Yahoo will host an Android vs iOS Fanboy Smartphone Challenge at SXSW 2015 and I’ll be representing Team Phandroid

Newsflash everyone – I’m a fanboy. An Android fanboy.

On Monday, March 16th at SXSW in Austin, Texas, Yahoo is holding a Fanboy Smartphone Challenge. They’ll be putting an Android enthusiast and an iOS lover head to head in the ultimate fanboy showdown. Thanks to a little bit of luck and years of praising our Lord and Savior, Matias Duarte, I have been chosen to represent the Android faithful in glorious battle.

What does it mean to be an Android fanboy? Well, simply put, I live, breathe, eat, and sleep all things Android. A normal day for me consists of playing with an abundance of Android powered devices; from phones, to tablets, to TV consoles, to smartwatches, and even face computers. Besides owning an absurd amount of gadgets, I’m often found geeking out, talking about Android to friends and colleagues, writing about Android here on our beloved Phandroid or social media, and generally consuming as much Android related news as humanly possible. I also may or may not own way too many mini Android figurines, collectible pins, stuffed plushies, and enough swag to start my own second-hand Android store. It’s not an obsession. It’s just a hobby that I’m very passionate about.

For Yahoo’s Fanboy Smartphone Challenge, I’ll be put through a series of tasks against my opponent, which will be done game show style. I’m hoping that I can use my Nexus 6, since my opponent will be using an iPhone 6, though Yahoo wasn’t too confident in hooking my Nexus 6 up to their A/V system. I did inform them that the Nexus 6 works beautifully with a Chromecast, however they sent me a Nexus 5 so that I could use it with a Slimport to HDMI adapter just in case. To be a little honest here, that kind of upsets me a little bit, seeing as I may not be able to use my daily driver, not to mention a phone that’s a year newer, and capable of activating voice commands while the screen is off – something my opponent’s trusty iPhone 6 cannot do. Oh well. I’ll turn it into a positive. My opponent is going to need all of the help that he can get. I don’t mind starting with a handicap.

It’s worth mentioning here that this game show will be done in pure jest. This is all in good fun. I’m not one of those fanboys that hates the other platform. In fact, I surely can recognize a positive when I see one and I’ve been known to praise Apple where applicable. Their products may not be for me, and I may not agree with everything that they do, but Apple does get a lot of things right. It doesn’t matter if you’re first to bring a product to market if it’s a horrible product or an implementation that isn’t very user friendly. This is why the general media sees Apple as the Jesus of computing. When Apple enters a market or launches a service you can bet that there will be little to no snafus along the way (well, except for people getting lost and bending phones). And speaking about markets, almost no one can drive a market like Apple can. I’m excited to see what they’ll do with mobile payments and wearables this coming year. Their success only means additional success and greater adoption for Android Pay and Android Wear.

Anyways, this event sounds like a blast and I’m excited. If Yahoo wants me to be a fanboy, I’ll gladly ham it up and be a their fanboy. I’ll be on stage wearing my Androidify’d t-shirt, Android beanie, wearing my Moto 360, and by the sounds of it rocking both the Nexus 6 and Nexus 5. Praise Duarte.

If you’re in Austin at SXSW this Monday, be sure to stop by Yahoo’s Brazos Hall at 12pm to see it all go down. Sadly, there won’t be a live stream for all of you to watch at home, but Yahoo has told me that they’re planning on posting the recorded video promptly at YahooTech.com. Wish me luck!

Uber to challenge Google, hires former VP of Google Maps

Aside from Search, Google has a handful of products that command dominating strategic advantages, one of them being Google Maps. Together with Android Auto, this positions Google brilliantly to capitalize on one of the tech industries most promising yet unharvested sectors. From performing simple turn-by-turn navigation that displays relevant advertising to the futuristic but not too far reality of driverless cars, there is a lot more money to be made- and Uber wants a piece of Google’s pie.

Here is what Google Maps looked like when it was announced in 2005:

Under the direction of Brian McClendon, VP Engineering at Google, here is what it looks like 10 years later:

Now McClendon, the man who took the Maps team from Point A to Point B, has officially joined Uber to help take their mapping efforts to the next level.

At one point Uber was just a taxi alternative but the size and speed of the company’s growth has been astronomical. Rather than simply being a service that relies on APIs from Google Maps and Apple Maps, Uber looks to compete directly. Not only could they create their own alternative as a broad solution, but it’ll prove invaluable down the road as the companies seem headed towards an inevitable collision course in the fight for eventual self-driving car prominence.

“Google was actually Ubering before Uber”

Before you begin claiming that Google is trying to use their sheer size to eat everyone else’s lunch, let us not forget that Google was actually was Ubering before Uber, announcing Google Ride Finder way back in 2005 aside Google Maps.

It’s way too early to tell who has the upper hand, but one thing is for sure: it’ll be fun to look back in another 10 years and see how far mapping, navigation, and transportation of come in relation to these two companies.