April 28, 2011

Our third, final, and perhaps most important article of Android week takes a look at the Android marketplace.

For all that our smartphones do out of the box — phone, GPS, email, music, internet — it is really their ability to do seemingly anything (and everything) else which is their greatest feature. The degree to which this is possible depends almost entirely on our ability to load additional programs onto the device.

Apple began this trend with their excellent App Store. Google has countered this with the Android Marketplace. After years using the former and a week-and-a-half with the latter, we take a look at the differences.

The Numbers

If you browse the Internet looking at comparisons of, say, the iPhone 4 and the Google Nexus S, you will find seemingly no end of reviews that give the edge to Apple on the virtue of numbers alone. Apple has over twice the number of applications, they say, so their store is better.

The logical fallacy here should be clear — more and better are two very different things. For instance, amongst those 350,000+ applications available to iPhone users are many an application that simulates fart noises. It is hard to be convinced that this makes for a better store.

Obviously numbers do matter. An application store with ten applications, for instance, would quite clearly not have the variety needed. But there is probably little difference in having one thousand, ten thousand, or one million options for your Twitter application — the average user is likely to narrow their choices quickly to a half dozen or so, and pick what appears to be the best out of that list.

With over 150,000 applications in the Android Marketplace, we at the Big Bad Blog feel that Android easily clears this hurdle — after all, two years ago Apple’s App Store had a mere 35,000 applications available, and we never had a problem finding what we were looking for.

The Wild West

The second trope that seems to be pulled out quite often is mention that the Google Marketplace is like “the Wild West”. For instance, to quote CNet:

The Android Market is like the Wild West, containing a mix of the best, worst, smartest and dumbest apps, jumbled up in a way that can be hard to sort through.

We are never sure what people mean by “Wild West” when they say it in reviews. We suspect they don’t either — it has simply become a trope. Certainly we do not think of “a mix of the best, worst, smartest and dumbest” as the “Wild West”. We think of bad Will Smith movies, Clint Eastwood, shoot-outs and the Oregon trail. We have our doubts that you are likely to die of dysentery through the Android Marketplace.

Still, CNet’s points are worth talking about.

The Best. The best applications available for Android are, quite simply, better than the best applications available for the iPhone. The folks at Google don’t care if you’re replacing a core functionality of the phone with your App. They do not stop your application from running in the background, or playing with certain parts of the phone. They do not prevent significant changes to your phones look, feel and functionality.

All of this means that applications on the phone can simply do more.

The Worst. The worst applications available for Android are, quite simply, worse than the worst applications available for the iPhone. Google places no controls on what can be sold in the Marketplace, which means that things that are simply too tasteless (or too poorly coded) to make it through Apple’s review process are available.

The Smartest. We do not know what “the smartest” means. Obviously smart applications are better because they can do more (see “the best”, above), except when they’re really trojans stealing your identity. This might actually mean that the iPhone’s good applications are “smarter”, though, as they have to deal with more restrictions, and require more creativity to perform some of the same tasks.

The Dumbest. Again, we do not know what this means. Certainly Apple’s store has plenty of fart noises in it. We think that both stores manage to reach the lowest common denominator pretty well.

Jumbled up. This is one of the two very valid critiques of the Google Marketplace — Apple has done a much better job at helping their users to find things.

The Real Differences

Organisation

The Apple App Store is far, far, far better organised than the Google Marketplace. While we spent many an hour with our iPhone browsing through the App Store to see what might come up, not only do we not do the same with our Android device — we have no desire to do so. A short-lived (and quickly aborted) attempt to interact with it as we did with the App Store was more than enough for us.

Instead, we decide what Apps we want on our new phone, and go directly to them.

Functionality

Android is a platform. Phone manufacturers (and users) are allowed to load it onto any phone they want, and make any modifications they want along the way.

The iPhone is a product. Only Apple is allowed to make phones that run their mobile Operating System, and access to the phone from a personal computer is forced to take place through custom-made Apple software.

This is reflected in the functionality permitted in the applications for their devices. Android is seemingly infinitely customizable. If there is something your phone cannot do, it is because the application has not been written yet, not because the application is not available. On the iPhone, everything needs to fit within a managed Apple experience.

The end result is that Android applications can simply do more. Synchronize over WiFi, for example.

