No Stupid Questions

Because they are easily gullible.

when you cant even have an app without a corporation’s approval

Apple has successfully positioned themselves as “the good guy”.

• Apple broke the monopoly of phone provider locks, and still prohibits phone provider bloatware.
• Apple seems like the only provider with any care for privacy, and many of their features and policies are privacy focussed
• Apple puts more effort than most software providers into usability
• you might think Apples constraints on the App Store blocks legitimate opensource and personal projects, but it mostly blocks commercial exploitation. It blocks behaviors that abuse customers or their privacy, that will give users a bad experience. I’ve read the requirement for a fee with a real credit card is actually the most effective strategy against malware
• every major app is available in the App Store
• its just a phone. My phone needs to just work, unlike my computer which needs to do whatever I want it to.

So maybe the root cause is lack of consumer protection in the US, but my experience with iPhone is much better than with Android phones. I’m not blind to corporate shenanigans but I do feel better protected in the Apple ecosystem. I do have freedom to choose almost any legitimate app, and I’m not particularly interested n futzing around with my phone anyway

Until there is a better alternative to the new evil that is google/alphabet, apple is a lesser evil.

The binary choice is the freedom. As many people in this thread have discussed, it’s not a real choice, but it’s simple enough that most people will put on blinders and accept the available options.

I use iPhone. It sucks but network effect from people in my circle brought me here

Because an iPhone isn’t “that” expensive when you buy it on a plan. I mean it’s only $38 CAD for the new iPhone 6e on a Contract. That’s with my paycheque to paycheque budget. /s

Though honestly that’s the mind set of these users. Sure they are literally paying $100+ CAD more than MSRP. But to them since it includes the data it’s a good deal.

Now bellow is my view as a guy who manages and orgs fleet of Samsung phone, developed apps for both Android and iOS, and is the defacto IT guy for my family.

I think the lean towards iPhones comes from budget Android being crap, and peer pressure from those around them. Get a cheap A series Samsung or a Budget Acer and you are just asking for a slow and buggy experience where the mic will just stop working after 2 years. Or it’s running Android One.

Even an older iPhone like the 6s is still supported by many apps. Plus since it once had flagship specs. The soc has more power and runs better than anything new from Android. It’s the same logic that if you get an older iPad for the same price as a new Fire Tablet the iPad will be better than a fire tablet.

The solution is to get a more expensive Android. But once you get to the price point of a Samsung S series, you might as well get an iPhone. The price is comparable, and you don’t loose out on features like the App Store (google play is a steaming pile in comparison). Plus iMessage and FaceTime is seamless and Airdrop “just works”.

My relative had Android for years and struggled to use them. I finally convinced one of them to use an iPhone XR by the time the 14 was coming out, and now my Nan is texting and doing FaceTime. They could’ve done this before with the budget Android their carrier gave them. But the work Apple did to make it feel intuitive is brilliant. In fact because of the confidence boost from the iPhone, she’s even gotten herself an iPad to do her crossword puzzles.

On top of that, unlike Apple. There is no guarantee that if you pay more for you Android that I’ll keep getting support. Most phones struggle to offer more than 2 years. And with the fiasco around the Pixel 4 battery, it’s hard to believe the biggest players “promises”. Compare that to Apple and while the promise 7 years, realistically it can be 10 years.

For me the reason I swapped over was the Play Store being hot garbage. And the disgusting amount of uninstallable bloat on it. I tried for years to install custom ROMs and midrange Chinese phones to get around it. While it works, I grew tired of the work required just to keep my phone up to date. And the loss of built in features since I was going u official. Like the loss of 2/3 cameras in the app (trying to find a cracked gcamera which enables both is a chore), and contactless pay (evolution x worked sometime, and locked me out other time).

Don’t get me wrong iOS isn’t better than Android. I miss my headphone jack, FDroid, side loading my own apps, the ease of adding custom ringtones, and custom launcher. Oh and being able to use 3rd party web browsers that aren’t skins of Safari (WebKit). But when updates come through I’m not concerned. My contactless pay works. Ad blocking is possible and I can’t complain about the cameras.

Bootlickers got nothing to hide..... Also Android is the same thing unless degoogled.

I have no need for third party apps.

For anything beyond texting or scrolling, I have a desktop.

Defying mask mandates wasn’t due to a ‘love for freedom’ but due to delusions and selfishness.

