Android's permission system looks good on the surface. However, there are so many required permissons nowadays that many users do not even check them anymore. And you can revoke specific permissions on an app by app basis.

On iOS, developers are told not to rely on certain permissions being available, such as location. Some apps truly can't function without those, but they are supposed to warn the user, not crash.

I run AppOps 4.3/4.4 rooted (so I use the "App Ops X" version internally), and I must say, I've restricted most of my non-system apps and I've never seen a single broken app.

I think this potential is vastly overblown.

EDIT: for example, in the official twitter app, I turn off these:

* Location

* Read contacts

* Receieve SMS/MMS

* Post notification

* Wake lock

Never had a single problem with the app.

Like 38° 53' 50.55", -77° 2' 14.51"

Could you detail the "etc"? To my knowledge historically the only activity that triggered a permission confirmation was a precise location fix. Later, after a debacle with many apps siphoning and scurrilously offloading contact lists, contact access was added as a confirmation.

Android has very granular permissions, and iOS does not. If you don't like the requests of an app, the general option is not to install it. Such is exactly what I've done with a number of small vendor apps -- if you demand anything that you don't need, I don't install.

Of course on the flip side Android, be design, allows for much tighter integration and leveraging between apps and the OS, so there are more interesting opportunities, both for good and bad. But those, too, are covered under permissions.

The first time an app tries to access any of the above you will be asked whether to grant it permission or not. You can then edit this preferences in Settings.app > Privacy

Discreet toggles and the request dialogs are roughly the only thing I prefer iOS to Android on. Too bad the rest of iOS is a prison.