Danger

The flip-side of the increased flexibility and functionality that is available through the Android Marketplace is that the applications are not always benign. With no oversight of the applications, and the potential to interact with any other part of your phone, there is an increased wariness when evaluating an App from Google’s Marketplace.

This is, of course, healthy. Apple’s devices have had their own issues with applications that collect (and sell) user data, and perhaps a bit more due diligence ought to also be taken with purchases there. But the increased functionality and decreased oversight puts the onus on the end user to ensure that his or her downloads do not compromise the system.

Options

The final difference, of course, is that Android users do not have to use the Google Marketplace. They are free to use the Amazon App Store, or the Opera App Store, or from any other place they can find that wants to sell them (or give them away for free).

With the shortcomings being largely specific to the Marketplace, and not to to the platform itself, one can find an App Store for their Android device that pre-screens applications and/or is organised in a pleasing manner for browsing.

The Impact

So how do these differences impact our behaviour? In a very surprising way.

Every Apple Application we ever bought was done so via the iPhone interface. We would browse to find something, or search for a term, read the descriptions and reviews, and make a choice. It was simple, self-contained and easy.

With the Google Marketplace, we approach things very differently. We begin by identifying something we want — “a Twitter client”, “an RSS Reader”, “a music player”.

We then search on Google — via our PC — for information. Recommendations, reviews. We check the application-maker’s website. Do they have a forum? How do they respond to feedback? Do they seem trustworthy?

We then find the application in the Android Marketplace, and review the permissions it needs from our phone. Are all the permissions necessary, or does it include permissions that are not needed for the functionality described in the application?

Finally, we download the App from the Marketplace.

Our conclusions

In the end, we expect that the Apple App Store and Android marketplace both appeal to different people.

The Apple version will appeal to those who are happy and satisfied with the Apple experience. Those who want whimsical things on their phone, enjoy browsing for them, and — while they may care that their phone has functionality — are unconcerned with limitations to that functionality. Those that prefer reasonable security with little thought.

Others — such as ourselves — get annoyed by the accumulation of silly, rarely-used applications that begin to pile up after multiple browsing sessions. If restrictions irk you, and a bit of research invigorates you, the Android Marketplace feels better. It discourages browsing — you need to know what you want, and go straight to it.

On the other hand, you can get anything you want.

We are of the second kind, and find the Android Marketplace a preferable place. For the former kind, there are other Android stores out there — but ultimately, if you want to be living within a managed mobile experience (rather than building your own), you are likely to find more success with Apple. It is, after all, their specialty.

April 26, 2011

I have now had a week to play with my new Google Nexus S phone, and given the attention that was lavished upon the decision, we thought that we would let you know our first impressions.

A few things to keep in mind:

• We are, in general, comparing the Google Nexus S to the iPhone
• Our iPhone was a 3GS. We will try to keep performance in perspective, as the iPhone 4 clearly ought to outperform our old phone.
• We try to remain neutral, but keep in mind that we are not fond of Apple in this corner of the Internet, and are a bit excited about a new toy.

Phone Build

The phone itself is fantastic.

It’s thinner, lighter and has a superior screen to the iPhone 3GS — we’re not sure about the iPhone 4, on any of these counts — and the curved screen makes it feel a bit more like a phone when using it as such. We are not holding a very expensive brick to our face any longer.

And the phone bits? Wonderful. Much better signal strength, much better sound quality.

It’s almost as if it’s a Smartphone built by a phone manufacturer, rather than an iPod with call-making capabilities built by a computer company.

The one advantage the iPhone has, however, is that the Nexus is lacking in heft — we are still left with the distinct impression that the phone will not handle abuse as well as Apple’s did.

Judging phone elements:
Style … Nexus!
Signal … Nexus!
Call Quality … Nexus!
Screen … Tie!
Heft … iPhone!
Accessibility … Nexus!

OVERALL … Nexus!

Music

We knew that Samsung would make a better phone than Apple, though, in terms of pure phone-ness. What about the music?

Music sync and playback is, to us, one of the most important features on the phone, and the biggest cause for concern when switching over — for all the annoyances, iTunes synchronizes with the iPhone pretty smoothly (or it did, once upon a time), and the iPhone is based upon the iPod — a music-playing device.

After some experimentation — the story of which is long enough to fill its own article — we settled on iSyncr and PowerAMP.

iSyncr enables synchronization over WiFi with iTunes. This has been flawless, and makes synchronizing music easier than it ever was with the iPhone. Not only are there no wires required, but changing the synchronization settings are a breeze, once everything has been set up.

