I don’t know.
As much as I like Apple products, I’m now utterly sick of iOS and iCloud.
iCloud because of security and availability concerns; it’s difficult to access (from any other devices that are not Apple) and maintain (there are a billion different options across OS X Mail, System Preferences, iOS preferences and so on and so forth) unlike other cloud-based products (OS X Yosemite and iOS 8 changes that to an extent, but it’s far too little and far too late), and the whole thing is an absolute unholy mess. iCloud was designed by somebody who has no experience of “the cloud”.
iTunes Match has become one of the worst services I’ve ever used. It’s often slow or non-responsive and again, the controls to maintain it look to be mere afterthoughts rather than careful planning.
The UK still does not have iTunes Radio and the whole iTunes ecosystem feels stale and unloved – I’m now looking at alternatives, but I tend to spend most of my time with Spotify these days (which seems to have pulled its fingers out of its bottom and is actually very reasonable now).
Apple TV has long since been consigned to the bin of uselessness. With lack of apps and content providers, the Apple TV is nothing more than a glorified screen sharing device. Google’s Chromecast has better support from developers and is more useful.
Apple is now set to introduce bigger iPhones. Bigger and supposedly better products that will transform all our lives. Yes, I get that a smartphone is pocket computer, but there’s only so many hours in the day and so many things you can do with these things.
When a device has so many functions, it becomes a jack of all trades and a master of none. The iPhone 5S tauted a fingerprint scanner, but it barely works 6 out of 10 times without having to keep trying over and over and by the time I connect, I could have just swiped and typed in my PIN code.
Smartphone manufacturers appear to be cramming in more and more functionality that, to be fair, many people don’t need – and charging a lot more for it each time. We’re likely going to be told we’re all going to need a new 64-bit A8 processor with optional co-processor for additional sensors above and beyond the current ones.
That these devices make phone calls seems like a secondary function. An afterthought.
And when these functions are implemented, they often don’t quite work as well as they should and need multiple updates before they start to come close to the original design. Goodness knows how wobbly early Android devices were which was why I moved over to iPhone.
Now I find I’m moving back to Android.
While Apple tries to be revolutionary with each new hardware release, Android has been more evolutionary – refining existing functionality without making too much fanfare.
I’ve started the long process of moving away from Apple’s ecosystem (with the exception that I’ll probably always use Macs because OS X is lovely operating system that does things right – mostly).
I’ve ordered a Samsung Galaxy S5 for my company phone, and will slowly be retiring my own personal phone plans from EE over the next 6-12 months. I’m just not sure how many more iterations of iOS devices I can take.
And who the hell needs a super expensive “iWatch”? I tell you one thing – you’ll be targetted by muggers faster than a cat to a fishpond.
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