood on Main Street as the townspeople look on.

Companies don't seem to understand that you cannot beat Apple by simply copying what they do. Only one company beat Apple that way and it when when Steve Jobs was young, arrogant, and stupid. Steve, however, learned from his mistake, his competitors have not.

Nov 06, 09 - 10:01 am Comment from: thethirdshoe

That's better.

Nov 06, 09 - 10:03 am Comment from: m159

Thought typing would be a drag on the iPhone. Once I got used to it, though, I prefer it. It's the future.

Cramming a physical thumb-board into a smart phone is like including a wagon tongue on a car.

Nov 06, 09 - 10:05 am Comment from: HolyMackerel

Just like people have tried the cheap, generic MP3 players then returned 'burnt' to the iPod, so too people may try the Pre/Storm/Droid and get burnt then return again.

There is a reason Apple gear costs so much and it is that quality really does cost more. If Google want to play at the same price point they had better lift their game.

What's a wagon tounge?

Nov 06, 09 - 10:10 am Comment from: LordRobin

Well, at least now it's clear why the Droid's first TV ad was a list of things the iPhone couldn't do. When your basic functionality is this lacking, your only choice is to attack your competitor.

I cannot believe the Droid doesn't come with syncing software. Both iPhone and Blackberry have syncing software. How does the Droid plan to compete if its users have to move songs, movies, and photos manually?

But I'm sure there will be plenty of contrarian tech-geeks who will sing the praises of this thing. They'll go on about how having to move stuff manually gives them more "control".

------RM

Nov 06, 09 - 10:14 am Comment from: Superior Being

Nobody can piss on someone's parade quite like MacDailyNews.

I do love it so.

Nov 06, 09 - 10:22 am Comment from: Uncle Al

Wagon tongue is the piece used to hook the wagon to the horses. Not really required on an auto.

Nov 06, 09 - 10:27 am Comment from: iPhoner

iDon't sync
iDon't trim video
iDon't have Safari
iDon't have iTunes
iDon't auto correct
iDon't have multi-gesture
iDon't have 100,000 apps
iDon't have much storage
iDon't select text very well
iDon't shop from computer
iDon't work outside the U.S.
iDont' have many accessories
IDon't have polish and simplicity
iDon't understand that mechanical keyboards suck

iPhone does

Nov 06, 09 - 10:29 am Comment from: Fred Mertz

iPhone user: Hey, I got this really cool app last week. Take a look.

Droid sufferer: I have a version of that app, too.

iPhone user: Cool, let's check it out.

Droid sufferer: Uh, it's at home. I couldn't fit it.

iPhone user: That's okay, we'll just use my iPhone.

Nelson Muntz to Droid sufferer: Ha-HA!

Nov 06, 09 - 10:31 am Comment from: jocknerd

Maybe the iPhone can do the one thing I've been hoping for. If the iPhone becomes so dominant, then the other carriers only choice is to compete on price. Maybe eventually Verizon or Sprint will decide to go with an unlimited plan that costs $50 per month in order to keep customers off the iPhone.

Would I choose a Pre or a Droid over an iPhone for $99 a month? No way. But I probably would for $50 a month.

Nov 06, 09 - 10:45 am Comment from: NCIceman

I missed the physical keyboard of my palm treo when I moved to the iphone. You know what? I got over it. Now it's no big deal, and dialing is actually easier with the bigger virtual keypad.

So maybe for some thumb-twitching mega-texters a physical keyboard is a big deal, but for most I imagine they can adapt as I did.

As an Apple fanboy this is one of my favourite sites. I know it's biased toward Apple. But this Droid thing deserves some biased reporting: it's been hyped far too much. It's taken Motorola two years to catch up (sort of) with Apple. And remember Apple had never made a phone before, unlike Motorola who had made oodles of the things. If it were down to Motorola we'd all be using the Razr "OS".

I wish the Droid lovers would get some perspective: Droid is to iPhone what Battlestar Galactica was to Star Wars.

Google fanboys make Apple fanboys seem reasonable.

I have had Macs for years and now have a machine with 10.6. I had AT&T;at one point and after allot of dropped calls I couldn't take it anymore and switched to Verizon.

I may get the droid I am looking forward to a alternative to the iPhone. I would love an iPhone (I can only hope they bring the iPhone to Verizon but I really don't think Apple will do that). Come on people do you have to rip and anything that is not an iphone?

And all of this because Verizon refused to share revenues with Apple! But it's good to see that Verizon has found new ways to nickel and dime people -- $3.00 for Visual Voicemail, $350 termination fee.

You know that the CDMA iPhone is sitting in someone's office in Cupertino. Just like the Intel-compatible version of Mac OS X.