The native Android music player is pretty horrendous, however, so we downloaded PowerAMP and found that suddenly our music collection was sounding better than it ever had on the iPhone.

Judging music elements:
Sync … Nexus!
Playback … Nexus!
Initial setup … iPhone!
Modifying setup … Nexus!

OVERALL … Nexus!

Social Networking

Music was an expected weak point for the Nexus, Social Networking an expected strong point. The key to a social network, after all, is to have people participating in it. With Android being the most popular handset Operating System and an open Android market, surely it must be bursting with excellent and innovative apps. While we found success in locating a Twitter client, we were also left with the impression that the iPhone has a greater range of options, application-wise.

We started with Twitter. Our Desktop Twitter client is TweetDeck, and our iPhone client was TweetList, which is not available on Android.

We decided to try TweetDeck for Android, and were pleasantly surprised. We had previously tried their iPhone application and found it lacking. Either they have redesigned their mobile client since then, or have completely separate design teams for the iPhone and Android. The Android Tweetdeck application is excellent — it puts all my networks into a single feed, and allows me to selectively update to Twitter, Facebook and/or FourSquare. (I believe they do LinkedIn as well, if you’re into that sort of thing).

TweetList is a wonderful iPhone application, with the most intuitive interface I have ever used on a Twitter application — or perhaps any mobile application — and is sorely missed for that. But the extra TweetDeck features are fantastic, as we no longer feel the need to have separate Twitter, Facebook and FourSquare applications on our phone.

Judging:
Choice … iPhone!
Functionality … Nexus!
Intuitiveness … iPhone!

OVERALL … iPhone! (by a whisker, so much here is application-dependent).

Other common uses

So there are other common smartphone uses here, which did not seem to group well, and we didn’t want to put elsewhere.

email … iPhone! The native Google application is surprisingly awful. The best option available appears to be K9, which is pretty good, but still does not quite match up to the Mail app that comes with the iPhone.

Maps and Navigation … Nexus! This should come as little surprise, as the iPhone uses Google Maps. Google happens to do Google Maps better. Offline maps and TFL Journeyplanner applications seem on par with the iPhone, though we have had little chance to press them into use thus far.

RSS Reader … Nexus! Back when we were setting up our iPhone, it took us weeks — literally weeks! — and more downloaded apps than I can remember before we settled on Reeder, which met all our reading needs. It took us 24 hours and two downloads to find NewsRob, which does everything Reeder does, but does it smoother, faster and more pleasingly.

Random observations

Beyond the above, we did note a few random things that bear mentioning.

NFC … Tie! A tie? The Nexus HAS Near Field Communication, the iPhone does not. But it hardly matters, because there are absolutely no functions for NFC at the moment, so we just turn it off so that it doesn’t drain the battery at all. Our dreams of swiping our phone to get on the tube, or pay for a coffee, are probably still outside the lifetime of this phone.

Accessibility … Nexus! It’s fairly evident that one of the benefits of Android is access to the device — users can change the battery, access the filesystem, and other such things. This plays out into a larger advantage than a plug-and-player like myself would have thought. Something as simple as showing how much each application has drained the battery is informative and useful, and Android’s policy of indicating what permissions are given to each installed application helps shape our choices more than we anticipated.

Accessories … iPhone! One thing that we didn’t anticipate was the dearth of phone accessories that would be available. Every phone store sells iPhone cases — and then there’s the Apple store. If you have a Nexus, good luck finding a case at the phone store, nevermind a choice of cases. We bought the Tech 21 case, only to find that it wasn’t actually designed with the curved body of the Nexus S in mind — it just had the right height, width, depth and cut-outs. No good. Our most promising option for a case right now is to order one from America. That just seems wrong.

In their pocket … Tie! However, if you are trying to get out under the thumb of Apple — as we were — Google may feel more free, but that’s not necessarily the case. Our phone’s information is backed up on Google’s servers. Our contacts are Google Contacts. Our photos are synched via Picassa, Google’s cloud photo service.

The great advertiser in the sky knows more about us than ever before.

Overall verdict

So, a week into our new Android life, are we happy with the decision we made? Do we still feel that the Nexus S is superior to the iPhone 4?

Yes, and yes.

