No, Apple isn’t “Big Brother”, that’s the government’s job. Go read the article, it’s very good, and gives you the truth about how the data is used, including this nice little nugget.

“Apple is not harvesting this data from your device. This is data on the device that you as the customer purchased and unless they can show concrete evidence supporting this claim – network traffic analysis of connections to Apple servers – I rebut this claim in full.”

Oh, and yes, Android devices do something similar.

If you have an iPhone and would like to create a map of the places you’ve been, there’s an app for that.

I’d imagine the developers that are trying to make money on this platform will love the change. Maybe, just maybe, it’ll mean a more consistent experience.

That’s a good way to look at it. There are those of us completely sold out to iOS and there are those sold out to Android.

We all win.

What’s the Big G up to? There’s a lot of fiber running into the building. Makes you go hmmmm? Especially with the recent Net Neutrality announcement that called out Google Android. (Which made zero sense.)

Hey, LEVEL could use some new space, I wonder if we could sneak the entire company into the building without them noticing?

Leave it to the carriers to ruin a good thing. As others have said, this could be one big reason Verizon doesn’t have the iPhone.

Go should be easy for C/C++/Objective-C developers to pick up but why in the world would you make it retarded from the get go? Who’s screwball idea was it to require the opening brace to be on the same line? It’s like we’re coding in COBOL again. Oh, that’s right, Google is big into Python. I forgot.

I still find it odd that people stick to K&R style.

Wow, you’re selling Java as a good reason to switch to Android? Strike one, two, and three. Java? Really? I’d rather use Go to be perfectly honest, or how about C#/.NET (via Mono), that would go a long way toward selling the platform for me. Ok, ok, Java isn’t really that bad, but there are better choices today.

I also love that you mention Joe Hewitt, I’m sure Joe is a nice guy, but he has a strange sense of what “Big Brother” means. Doesn’t he work for Facebook? The worlds biggest “Big Brother.”

Seriously, no offense to Joe, I just don’t agree with him, that’s all. I love the iOS platform and wish I could make a living doing nothing but applications for it. In fact, I’d jump at the chance. Mobile is too much fun!

This is pretty interesting. Google bowing to the demands of the wireless provider, sound familiar iPhone users? It would appear the “openness” of the Android is a bit of a fallacy. It’s obvious the carriers are in control of the devices, thus the Verizon/Google backed crusade to regulate wireless.

Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to have cheap wireless, with everything being equal, but the reality of it is this, these guys are in business to make money and they’re going to do what they have to to differentiate themselves from the other. Multi-tiered pay plans is one way to do it, not just based on the amount of data you can move per month, bit how fast that data moves and where.

Get used to the idea, it’s the American way!

I find it interesting that Intel is now making tablet specific chip sets, after Apple ships a highly successful device. Ballmer also states that the Windows based devices will likely be cheaper than the iPad.

I guess we’ll see. I hope they’re good because that’ll just push Apple and others to make better devices, which makes things better for all of us.

I’d also expect to see some Android based devices hitting the market pretty soon.

Go read the entire article, it’s a good read, too many quotable paragraphs to include here. He makes some great points about the choice between Android based phones and the iPhone. The bottom line: iPhone is a better choice, and experience, for everyday folks. Android is a good choice if you’re more technically inclined.