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When I bought my first Smartphone, the first one of the Samsung Galaxy series, there was a very notieceable difference in features between the lower end smartph

When I bought my first Smartphone, the first one of the Samsung Galaxy series, there was a very notieceable difference in features between the lower end smartphones and the flagships. Buying a cheaper one would have meant half of the 840x400 resolution my Samsung had. Now I have a Moto G, which is simply good enough for my needs. The improvements a flagship phone would grant over the Moto G are not worth 3-4x the price for me.

Tepix 11y ago
The curious thing is that the very good medium priced Android phones (200-300€ / $250-$350 unsubsidized) have not had an effect on Apple. I hope one of the reasons is Apple having publicly stated that using their customers private data is not their business model.
- mike_hearn 11y ago
  They offer basically similar services that use data in very similar ways to Google. That claim by them always seemed more like an attempt to put a positive spin on their much less successful cloud offerings. They have iAds etc, but it hasn't really taken off like Jobs obviously hoped.
- soylentcola 11y ago
  I think another part of that (in the US at least) is the dominant framework of carrier contracts and subsidies. This is starting to change in theory but up until now, the norm has been for a person to finish a 2-year contract, walk into a carrier storefront, and choose from several phones with ~$200-250 price tags. When you see an iPhone next to a Galaxy or an HTC variant with carrier logos plastered all over it, the iPhone seems like the most "premium" option and the price difference is either minor or nonexistent. Besides, the iPhone, through a combination of legitimately good track record and expert marketing has an excellent reputation. But if you're buying your handset outright, those other devices with less (or essentially no) marketing like the Moto X or the Nexus 5 start to stand out a little more if you're not married to one platform or the other. The difference between $200 and $250 isn't much to the person buying subsidized but the difference between a $350-400 handset and a $650-800 one is obvious. You can almost buy two Nexus 5's for the cost of an iPhone so the glass and metal "industrial design" may start to matter less. At least that's what happened for me. When I stopped doing the contract-and-subsidy thing to switch over to a $30/mo prepaid plan, I considered an iPhone 5S (the current iPhone) and the Nexus 5. The iPhone was maybe a little bit more capable and had nicer construction but if I got the Nexus, I'd save enough to pay for 11 months of service. Maybe I'm just a compulsive bargain shopper and spend a lot of time looking for the best bang to buck ratio. Maybe I'm just a cheapskate. Either way, my concern wasn't about targeted ads based on my search and navigation history. It was about not necessarily getting the absolute "nicest" thing out there, but rather something that did everything I needed it to do without spending a premium for that last 10% of quality/reputation/etc.

Tepix 11y ago

The curious thing is that the very good medium priced Android phones (200-300€ / $250-$350 unsubsidized) have not had an effect on Apple. I hope one of the reasons is Apple having publicly stated that using their customers private data is not their business model.

mike_hearn 11y ago
They offer basically similar services that use data in very similar ways to Google. That claim by them always seemed more like an attempt to put a positive spin on their much less successful cloud offerings. They have iAds etc, but it hasn't really taken off like Jobs obviously hoped.
soylentcola 11y ago
I think another part of that (in the US at least) is the dominant framework of carrier contracts and subsidies. This is starting to change in theory but up until now, the norm has been for a person to finish a 2-year contract, walk into a carrier storefront, and choose from several phones with ~$200-250 price tags. When you see an iPhone next to a Galaxy or an HTC variant with carrier logos plastered all over it, the iPhone seems like the most "premium" option and the price difference is either minor or nonexistent. Besides, the iPhone, through a combination of legitimately good track record and expert marketing has an excellent reputation. But if you're buying your handset outright, those other devices with less (or essentially no) marketing like the Moto X or the Nexus 5 start to stand out a little more if you're not married to one platform or the other. The difference between $200 and $250 isn't much to the person buying subsidized but the difference between a $350-400 handset and a $650-800 one is obvious. You can almost buy two Nexus 5's for the cost of an iPhone so the glass and metal "industrial design" may start to matter less. At least that's what happened for me. When I stopped doing the contract-and-subsidy thing to switch over to a $30/mo prepaid plan, I considered an iPhone 5S (the current iPhone) and the Nexus 5. The iPhone was maybe a little bit more capable and had nicer construction but if I got the Nexus, I'd save enough to pay for 11 months of service. Maybe I'm just a compulsive bargain shopper and spend a lot of time looking for the best bang to buck ratio. Maybe I'm just a cheapskate. Either way, my concern wasn't about targeted ads based on my search and navigation history. It was about not necessarily getting the absolute "nicest" thing out there, but rather something that did everything I needed it to do without spending a premium for that last 10% of quality/reputation/etc.