LOL

"But wait, there's more! That $30 a month data plan grants you the ability to use an 'unlimited' 5Gb of data...as long as that data doesn't come from a Microsoft Exchange email server. If you want the privilege of connecting with an Exchange email account you have to pay $45 a month for the 5Gb of unlimited data."

http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/181590/verizon_droid_tethering_will_cost_you.html

Nov 06, 09 - 11:35 am Comment from: Geo B

@ Dick -

I hear there are other places to live where you can pick up AT&T;-)

682MB of applications MDN? What do you use your iPhone for–just calls? TomTom Western Europe is 1.45GB alone. A navigation app with built in maps is essential to avoid roaming charges when travelling through Europe. Add in a few city guides at upwards of 50MB and you're talking. The Dreck's Google navigation app just won't cut unless you like handing your complete pay cheque to the phone company at the end of he trip. I'm currently loaded with 3.61GB of apps (not games). Lets hear from the seriously app loaded!

It can give you a turn-by-turn direction to the nearest Apple Store.

@Paul Johnson

"Just like the Intel-compatible version of Mac OS X."

I believe I have that on my MBP right now...

This may be a moot point, but I wouldn't expect most of the readers on macdailynews.com to buy a Droid, nor would I expect too many positives to be found in it.

I will say this - the iPhone is still king, but the market will slowly be chipped away in the Smart Phone market as the competition catches up. I don't see any reason why the Droid doesn't have "pinching", but would be a big plus along with a simple memory upgrade as more apps are developed. 12,000 apps are still plenty to keep a simpleton entertained.

Also, the Droid does offer touch typing - I'm not sure why so many comments are bashing this. The auto-complete only works for touch typing only, not the keyboard (which was not clarified here). And the Droid has been reviewed as being quicker than the iPhone in terms of its processor.

It seems Verizon has done a good job (for those willing to shell out for it) keeping their customers for at least another 2 years. I'm an iPhone fan, but I don't think it hurts to mention these few things. This isn't Mac vs Motorola, this is Verizon vs AT&T;.

Let's not get all comfy about the iPhone vs Droid here people.

Droid is open source and Google is putting in A LOT of money on the platform. Let's see what the landscape looks like in one year from now. Most of the problems listed look like a simple OS upgrade away. No showstoppers there.

Remember, it is an OSS device. You, the user has full control. No jailbreak BS to stop you. The winner in this battle has not yet been announced!

BTW, I am an iPhone developer. I never even seen a Droid.

Nov 06, 09 - 12:43 pm Comment from: Predrag

Sherman:

Paul Johnston was referring to the period between 2001-2005, when Apple was still selling only PPC Macs, and had a "Skunkworks"-type operation in the Cupertino campus where an Intel version of OS X was being developed in parallel. At the keynote where the Intel switch-over was announced, Jobs even talked about the operation as a top-secret location (showing a satellite image of the campus with the sniper scope-type crosshairs on the "secret" building).

Building a CDMA-compatible iPhone is most likely rather trivial (after all, EVERY single handset maker has been doing it so far), so I'm sure CDMA is not an obstacle at all. The actual, real obstacles have been discussed at length here.

Nov 06, 09 - 12:48 pm Comment from: Predrag

Linuxaos:

There is a fundamental problem with the current Android phones. Not a single one of them can be upgraded to the newer versions of Android. Only "Droid" is running the most recent version; all others (G1, MyPhone, whatever) run the old version and CANNOT be upgraded through the carrier (or through the device manufacturer). I'm not sure if some tinkerer wouldn't be able to figure out a way to install Android 2.0 on G1, but that obviously isn't really relevant.

Original EDGE iPhone is already running iPhone OS 3, and people get to upgrade their OS as soon as it is released. Android phones (the ones released so far) are like all other cellphones -- you're stuck with the OS for the rest of your phone's life.

Nov 06, 09 - 12:50 pm Comment from: Predrag

Android is much like Windows 7; the best Windows yet, but still far from Snow Leopard. The only difference is, while Windows still dominates desktop market, Android has very little chance of gaining significant share.

Nov 06, 09 - 01:30 pm Comment from: twilightmoon

@ specialslacks,

The "faster processor" you mention is hooked up to a clunky bolted together OS that is slower, harder to use phone with terrible text selection, poorly constructed hardware keyboard, worse virtual keyboard, poor selection of poorly made apps, small amount of room to put apps in. Hooked up to a customer hostile nasty nickel-and-diming rude company known affectionately as Verizon.

A faster processor does not make a better phone if its hooked up to poorly coded cruddy software. The Droid is not remotely in the same league as the iPhone. Verizon knows this but they want to sucker in as many sucke... I mean customers as possible and trap them with a sadistic 350 ETF prison.

