It’s not the device, it’s the ecosystem

[kaardowiq]

Im wondering that I’m the only one who heavily relies on the ecosystem. In fact, with iCloud we have all parts fully covered:

- custom email domain
- (Famiky)sharing
- Photo / Drive etc
- office (incl. cal)
- connectivity like messages and facetime
- Find my for family members and devices

I’m really missing the possibility for Google One. With Google One I’m missing custom domains, when using GSuite it lags of supporting several services like Stadia, Home etc.

 

[ian87w]

The only catch with Apple ecosystem is that you will only use Apple products (aside from Apple TV or Apple music). Once you have a non-Apple device mixed in, the integration breaks down.

 

[kaardowiq]

that's true. Therefore, I don't understand why Google isn't taking the afford to make Google One more attractive like custom domains. The whole infrastructure and toolset is already given by GSuite.

 

[ian87w]

that's true. Therefore, I don't understand why Google isn't taking the afford to make Google One more attractive like custom domains. The whole infrastructure and toolset is already given by GSuite.

Imo right now, both Google (worse) and Microsoft (decent) have mediocre offerings for their consumer version of services, compared to their enterprise version. Their consumer products are not as fully featured. Apple has the opportunity to provide better service targeted towards consumers instead. I thought Apple was going somewhere when they announced iWork on iCloud, complete with a demo. The custom domain thing is a welcome addition. Small businesses is where the market is ripe for competition, where most of them need/want to go digital, but don't have the IT for it. Apple should be putting more efforts into making Apple services more accessible for small businesses.

 

[The Game 161]

Yep we have family sharing on all our devices as wife and daughter have iPhones, apple watches and ipads. Soon I will be needing to add the 2TB plan

 

[cuzo]

Google needs to do much better and honestly OneDrive is better integrated than Google drive in a sense. Even the your phone feature on android phones still has issue connecting to the desktop. Google needs a solution to be more competitive to apple when it comes to selling integrated features apple kills them with how iCloud integrates into everything.

When you think about it the chrome book should be pushed heavy like iPads as it’s somewhat in the same market. They need to focus on tablet chrome books and integration with Google drive and pictures and so forth but Google is all over the place. Chrome book will never replaced the pc they need to focus on portable light activities like iPad.

 

[samcraig]

I find Google's suite more straightforward. But YMMV, clearly.

 

[Awesomesince86]

Apple does the ecosystem thing right. They make it so every device you have in the ecosystem improves the overall experience be working seamlessly together. Google has never really gotten that aspect and probably don’t really care since hardware is very much secondary to them. Samsung has done an admirable job lately of building an ecosystem and I think it actually works pretty well. Not on the Apple level, but close.

 

[kyussmondo]

I do think iCloud is underrated. I know in the past Apple has been criticised for services like the original Maps and MobileMe, but they are solid services that have improved over time and never let me down. The main issue is, I care less about hardware and operating systems than ever. I use macOS all day at work and use Windows in the evenings. I use iOS but would be perfectly happy on Android. Services are the most important thing, stuff like iCloud and Google are the things that are connecting all these devices together.

The issue with iCloud is that while some services like Apple Music are becoming more cross-platform and while iCloud Mail etc do use more open standards like IMAP, there are services like iCloud Photos and iCloud Drive etc that just are not available on Android or pretty lame implementations on Windows. Google Photos, Gmail, Google Docs, Chrome, Drive, work everywhere. Yeah, iCloud has some web versions, but they really are like a toy when you compare them to the apps and other web-based apps. Really, the only other company that offers like for like is Google and it is cross-platform, then if you decide to go Android then you do get Find My replacements and Family Sharing, screen time etc through Android and the Chrome browser, same thing through a Microsoft account.

Honestly, I have never used handoff that much between my Apple devices. Stuff like cloud tabs on Chrome and Spotify Connect (ironically even better than Apple Music) work great cross-platform. And then there is Apple One bundle. The only two Apple services I care for are maybe Apple Music and iCloud Drive, I really do not care for Arcade, News+, Fitness+ or TV+. If Apple is serious about services, beyond just linking their hardware together, they need to focus a lot more on cross platform with much better Android, Windows and web apps for all their services. I guess if they did that though they would become a bit looser on privacy, which they are essentially subsidising right now with hardware sales.

 

[JahBoolean]

The only catch with Apple ecosystem is that you will only use Apple products (aside from Apple TV or Apple music). Once you have a non-Apple device mixed in, the integration breaks down.

The file sharing does work with windows devices. The apps are an other problem.

 

[edubfromktown]

Im wondering that I’m the only one who heavily relies on the ecosystem. In fact, with iCloud we have all parts fully covered:

- custom email domain
- (Famiky)sharing
- Photo / Drive etc
- office (incl. cal)
- connectivity like messages and facetime
- Find my for family members and devices

I’m really missing the possibility for Google One. With Google One I’m missing custom domains, when using GSuite it lags of supporting several services like Stadia, Home etc.

Nope...

I do not rely on the ecosystem at all. Used an iPhone 3gs on up to 8 Plus and threw in the towel on the UI alltogether. 30k+ photos managed in LightRoom Classic with all the Creative Cloud resource hogging garbage ripped out.

Still use Mac’s as primary systems at home and one iPad to keep tabs on my Apple CC and occasional FaceTime chats. Otherwise, Android phone (OnePlus 8T with contacts synced to Google… which go to the Mac’s too), a couple of cheap Chromebook’s (free Google One account) and that’s it!

 

[Reggaenald]

Personally I wish I could unterstand the praise for the ecosystem better.
iCloud tabs in Safari haven’t worked for me in awhile (thanks to Monterey) but it’s been here and there over the years, Handoff is hit and miss as well, Note and Calendar syncing has giving me a lot of headaches and it still does too often, I’ve had entire folders with many subfolders just disappear from Files (I didn’t delete them, they were just gone one day) which is completely unacceptable!, I’ve had entire photo libraries corrupted all of a sudden to a point not even an iCloud senior on phone could help, the list goes on.
Still I see great benefit from iCloud for all the times it does work but every time I read or hear someone say it’s seamless I could, hmmhm, get really angry. Especially if someone at Apple says that.
Apart from that I hate that if you don’t have a Mac you need an Apple Watch to tell the time by the second, the Watch widget on iPhone doesn’t count.
I hate that Apps like Music on iOS are very very very feature stripped compared to their Mac counterparts. For example looking at Playlist management. Or viewing metadata and other info on songs and albums.
I basically hate that for some things you need a different device because Apple creates that need artificially with their software.
I love the ecosystem when it makes my life easier, Family Sharing for example is great.
But I literally hate it when it stands in my way. Not because it has to, but because someone at Apple wants it to.