Alas the apple fell

Recently there's been a lot of talk about the new iPhone, and it's signal troubles. One small thing that got swept under the carpet, was the unfortunate effects of the new iOS4 for users of the iPhone 3G, like me. Apple, as usual, never really gives an "option" on whether to upgrade an OS or not, nor does it ever issue an advisory on whether the new OS can render your phone a relic of the past. But, before we delve any deeper, lets start from the beginning.

I've always been a Windows and Linux guy, ever since I played my first games on MS-DOS. I do have respect for Apple's design, but not as much for the systems they contruct (hardware wise they seem a little behind the times to me). So when I bought the then state-of-the-art iPhone 3G, I surprised myself too. Quite frankly, I hadn't planned on it, but that beautiful phone caught my attention as soon as I saw it, it was love at first sight! Logic failed me, and I ended up shelling out a hefty amount (I'm still a grad student) to get this shiny new plaything. Granted, I never regret having made that decision, I stand by it. But 3 months later, I realised Apple couldn't care less, and rendered me and my shiny new toy obsolete. A couple of months of depression later, I realised it probably wasn't as bad as I first thought, Apple's new plaything was only a minor improvement, and not something that would scar me forever as I initially thought. Yet, that reget of not having waited a few months before taking the leap lingered. Time passed on and we got to the new year with more hope.

As rumors of the new model reached a crescendo, so did little leaks of a new iOS, and of support for multi-threading at last! My brain told me not to increase my expectations, my friends advised me against it, yet the fool that I was, I walked right into it! A few weeks later came the shattering news of the fact that my phone would not support the hallowed feature. Alas, Apple broke my heart again. Add to it the inscrutable thinking that Apple projected, made me wonder about the sanity of their thinktank. The silence and hostile actions against all who dared to doubt its vision confounded me. Yet, with the news that it had overtaken Microsoft as the biggest computer firm by share price, Apple's popularity seemed to have reached a zenith. Not losing hope, I rejected overtures from contenders like the Droid, ah those sluts! How could they ever match the beatific and virginal lure of Apple! They tried to convince me that Apple did not reciprocate my feelings of admiration and love, and that it would never, yet I did not give up.

But alas, the new iOS and iPhone 4 broke the camel's back. They supported something I had long despised, something that made Microsoft one of the most hated Goliaths of the 90s, dictatorial decisions and a lack of openness. They cancelled the long promised support for flash, blocked all development tools other than their own, the new OS took 10 attempts to install, and finally took about 6 hours to install! And even then it has made my phone like an old man's wheelchair on the freeway. Atleast when MS released a new OS, they had the decency of telling you which computers it would make obsolete, so you would not install it on those. Apple has yet to learn that it seems. The new phone has none of the etheral beauty of the versions past, and seems like a botched half attempt to do too many things. Quite frankly, the aura that it once had has diminished, and the other options seem more and more attractive, seemingly not just for me, but for others as well. If all stays the same, Apple might return to it's position of something that has much promise, but never quite knows how to deliver. It's behavior over the past few months reminds me of this line from LOTR, "The door is shut, it was built by those who are dead, and the dead keep it, the door is shut!" (mostly the door is shut part, nothing dead yet)

And so I know I must return to my comfortable world of Windows and Linux, and put this ill-fated experiment behind me. Android seems to be on the rise, and well, Google isn't that evil yet. Every day Microsoft too seems more and more attractive. Yet I shall forever remember my little escapade, before the apple fell....

(Ps: if this seems a little insane to you, you're not reading carefully enough! :) )