10 Ways Android Beats The iPhone 5 Hands Down

Apple may have mollified the masses by adding significantly better specs to its smartphone offering, but when it comes to innovation, the iPhone 5 just can't compete with the latest Android handsets. Sure a larger screen, 4G LTE support and a faster

Apple may have mollified the masses by adding significantly better specs to its smartphone offering, but when it comes to innovation, the iPhone 5 just can’t compete with the latest Android handsets. Sure a larger screen, 4G LTE support and a faster CPU are welcome additions to the world’s number one phone, but Apple is a year late and $199 short, because Android has provided all these features and more for some time now.

In fact, even after Apple’s johnny-come-lately improvements, Android phones have a number of key advantages over the iPhone 5.

Screens larger than 4 inches

Apple may be patting itself on the back over its move from a 3.5-inch to a 4-inch display, but in the smartphone size race, the iPhone 5 trails the field by a wide margin. In the Android world, the 4.3-inch Droid RAZR M is considered a "compact" phone, the 4.8-inch Galaxy S III is mainstream and the 5.5-inch Galaxy Note II is large.

Why would you want a phone with a larger screen? A larger display makes videos more exciting, text easier to read, and keys on the keyboard easier to target with your finger. And if for some reason that doesn't appeal to you, the Android ecosystem also has smaller phones.

NFC support

If you own an iPhone 5, you can just forget about using mobile payment systems that let you touch your device to a reader in order to conduct a transaction. Instead of MasterCard's Tap and Pay, you'll be using tap and pray as you rap your fingers on a table and hope that Apple provides NFC support on the iPhone 6 in 2013.

With NFC support, the latest Android phones can not only send out payments, but also share photos, contacts, videos and more, just by tapping their backs together. Since Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, the OS has built-in NFC sharing software called Android Beam that any third party application can use for seamless sharing. Task management app Any.Do even lets you beam assignments to friends and family. I'm sure Apple will add this functionality just in time for iOS 8.
custom widgets

Custom widgets on your home screen

Congratulations iPhone 5 users! You now get an extra row of icons that you didn't have with the iPhone 4 and 4S. That means you can see your TweetDeck icon and tap on it without scrolling over. The Times Square billboard writes itself: "iPhone 5: Now with More Icons!"

However, if you use any Android phone, you get more than just a static set of application icons on your 5 to 7 home screens. You have a working desktop you can fill with interactive widgets that show everything from the weather to your latest social media updates. I particularly dig the circles widget that Motorola includes on its Android phones, which shows you battery life, time, text alerts and local weather.

A micro USB port rather than a proprietary connector

If you're like me, you have a drawer full of USB cables and, if you can't find one, you can always buy another on any street corner. When you upgrade from an old phone to a new one, you can still use the same old wires and charging plugs, because micro USB is a standard. In fact, the European Union requires phone manufacturers to use micro USB for charging, because it reduces waste as users hold on to their old cables rather than tossing them in a landfill.

Unfortunately, the iPhone 5 uses a proprietary connector it calls "Lightning" instead of standard micro USB, but gets around the EU regulation by offering an adapter.Why not just use micro USB like every other company? Then you couldn't make a mint selling proprietary wires and making every iPhone 4S owner that upgrades buy new accessories, because older iPhones had an even larger proprietary dock connector.
third-party keyboard.

Third-party software keyboards

With the iPhone 5, you can have any keyboard you want as long as its the stock iOS 6 keyboard. If you're using Android and you don't love Google's default layout, you're free to install a third-party keyboard that suits your needs.

Some of the best Android keyboards include Swype, which lets you create words by tracing between letters on the keyboard, and SwiftKey, which predicts the next word in your sentence to save you keystrokes. Heck, you can even buy an Android slider like the Motorola Droid 4, which has a real physical keyboard.

Attach any files you want to your email

Apple doesn't gamble on immature technologies so perhaps its understandable that the company has yet to include this new-fangled thing called "email attachments" on its iPhone 5. While previous versions of iOS Mail didn't even present you with any attachment options in its message composer, the new iOS 6 mail on the iPhone 5 gives you the option to attach images or video only.

What if you need to send your boss a PowerPoint presentation, a Word doc or some other type of file? You will need to have an app that opens that kind of file, go to that app and send the file from there. In other words, there's no way to simply attach the file(s) of your choice when composing email in iOS mail. There are workarounds and third-party apps that address this problem, but Apple's approach here could not be lamer.

Just like Windows or Mac OS, Android allows you to attach any files you want to any email message. Whether you're using the Gmail app, its stock email app or any of a dozen third party email clients, there's always a prominent attachment option on the composition screen and, when you hit it , you're able to browse your gallery, your file system or any other apps you've installed that organize files (Dropbox, Quickoffice, etc).
sharing Android iOS

Share using any service you want

With Android, every relevant app from the browser to the photo gallery includes a share button. When you tap share, you're given an extensive and universal list of apps you can share with. And that list grows, depending on what software and services you have installed, from Facebook to your SMS messenger to Bluetooth transfers. So if, for example, you join Pinterest and install its app, you can share directly to that from any app with a search button.

