I decided recently that I wanted to record my girl doing high-tech sounds like “dee-doot-deet” or “dee-doot-doot” so I could use them as my incoming text message sounds. I also wanted to be able to record myself saying, “Text from Chris”, and set that as the text sound from Chris, etc. I think it adds personal touch to the mobile device, and it also keeps me from looking at my phone when someone else gets a text nearby.

Anyway, the Internet wasn’t much help, and I had to figure out how to do it myself. Here are the steps:

1. Create a new Podcast project in GarageBand
2. Record and trim your segment to satisfaction
3. In the Share menu, select “Send Ringtone to iTunes”
4. Make sure you’re syncing Ringtones to your phone within iTunes, and sync
5. Go into your sound settings or the individual contact and assign the ringtone

::

We’ve heard a thousand such analogies, and they generally suck. Perhaps this one will suck slightly less.

Getting right to it, the iPhone experience is like a porsche. The Android experience is like a Winnebago.

The idea here is not that iPhone is “better” or “worse” than Android. Those words don’t mean anything unless you completely synchronize on subjective sets of values. The goal is to convince you that the platforms are different.

iPhone

The iPhone is like a specialized sports car. Porsche, Aston Martin, whatever. It’s designed to do a few things well. Accelerate, turn, be attractive, etc. It focuses primarily on being aesthetically pleasing in terms of look and feel while doing those things.

Porsches lack many luxury features that you can find even in high-end Toyotas. But high-end Toyotas don’t turn heads like Porsches do, or have the resale value that Porsches do, or make men and women feel like Porsches do.

Android

The current Android experience is like a mobile home. It’s not very pretty, tends to be bulky, but you can do almost anything with it. Satellite on the roof. Kitchen on-board. Bathroom. Sleeping quarters. Oh, and you can live in it. The primary focus of a mobile home is the list of amenities it provides.

So mobile homes have pretty much every feature you can ask for, and the ones you can’t get by default you can have added on. But when people see them on the road, man or woman, the thought is not one of sexiness–it’s one of functionality.

Preference

Many may point out that Android is just software, so it doesn’t have to be a Winnebago. It can be trim and sexy as well if it was designed so. And this is true. My argument is more about the current pitch from the overall Android experience.

The HTC Thunderbolt is a great example. If Android isn’t a Winnebago, the HTC Thunderbolt definitely is. It’s massive, unattractive, and highly functional. 4G, great benchmarks, etc.

The thing that strikes me is that if I were going to pick up a fashion model in downtown NYC, I’d never bring a mobile home. And if I wanted to go camping for three weeks in the Florida woods while keeping all of my comforts of home, I’d definitely not bring a Porsche.

It’s about what matters to you the most: Feel vs. function.

For me it’s feel, as long as there’s enough function there. For the Android crowd it seems that the answer is mostly function. It’s not quite that simple, but it’s close. ::

So I am back to iPhone after making a serious effort to go Android. The most important thing I learned is that I definitely prefer a unified, connected experience to that of increased yet disjointed and ad-hoc functionality.

As I wrote back before iPhone launched, feel beats features–at least for me.

But it’s clear that this is not the case for everyone. Some people simply don’t resonate at the frequency of design/feel the way I and others do. And for them the choice between iPhone and Android is a clear one for the latter.

I desperately wish Android’s versions of Google Maps and Google Navigation were on iPhone; they are so superior on an Android device that it’s like stepping back three years to use the iPhone versions of each again.

Gripes

Since some people will be interested, here’s a subset of the issues that caused me issues on Android:

