Comment by afavour | Hacker News Reader

Comment by afavour | Hacker News Reader

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> I continue to be surprised that so many developers and other tech nerds - the type who post on HN - chose and continue to choose the iPhone over Android when Apple dictates what apps they can install and locks third-party accessories out of certain features.

I bought a Nexus One the day it became available, installed endless third party ROMs on it, tweaked it to my heart's desire. Got a Nexus 4, then 5. Today I have an iPhone.

I just need something that works, just because I can tweak endlessly doesn't mean it's a good use of my time. Honestly one of the original biggest motivators was iMessage. A rock solid messaging system ought to be table stakes for a mobile OS but Google has reinvented the wheel so many times I've lost track. Also FaceTime for calling distant relatives.

Sad to say, I don't find myself missing the relative openness of Android at all. Google-branded Android has issues similar to iOS, they also removed ICE Watch style apps. And non-Google Android is work.

> Also FaceTime for calling distant relatives.

Are your relatives unable to install Signal or WhatsApp?

Yes is a possible answer here, but installing a messaging/video-call app seems pretty low effort. I've had several elderly relatives do it and none required hand-holding, just the name of the app.

At the time neither WhatsApp nor Signal had iPad apps. Looking at it now it seems Signal added that in 2020, WhatsApp in 2025. But I switched years before both.

Even starting a FaceTime call is a struggle for lots of people.

Installing an setting up Signal or WhatsApp is out of the question for a huge portion of the population.

> Even starting a FaceTime call is a struggle for lots of people.

Yes, 90% of global smartphone users can't do it at all :P

> WhatsApp is out of the question for a huge portion of the population.

What an insane take this is.

How is it an insane take? My mother is in her seventies, has an iphone, and can't seem to figure out how to put me on speakerphone when I call her. It's a struggle to get her to do much of anything on there. My father is even worse. They didn't grow up with the technology like younger generations did and just don't get it.

At the same time, there's plenty of people who didn't grow up with the technology and manage to navigate their devices fine. I had to teach an elder what the notifications bar was because their children never bothered to explain it. We should take some responsibility instead of being ageist by assuming old people are dumb.

> assuming old people are dumb

Not just old people. Hackernews skews technical and seems to mostly interact with other technical people.

There are people in their 30's, 40's and 50's who don't own a computer at all (other than a smartphone), don't interact with computers on a regular basis, and almost exclusively use the built-in talk/text/browser apps that come pre-installed.

It may be a relatively small percentage of the adult population in the US, but it is still many millions of people.

Some of it isn't them being dumb, it's them being stubborn. My dad has been using computers since the 80s and used probably every Microsoft OS from DOS to 11. Give him a Linux PC and he could probably fumble his way around. Try to tell him what the notification bar is on Android and he just straight up won't listen. He doesn't want to hear it. He doesn't want to know how to type without poking at individual keys on mobile. He doesn't want to know what the difference is between an app and a website. He doesn't want to know what the home screen/launcher is. Many older people have issues with understanding. Many have no problems with understanding. And many just don't want to know. Some people just want things to work the way they always have (and they have a point: there's no excuse for Microsoft changing how their mail app interface works every 3-5 years)

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