Only a fool would buy a Droid.

I still don't see Motorola being in the phone business in 5 years. Palm won't make it past 2. I'm surprised they are still around actually.

Its still a dumb decision to dedicate only 256MB to the app storage area. However, the whole thing is kind of misleading.

An app designed for android will install its executable files in the app area, but store image, video, audio and game data on the storage side. There's a couple of negatives of course:

One, you can't keep people from hacking at your data on the storage card, it would need to be constantly verified. Two, rather than using Apple's tremendous bandwidth to deliver your 200MB game as part of the 30% cut they get, instead that data has to be sideloaded from a server and bandwidth you are paying for.

Anyway, while it is worth noting and bitching about, for the average consumer it probably won't be that big of a hassle.

@specialslacks

In addition to what twilightmoon said, we need to be clear about why jailbreaking is a serious question on cellphones. In a year or two, when smartphones are widely distributed, we may begin to experience a security crisis similar to the Windows disasters.

Jailbroken/unsecured phones, regardless of their manufacturer and carrier, will be as tempting a target for hackers/spammers/malware purveyors as unpatched Windows computers have been over the last decade. Apple is trying to find a position in this coming conflagration similar to what it has with Mac OS X. Why do you think that Apple just put out an ad for an iPhone OS security employee? Sandboxing and software signatures may not be enough to stop the onslaught.

Nov 06, 09 - 02:10 pm Comment from: twilightmoon

"Let's see what the landscape looks like in one year from now. Most of the problems listed look like a simple OS upgrade away. No showstoppers there."

Yeah in 1 year it will look even more like the ever so elegant desktop linux on a small screen! Can't wait.

Look, I love OS software, but it's never going to make an elegant consumer experience. It never has. It never will. That's just a fact.

@twilightmoon, @Predrag,

Are looking at fundamental flaws or growing pains. Let's give it one year and see.

Droid might be OSS (and OSS does have issues) but this is Google OSS. I am not going to say that I am smarter than Google. They have all the money in the world and they are young and hungry.

What I will say is this: Competition at last. Let the games begin!

You know I actually see people using their iPhones and rarely see people actually using and other smart phone except to make a call or check email. The iPhone makes it so easy to do all those other things so it actually gets used. You really get your money's worth with the iPhone.

All points taken... you boys know your stuff. Its true that with greater technology there will be more problems and Apple obviously takes more time to make their products at a greater cost..

I'd like to see how this pans out. Even if it took future versions of the Droid to be the showstopper, I agree with linuxaos' comments - Let the games begin! Smartphone technology is catching up to the iPhone and things are starting to even out in the eyes of the average consumer (obviously not yet on fansites).

Nov 06, 09 - 06:15 pm Comment from: twilightmoon

linuxaos,

Respectfully, no, not really. Obviously this depends heavily on how you define competition. But if you mean competition with the iPhone in the form of a heavily integrated, easy to sync, well thought out user friendly robust software platform in your pocket..

Then no, there really is no competition for the iPhone out there at all.

If you just mean "any old smartphone" well then that existed before the iPhone.

Now I will grant that the wanna be's trailing behind Apple are slowly starting how to figure out how to badly copy what Apple created 2 years ago, then yes. In a very generous and broad sense, sorta maybe not really.. but ok. As long as you toss out the importance of elegant design, user friendly interface, consistency, ease of use, and efficiency of design.. sure.

But Apple is not sitting still waiting for the competition to catch up, they are pushing forward. They have a retail network, the most popular media distribution platform on the planet by far, the cache among youth, expertise in building software platforms, and integrated devices that sync with computers, I could go on and on.. There's a reason the iPhone has such massively high user satisfaction ratings and no one else does.

There's a reason RIM has gone from up and coming star to fading also ran nearly over night. There's a reason Windows Mobile which has been in the market for over a decade is suddenly obsolete and considered dead and buried by everyone except Microsoft.

There's a reason why Apple was able to "walk in" to an industry that was 20 years old with multiple entrenched players selling hundreds of millions of units per year and turn it upside down on its head overnight.

Hint: it wasn't Android.

@twilightmoon

I never, even for one second, took Windows Mobile seriously. M$ just doesn't get marketing when it comes to these devices. I mean, check the Zune. What a disaster. Actually, take Windows 7, same thing. They are losing market share. No way they can build an "iPhone". They are on a death spiral.

Poor RIM. They have an entrenched user base and they do good by them. And they will continue to do so until the market dries up.

I am talking about the future here.

Apple is the winner with iPhone because they had a blank slate to start with. They could build anything. Steve Jobs had the vision to see what people wanted (3-5 years in the future) and he made the iPhone.

