Dear Samsung: A Few Conditions to Keeping Me

Please pay attention. (photo cred: The European Sting)

Dear Samsung Mobile,

My last letter was a bit harsh, so here's a lighter one: I may stay with you if you prove yourself worthy.

For one thing, I am re-considering the Gear 2 Neo and I may look at the Galaxy S6 when you release it in 2015. However, there are some things that you need to do to keep me (and also attract a majority of new customers).


1. Re-tool or minimize the massive amounts of TouchWiz UI in your version of Android. Yes, it's pretty and all, but I want to be able to customize aspects of it, like home screen transitions and color schemes. However, if you reduce the presence of TouchWiz in your devices, I will accept that as well.

2. Let me pick what software I want to use. I don't need a majority of your S apps. Make them available in the Samsung App Store for free or for a small charge. This is getting ridiculous.

3. Update the firmware of the Gear 2 family. The heart rate monitor is pretty buggy from what I've seen, and I do want to use that feature for fitness.

4. Re-work your Gear family pricing scheme. $300 is too much for the flagship Gear 2, and $200 is too much for the Gear Fit. Low-to-high pricing should be $100-$250. All that you have extra on the Gear 2 compared to the Neo, aside from materials, is a low-quality camera. Either get rid of the camera (it's unnecessary) or drop the price by $50.

5. Open up to other versions of Android. Yes, having a monopoly on all your products is nice, but you're taking it to Apple-like extremes. Sony is much more open, offering a few exclusive services to its devices, but not locking in features to its own products. The only thing you really have that's open is a remote control app. I can't even use Android Beam to share things to my Nexus 7 from my S4. The whole point of Android is to be more open than iOS, and you are failing rather spectacularly at that.

Darling, you know I love my S4, and you know I know you're better than Apple. Please don't stoop to their level, and I'll come back.

Much love,

Matthew