10 Things We Love About Android

By Branko Miletic

When the iPhone burst onto the mobile phone scene just over two years ago, it heralded a vast rethink in the telecommunications sector about what a handset is, what it is capable of, and where it fits in the technological landscape. Whether you were a fan of the House of Apple or not, the iPhone revolutionised the phone industry, and not only introduced the smartphone to the masses, but vicariously made other vendors stand up and realise they had to get on the smartphone train or risk being left behind. Enter Google with its Android open-platform operating system. Samsung, LG and HTC jumped on board, and are now posing a serious threat to the iPhone’s perceived smartphone dominance. Market leader Nokia’s Symbian operating system seems almost second class, however the Finnish company is promising big things with its much-anticipated N8, which is due out in the final quarter of the year. However, I have become a fan of the Android for many and varied reasons, the top ten of which are outlined here:

1. A reliable open source platform – which means it is constantly being updated by a world-wide army of developers who want to make the user experience better and not just their bank accounts fatter.
2. Android just doesn’t add icons, it adds widgets – which actually can do things like search the Net or send email or phone with just one click.
3. Better integration with your PC – in other words, if you want to update your Android phone, you don’t need to install programs like iTunes or some other program on your PC to get that update.
4. Faster loading phone – in fact depending on the Android phone, the speed of Android is fantastic- there is no need to wait for a phone to ‘boot-up’ with the Android OS.
5. Personalisation – when it comes to personalising your phone, the likes of Apple or Nokia could learn a thing or three from Android.
6. Better and cheaper apps – not only are the apps for Android mainly free, they are also cheaper and much more useful. And as far as I know, there are no Android fart apps!
7. Battery life – Android seems to be a little kinder to a phone battery than other mobile operating systems- although this will also depend on the phone being used.
8. Multitasking- Android has been developed with multitasking in mind in the first place and not as an after-thought as in some phone operating systems.
9. Program integration – it seems Android is better in integrating programs to work together better than the same programs on other phone platforms. If you get mail in Android, chances are that your phone will advise you of this through multiple platforms and not just the email client.
10. It's all about Google – as Android and Google are now inseparable, being wedded to the system that, by all accounts will one day rule the world, is not such a bad thing.