Rather than providing you with one share list to rule them all, the iPhone 5 lets each app developer create his or her own share menu, which has a finite list of services that developer feels like supporting. The default Safari browser and iOS photo gallery apps can only share to Facebook, Twitter, email and messaging. Google, Flickr, Pinterest, Google Talk and any of 100 other services need not apply.
Android file system

Visible file system

Try plugging an Android phone into your PC and mounting it as a storage device. You'll have access to all the files and folders, just as you do when you browse through your WIndows computer's C drive. So, if you want to copy a raft of MP3s or PowerPoint presentations to your Android handset, you can just drag and drop them.

Say you record a memo with Droid Record and want to grab its output files. You can navigate down to its folder and move, copy or share them directly from there. If you run a file browser on the phone itself, you can also dive into the file system from there.

So what happens when you plug the iPhone 5 into your PC? You get access the digital camera (DCIM) folder only so all you can do is drag and drop pictures. Yes, you can iTunes to transfer media files back and forth, but you still can't go directly into file system because Apple just doesn't trust you enough to let you see the folders on the iPhone 5 that you bought from them. Whose phone is it anyway?

Haptic feedback

Most Android phones offer optional haptic feedback, which allows you to get a nice tactile vibration when you type, long press on the screen or tap the navigation buttons. While some people dislike haptics, the vibrations give you a strong acknowledgement that your touch has registered so you don't have to tap twice. Unfortunately, with the iPhone 5, you don't have a choice; just a flat screen that provides no feedback.

Laptop Pen support

"If you see a stylus, they blew it," Steve jobs famously said of pen-enabled computing and, like its predecessors, the iPhone 5 does not support pen input. Yes, you can get third-party capacitive styluses that will work on the iPhone 5, but these little sticks do nothing more than give you a thinner finger.

Want to scribble down some notes like you do on paper? On Android, you can. Samsung's Galaxy Note and LG's Intuition both offer large screens, active styluses and deep pen integration into the operating system.

On the upcoming Galaxy Note II, you can hand write notes on your calendar, on the backs of JPGs and in half a dozen other places throughout the OS. You can even get previews of emails, photos and videos by hovering the Galaxy Note II's stylus slightly above the screen.

Google Privacy Test Case Infront Of EU Court

Google Privacy Test Case In EU Court

Google will do battle with Spain's data protection authority in Europe's highest court on Tuesday in a landmark case with global implications which poses one of the thorniest questions of the Internet age: When is information really private?

The issue before the European Court of Justice has been boiled down to this poser: If a person fails to pay social security contributions and their house is auctioned off as a result, do they have the right to ask Google to delete such damaging information from search results?

Behind that lies complex arguments over freedom of information, the right to protect data, what it means to be a publisher and who ultimately polices the web.

Lawyers for Google will argue the search engine company should not have to erase lawful content which it did not create from its massive search index.

Spanish officials will argue that Google should delete information from its index where an individual's privacy is breached.

Tuesday's hearing in Luxembourg opens arguments but it could be nine months to a year before a ruling is handed down.

It is based on a complaint made by a Spanish man who made a Google search using his name and uncovered an announcement in a newspaper from several years earlier saying a property he owned was up for auction because of non-payment of social security.

One of Spain's top courts, the Audiencia Nacional, upheld his complaint and ruled Google should delete the information from its results. The case was referred to the Court of Justice in March last year after Google challenged the decision.

Supporters say that if Google is asked to delete such information it will create a slippery slope leading to all sorts of data being deleted for spurious reasons, and it would essentially make Google the responsible party.

CONTROLLER OR HOST?

The European court will try to determine if Google can be considered the "controller" or just a host of information. It will also assess whether a search engine run by a company based in California such as Google can be subject to EU privacy law.

Spain's data regulator has said EU judges must consider if EU citizens have to go to U.S. courts to exercise their privacy rights and whether Google "is responsible for the damage the diffusion of personal information can cause for citizens".

The hearing will also test a draft European law that aims to strengthen citizens' privacy. The rules proposed by the European Commission in 2012 and being debated by the European Parliament would give people "the right to be forgotten" - that is, the right to have personal data deleted, in particular from the web.

The proposal has sparked sharp criticism from industry experts who say Internet content could be manipulated at the expense of freedom of speech if such a principle were to be enshrined in European law.

In a blog, Google's global privacy counsel, Peter Fleischer, said such a right created false expectations.

"I regularly hear requests from people to 'remove all references to me, Mrs. X, from the Internet'," Fleischer said, adding that he was expressing his own views, not the company's.

"No law can or should provide such a right," he said.

Spain referred the case to the EU's highest court to clarify how the EU draft law should be applied, particularly in relation to Google. It said the outcome of the hearing would be relevant not only in Spain but in all EU countries.

Spain's data protection agency said almost 200 verdicts in similar cases had been challenged in the Audiencia Nacional.

