I am a strong advocate of Google’s Android mobile operating system, but I assure you I’m not a totally blind zealot. Android has matured but still features its fair share of problems. Some of these problems are nerve wracking and could have caused me to leave the Android ecosystem if there were any viable alternatives (in my eyes).  From bugs to security, Google has a lot of issues to solve and here’s hoping that Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) does that. Until I get ICS in hand, here are five things I hate about Android.

5. Bugs/Glitches.

There are bugs in Android and then there are BUGS in Android. For the most part I have come to live with them, as a side effect of the freedom Android offers. Although, there are some that make me want to throw my phone. There are random reboots to deal with on top of selecting one app and having another launch to the dialer calling the wrong person. These quirks aren’t common but are far from rare. They’re not limited to one ROM either, as I have suffered from these problems through official HTC skinned versions of Android to CM 7.1. Perhaps, they are inherent core issues.

4. Response Lag.

Android can be slow to respond and this bullet point could very well be another side effect of number 5, but it earns its own spot nonetheless. There’s a second or two of lag whenever I try to wake my phone. Sometimes I get lag when I’m scrolling through my apps. I even get lag when I’m moving from one home screen to another. These sporadic bouts of slowness ruin an otherwise great experience. I have several iPod Touches and while they have their manic moments, the lag is far too prevalent in Android.

3. Advertisement Galore.

Even since Google added the ability to add in-app Advertisement, Ads are everywhere! I do understand the developers of apps want to receive some kind of monetary compensation, but some apps shouldn’t even have ads. If a developer is going to include in-app microtransation functionality in lieu of payment for the actual app, I shouldn’t be bombarded with ads on top of that model.

Ads also consume bandwidth and it adds up especially if you have a data cap. One of my favorite apps/games is 9 Innings Baseball and if you have any knowledge of the game on Android, you know it is “Adtastic”. In one update, they added new video ads that I imagine sucked up some major bandwidth. I would gladly pay Com2uS (the developer of 9 Innings Baseball) the 99 cents it charges iOS users for an Ad-Free version. That is something all of these Android developers need to think about, Ad-supported and paid versions of the same game so the developer gets paid and I can live without ads.

2. Fragmentation.

I place most of the blame for fragmentation on the OEM phone makers and carriers. The truth is that companies are all using the same hardware and in order to differentiate themselves, they have chosen to compete through Graphical User Interfaces (GUI) overlays. Excluding HTC’s Sense (for the most part), almost all of the custom Android GUI’s out there suck. The major problem is that when Google releases a new version of Android, consumers have to wait and hope that their phone maker and carrier update their GUI’s, [mandatory] apps and more for the latest version.  More often than not, they are left waiting or end up buying a new phone with the latest version of Android.

1. Security Woes

The open nature of Google’s mobile OS, policies and Market coupled with rapid gain in smartphone market shares has placed a target on Android. Malicious app developers have found success in releasing apps that can steal personal data into the Android Market and this is due to a lack of a regulatory review/approval process for app submission. Google has removed about 60+ malicious apps from the Android Market thus far and I only see that number rising.

While Advertisement is here to stay, the bugs, laggy performance, fragmentation and security problems can be gradually fixed. I’m not expecting Ice Cream Sandwich or even the next version of Android to fix all of my issues, but I am expecting Android 4.0 to be a start. Are my issues the same as yours? Do you agree or disagree? Let me know the five things you hate about Android in the comment area below.