Android still has a long way to go. I have the Nexus 7 (I should divulge I am an iOS/Cocoa developer) and I kind of like it, but it still has a cheap usability feel to it. The parallax is pretty obvious which translates into issues like laggy typing and occasional awkward pauses. The select/copy/paste is just bizarre. Video playback is crappy.
Android is to Toyota what Apple is to Mercedes. They both essentially do the same thing, will get you to the same places, but it's a different kind of ride. Some people like Toyotas, and that's OK.
I also don't think the kind of people that buy Android devices are the same people that buy iOS devices. Not mention the homogeny of the whole Apple experience and how much smoother that gets with each iteration of OSX and iOS. I can pick up one device where I left off on another one. Because Google doesn't own that kind of end to end experience, it will be hard for them to compete on a whole.
The qualitative arguments are valid enough, and I won't try to dispute them except to point out that most of what you argue is lets-just-say-controversial and not uniformly agreed upon.
But the car analogy is just bad. Mercedes sells cars into different markets with different feature sets than Toyota. People don't buy a Camry expecting it to accelerate like a E350. And the "polish" features are things like Leather Seats and climate control, which are objectively measurable.
Compare the Nexus 10, which by basically all objective measures is a better piece of hardware than the retina iPad. All that Apple has on it is brand and opinion.
Even Mercedes can't sell cars on brand and opinion alone.
I agree that the analogy is wrong: Apple & Google are competing head-2-head, Toyota & Mercedes generally don't.
But it's interesting to think about why. It's typical that as market categories mature, we get segmentation. Start with the model T, eventually you have luxury SUVs, sportscars, minivans, large sedans, smarcars....
A lot of these things you're saying have to do with just being aligned with the Apple universe.
> I can pick up one device where I left off on another one.
I would argue that seamlessness across devices has historically almost always been stronger on Android than iOS (although they're pretty similar right now that iCloud is fairly caught up with Google's cloud offerings). It's changing OS that's a hassle.
> The select/copy/paste is just bizarre
Really? I found this quite intuitive and feature complete; I don't really know what it's like on iOS, are you sure you're not just used to a different way of doing things?
I didn't have your laginess issues with the N7 but I'm sure your complaints are legit. Nevertheless I think they will vary from device to device; it's not clear that Apple could build a $200 tablet with those specs that didn't ever lag. Knowing Apple, if they couldn't they just wouldn't.
On paper the N10 looks considerably better to me than the iPad (lighter, has better screen resolution, etc.). That's BMW vs. Mercedes not Toyota vs. Mercedes. We'll see if it lives up to its specs but if it does I don't think there's much left to the argument that Apple products are on the whole better rather than different.
"I also don't think the kind of people that buy Android devices are the same people that buy iOS devices."
Really ? I used to own an iPad 2 and an iPhone 3g. Because they were much, much better than the competition at the time. I sold my iPad 2, got a nexus 7. I'm going to buy a Nexus 4 as soon as it's released.
I don't understand your point about laggy typing with the Nexus 7. Did you hit the bug on the 16gb that starts when you have your internal storage filled ? (yeah, I agree that this kind of bug shouldn't even exist, but if you've filled your N7's ssd and ignored this bug you don't really know how smooth the device can be) I've always been good at typing, I get a very high word-per-minute on a real keyboard and a satisfying wpm on touch keyboards with good prediction, I admit I use swiftkey rather than the built-in android keyboard but I haven't noticed a lag so far. The experience has been stellar for me, everything runs as smooth as my iPad 2 but I now get the functionality I have always desired, such as a real filesystem access, the ability to disable built in apps and use a third party app as the default (Android Intents) and so on.
I admit that android is lacking in tablet apps, but that's almost certainly going to be solved with the release of the Nexus 7 and now the Nexus 10, because past android tablets really sucked and you couldn't count on them to get OS upgrades. With the Nexus 7 and 10, developers will have a good reason to come to the platform. The Nexus 7 is already outselling all the other android tablets combined I think. JellyBean and ICS fixed a lot of what was wrong with the UI and smoothness. When it comes to the core OS itself, I now consider Android on par with iOS, which wasn't the case for me during the days of 2.x and honeycomb for tablets. Why do I like android better than iOS now that they're on par (IMHO) ? the ability to customize the OS, even without having to root the device. I didn't root my N7 nor did I install a custom rom. But I'm using a third party launcher, keyboard and lots of app that CAN'T exist under the iOS ecosystem. I've always wanted to use Android, but bought iOS devices in the past because they were objectively better and too good compared to the subpar android releases, my desire for a more free (as in freedom) ecosystem didn't outweigh the cons of early android. But in 2012, with Nexus devices ? iOS is dead to me.
I'm not saying iOS sucks. I still like it a lot, and think that Apple truly changed the market and I doubt the competition would've become as good if Apple didn't release those devices. But I absolutely can't stand the walled garden and only submitted to it because of the lack of real competition, until now. If Apple gave us the kind of freedom with expect on a computer, be it an OS X laptop or Windows 8 laptop, I would have no qualms in coming back to iOS, and buy the next iPhone or iPad. But with android getting much better than it used to be, and iOS being still as constraining as it was in the past, hell no! Waiting for the jailbreak when new devices are released, and waiting before installing os updates because they break the jailbreak is not for me. Android allows me to do things you'd need a jailbreak on iOS, but not something like rooting or unlocking the bootloader on Android. Btw I'm not a software pirate, I buy the apps that catch my interest, I don't need "full freedom" but android gives out far more freedom out of the box than iOS and some of those freedoms are truly useful. Swiftkey is the best virtual keyboard I've ever used, your mileage may vary. You can't replace the keyboard on iOS without jailbreaking. You can't have a keyboard with symbols for programming without jailbreaking. Why ? Why should we let ourselves be shackled by Apple so much ?
Windows 8 (RT and Phone) is going the wrong direction too. Sideloading shouldn't even be a word. Installing apps outside of an app store shouldn't be considered a specific, niche use case.
Android is to Toyota what Apple is to Mercedes. They both essentially do the same thing, will get you to the same places, but it's a different kind of ride. Some people like Toyotas, and that's OK.
I also don't think the kind of people that buy Android devices are the same people that buy iOS devices. Not mention the homogeny of the whole Apple experience and how much smoother that gets with each iteration of OSX and iOS. I can pick up one device where I left off on another one. Because Google doesn't own that kind of end to end experience, it will be hard for them to compete on a whole.