Thank you for the Android platform. You have created the greatest operating system on the planet with access to the world at my finger tips. You do your very best to improve upon the OS and your various applications that help run my day-to-day life. I have access to the web and you even sync my PC Chrome pages to my device so I don’t have to remember what that website was that I left open on my PC. You manage my personal and business email with ease and make it functional and fluid. You keep me connected to people via Gchat, offer me a free phone number with Google Voice and provide me with a social outlet to make friends and explore the world with Google Plus.
Your OEM partners continue to redefine what a smartphone is and what it should do. Using your open platform, they have created amazing devices with functions, that 5 years ago, would have just been a dream with no leg to stand on. Seriously, 5.5-inch HD screen, quad-core processors, 2GB of RAM, split screen viewing, floating windows and video, HDMI out, 24 hour batter life, 1080p video capture and photos while recording a video just to name a few ridiculous specs.
You took the Android Market and redefined it with a new branding, the Play Store. Taking what major company’s might have seen as child’s play and turned it into successful and thriving business and culture. Going beyond simple and fun games and useful tools to movies, TV shows, Books, Magazines and music. Bringing the digital world to my finger tips 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. To make things even better, you took your platform to your partners and created great and affordable devices like the Nexus 7, Nexus 10 and Nexus 4. Offering the world to consumers at a price many could actually afford.
You continue to offer a service that developers across the globe embrace and build upon. Apps like Netflix, Plex, HBO Go, Hulu Plus, Angry Birds, Instagram, Pinterest, Kindle, Safeway Just for You, Flipboard, Dropbox and so many more that I couldn’t live without. The list could go on for days. Over the course of my Android career I have installed over 2,200 various games and applications. All served a purpose at some point in time in my life. For all of this I thank you, but at the same time, I loath you. I will tell you why.
When I first started with Android in  the days of the only Android device available, the T-Mobile G1, I had no idea where the journey would lead. The technology progressed, the OS matured. The developers had a better platform to work with and better hardware to push to its limits.  I thought it couldn’t get better than turn by turn voice navigation on my phone via Google Maps. Boy was I wrong. I have more apps than a person should need in their entire life. I can’t decide if I want to watch a movie or read a book. Should I grab the Moga controller and play some N.O.V.A. 3 or check what’s going on on G+ and all my circled friends. The overwhelming ability of Android has driven me to keep a minimum of three devices charged at my bedside. Having a movie playing on one, a book open on the other and checking feeds on the third. I hear my device chime and I just have to look and see what it is. Was it an email about a great new accessory? An email about an amazing new app? A new Twitter, Facebook of Google+ comment or share? I just never know.
Thanks to you I have gone from the average American who would sleep a consistent 8 hours a night, down to getting 4 to 5 hours of sleep if I am lucky. You have single-handedly created an addiction that there is no rehab for. Even if I head to the woods where I have no data connection, I take your platform with me for GPS mapping and tracking, a flashlight, an alarm clock, internal media like movies and books and so much more. I can’t leave the house without my device and I can’t sleep knowing that I might just miss something.
I know that if you were to leave me, I would go through terrible withdrawals and might do something stupid, like buy a Windows Phone. So please don’t go away or change. But seriously, I need some sleep.
Sincerely,
Stormy Beach
*Disclaimer – This letter is fictitious and meant to be funny. It is in no way meant to bash Google or Android in any way shape or form. It is something that popped into my head and I thought it could be a fun little post. Have a little laugh and let us know if you have lost hours of sleep because of your device, a new game, an OS update, a new ROM or anything else thanks to Android.