Tbh androids privacy is shit. I’d rather deal with Apple than Google both on hardware and privacy any day. The only way I’d switch is to something like Graphene

Because my belief in political freedom has nothing to do with my phone choice and it would be odd to conflate the two.

When I had an android I had to spend a lot more time making sure apps would work with my phone and that my phone would be "secure" whereas I have less concerns of that with apple.

Simply put with apple I dont have to do as much work to make sure things work.

Americans don't really value freedom. Not really. Americans pretend they like freedom, but they will give up all their freedoms for the slightest bit of convenience, and because social media told them so.

Am I talking about consumer electronics, or politics? Impossible to say.

You have to connect it to a server to even use it

That's also true of the versions of Android that 99.99% of people use

cannot have any third-party apps without an online account.

Most people don't care. They'll use the suggested app store and have an account already.

Right or not, it is what it is.

I want my phone to be like a gaming console.

I turn it on, it works. I install curated stuff from a store.

The hardware is stable and predictable and thus software is of better quality when the developer doesn’t need to test 420 different hardware variants.

I do not want it to be a Linux PC I need to tinker with every day. I specifically want it to prevent me from fucking with it.

EDIT: I also have “adult money” so I can get any phone I want, I don’t need to get the cheapest.

Not an American but to be honest, both Google and Apple are appalling. Google openly steal all your data and sell it. Apple do similar but on a smaller scale but also claim they're all about privacy. Both make it difficult to use alternative app stores but with Apple its actually impossible. Phone vendors can and do install their own awful bloat on Android phones. Apple force you to use webkit for any browsing you might want to do, Android's native GUI is a mess. Nothing Apple put on their devices is open source so all their claims of privacy can never be verified. Both companies constantly try and impose proprietary standards or charge you a bajillion pounds for a fucking pen or some such bullshit.

The key difference for me is I can put something like Calyx or Graphene on an Android device and use a whole open source ecosystem of alternative apps which vastly improves the privacy of my device.

Not an American, but as an iPhone user who has had Android phones since cupcake before: iPhones „just work“, they are a lot less janky than Android, the ecosystem is smooth (although admittedly and intentionally less so when leaving it), they get updated for longer (and at the same time!) and apple has a much better privacy track record than the competition (a low bar).

Yes, I would prefer to install my apps from anywhere I want on the device I should own. An open source phone from top to bottom would be my dream, but Android is about as far removed from that as an iphone. Google took Linux and made it into a Frankenstein nightmare that is wholly dependent on them.

Just try to stick to open source and make your phone respect your privacy and see how far you get. Start at the usually locked bootloader, install a rom without google and see how few apps are left that do not require google services. And even then you are most likely dependent on binary blobs for the drivers, meaning the manufacturers can (and will) pull the rug from under your efforts as soon as they no longer feel like updating their shitty built of Android for the device in time.

I do not have time for that. What I have is enough money to buy a phone that comes as close as possible to my idea of safety, freedom and privacy without constantly jumping through burning hoops. If I am to be in a cage, it better be golden.

Not an iphone user, but am intrigued by all the ads the apple people say are on androids. Literally have never seen one, and I've had adjusted androids since the og htcs.

Conspicuous consumption.

Americans have been propagandized by Apple advertising into thinking Apple products are "high class."

Ask yourself: Why does anyone wear a Rolex?

It boils down to the same thing, showing people your wealth and thus "social value" (barf) via conspicuous consumption.

If it wasn't conspicuous consumption, why would US people literally judge potential dating partners on what kind of phone they use?

Example: https://www.latimes.com/archives/blogs/technology-blog/story/2008-08-07/apple-removes-1-000-featureless-iphone-application

Its function is exactly what the name implies: to alert people that you have money in the bank. I Am Rich was available for purchase from the phone’s App Store for, get this, $999.99 -- the highest amount a developer can charge through the digital retailer, said Armin Heinrich, the program’s developer. Once downloaded, it doesn’t do much -- a red icon sits on the iPhone home screen like any other application, with the subtext ‘I Am Rich.’ Once activated, it treats the user to a large, glowing gem (pictured above). That’s about it. For a thousand dollars.

This was barely a year after the original iPhone's release. The attitude toward Apple products has persisted ever since.

The average American is a fucking idiot and half of them are dumber than that