I'd say it's even less complex. My non-techie friends who have bought Android, did it for one of two reasons (I've actually asked many of them!):
* They wanted a smartphone, but they live on the east coast (NYC). For sometime, iPhone was only on AT&T, and AT&T had a reputation for bad reception there. I believe this has improved in the recent years, though, and well, Verizon and Sprint are also in the game now.
* They made an arbitrary choice based on a current promotion, TV ads, look of the phone, screen size, etc., without any deep knowledge of the app ecosystem or hackability. There were also a couple who have never owned an Apple product, but felt that Apple was too trendy, and wanted to get something "different."
IMO, Android and iOS are two very different beasts that look the same if you were to just compare the specs. Both have phones with touch screens. Both have apps. Both have cameras, etc, etc. This is how users compare. We know that these are not the useful criteria for comparison. But how would you reasonably explain this to a non-tech user?
* They wanted a smartphone, but they live on the east coast (NYC). For sometime, iPhone was only on AT&T, and AT&T had a reputation for bad reception there. I believe this has improved in the recent years, though, and well, Verizon and Sprint are also in the game now.
* They made an arbitrary choice based on a current promotion, TV ads, look of the phone, screen size, etc., without any deep knowledge of the app ecosystem or hackability. There were also a couple who have never owned an Apple product, but felt that Apple was too trendy, and wanted to get something "different."
IMO, Android and iOS are two very different beasts that look the same if you were to just compare the specs. Both have phones with touch screens. Both have apps. Both have cameras, etc, etc. This is how users compare. We know that these are not the useful criteria for comparison. But how would you reasonably explain this to a non-tech user?