Make no mistake, Steve Jobs saw this and he built it. He's a goddamn genius. Is he going to sit still and wait for the competition to catch up? Well, we know the answer to that!

Ok, then, who's left?

Goggle Android. And I'll tell you why. First of all, being OSS gives them a techno-cool visibility. The techies are the first ones to start using a gadget, way before it becomes mainstream.

Is that enough to guarantee success? No. But it starts there.

Does Google have the integration (online store, apps, etc) for a seamless product? Nope! But we are talking about Google here. They know a thing or two about advertising and the "internets".

Why do I care? Simple: Competition is good. I saw none from M$, or RIM or anyone else. Apple swept the floor with them,
and that's exactly what they deserved, because their products sucked!

Apple is now king. He will be a better King if Google is right behind him, howling and hungry.

We, the users, will be better off for it. Hell, I am a iPhone developer. I can't wait for this market to get completely crazy all over the world. That's my bread and butter.

there is a saying..."The tide raises all boats" I never had an iPhone because for me, AT&T;Sucks. The iPhone is the 800 pound gorilla, at the moment, and will reign for quite some time. I also think that Jobs is a genius. I am a verizon evangelist and am thrilled that they finally have *something* to offer, even if it is not the iPhone. Add to that that they finally have decided to *not* cripple this device like they have done so many times in the past. Did I mention LInux?

This site is clearly biased towards apple, and that's ok. But thumbs up to all those who have seen that competition is good, and that having room for improvement is not reason for bashing.

I just got my droid, this morning, and it's the best thing that Verizon has ever had. Is it an iPhone, no. Is is the next best thing, yes. And it's on the Verizon network.

Competition is good...it makes us all strive to be better. I am glad I have the Droid.

funny enough, the term iphone killer has been overused.. what some people want out of a device is something not everyone can get from a device.. like reliable wireless service.. Motorola is really good at making 'phones' before you go off about the RAZR sure it was a piece of crap, but the number one selling piece of crap nonetheless. However, aside from all the problems with that particular phone, Motorloa overall quality on the phone end of the spectrum has done great things and provided great products with a great phone included.. this being said, Apple has lacked a little bit on that end, even on the iPhone 3GS i was a bit heartbroken that nothing had really been done to improve the call/sound quality on this outright $800 device.. especially when compared to the outright price of $560 for the droid.. its very obvious that macdailynew and its subscribers are heavily biased towards apple.

The iphone has yet to honestly impress me as a whole, mainly for the fact that they allowed Verizon to pass them on and went to one of the worst networks they could've chose.. I see a lot of people giving VZW crap on here and for what reason, how would any of you know if you do in fact have iPhones. Verizon is the number one network provider in the country for a reason, their customer support is the best and their network is the best. Sooner or later Google will develop the ability to store apps on your microSD just so ya know.. and that 256mb goes to 16+GB. I currently have a Blackberry Tour, which is a wonderful phone and multitasking smartphone that navigates the web quickly and accomplishes tasks efficiently. I also have 256 MB of space available on board, but also have the ability to save my apps to my microSD but who honestly needs a hundred apps on their iPhone? Really?

The android app store is growing as fast if not faster than the iPhone App store was when the EDGE powered iPhone first came out. Give it time. As for the guy who said you can't upgrade OS's.. umm, yes you can, in fact Android devices do it wirelessly.. right there, on your phone. It is true that you can't put 2.0 on a G1 or a MyTouch 3G but that is like not being able to put Leopard on a PPC Mac.. there have been many software updates for Android 1.0 and there will be as well for Android 2.0. To the same person who said Palm will be gone in two years.. that made me LOL in my pants.. they were the smartphone innovators.. the pre is a piece of shit, but their bread and butter devices are what holds them together and are used by real users of real smartphones at work. I still don't consider the iPhone to be a smartphone, it just isn't. sorry guys.. the inability to do real multitasking is a killer in the business world. Yes I'm well aware that you can jailbreak the phone and do whatever you want blah blah blah yada yada yada.. but the point is you shouldn't have to.. remember the old Apple saying, " it just works.. " Apparently not.

We at Motorola Android think the Motorola Droid is great!

Many good pros and cons have been identified. But there is one issue that overshadows all others by far: data control.

- iPhone leaves the user in complete control of his data - manage your own data without unreliable MobileMe "cloud computing" if you wish, buy apps to avoid ads.
- Android is intended first and foremost to feed Google's databases so the end user can endure increased advertising.

From AppleInsider: "The company [Google] doesn't make money selling phone hardware or even in licensing the core Android software (which is free and open source). Google makes money selling ads and tracking users' preferences, which it does through its own Google-branded, bundled apps (which are not free nor open source)."

Why would anyone choose 'droidware?