I'm a diehard Android user, Google Pixel to be specific.

I gave iPhone a serious try once. I hated it. The first phone was bricked out of the box. I'm not kidding - the salesperson literally broke the seal, pulled out the brand new untouched phone, and it wouldn't turn on. This was not some sketchy place, it was an official big chain telco.

Then, get this, because I had already signed the contract and technically bought that phone, they said I have to take it to Apple to get it replaced.

I got a replacement from Apple, but the home button stopped working after only a few months of use. Got another replacement and the same thing happened.

I also hated the inflexibility of iOS. There was no dark mode, no adblockers or other plugins existed for any browser etc etc. These are niche complaints that only a tiny cult will care about, but coming from Android which had already had those features for years, small things like that were incredibly annoying.

But the past couple of years I've been reading more and more horror stories about Googles lack of support. Have you used Pixel phones and paid for Google products like Google Photos etc for years? Did you lose access to your account? Tough luck. You can't speak to a human to try to restore it. You're FUCKED. All your emails, photos, gone, forever.

And Google doesn't do this just to individuals. Many of us have read horror stories of businesses operating on Google Cloud (and paying good money) having their entire accounts catastrophically and irrevocably shut down with no explanation and no means of support or recovery.

IMO, this should be illegal. These companies are utilities at this point and should be regulated as such. They should be forced to have human support and ability to regain access to accounts using government ids or whatever. But I just assumed the lack of support is how it is and you just have to accept it.

Then, the other day, a friend of mine lost her iPhone. She went to Apple and they were gonna help her do the find my iPhone thing from the Apple store. But she didn't remember by heart her password either. No problem. Within minutes, she had gone through some process to prove she was the owner of that account, regained access to it, did the find my iPhone thing, realized where she had left it and went back and got it.

As a Google user, my mind was blown. It made me curious about giving the new iPhone 15 a shot, so I got on the online Apple store and got a 15 Pro the other day. It was delivered to my house hours later. (!)

I've set up an Apple account, got AirPods+ (which are better than even my Sony WF-1000MX4s, which are supposed to be the best in the world), got a bunch of AirTags I've put in my belongings and I'm enjoying months worth of free Apple services.

I've enabled dark mode and installed adblockers. I still think Gmail, GPhotos, GMaps etc are better than the native Apple products, but that's fine, I can just install those apps. But from now on everything important will be synced to Apple, not Google. I also note that despite having a smaller battery, the iPhone 15 Pro lasts twice as long as the Pixel 7, even compared to when my Pixel 7 was brand new. (it never lasted even a day of full use for me, nor have any other Pixels I've had)

So yeah, that's all it took for someone who has been a frothing at the mouth Android and Google Pixel user for decades at this point to switch. That should worry someone, somewhere. But I'm not holding my breath for Google to change.

Before anyone starts typing akshully you should just set up backup emails and phone numbers etc on your Google account to ensure you can never lose access to your account, guess what, I already have, and so have countless others who have still lost access to their account.

These things, however unlikely, can and do happen to even those who did everything to cover themselves. Apple cares about that, Google doesn't. I'm happy to live in Apples walled garden.

user:	debayande
created:	November 23, 2020
karma:	10