Eric Schmidt pulls a Joe Belfiore

[HeyCori]

Google chairman and former CEO Eric Schmidt caught using an iPhone 6s

Is it that hard to not use a competitor's product in public?

 

[Laura Knotek]

His previous device was a BlackBerry.

Google's Eric Schmidt still loves his BlackBerry Bold 9900 http://www.crackberry.com/googles-eric-schmidt-still-loves-his-blackberry-bold-9900

 

[Indistinguishable]

If I owned a Galaxy Note 5, a Lumia 950xl, and an iphone 6+, i'd probably use all of them on different days. I bet high end tech exec's do the same.

 

[xandros9]

If I owned a Galaxy Note 5, a Lumia 950xl, and an iphone 6+, i'd probably use all of them on different days. I bet high end tech exec's do the same.

I'm imagining this Batman utility belt filled with phones right now...

 

[libra89]

I'm actually glad this happened, since Joe got so much grief for this. So many people interpreted that one way, I wonder how people will interpret this.

Oh I like that the article included a quote about the situation with Joe Belfiore lol.

 

[Krystianpants]

Who cares, these guys probably have lots of different phones they use.

 

[Jack Neill]

Googles apps on iOS are excellent..

 

[Danny Doj]

These people would be stupid NOT to spend time using the competition's phones. If you play with an iPhone for a month and then go to Android or WP, you really notice what is missing AND what is better.
It is important to use competitor products regularly.

 

[Keith Wallace]

I was expecting a yearlong hiatus from work. I also forgot who Eric Schmidt was.

 

[Giddora]

Of course he uses an Iphone... Have you tried Android??

 

[xandros9]

Of course he uses an Iphone... Have you tried Android??

Yup! and I still am.

 

[libra89]

If you play with an iPhone for a month and then go to Android or WP, you really notice what is missing AND what is better.
It is important to use competitor products regularly.

I can agree with WP, but I didn't notice anything going from Android to iOS really. I can tell you what I have noticed though. Better is probably subjective though. Android not having any controls to what runs in the background is lame, but someone else might not care about that.

 

[ArtificiallyYours]

Okay and Microsoft employees were often seen using Blackberries or Palm devices way back when. Tech journalism is probably worse off than games journalism at this point. Is it journalism even? No it's the ***** stoner teenagers who think they own the scene. Act your age, not your shoe size.

 

[Danny Doj]

Personally I love Android (only really the pure/AOSP experience offered on a Nexus; Samsung's TW variant is vomit-inducing!), iOS (on any device with 2gb RAM or above only ) and W10M, though Windows 10 M is by far my favourite. It's hard to call W10M the best system, objectively, especially as it's far from feature complete or from polished (I believe that it won't be until Redstone 2 that it will be feature-complete in terms of what the original hypothetical fall 2015 release was envisioned to be) and there is still the issue of the (shrinking) app gap.

For as long as the owners of the companies making rival phones are working in their respective positions for MS and Google, it really is important for them to spend a lot of time with the phone that is generally considered to be the holy grail (which, love or hate Apple, will always be iPhone until the next paradigm shift), as well as the other competition, in order to refine their own systems. If I were making Xbox, I would spend as much time as I could using the PS4, if I were producing Porshe cars, I would spend as much time as possible driving a Lambo. It makes far more sense than just to see them only using their own company's product, it doesn't demonstrate a lack of confidence in it, it demonstrates a determination to learn more about rivals to improve their own products.

 

[Muessig]

Honestly I'd be more worried if these guys never touched another mobile OS. They need to see and experience other mobile OS's and features in order to keep their own platforms ahead of the curve.