• Open a text in native text messaging app instead of the one I selected
• Hate the screen; larger with less resolution
• Hate the responsiveness; often press multiple times to get a response
• Dislike the app store compared to apple’s
• Plug into my mac and my photo app doesn’t recognize it
• The tethering intermittently stops working
• I’ve had a voicemail in my notification bar that I can’t get rid of
• Google voice integration, isn’t
• The voicemail app is not pleasing
• All my main social apps are far better looking and feeling on iphone: twitter, facebook, foursquare, tripit, fandango
• BATTERY LIFE; measured in a few hours rather than a day or more
• UI polish is completely not there (the tethering app, for example)
• updating and tweaking isn’t my thing (I like it, but don’t want to)
• I prefer the soft buttons to the hard ones
• The unified email client on OSX is superior to those on Android according to my preference
• There are constant updates coming out for Android–new ROMs, new kernels, etc. that make me want to spent a LOT of time messing with my phone
• Browsing was far more jumpy and crude compared to an iPhone
• Flash on Android was hideous looking–very jumpy when scaling in, scrolling, etc.
• Much prefer the camera on the iPhone to Android

This is a list of random thoughts; so don’t take the language or tone too seriously.

I also want to explicitly thank my friends Sasa and Ken for doing their best to make me feel at home with Android during my transition period. They did help me get deeper into it, and I was convinced I was going to stay with it for a few days there before the doubts started leaking in. Their efforts were much appreciated, and I know how it feels to be into something so passionately that you want your friends to enjoy it as well. I’m truly sorry it didn’t work out in the end.

Anyway, for the time being I’m going to be an Apple guy. But I haven’t sworn off of Android. I think Google is going to figure out fairly soon that they need to do what Apple is doing in terms of core applications. They need a core set of apps that are unified and integrated that accomplish all the main tasks. Music, media, images, everything. All within native Google apps that sync to the desktop, the cloud, other devices at home, and that look as polished as Apple.

This is within them to accomplish, and I think (and hope) it’s only a matter of months before this happens. I maintain my position that I will eventually end up on Android; I thought it might have been early (two weeks ago), but it turns out the time isn’t quite right for me yet. But it won’t be long: perhaps 1-2 years. Once Google figures out how to do what it is I like about the iPhone I’ll have no reason to stay with Apple whatsoever. I’d rather be a Google fanboy than an Apple fanboy any day. ::

This is an attempt to show the differences–not without bias, but without hate.

Functionality

The iPhone focuses on doing a few things in a very polished way, while Google stresses being able to do as many things as possible. As I mentioned when the iPhone launched, the iPhone will focus on how relatively few features are implemented, not on how many are implemented.

I’d give this to Google pretty handily.

Openness

Apple wants openness to the extent that it gets more people developing for the platform. The focus is not ‘freedom’; it’s ‘get more high quality apps into the app store.’ Google, on the other side, is pushing to actually be as open as possible, to allow for unrestrained creativity. Apple does open to the extent that it benefits them (via user happiness). Google is doing open as a philosophy.

Winner: Google.

Attitude

iPhone users enjoy being excited about things and don’t much like hearing why that’s a bad idea. Android users tend to hate that. They struggle not to vomit when people freak out while showing off an iPhone–or just generally gush about things that are not 100% objectively superior. Even then it’s not encouraged. It’s like the Vulcan Android users are looking down on the emotion-proles from highbrow mountain.

Their preference for Android is directly fueled by this disgust of Apple and its mindless followers. Sure, Android is ok, but its best attribute is not being an Apple product. Apple users, however, are mostly ignoring Android because they’re too busy loving Apple. They’re too deep in their love affair to notice anyone not involved. And if someone calls them on their over-the-top antics, they’ll bite back with, “You just wish you loved your device like I love mine.”

Most interestingly, both groups are consumed by Apple. This is evident by going into a Verizon store. The first thing you’ll hear when you ask someone to describe an Android device is, “It’s like an iPhone, but …RAAAWRRRR!” Settle down there, buddy.

Winner? Nobody.

Appearance

The iPhone is like a piece of technical jewelry. Jewelry has a very limited function–namely to make you feel good about yourself and to raise your value in the eyes of others. It’s about appearance.

Android really isn’t about that. It’s like Linux in that way. It focuses on what it can do rather than how it looks doing it. And that’s why it doesn’t have the pull that iPhone does. Features aren’t sex, appearance is sex. Interface is sex. I’m not sure if Google doesn’t get this, or if they get it and can’t do anything about it.