Nokia's $39 Phone Wins More Time for Comeback Bid - Businessweek

Zee News

Nokia Oyj (NOK1V), burning cash as it struggles to revive its smartphone business, is winning time for the recovery effort by gaining more customers for another product: basic mobile phones it sells for $39. By adding features such as quicker Web and online games to its Asha handsets popular in faster-growing economies including India and China, Nokia boosted its share of the basic-phone market to 35 percent last quarter -- the highest in two years. Unlike the smartphone division, the basic-phone business is profitable and unit sales are increasing. The more than 70 million cheaper handsets Nokia sells each quarter is providing relief for Chief Executive Officer Stephen Elop as he tries to stem revenue declines and recover from five quarters of losses. The basic-phone division is also winning over first-time users who may stick with Nokia when upgrading to a more expensive device. “Nokia’s Asha models are selling quite well and that is good news for them since it gives the company a bit more time to get its smartphone business on track,” said Teemu Peraelae, who helps manage $1.5 billion including Nokia shares at Alfred Berg Asset Management in Helsinki. Nokia’s cheaper phones outsold its smartphones 7-to-1 last quarter and, at 2.29 billion euros ($2.86 billion), brought in 49 percent more revenue for the Espoo, Finland-based company. If Nokia’s smartphone strategy fails, the basic-phone unit may become the company’s most attractive asset for an acquirer because it remains profitable and has a dominant market position in many emerging markets, said Sami Sarkamies, a Nordea Bank AB (NDA) analyst in Helsinki. A buyer would also benefit from Nokia’s strong relationship with carriers in growth economies, he said. Asha Demand Nokia’s Asha phones are gaining users in the developing markets because they resemble smartphones, yet cost a fraction of the price, Anshul Gupta, an analyst at research firm Gartner Inc. in Mumbai, said in an interview. Some Ashas have full- length touch screens similar to Nokia’s higher-end models and Apple Inc. (AAPL)’s iPhone. The underlying operating system is less sophisticated, making them cheaper to build. “They have almost all the features a smartphone should have like an application portal to download apps, a touch interface, social-networking integration -- so these devices are completely like a smartphone,” he said. Nokia added touch-screen handsets to the Asha line in June to meet the surging demand for smartphone features. The Asha 305, retailing at 65 euros, is Nokia’s cheapest full-length touch-screen phone. The Asha 311, featuring a faster touch screen and a 1-gigahertz processor, costs 95 euros. The company on average sells basic phones for 31 euros each, compared with 151 euros per smartphone. India Shoppers The 305 and 311 are seeing “fantastic traction” among customers, said Sathish Babu, who owns handset retailer Univercell with about 500 outlets across southern India. “The new Nokia phones are doing very well,” Babu said in an interview, adding today’s younger shoppers demand slimmer phones with vibrant colors and full touch screens. “The more stock that comes in the more my sales go up and it’s even cannibalizing into other brands. With the touch screen, the balance is tilting toward Nokia now.” Nokia CEO Elop, commenting in an e-mail, attributed rising sales to its devices’ “bold design” and new colors. Nokia’s basic-phone sales climbed 2 percent to 73.5 million units in the second quarter from a year earlier, even as the global market for such devices fell 15 percent to 211 million units, according to research firm Strategy Analytics. Shares of Nokia have risen 66 percent since it reported the second-quarter numbers on July 19. The stock is still down about 90 percent since Apple introduced the iPhone in 2007, a debut that started Nokia’s decline in smartphones. ‘Myopic Focus’ Nokia’s share of the basic-phone market rose to 35 percent last quarter from 29 percent a year earlier. In smartphones, the fastest-growing and most valuable market segment, Nokia, the former leader, has slumped to less than 10 percent. “People forget how significant it is that we’re selling a million phones a day,” Peter Skillman, head of mobile-phone design at Nokia, said in an interview. “There’s almost a myopic focus on smartphones.” Features helping Nokia’s basic-phone sales include browser data-compression technology, which lowers the cost of Web surfing, Skillman said. Nokia is also benefiting from demand for phones that let users insert two SIM cards, a feature many consumers in developing countries need to make it easier to switch service between carriers as they travel, he said. This month, Nokia said Asha users get Zynga Inc. (ZNGA)’s “Draw Something” and “Zynga Poker” games for free. Such features are important for a company whose biggest markets last year were China, which made up almost 16 percent of revenue, and India with 7.6 percent. Samsung Competition Nokia’s success in basic phones isn’t guaranteed, as ZTE Corp. (000063), Huawei Technologies Co. and other manufacturers are entering the cheaper market segments with phones using Google Inc. (GOOG)’s Android operating system. Samsung Electronics Co., which passed Nokia as the biggest handset maker overall this year helped by smartphone sales, also pushes basic touch-screen phones under the Star and Champ names. The intensifying competition caused Nokia to reduce the average selling price of its basic phones 14 percent last quarter, dragging down revenue even as unit sales rose. Profit margins on Nokia’s cheaper phones also narrowed. “It’s been a slippery slope for Nokia’s feature phones, but they did see an improvement in volumes in the second quarter unlike their smartphone business,” said Janardan Menon, a Liberum Capital Ltd. analyst in London. “Competing more effectively with low-end smartphones will be key to any recovery.”

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