When Did Apple Become Boring? (Or) More Reasons Why I'll (NOT) Buy The iPhone SE

On Monday Apple was ready to ‘Loop me in' when they announced two new products. As I was reading the event’s coverage on my Twitter, I quickly unraveled, then console myself with positive thoughts:  ‘your Galaxy S6 is great –besides its battery and heat issues– ‘ , ‘your 2 year-old iPad Air 2 is still a shining piece of technology and you love it so much!’ , ‘Don’t worry, be happy [with the things you already have]’. Suddenly, the little devil sitting on my other shoulder, that I tried to silence, started to act nervous.

Even though I like Apple products, I’m not a fan boy. I use both PC and Mac, but this event got me questionning: how a company as successful as Apple, –which has always thrived by the rules of design, innovation and simplicity–, has failed to keep me and -millions of customers- on the edge of excitement that day? How did they let competitors like Samsung and Windows steal their shine? I’ll discuss this further with you today.

Remember the time
Do you remember? There was a time –not so long ago- when you could only find a sophisticated phone in healthy family’s living rooms. The head of the household was fiercely guarding it, and you had to ask for permissions to call your neighbor friend to come over and play ball or Super Nintendo games. When you were expecting a call from a family member who was living abroad, you had to wait long seconds until you could hear his/her voice. Soon as it went mobile, it was a technology so clunky and intimidating that you wouldn’t dare playing with it. Telecommunications were terrible but it was the good times!

Companies started to understand that design sells products. Back in the 90s, Nokia was the hype, especially the N33! It could fall and break into pieces but you could pick it up, reassemble it and power it up again, it worked. I even heard stories of people dropping it from 3-floor buildings, and running the same drill. Dope! Phones will always be linked to our memories and emotions. Steve Jobs knew that, so he put those emotions on a display and made us 'touch' them with the iPhone. A revolution.

Then those guys...from Google
Came along thinking it was unfair to let one company rule the market so hard that, for you to make the device better, you had to customize it with paid apps. So they created Android: a platform for slick phones that can be built by others, with more free apps! Steve went mad, he was right: the force was strong and the menace was real.
 
Why Android rules?
Where the sun is shining, Android is king. It has matured into something amazing. In a previous article I talked about my leap of faith into Android.  Because of its ease of use, it runs deep in the emerging markets smartphone usage. Plus, most of the apps on the Google Play Store are free and rarely exclusive to the app store –as it was the case few years ago–.

As an Android user you'll always get a “I can’t do this, why can you do it and not me?’’ from iOS users. These are the very words of my mom, frustrated at her iPhone 4:
-she couldn’t unlock it because it was bought overseas.
-when she wanted to upgrade or install an outdated app -the one she used the most like Viber or WhatsApp, she had to upgrade the whole iOS system. And iTunes asked for her account and credit card info.
-she couldn’t keep up with the iOS upgrades because of the terrible internet speed. 

Let me tell you this: in Africa, we are very picky when it’s about trusting our flawed banking system or give sensitive info online. It’s in our culture. -It not only applies to Africans, I guess everybody is like that- most people prefer the cash to virtual money, ask them to use their credit cards to buy virtual goods- like apps- instead of food or gas? Plus, they don’t have store’s account, they just have emails, [when they use it] that’s it. This is why android phones comes with a lot of preinstalled apps. Most famous are: WhatsApp, Viber, Imo, Line, Skype. Telecommunications are so expensive that people are always finding new 'free' ways to call. VoIP industry's future is promising.

Smaller screens…are we going back there?
I thought that bigger screens were a trend nowadays. How to read or watch a movie or multitask on such screens? Nobody’s listening to Cds anymore, that doesn’t mean that you have to forced them using Minidiscs. Apple made a one step forward -with multitasking [forced by Android]- and is going now two steps back. A small iPhone 5s on iPhone 6s’s steroids is still the same iPhone 5s looking like an iPhone 4s...confusing isn't it?

Just because it’s cheap
Don’t get fooled around. Just because we are ‘emerging’ doesn’t mean we don’t care about design, customer care and shining technologies. I think it’s an offending message that Apple is sending, it goes like “Oh you don’t have money? We’ll make it cheaper then, easy now?”. Who told you we -emerging markets-didn’t have money?. All our industries are booming.   

USB cable and Bluetooth
How to run iTunes and download apps especially for people who don’t have PCs at home. How about sharing a song with your friend’s phone without struggling? Android lets you use an usb cable to access and manage your folders, and is way more 'offline' oriented than iOS. 

Show me the Apple Store
You'd need a friend to fix your Android’s phone issues, usually it takes seconds. I can’t tell the same for iOS. Apple makes simple products but their learning curve is complicated. I spotted this interesting question on Quora lately on why Apple doesn't care about Africa. People want more local Apple Stores, not only in Africa’s famous economic hubs like South Africa or Morocco. I don’t talk about resellers shops who only want our money and where you’ll find the cashier sleeping, pointing you the shelf that displays outdated products. We want the full experience.

How many SIM cards?
Changing sim cards is daunting, hence a smartphone's Dual-Sim feature a necessity. Users are switching between primary and secondary SIM all day. Even, Samsung implemented hot swapping for SIM: you don't have to reboot your phone to change your cards. 

We don't want to upgrade
Upgrading an OS is scary! You need to go through a lot of instructions and perusing lot of forums to 'make sure' you are doing the right thing. Phil Schiller mocked at Windows and Android users for lack of upgrades. Well, that's because they don't feel the URGENT need to upgrade. Especially when it will suck their precious data internet connection -remember guys, the internet is still very expensive and slow in some emerging countries- plus it will bring more troubles. I for one, updated to OSX El Capitan, it was a mess: some drivers from other manufacturers' hardware were not even functioning.

 Read more: When Did Apple Become Boring? (Or) More Reasons Why I'll (NOT) Buy The iPhone 4 SE

 About the author: Lionel Thomas is the founder of KILIFORI, a creative agency dedicated to helping businesses from both Africa and further afield to meet their marketing goals by telling their stories in a simple, uncluttered way that allows the most important elements to rise to the surface. His approach is distinguished by a passion for stories, drawing, photography, design and interactive media.