We find it nicer to look at, nicer to make calls with, and nicer to listen to music and read with. Its in-built functionality is considerably weaker than that on the iPhone, but unlike the iPhone, these functions can be easily upgraded from the market.

And that’s where the real satisfaction comes in. Both systems are easily extensible, through third party applications. But Apple’s insistence that applications are not permitted to compete with the core Apple-built products on the phone means that upgrading is difficult to impossible.

We would choose Android again in a heartbeat.

April 15, 2011

[poll id="2"]

The year 2011 appears to be the year of the unexpected expense. The year began with my old computer dying, forcing me to buy a new computer as we at the Big Bad Blog are clearly computer addicts that can not stand to spend much time unplugged. Then our glasses broke, and it proved necessary to purchase a new pair to wear on our face on a daily basis.

Now? Now it’s the phone.

Back in January, my phone broke — it refused to sync with iTunes. This was frustrating, and had me thinking about what I would look for in a new phone, but was ultimately fixed by returning the device to factory settings.

It’s a hand-held computer, I thought, and these things happen. It’s fixed now.

Fixed, yes, but data was lost. All the information for all my contacts. The way my applications were organised. The saved passwords. Everything had to be painstakingly put back in its place.

Last week it happened again. iTunes won’t sync — it doesn’t recognise the phone, and thinks it has been previously synced with another computer. It wants to set it up from scratch, as a new phone … or, it will allow me to restore it from backup!

Except that when this error first happened, it tried to back up the phone and failed.

This has now happened twice, a few months apart, so a new phone search is officially on.

Before we begin, a quick rundown of what we need from our new phone:

• Music on the go. My iPhone has been, first and foremost, an iPod. The ability to set up and sync “smart” playlists (that change, rotating different music in and out), and a good music interface is a primary concern.
• Social Networking. We like to tweet on the road. And to consult our RSS reader when we’re bored.
• GPS, maps and navigation. Once upon a time, we used to consult maps before leaving our home, so we knew where we were going. No longer. We get ourselves close and pull out our phone now. Train schedules? App. Tube closures? App.
• Extensibility. Back when we got our first iPhone, we wouldn’t have believed point two, and would question the extent to which we lean on the items in point three. We won’t try to predict the future, but we do want a phone that will be able to handle whatever that future might hold.
• Security. Phones are no longer phones, they are computers. Each of the phones that are listed below are more powerful than the computer I (by which I mean my parents) bought when I left for University. Ensuring that patches for security holes are being loaded to the phone is incredibly important.

One more item is that — unlike computers — when it comes to phones I am a plug-and-play guy. While I do not mind spending a lot of time setting up the phone, once it’s set up, it needs to run on its own. Plug it in, sync it in three clicks (or less), and go. I do not have the time (nor the inclincation) to have to play with the phone beyond the initial set up and the very occasional revisiting of those settings.

For instance, two set ups in four months is enough for me to change phones.

The Contestants

iPhone 4

Always start with the incumbant. Or something along those lines. While the actual incumbant is a broken-down iPhone 3GS, let’s be realistic — I’m not going to spend a bunch of money to get the same phone I am unhappy with right now. So we will consider the upgrade to be the incumbant.

What to say about the iPhone 4?

While we at the Big Bad Blog have (quite clearly) grown tired of Apple and its products, their iPhones have been meeting our smart phone requirements for nearly three years now, and their iPods our music requirements for over five.

The Pros:

• Familiarity – Let us not underestimate the power of familiarity. Change requires effort. There will be new software to install, we will have to find the ideal applications for us to use, ad nauseum. These things have a cost.
• Porting – Our iPhone is backed up on our computer (allegedly), so all the information from it should simply copy over to the new phone. That’s how it worked when moving from the 3G to the 3GS, anyways. In any case, our downloaded (and, for the most part, purchased) applications can be loaded onto the phone at no cost, rather than having to re-buy everything for a new Operating System.
• iTunes – We hate iTunes, but we love iTunes. Music, photos and applications simply sync with the click of a button … and that click is optional. While there are things to hate about the iTunes/iPhone relationship, it certainly is plug-and-play.
• Music – The iPhone is built on the iPod, which has been leading the pack in mobile music for years.
• Navigation – GPS-enabled, with a good selection of navigation apps already downloaded.
• Social Networking – Apps, apps, everywhere. The only trouble is identifying which to use, which we have already done.
• Extensibility – Apple has the largest phone application store of the three competitors.
• Security – With Apple handling both the hardware and software, and updates coming via iTunes (rather than through the mobile carrier), there is no middle-man, meaning that patches are installed as soon as they are available.

