Comment Oh of course... (Score 1) 124
So Samsung finally release a phone that hits all the marks, that reviewers and consumers go crazy for, that actually has decent software on it.
So OBVIOUSLY to maintain this level of success they should go and fork Android and create a crappy customized version that nobody wants... yeah, that makes PERFECT sense.
I think Samsung (and TFA's author) are seriously overestimating the appeal of Samsung's own apps. I've got an S3 (the first smartphone I've owned, because it's the first one I've ever really wanted) and the Samsung apps and features are just bloatware:
- AllShare Play seems to be a cloud storage service for media files, with the curious limitation that it can only be used on the S3 and Windows computers. So in other words, it sucks. Dropbox or a similar service would seem to be a far better option.
- ChatOn is one of the stronger apps that Samsung bundle with the S3. It's a chat/messaging service that works cross-platform (it's available for Android, iOS, Blackberry and Windows Phone) and it's actually not too bad at what it does. Still, there are lots of other communications apps out there, so it's not exactly a killer app.
- S Memo is a simple note/sketch app with sync capabilities. It can sync up nicely with...
- S Planner is a decent calendar app, and it can import/export and sync with most calendar sources (Exchange, Google, Samsung account, etc.). It's not too bad. Shame the default (perhaps only?) skin is a brown/beige colour scheme that really doesn't fit with the rest of the phone. Again, there are LOADS of good calendar/task planning apps out there.
- S Suggest is like a social frontend to an app store. It integrates with Facebook (though I haven't tried that feature) and lets you see what apps your friends download and recommends new apps based on your preferences. I looked at a bunch of featured apps, and none of them had any comments whatsoever, so perhaps without FB integration enabled it's useless. I wouldn't go near this app, tbh.
- I haven't used S Voice. It certainly looks like a ghetto Siri, but I don't know how functional it is. Personally, I think Siri on iOS is a gimmick, which would make this a knock-off of a gimmick. I have no desire to use it.
What I actually love about the S3 is that it runs ICS like a dream, has a nice large, bright, vibrant screen, lots of connectivity options and a reasonable battery life. That, and the best content of the Google Play store are what attracted me, not Samsung's own apps which range in quality from "ok" to "why even bother?".