Thanks Josh for taking the time to share all that knowledge. I would say we are probably hanging out in some of the same forums, you're obviously familiar with flashing ROMs, radios and the general tweaking that comes from dealing with all these various devices. I understand your explanation of "rooting" as OSX has the same type of security built in. Instead of "rooting", it seems a simple sudo command would be better. Plenty of good ROMs out there, I'm using HyperDroidGBXv7 on my HD2 after trying about half a dozen others. Gingerbread is very fast and stable on this device.

Some of my questions are just rants that I think people should think about before committing to the Google/Android lifestyle. Obviously there's no way to keep supporting old hardware with advanced new versions, but it seems that WinMo ROM cookers were able to keep the lifespan of WinMo products going a bit longer than the Android devs. A good example is the 600 Yuan I spent on a Shanzai tablet less than 12 months ago. It's been abandoned by the development community at Android 1.5 ....oh well, it makes a nice photo frame/viewer. If you do find a cheapo tablet, be sure you see it running at least 2.2, otherwise it's probably going to be a turd, stuck at 1.5 or 1.6.

Google's policy for their Market store and apps really isn't better (and in many cases is worse) than Apple's iTunes store. It's got nothing to do with IP, it's just a sloppy setup that doesn't work. Most of the apps I've had problems with are either free Google products, or free apps from other developers. They just don't show up, or can't be downloaded if you access the store with a China SIM card in your phone. Put your phone in airplane mode, turn the WIFI on and then access the store and the store thinks you're using a tablet (inside China) Boom, the apps can be downloaded. In other words, they're OK with you downloading apps to Shanzai tablets in China, just not phones with China Mobile SIM cards. And it's not just China, this problem is mentioned with lots of other devices in other countries.

Google Maps navigation is rather strange, as BRUT Google Maps/Nav performs turn by turn voice navigation beautifully here in China, and it's simply a hacked version of Google's product. The routing data comes from the map companies, of which there are a half dozen throughout the world that control the entire market, so I'm guessing that Google can't provide turn by turn because their map providers forbid it.

I agree that Apple is data mining Mobile Me, but there are plenty of applications out there to sync your MacOS address book, calendar and bookmarks with any device OS without using the internet, likewise for Windows.

About Apple charging premium prices for premium products... True, Apple builds premium devices, but their prices are either the same, or lower, for anything else on the market with comparable specs. Look at the price of the Motorola Xoom, Samsung Galaxy and Apple iPad2...no contest, more hardware for less money from Apple. What we get from the Android world is more choices and options at variable price points, and I think that is where Android can beat Apple every time.

Cheers!
ChinaV