The Cons:

• It’s Apple – A quick search for “Apple” on the Big Bad Blog will turn up more than a few negative articles about Apple. The standards they use to approve (or, more accurately, to disapprove) of apps is disappointing. Their business practices border on unfair and monopolistic. And we fully believe that when Mr. Jobs’ age and ill health force him to retire (hopefully — we would rather he not die anytime soon), one wonders how the company will function. The iPhone could have lost its mojo in a couple of years.
• iTunes – We love iTunes, but we hate it more. It’s slow, clunky, and poorly designed. And the iPhone locks you into using it. There is really no other way to get things on and off the phone.
• The Lockdown – Apple considers your phone to be their phone. It’s on lockdown. They decide what can go on it, and what can’t. How you can access it. While this is of little practical consideration from a plug-and-player like me, the principle is grating.
• No flash support – HTML5 has not taken off to the point where this is not a pain in the backside.
• Most expensive option – We crunched the numbers, and the iPhone 4 costs between £100 (if we front-load the price) and £250 more than the next closest option (the Nexus S, below) over the course of the contract.
• Legendary for its poor performance as an actual phone – The iPhone has long been a running joke as being the best phone out there, as long as you don’t want to make calls. The “holding it wrong” issue with the iPhone 4, combined with competitors catching up in features and performance make this weakness appear even more glaring.

Nexus S

The main alternative to the iPhone is the Android phone — and there are many of them. But nearly all of them suffer from the same flaw: manufacturer interference.

Google, of course, is the author of the (open source) Android Operating System. But nearly every incarnation of the Operating System that makes it to the consumer is not Google’s Android. Instead, it is a manufacturer-modified version of Android. This means that when a security issue is noted and patched by Google, that security patch cannot be installed on your phone. Instead, the maker of your phone needs to then recreate their modifications, or modify the patch, or whatnot, to make it compatible with whatever they have added to the OS.

And how many Android developers do you think that your average phone hardware manufacturer has on staff doing this?

The result is that patches are delayed, or security holes are never patched.

Android is the market leader for phone Operating Systems, which means that they are the primary target for phone hackers. Android also has an “open” application market — the applications are not pre-screened before benig sold. Which makes the patches even more important.

The only way to be sure that you are getting the latest patches is to buy a Google flagship phone — one that has pure Google Android on it. And Samsung’s Nexus S is the current version of such a phone. As such, it is the only Android option capable of checking the “security” box, and our #1 Android contestant.

The Pros:

• Extensibility – While the application store is not as large as Apple’s, the selection is so extensive that it is hard to imagine noticing this without actually checking the total numbers from a third party. And because Google does not censor apps, there ought to be a wider variety.
• Security – The Nexus S should be the most secure of the three we are investigating. Open Source solutions are almost universally more secure than their closed brethren. The Android exception is due to the unavailability of patches when security issues come to light. This, however, should not be an issue with the Nexus S, as Samsung does not modify the OS.
• Social Networking – The Android app store is chock full of applications for social networking. The problem will be choosing which ones to use.
• Navigation – The Nexus S is GPS enabled, and the Android market has good looking options for the rest.
• The spec – On pure, raw, under-the-hood power, the Nexus S is the best of the three phones. Not that any of them are a slouch.

The Cons:

• Interface – Compared to the Windows and Apple interfaces, Android 2.3 seems rather clunky. It is not responsive, smooth or polished by comparison — merely functional. While functional is enough, in theory, this is supposed to be a top-of-the-line phone … and is certainly priced like one.
• Phone build – The Nexus S is supposed to have a fancy, state of the art, curved screen. Maybe it does — we couldn’t tell the difference. But the phone itself felt lightweight, plasticky, and cheap. Again, we might not mind at a lower price point, but it is a concern.

The Questions:

• Music – There is an application called DoubleTwist for Android that is reportedly pretty good for what we are looking for. And there are other options out there, too. The phone we tested in the shop had no music on it, however, so we are uncertain about the Android music interface.

HTC HD7

The third major OS for smart phones is Windows Phone 7. There are also Blackberries, but we consider them to be business phones, and are not considering a Blackberry for our personal phone needs.

