Sending My Money To Cupertino (instead of Mountain View)

Let me preface this post by saying that I've owned four different Android smart phones for the last four years. Beginning with the Eris, then to the Incredible, on to the Thunderbolt and a Galaxy Nexus as of late. And also, it's worth saying that in spite of my very recent jump to the iOS world, I still think AndroidOS has a great deal of potential and unparalleled access to its development tools.

So, why did I send my hard-earned dollars to a corporation whose litigious "thermonuclear" war against all competitors I vehemently and fervently oppose?

• Because, in my opinion, they currently have the best overall smart phone. While it could be argued that late-version Android OS has a better feature set and some Android devices have superior hardware specs than iOS and iOS devices respectively, the end result of an Android device is much less than the sum of its parts.
• Android's openness is actually too much of a good thing: while open source sounds great in theory, in practice it means that Google has very little control over the OS as it cascades downstream (the exception being Nexus devices). This means that, at the very least, the OS that finally makes it to the device has been modified and/or tweaked by both the hardware vendor and the carrier. This actually is a bigger deal than you would think. Often either the hardware vendor or the carrier add unremovable UI  layers that are not aesthetically pleasing, intrusive, and resource hogs. Then, on top of that, the carrier usually loads your phone with an Imperial shittonne (pardon my French) of unremovable bloatware. So, you get a device and have to choose to either root it (and lose the warranty) or spend quite a bit of time deactivating each of the offending bloatware apps and then having to live with an inefficient and possibly unsightly UI layer.
• Rooting/Modding: if you must root and mod your phone just to get decent performance and rid your phone off unneeded vendor UI layers, you are doing it wrong. People often see rooting as a solution, I see rooting and modding as solving one and opening two different problems. For one, you'll lose your device's warranty and secondly, you are now at the mercy of a fickle and capricious "community" that at least in my experience has shown itself to be rather ineffective and hostile. 
• Uniformity and predictability: although Google has made great strides in and is pushing hard for UI design and usability best practices as of late, there is no enforcement at the app submission level. This means that adherence to their guiding principles is completely voluntary and the end result is UI chaos. Developers each do things their way and often leave outdated apps in the market with no consideration for UI looks and usability. While many developers have complained about Apple's draconian manual app approval process (including myself),  it results in a more cohesive, predictable user experience. I was a big believer of Google's "market self-policing"philosophy, but this has proven to be ineffective at encouraging developers to comply with Google's design guidelines and this very likely will remain to be the case.
• Even Google's own apps look and work better in the iOS platform. Case in point, the gmail app, the Maps app, G+ app all look and work much better on iOS than on Android! No, seriously, some of them are not even a judgement call, they simply are heads and shoulders above their Android counterparts. Not really sure why Google doesn't use that same quality and UX emphasis on the Android versions. And just like that, at least in my experience so far, many other apps that exist in both platforms, they tend to have a much user experience in the iOS world. 

There are other smaller factors, but the points above are the main drivers of my decision. For instance, Verizon thought it would be a wonderful idea to brand every single Android device with their horrible and gaudy red-black "DROID" looks and sounds. Although that's a Verizon-specific complaint, it highlights the root problem (which was mentioned above): Google has little control over the end product. And I'm guessing it has been the same issues for many people who have switched away from the Android platform. Perhaps in a few years' time Google will figure out a way to keep vendors' and carriers' hands off Android and they'll find an automated way to vet app submissions for UI/UX compliance. If and when that happens, there's a good chance I'll jump back into the Android bandwagon.