My wish...for an iPhone

Yes, it's true, I have a wish for an iPhone, however, it's not to own one, it's to school the owners of them that they don't make you cooler. They're like drop-top Ferraris. You can drive that shit with the roof up all day long and no one will think any differently of you, but you put the top down, and you look a doos (this joke is courtesy of Mr Jeremy Clarkson, I'm not that good). This is a fact. No one wants to sit in their i10 at the traffic lights and to the left see a 30-something in their brand new convertible Ferrari. You know what the irony is? Most people who drive Ferraris, especially the drop tops, drive them alone.

I've found a lot of iPhone users to be kind of "hey, look at what my phone can do!" So I will indulge you, blow my mind, and they show me apps. Really, you think your phone's capabilities are determined and best illustrated by the apps you download from your closed source, source? 

I may only have a humble HTC Desire, which is rooted, running the very latest version of Android, underclocked and other geeky things that aren't important right now, but the point I'm trying to make is that it's about personalisation, no matter how big or small. 

After all, isn't that what a phone is all about, they do tend to act as extensions of our personalities, so luddites, they're mostly Blackberry fans, geeks are Android fanboys and the trendies, well, we all know you want something that looks fabulous, darling. 

And the iPhone does, it looks exactly the way Steve Jobs wanted it to look, but I want my phone to look like mine, not like everyone else's. I want it to make my life easier, not bend my usage habits to play by its rules, and if the urge grabs me, I would like to be able to see how its guts work, this is called open source. 

If you don't know what open source means, here's a breakdown, in simple English, it's free software that you can do with whatever you want to. Modify it, share it with your friends, read it, it doesn't matter, because it's free and that's the way information should be, free for you to do with as YOU choose, not as you're told.

Android runs on a number of devices (many better than the iPhone, any iPhone), so you have choice, you can decide what works for you, instead of being spoon-fed what Apple deems acceptable. So when you're upgrading next time, don't listen to your friend behind his Instagram camera about how "cool" it is, test some other devices, HTC, Samsung, Motorola all have fantastic handsets, see what fits your needs, and remember, you can find an open source version for Android of pretty much any Apple app imaginable. Fact. (Quick Android tip. Vignette is one of the best camera apps available, for any platform. check it out in the Market.)

The choice is yours, do you want to be part of the iPhone or the future? Decide wisely.

rick.

out.