Multiple times a day, if you look at the comments on any tech news website, or community forum, you're bound to see a flame war. Occasionally, you'll see a reasonable conversation, but more often than not, it's one side vs another with no understanding or communication involved. It a phenomenon that's easy to understand. Few of us can afford multiple devices, so you make your choice of brand and stick with it. These brand choices are especially powerful when the devices get more expensive, so electronics see this loyalty become much more fierce than anything else, and, sometimes that loyalty will go a bit too far. New studies have found that "fanboys" actually take it as a personal insult if you critique their brand, which makes rational conversation even more difficult. There are two major ideas that make this entire phenomenon ultimately pointless. We'll tackle the first idea in this piece, and the second in the next piece, which we're aiming to have up for Monday.
It's all opinion
Quality becomes ubiquitous by the nature of competition.
It's often hard to hear, but it's true: iOS isn't better than Android or WP7 or WebOS. But, that's because no OS is better than any other, because each fits a segment of the population with certain interests, needs, and preferences. To make this easier going forward, here's a handy summary to choose the best OS for you when choosing between iOS, Android, and the field. We're going to focus mainly on iOS and Android, because they are by far the powerhouses in smartphones right now. All other platforms will be relegated at this time to "the field" because each is either on its way out (BlackBerry, Symbian), has a limited user base (bada, WP7), or is in limbo (MeeGo, WebOS).
iOS
If you want an OS that is simple and intuitive, but fairly thin, or you're an avid iTunes user, your choice is iOS. The news that Apple fans don't want to hear, even though it's completely true: iOS, despite its name, is out of all the mobile platforms is the one that's the least of a full operating system. In reality, iOS is not much more than an app launcher, especially given the limited form of multitasking that exists. This is the Apple way, of course: simple and easy to pick up and use, with as little as possible to have to worry about. However, because of the tight control by Apple, you have to move on Apple's pace and only get updates once a year.
That said, because iOS isn't much more than an app launcher, it does have the biggest and best selection of apps available on any platform. Many developers still choose to create their apps for iOS first and other platforms later. And, because of the app review policies and general OCD legacy of Steve Jobs, the apps on iOS tend to be higher quality, and tend to have better UI compared to Android and BlackBerry at least. And, especially once you get to the iPad, the selection of tablet apps on iOS blows away any competition. Some may point to the fact that Android has almost as many apps as iOS, and that is true as far as pure numbers from each store, but the difference is that the Android Market has a large supply of clone apps, spam, and general crapware, whereas iOS may have a lot of pointless apps, but at least you wouldn't find Perturbed Pigeons or any other ripoff like that in the App Store.
The iOS platform tends to iterate slowly, taking far longer than anyone would want to add features like cut/paste, or a better notification system. However, when Apple does release a new feature, it tends to be more matured than that of other platforms, especially Android. For instance, Apple may have taken a cue from Android with iOS's new notifications system, but the system seems to be more thought out and complete with more options than what you'll find in stock Android. Additionally, Google has just bumped its Voice Actions app to support 6 total languages, because Google wants to release features faster. On the other side, Apple's upcoming voice controls in iOS 5 is powered by the voice input gurus at Nuance, so it would be surprising if iOS has support for fewer than 20 languages at launch. Or, even with Google Wallet, which just launched on one variant of one device with one credit card partner. Again, assuming Apple has NFC in the new iPhone, we would expect that the mobile payment system included would be far more matured with more partners at launch, or very soon afterwards.
As far as hardware, it's a bit of a double-edged sword with Apple. Apple tends to have great hardware design, but that design has to be good enough for everyone, because it's the only option. The only choice you'll get is in color and storage size. If you want a bigger screen, different form factor, or physical keyboard, you're out of luck. Or, if you don't want to spend $199 for the iPhone, you'll have to choose the previous generation iPhone, which may be obsolete before your contract is out. In general, customization is frowned upon with Apple, aside from changing your background. For customization and choice, you want:
Android
If you like to tinker and customize, if you like to have new features regardless of if they're fully baked, or if you're deep into the Google web ecosystem, Android was made for you. To be fair, many manufacturers try to do some of the customizing for you to make the experience simpler and more coherent, but at its core, Android was made for those of us who like to play with our gadgets. HTC Sense and other UI overlays are really just an attempt to capture some customers who would normally choose the simplicity of Apple. But even then, you can customize anything you'd like from the look of the launcher to alternative keyboards, and that's where Android shines. Alternative keyboards like gesture based Swype or FlexT9 alone are a huge benefit because of the added speed of text input, add that to easy access to information through widgets, and you can really make your device whatever you want.
Of course, you can't talk about Android without talking about its open nature. Customization is a big benefit of this style, but it also leads to a lack of control for Google. This means that even though Google releases a new OS update once a year, manufacturers don't push those updates very fast. This delay has forced Google to split the basic apps from the OS, in order to push updates faster through the Android Market. Both iOS and Android have a fair number of jailbreakers/rooters, but for different purposes. On iOS, you would jailbreak to add features to a tightly controlled platform, while on Android you root to add features, but more importantly, to know you have the newest OS at all times.
The open nature obviously also extends to the Android Market. The benefit of this is in the speed of releases, and no apps being banned due to objectionable content. Unfortunately, that also means a ton of spam, clone apps, and copyright infringing apps, as well as some malware. Overall, the selection of apps on Android phones is on par with iOS, but the quality tends to be lower (although getting better), and as we mentioned, there is still a big gap with tablet apps.
As far as hardware, once again Android is rife with choice. If you prefer a smaller screen, larger screen, physical keyboard, or various amounts of internal storage, the options are there. More importantly, there are choices for every price point, whether you want to pony up for the high end, or even if you just want a free smartphone. Of course, hardware quality and OS update speed vary with manufacturers, not to mention the variation in software UI. It can be confusing when purchasing, but once you've decided, you're still in an ecosystem and can share apps or widgets with friends who may have a completely different Android experience.
Some will complain that the Android ecosystem moves too fast, with both hardware and software, and that handsets become outdated too quickly. But, we're of the mindset that faster is always better. The competition is pushing all manufacturers to keep ahead of the pack and that competition pushes forward the entire smartphone ecosystem, not just Android. Besides, Android is still iterative, just like desktops. Sure, there may be something better out a few months after you purchase, but your 2+ year old phone probably still works just fine, assuming it has received software updates from the manufacturer. Even Apple is letting older phones stay alive with new versions of iOS, and not pushing as hard with forced obsolescence. Of course, on both platforms, some older devices may not be able to take advantage of all new features, but for the most part apps will work no matter what. The only trouble that can arise is that, as with desktops, when there is a big jump in hardware, the software may not be optimized to handle it. For example, the first dual-core Android phones hit the market in early 2011, but the Android OS won't be optimized for multiple cores until Ice Cream Sandwich
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