Friday, August 13, 2010

One Reason Not To Buy The Droid

I'm an iPhone guy. Even though my new iPhone 4 drops calls like Braylon Edwards drops passes, it wins out in design, features, apps, and ease of use. I've had an ongoing, friendly debate with my cousin about which phone is better, the Droid or the iPhone, and I have to admit, he makes some valid points.

But one criticism of Apple, its tight control over the Apps in its App Store, could also be one of its selling points. After all, there's no danger of typing "Jewish" into the App Store search, and getting a result like this:


Heil Droid?

As Joshua Topolsky writes on Engadget:
No one is going to tell you that you can't install a Nazi theme on your phone, but we're pretty sure that Google shouldn't make it so easy, and it shouldn't subject a large portion of its users to content that rightfully deserves to sit on the fringes, not in the center.
So don't buy the Droid, people. Google may not be profiting off this Hitler App, but they're providing a tool that helps the despicable people who would develop and purchase such an awful thing.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm also iPhone guy, but check out http://www.jewishiphonecommunity.org/news/do-you-hate-israel-there%E2%80%99s-an-app-for-that . AppStore isn't so kosher as well

Adam said...

Wow. Crazy. I didn't know about that. However, there's a slight difference. It appears that the MyNation apps were created to be open to everybody's input, and unfortunately, that everybody includes the immature and anti-Semitic. The Google apps are designed specifically to appeal to hate groups and bigots, and can transform the background, icons, and other parts of the phone to conform with the group's imagery. They're most likely directly created and uploaded by hate groups themselves, and sold as such. The Google App store provides these groups with a way to earn money and visibility. And that's the most disturbing part.

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