As luck would have it, I’ll be in the market for a brand-new phone in the coming weeks. Terribly exciting, yes. But there’s a bit of a problem: the two “biggest” phones out there, the iPhone and all those Android-based ones, rub me the wrong way. Longtime readers will know that I’m fairly neurotic, sorta like George Costanza from Seinfeld. Does the phrase Jerkstore mean anything to you? That’s 100 percent me. (Yes, the irony in linking to Google-owned YouTube is not lost on me.) So what’s a person to do when, for reasons I’ll describe, he wants nothing to do with Apple or Google phones?
I’ve had an iPod touch since last autumn, and there’s no way I could envision using that as a phone. It’s just so cumbersome, I think. I feel like I’m holding a brick in my hand whenever I use it to check WoW.com before going to bed. Plus, I’ve soured on Apple’s attitude in recent years. Again, George Costanza says hi.
On to Google. There’s another company I’ve grown tired of in recent years, the most recent offense thinking it can bully China—China!—into bending to its will under the guise of the free flow of information. Does Google think it’s the East India Company, making demands left, right, and center?
I simply don’t like the companies enough to support them in this fashion.
What are my options?
People love the iPhone, but again: it’s not for me, and that’s based on using the iPod touch for several months. The Droid got high marks, and the Nexus One should be hitting Verizon Wireless (the only wireless provider that has reliable service in my area) in the next few days, but do I really want to spend money supporting Big, Bad Google? Note that I already support Big, Bad Google with my use of Gmail, and don’t think I haven’t thought of weening myself off that!
Or maybe I should take a ridiculous stand and just go without a phone from here on out?