I would totally buy this theory. I think that tradeoff with the zero-shutter-lag feature is that the phone does a cursory attempt at focus/metering/white-balan

I would totally buy this theory. I think that tradeoff with the zero-shutter-lag feature is that the phone does a cursory attempt at focus/metering/white-balance (if it does one at all) and totally misses it most of the time. You can try to focus by tapping the screen first, but it still doesn't quite get it right in my experience.