We expected the Microsoft mobile OS to fall flat. The company that separated hardware from the software that ran on it, went on to completely dominate the world of office software, and created a browser that destroyed all competition in its first twenty years has had a miserable last decade. 2001 marked the release of Windows XP and Internet Explorer 6 — and Microsoft ruled the roost.

The next decade is largely lost for Microsoft — Office 2007, Windows Vista, the Zune, IE7, practically no presence in mobile computing (tablets and smart phones) — it seems that Microsoft spent an entire decade getting only the XBox right.

But with Windows 7 and Internet Explorer 9, Microsoft has once again started to improve their flagship products. And we at the Big Bad Blog have always coveted these HTC phones that are so very pretty, but belong to somebody else. We took one for a spin, and were not let down.

Windows Phone 7 is as slick on the HTC as the iPhone 4 interface, while being completely different, while Android feels like a clunky Apple imitation. Everything is still intuitive (though it will take some getting used to). We were impressed.

The Pros:

• Music – According to the reviews we read, the HD7 syncs seamlessly with Microsoft’s Zune desktop software. While porting our music out of iTunes promises to be a pain in the ass, we won’t be sorry to be using different software. The phone is not on lockdown, so other options will exist if Zune happens not to be our cup of tea.
• It’s pretty – We like the HTC. The hardware and the interface are all good looking, smooth and responsive. The iPhone is also pretty, but we liked the feel of the HTC better.
• Less expensive – The HTC HD7 is £200 less expensive than the Nexus over the life of a contract, and £500 less expensive than the iPhone. It certainly appears to be better built than the former, and on par with the latter. We assume it’s the “unpopular OS discount”.
• Security – If anybody knows how to roll out OS updates to customers using third party hardware, it’s Microsoft.
• Navigation – The HD7 is GPS-enabled, with a compass, and we were impressed with the Maps application. Tube and National Rail applications are also available.
• Social Networking – Twitter clients? RSS Readers? The Microsoft App Store might be in its infancy compared to its Android and Apple counterparts, but there were plenty of clients found for the functionality we’re looking for.

The Cons:

• No flash support – We are used to this from the iPhone, and there may be an application or update in the wings for this — we don’t think that Microsoft shares Apple’s Adobe vendetta — but it is disappointing nonetheless.

The Questions:

• Extensibility – Microsoft’s app store looks pretty pathetic in comparison to those for Android and the iPhone. It’s a fair question to ask whether the groundbreaking applications of the future will be available to Windows Phone users.

Our conclusions

Right this minute, we are leaning towards the HTC HD7.

We do not wish to be an Apple customer any longer. Every time we buy an app (or see an advertisement on a free app) on our iPhone, that’s money in Apple’s pocket. It will be nice for that to stop. While the iPhone checks all our boxes, it is also prohibitively expensive and constantly twists our nipples.

Android seems fantastic, but we wish their “flagship” model lived in a nicer house — or that patches could come quickly on other phones. We cannot help but think that our money might be better spent on a different product.

But it does have the best spec.

But the HTC HD7 is beautiful.

Bbefore we go and spend our hard earned money, we are wondering, dear Internet, if you will give us your opinion:

Do you (or have you ever) owned one of these phones? If so, what do you think of it? Is my take on the phone consistent with your experience?

If you could choose any of these phones, which would you choose … and why?

We are hoping that our reactions to your answers help us determine what we want. Or that you can convince us one way or another.

(NB: Just a few seconds later, and I’m already second-guessing myself. Though the last bit of the second video reminds me of how nice it is to interact with the HTC phone … it’s so smooth. So now I’m hedging back.)

(Help me, people!)

NEW: A Poll!

To help all you quiet people out there:

[poll id="2"]

April 1, 2011

Our concept of which companies behave “ethically” is skewed. People generally seem to associate Microsoft with “the man”, hence they are evil. Apple is more carefree — not necessarily ethical, but certainly not anti-ethical. Google is good.

Reality, of course, is not so cut-and-dried. Of the three companies mentioned above, only Microsoft finds itself on the 2011 list of most ethical companies.

Here at the Big Bad Blog, we are not so surprised. Microsoft was founded (and, for years, run) by Bill Gates, who now spends his time trying to give away his ridiculously large fortune to charitable causes.

Remember kids, branding isn’t behaviour, and actions mean more than words.

Image by Mehmet Ozgur. Found at My Modern Metropolis.
Webcomic is Jesus and Mo, by whoever it is that makes that comic.