This article is reprinted with permission from TechFLow Deep Tide, author: David, copyright belongs to the original author.
Today, the entire tech circle is discussing one thing: the iPhone 17 has been released.
Social media platforms like WeChat Moments, Weibo, and Xiaohongshu are flooded with news about Apple. Some stayed up late to watch the launch event, while others are calculating whether the price is worth it.
However, this year's discussions have a unique tone. Besides the new products themselves, a new meme has gone viral on the Chinese internet:
"Android thinking" and "Apple thinking."
Some have summarized that Android users have a "cost-performance mindset," always comparing parameters and calculating prices; Apple users have an "experience mindset," willing to pay a premium for the ecosystem and brand.
This meme has spread widely, moving from the mobile phone circle to various fields, with people starting to use these two types of thinking to describe their ways of doing things.
While I was scrolling through these discussions, a chart posted by Coingecko on crypto Twitter popped up on my timeline.
In 2011, buying an iPhone 4S required 162 BTC; in 2024, buying an iPhone 16 only requires 0.014 BTC. Based on today's price for the iPhone 17, it would be about 0.07 BTC.
I stared at this chart for a while. Whenever calculating the value of goods in terms of cryptocurrency, one always feels the pain of the coins they have lost.
While everyone is discussing "Android thinking vs. Apple thinking," I am pondering another question: what is the true "Apple thinking" in the crypto world?
If Apple thinking is about believing in a brand or a concept and then holding onto it long-term without wavering, then are those who have held onto BTC since 2011 the most thorough practitioners of "Apple thinking"?
This thought has led me to reevaluate many phenomena in the crypto space.
The crypto world might be the place in the world that loves to label the most.
"Diamond hands" or "paper hands," "Builder" or "Trader," "value investing" or "speculation"… we are always categorizing ourselves and others.
Now, with the meme of "Android thinking" and "Apple thinking" reaching the crypto space, it is surprisingly fitting.
What is the "Android thinking" in the crypto world?
The core is one word: gamble.
Believing that small funds must take high risks to turn around. BTC doubles from 90,000 to 180,000, but a meme coin might increase tenfold in a day. They are not pursuing steady growth but rather a leap in social class.
The logic chain of this thinking is very clear: ordinary people have no resource advantage → must find asymmetric opportunities → new projects and new concepts are most likely to generate Alpha → so they must keep trying and rotating.
So what is the "Apple thinking" in the crypto world?
The core is also one word: hoard.
Believing that time is more important than choice. It’s not that they don’t want to make quick money, but they think the expected returns from chasing trends are negative. Rather than losing on 90 out of 100 projects and making money on 10, it’s better to choose one with the highest certainty and hold it long-term.
The logic of this thinking is equally clear: the market is unpredictable in the short term → most people cannot outperform the market → BTC is the only asset validated by time → holding it is victory.
The most typical example is those with "laser eyes" avatars, whose personal bios might just have one word: Bitcoin.
Interestingly, both sides may not understand each other and even doubt each other.
Those with Android thinking see Apple thinking as too conservative; crypto is inherently a high-risk, high-reward place, so if you want stability, why not just buy Moutai?
Those with Apple thinking view Android thinking as dancing on the edge of a knife, making ten times today and going to zero tomorrow, with a high probability of ending up losing in the end.
Both sides have their own beliefs. One side believes in WAGMI, while the other believes in HODL.
But these two may not be a matter of right or wrong, but rather a matter of circumstance.
A young person entering the market with 5,000 yuan and an old-money individual entering with 5 million yuan—can their optimal strategies be the same?
For the former, even if they lose everything, it’s just two months' salary; but if they bet right, it could change their life. For the latter, a wrong bet could lead to irreparable loss.
So those with "Android thinking" are not wrong when they say, "If you don’t gamble, how can you turn things around?" Those with "Apple thinking" also have their stance: preserving capital is essential for long-term survival.
It’s like someone asking you whether to buy an iPhone or an Android.
The answer always depends on what you want.
On the surface, the crypto world and "Apple thinking" should be mutually exclusive.
After all, the birth of crypto was to break monopolies, embrace openness, and promote innovation. Meanwhile, Apple represents a closed ecosystem, centralized control, and incremental updates. Logically, the crypto world should naturally reject "Apple thinking."
But reality is full of irony. The most successful coin is precisely the most "Apple."
BTC has been around for over a decade, and the updates to its codebase are cautious to an astonishing degree. Doesn’t this resemble the incremental innovation of the iPhone? Every year, people say the iPhone is falling behind, yet it continues to sell the best.
The community that believes in BTC the most is also the most "Apple."
The arrogance of Bitcoin bulls is no less than that of any Apple fan. They have a famous saying:
"Shitcoin is shitcoin," no matter what innovative ecosystem it is, in their eyes, it’s all garbage. They also have Satoshi Nakamoto's famous saying in reserve:
"If you don’t believe me, sorry, I don’t have time to convince you."
This self-righteous attitude is quite similar to the superiority complex of some Apple users who think "Android just doesn’t work."
What’s even more interesting is the current market choices. Institutions, publicly listed companies, and national reserves are starting to hoard Bitcoin. You might say it’s a form of delayed realization, but it’s hard to argue that they are all fools investing real money into an unprofitable asset.
