Tuesday, June 29, 2010

the Debate of the ... it's not really THAT important...

I'd like to say I've been super busy lately and that's why I haven't been posting. I'd like to say that and have you believe it. But we both know the truth. I haven't been busy. I've thought about being busy, and maybe that's good enough. But really, I've just been at the beach, or at house parties, or moping about girls. All fun things. Or mostly fun things. But none of them truly productive.

As some of you may know, I spend about 30 hours a week locked in a Radio Shack. And as of late, the iPhone craze has resurfaced and is currently raging around like...well Apple fanboys. I've spent most of my time the past few weeks on the phone, telling people that, no, we don't have the phone in stock. Yes we will. Would you like to be on the list? Etc. Etc.

What I don't actually get is the intense desire to have this phone. It has very few viable differences between it and the 3GS, that I can see. Sure, facetime could be called "reinventing the way we communicate..." if most laptops weren't built with webcams, and both parties didn't have to have the iPhone 4. The retina display could even be the best thing to hit phones, or small media devices in general, if the Evo and Archos didn't already have more advanced displays.

The sad fact is that, I too am a fanboy, but I will not be making the jump to the 4th iteration of Apple's phone empire. I'll wait and see what happens with the Android OS or maybe wait for the iPhone 5.

Here is the core of my current debate, as a retailer: Evo vs. iPhone vs. T-Mobile's stupid fast internet. The Evo is probably the best phone in existence today, sadly trumping the iPhone 4 in most categories. The iPhone 4 is beyond trendy, and works pretty much right away. Android tends to take a little more time to master, and it's meant to be more customizable, that's their ad campaign. What this means for you is this: you actually have to take the time to customize it. If you're that type of phone user, which I am not, then go over to an Android phone and laugh at us simpletons who claim the iPhone is the greatest thing since Jesus put fish on sliced bread or turned water into a party.

But, but, but, but...if you are one of those smart phone users who starts to quote specs, gets involved with the speed of the phone, claims to use the phone for it's internet capabilities, then you can't really be talking about the Evo and it's mythical 4G speeds (which are now expected in Orlando soon) or the iPhone and it's processing power (although the Snapdragon on Evo still beats it out by a bit) ... no you sir, or ma'am, need to be on T-Mobile, whose new upgraded 3G network is running at about a billion KBS. Comparatively.

However, talking about providers does require you to get into the cost of the plans, and sadly, at the moment, that battle is being won by Sprint by a landslide.

I have a few stories about some of the phone calls and the retail adventure that has been working these phone releases, and I'm sure I'll get some more from my former partners in Best Buy crime pretty soon, but for the moment I wanted to get my argument out of the way.

Evo = coolest phone ever.
iPhone 4 = trendiest phone ever.
T-Mobile = making Sprint and ATT feel like douches.