I thought about this after I posted, and I realized something... and in all-sad seriousness, I am a rather dormant person without a lot of daily errands/tasks at hand, so I guess I can see why the nature of multi-tasking doesn't seem so important to me...because it would make me realize all the more how little I really do/ get done. So I guess if I had more on my plate, and were better able to utilize those features, I would love it too.

As for the Micro SD card expansion, had I not found Simplify Media and Orb Live I might have just gone screaming, but they give me a virtual access to stream all 30 GB of my music, and 125 GB of my video without ever taking up an MB of space, or having to go through annoying file conversions. Of course, the downside is they both work best on wi-fi, but are acceptable on 3G. But most iPhone owners I know don't look for these types of resources, which, in my opinion, makes most iPhone users seem like simpletons who don't want for more.

I keep my eye on Android sites because, to me, it's the only other OS out there other than Apple which seems to have a pulse. I want to see it succeed because we all know a worthy contender will finally bring competition, and more innovation to the market overall...for everyone.

[flame on!] ...just kidding.

My hubby has an iPod Touch. It IS an elegant device and I have big-screen envy. I also like that little magni-bubble that comes up when selecting text. But... I could never give up my Android for that. The i-thingy just doesn't do things that I take for granted on the Android.

Example: I use Remember the Milk for tasks. The RTM Android app is location-aware and pops up a reminder of a task when I approach the location I set for the task (very cool). If I share RTM lists with other people and they make changes to the lists on the web, the lists on my phone automatically update. With the i-things, you have to remember to run the application - it won't update on its own.

There is the Locale app that adjusts my phones settings based on location, time and other conditions.

Oh, and I can expand the memory with a MicroSD card.

The phone is completely customizable; it looks and behaves exactly the way I want it to. Because it runs things in the background, I can set my preferences and go on with my life - my phone then lets me know when I need to deal with something. With an iPhone, I would have to fire up the various apps to get updates on things. I know the iPhone allows some notification capabilities, but they are so limited to what "the man" deems worthy.

I could go on, but I think that captures my point. If the hardware provides enough memory and processing power, everything runs great. I keep my phone docked at work and I have a car charger, so battery life is manageable.

The only way I can see it as beneficial is if the phone gets hung up opening and closing apps, to which my iPhone does this quickly, and seamlessly.

Android will get to the masses but it will take time. It's a long way. Apple proved "normal" consumers will adopt technology faster if it's dead simple to use - EVEN if it lacks features. "Easy-to-use" will always beat out "feature-heavy" when you're talking mass-market consumer.

As far as point 1 goes, I've read that the reason that they've stayed away from apps2sd is at least in part that they don't want to introduce the instability that would be caused by removing the SD card mid-stream when that's where your apps are stored. While this makes sense to a point, it seems that so much else about Android is geared toward the more techie user that this is an issue that we could deal with. At least it could be an option, along with a sternly worded disclaimer. Personally, I've been using Cyanogen's mods for about four months now, and I've been amazed at how much more usable my G1 is now - it's truly like night and day. I look back now and I don't know how I put up with the slowness of the standard ROM.

You can exit out of an app and leave it running by using the home key, or app switcher (long press home key). If you use the back key or the close option in the menu then the app closes and does not run in the background. That way both advanced users and regular users have an easy way to control what happens with an app when you exit.

@André: I'm a Mom, but I get your point. People who aren't technical types should just stick with the simpler phones.

That leads me to another point: Why do phone consumers only have two flavors? We either have total geek-phones that are too complex for the non-techies, or we have phones that are just for talking and not good for much else. Someone should make a basic smartphone that just synchronizes your calendar, contacts and tasks and gives alerts for reminders and appointments. I'm the techie in my family - my husband and kids are not. I wish they could have simple phones to which I could just push the google calendars, etc. (and for which a full data plan would not be needed, of course).

- Andrew

We should distinguish between "users" and "users". Let's call them "prosumer" and "consumer" whereas the first one is everybody reading AndroidGuys.com and the latter ones are your moms. Of course everybody reading AndroidGuys.com is smart enough to understand what tasks are and all of you are able to use a task manager. And you also know that you're going to overload the system if you're starting dozens of apps which simultaneously notify about the latest Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and FriendFeed postings. This is exactly what you describe with "responsibility of the user".

My mom, however, doesn't think of such things. But she will never encounter those problems anyway because she's not a tech geek and never heard of AndroidGuys.com. She doesn't even know what a blog is. If her mobile is slow or crashes than that's not her fault actually. At least she wouldn't feel guilty in any way

The key to success of a platform is to get both the consumer and the prosumer. iPhone definitely does a better job here but the Android platform hasn't reached full speed yet. And it was always one of Google's tactics to get the prosumer first because in the end of the day the prosumer ("you") is the one telling the consumer ("your mom", "your neighbor", etc.) what to buy. Just let's give the platform another 6 to 12 months and watch all the Motorola Blurs and HTC Senses user interface evolute to a real consumer friendly system.