There’s a deeper logic here: in a market full of uncertainty, "boredom" might actually be the biggest advantage.
BTC doesn’t need a roadmap, doesn’t need white paper updates, doesn’t need a CEO to promote it, and doesn’t even need marketing. It’s just there, unchanged for over a decade—boring but reliable.
But for most players in the crypto world, this way of thinking is still difficult to practice, and the biggest paradox is this: while they shout about decentralization and innovation, the market invests the most money into the most "conservative" project, BTC.
This paradox is worth pondering. Why does the crypto world, which prides itself on openness and innovation, end up with big money flowing into the most closed and conservative strategies?
First, let’s look at the "innovation anxiety" in the crypto world.
Every bull market has a new story. In 2017, it was ICOs; in 2020, it was DeFi; in 2021, it was NFTs and GameFi; in 2024, it’s inscriptions and AI. Each story, at the beginning, claims to "change the world."
Where does the anxiety come from? It comes from missing out.
Watching others achieve financial freedom with SHIB, change their fate with BAYC, and make a fortune through early DeFi mining—who wouldn’t feel anxious? So everyone desperately chases the next trend, fearing they’ll miss out again.
Social media amplifies this anxiety. Open Twitter, and the screen is filled with "Congratulations ×× for getting a thousand times," "×× track still has 10 Alphas." Not chasing trends feels like a crime and not participating properly in the industry.
But the reality is harsh.
How many of the ICO projects from 2017 are still alive today?
The more innovations there are, the more projects go to zero. This has almost become a rule in the crypto world. What’s important is how much fruit you have left before the tide recedes.
Diving into the wave is easy; getting out unscathed is hard.
Let’s be honest: if there are so-called extreme "Android thinking" players in the crypto world, their real state must be very exhausting.
Open these players' Twitter accounts, and you might see them simultaneously following: new L2 launches, which chains have airdrops, new DeFi pools, floor prices of inscriptions, trends of AI concept coins…
During the peak of meme popularity, while others are sleeping at 3 AM, they might be scanning chains and looking for angles; while others are resting on weekends, they are studying new narratives.
And the so-called "scientists," stripped of their filters, are just ordinary people desperately seeking information gaps to make guaranteed profits, exhausted yet happy.
Ask the "Android thinking" players around you how many of them are really making money?
Most people's real situation might be that they made ten times on Project A and went to zero on Project B; they made a million at the beginning of the bull market and gave it all back in the bear market; they caught one Alpha today and stepped into three pits tomorrow.
After a year of calculations, they might as well have just held onto BTC.
Why is this the case? Because "Android thinking" has a fatal flaw: information overload. When you try to seize every opportunity, you actually end up grasping nothing.
When your attention is scattered across 100 projects, your understanding of each project is superficial. You think you are researching, but you are merely browsing. You think you have mastered the information gap, but what you see is what others want you to see.
A deeper issue is that in this circle, for ordinary people, diligence is the only antidote to anxiety.
Most crypto players deep down know they don’t have a real advantage. No insider information, no technical edge, no big funds; the only thing they can do is "work harder." But in a PVP market, effort may be the least valuable.
Of course, there are successful Android thinkers.
Those who truly make money as Android players often focus on a specific niche, have their own sources of information, and know when to stop… More importantly, they treat this as their full-time job.
In contrast, the state of "Apple thinking" players is completely different.
They might not check prices for a month, and their focus in life is not on the crypto world. They have their own jobs, careers, and lives. Crypto is just a part of their asset allocation.
There is no right or wrong, only choices. If you have the time, energy, and talent, "Android thinking" might really suit you.
Returning to the chart at the beginning of the article.
The price of the iPhone measured in BTC has dropped from 162 to 0.01 over 13 years, a decline of 99.99%.
This number is indeed striking, but perhaps it’s worth considering another, more practical question:
If you were the person in 2011 who was torn between buying an iPhone 4S or 162 BTC, what would you think now?
In 2011, the iPhone was a genuinely revolutionary product, while BTC was merely an experiment in the geek circle. Choosing the iPhone at that time was rational; choosing BTC was the crazy option.
But looking back 14 years later, the rational choice left you with an outdated piece of electronic waste, while the crazy choice gave you an asset worth $1.5 million (if you could hold onto it without selling).
What does this indicate?
Perhaps it indicates nothing at all; success is merely a survivor's bias. What everyone did at that time was the choice that best suited their personality and seemed most reasonable in hindsight.
There is no right or wrong, really, no right or wrong.
The market rewards truly excellent "Android thinking" players, those who find Alpha; the market also rewards steadfast "Apple thinking" players, those who hold onto Beta.
What the market punishes are those who are indecisive. So, the real question is never which type of thinking to choose, but do you understand yourself?
Whether you choose to buy an iPhone or BTC, whether you have "Android thinking" or "Apple thinking," the most important thing is:
This is your own choice, not the answer someone else told you.
After all, in the crypto world, the highest realm of "Think Different" may just be "Think for Yourself."
Related: The iPhone 17 only costs 0.007 Bitcoin
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