ball-

But that’s the thing. I don’t believe the Xperia Play in its final form was the exact Nexus candidate reported in the news. The specs are far too non-flagshippy; just an Xperia Neo with extra buttons, and we all know how midrange-y the Neo is.

Also while I don’t have any figures to back me up, I believe the Xperia Play that did come out sold extremely poorly, and I can totally see Sony deciding not to waste any more resources on a very bad flop.

Rumor has it that the WSJ reports are almost always official leaks intended by Apple.

But Google and everyone else, they’re all like that. They all change things up without asking, and short of quitting there’s nothing any of us can do.

“world’s thickest LCD notebook with an integrated hard drive”…

I mean the Japanese corporate types go to these world-best claims like moths to a flame, and you can see the world cares less and less and less each year. It’s as fun as watching a Japanese 3-hour JonBenet Ramsay TV Special, i.e. a car crash, unfold. :P

Totally agree. Vlad is having a knee-jerk emotional reaction. I’d like to know if he still feels the same 6 months from now.

A few things to keep in mind.
1. Smartphones are going to enter a further proliferation phase, and they will become more like Camrys than Ferraris. The GS is still the biggest smartphone brand entity outside of iPhone at this point, and is poised to claim its advantage and market share for no other reason. It’s got momentum and Samsung hasn’t done anything to undermine it. People are only bitching because it’s more Camry-like this time.
2. The hardware advancement is going to slow eventually. We are probably NOT going to get 8-core this time next year on any phone. Are you going to bitch about that, dear Verge writer? It will happen one day.
3. Vlad correctly pinpointed that Samsung is Samsung. Every corporation has a set pattern and culture, but I think it’s so obvious, there’s no way a tech writer in the trade would be unaware. So it’s more than a little trite to use the “I just saw the devil” line.
3. I like the One X but every site review including yours claim its photography has no advantage. That’s one selling point busted. I also don’t want a phone that’s only 32GB. Deal breaker.

Samsung happens to have given me what I want this time. I may not be a big fan of the design, but you know what, I’m equally unimpressed by everything else that you call sexy. :P

This is the last time I will suffer the slowpoke comment system… I am on Firefox 12 for christsakes.

Ugh, botched URL. It’s okay, I’m just gonna go pray that Docomo will feature Ken Watanabe again when they launch the Galaxy S3… who wouldn’t want Ken Watanabe as their smartphone. :P

omg @ the camera sample! I miss Matsuya! I want to order noms without talking. ever. again.

Strictly my opinion: The biggest issue with Japanese corps is they’ve lost the plot mentally. they can do the perfect hardware and maybe even software, but they’ve got no grasp on what anyone outside Japan would want, nevermind marketing to them. And they don’t really care either, no matter how much they want the int’l business. (Sony has always been less typically Japanese and thus suffers a little less)

But by your definition it is perfectly possible with Instagram – As long as the content of the picture is posing a question or commentary.

“code the most basic HTML”, that is. Okay let the ass-biting commence.

Totally agree.

I learned to code the most HTML in the late 90s, because I had an instinctive urge to use web pages as a creative outlet. Since then every development from the last 10 years (including blog platform, social networks) have done nothing for my creative side, except to take away my freedom. It is often no longer possible to handcode a page on a popular, free platform, just so I can position something where I want, e.g. they may always enforce the masthead.

What the Verge writers are realizing now, through this debate of theirs, is actually not a discovery about Instagram itself, but something I’d realized years ago through my experience above: In their current paradigm, phone/tablet apps will never give you enough options to deliver your creativity. And I totally cringe when the iPad first came out and fanbois cried “omg I can replace my laptop with this!”. No. You. Can. Not. Go read Marco Arment’s 5 minute interview; he knows he can’t. I know I cannot, even though all I do is crap in The Gimp, it’s crap I’m not able to do efficiently on my tablet.

Everything’s cookie-cutter in the App world: You have no choice but to take what they give you. But you and I should realize their lack of options (and thus failure) serve a fairly good purpose – they are fabulous time and effort-savers for many.

I was going to argue that developers can initiate the shift towards more “professional” apps with more creative leeway (i.e. with sliders you can mess up), but I’m not going to. Those of you who made the moronic assertion that the iPad is awesome and next-gen because it no longer has file trees, why don’t you go and suck it up. Because this is just the flipside of that same philosophy of removing all inner-workings from user view.

Meanwhile I love Instagram. I don’t care if something’s better resolution or whatever, it’s a complete solution with servers I can upload and share to. I’m gonna go code my rudimentary, two-steps-behind HTML homepage, and put my instagram photos on it.