Either way, ask yourself a simple question: How many BMW or Rolex owners have Android devices instead of iPhones? In other words, if you care enough about design and appearance to like one type of thing, you’re likely to go that direction with other things as well. That’s why Apple stores are full of highly paid people who can tell you a lot about art, or food, or whatever they’re interested in.

Winner? Nobody. If you aren’t into aesthetic, then nobody is going to convince you to be. And if you aren’t, then features are king.

High vs. Low Maintenance

Another way iPhone’s are like jewelry is that they’re extremely low maintenance. They’re designed to be left alone. They do a few things and they look good doing them. No muss, no fuss. I’m sure Android can be used that way, but they seem to stress how configurable every single thing is, constantly. When I talk to my Android owning friends they are usually in the middle of some kind of tweak of their interface, OS version, or widgets, or whatever.

This is also awesome. Let’s be clear about that. Linux is the same way. I have had endless hours of fun configuring Linux desktops, but they tend to be rather fragile, and when it’s time to work I prefer to not even notice the interface at all. OS X and iPhone are better at that I think. They’re better at being invisible, but pleasantly so.

Winner? Depends on your perspective. I think for most, though, the iPhone approach of being happier with a “lesser” device until next year is better, as it avoids the stress of latest and greatest.

The Cycle of Want

One reason I have really enjoyed being an iPhone user over the last year or so is seeing how many awesome Android devices that have come out in that period of time. I am happy knowing that I’ll get a new iPhone every year, and that the design and feel of the device/software will keep me content until then.

With Android you can go by the sickest phone on the market tomorrow, and when you get back home and charge your battery you’ll be reading about a new device that makes yours look silly. It seems like it would be easy to want new devices all the time, and new versions of the OS (which don’t run on your hardware).

To sum, Android seems to drive a constant state of change, tweaking, and want for new widgets, OS versions, and hardware. iPhone, on the other hand, is like an old Rolex. A new one isn’t that much better.

Winner: Same as above–iPhone.

Conclusion

I think Android is awesome. I seriously do. I have mad respect for Google and for what they’re doing to push the market. And when I see my friend’s live background and sick widgets it makes me want one so I can play with it.

But that’s also why I don’t want one. I don’t want to want that. I don’t want to tweak my background or widgets or root my device to get the latest, or to wish I had waited one more month to get the new wicked-sick hardware.

I want to go with the BMW or the Rolex and know that I got high quality and high design, and that the thing itself, doing the few tasks that it does, will do them in a way that feels clean and solid. So for now I’m sticking with the Apple ecosystem.

I have no doubt that I’ll be on Android soon, though. I think Google will figure out design before Apple figures out how to be Google-level awesome. It’s just a race at this point, and I’m not betting against Google. ::

Notes

¹ I used Ken and Ryu because they are the same.

Image from http://www.geeks2u.com.au/

It’s pretty well accepted that one way to gauge something’s value is to see how it retains said value. One example would be, say, a BMW vs. a Ford Expedition: You can get into either one for around $35K, but after a year what will they be worth?

The same goes for the mobile device market. I just sold my iPhone 3GS on eBay for $300–in four minutes. The interesting part is that’s how much I paid for my iPhone 4, and this is the third time in a row that I’ve done the exact same thing.

In other words, since camping for my first iPhone I’ve either broke even or made money selling my previous one–even though it was a used, previous-year model. That’s extraordinary.

So my point is simple: we have another data point in the quality/demand debate between iPhone and Android: their re-sale values. Let’s check some rough numbers on a top-google-hit-site that buys used phones: cellforcash.com

Android Phones

iPhones

Granted, this is just one site I picked from the top of Google, but I am willing to bet it’s representative. And look at the numbers: the top Android phones that just came out aren’t even worth what last year’s (or the previous year’s) iPhone.

DROID Incredible: $69
EVO 4G: $81

The absolute latest models, mind you. And the iPhone?

iPhone 3: $114

That’s not even the 3GS–that’s two generations back, and still more than the EVO 4G. Last year’s model (the 3GS) goes for $240–almost 3x Sprint’s iPhone killer that came out like 20 minutes ago.

Yeah, pretty compelling… ::