Justin Williams on third-party alternatives to built-in apps

Justin Williams on third-party alternatives to built-in apps

It still drives me nuts to this day to see family and friends using the bundled Notes app over Elements, but it accomplishes 90% of what they want and is free. Hard to compete with that.

I use the bundled Notes app. I’ve tried many others, including Elements.

At least for me, price has little to do with it; many of these apps, I already own, and I’m still not using them. There is an additional benefit to choosing the bundled Apple version over any third-party version, which I think many developers underestimate: simplicity of choice.

Choosing to use Apple’s version is simple and requires almost no thought. Choosing something else makes me think about a lot of things that I otherwise wouldn’t have to:

• I know Apple’s version is going to ‘just work’.
• I know it’s going to look and feel like the other apps I already know how to use.
• I know it’s not going to have problems during the next iOS update.
• I know it’s not going to change unexpectedly on me one day.
• I know I’m not going to need yet another username and password.
• As unfair as it is to developers, Apple’s apps get priority access to private APIs, which means they can integrate better with the OS in ways that no other apps can.
• I’ve been using Apple software for decades, and while they have disappointed me occasionally, overall the odds are in their favour.

To get me to use it, a third-party alternative doesn’t just have to offer one or two features that I wish for and don’t have; that’s not enough. As cliché as it has become to repeat these Steve Jobs quips floating around everywhere, here it is (paraphrased), and remember it well:

It’s not enough to be a little bit better. You have to be 10 times better.