The Android ecosystem has been feeling more like an invasive chaotic advertisement machine the past few years. The play store is a cesspool, the weather app switch was poorly executed, Google Podcasts went to the graveyard, and Google pay getting shut down meant I had to switch back to vomits Venmo.
I still have Android gaming handhelds, but why wouldn’t I just get an iPhone the next time I go to replace my phone? I can’t believe I’m even saying that after being so die hard Android so for years.
why wouldn’t I just get an iPhone
Jumping from the frying pan straight into the fire.
Exactly this. Just left iOS and got a pixel8a and flashed grapheneos on it. Apple is doing the same shit. GOS might be a pain in the ass sometimes but I feel much better knowing that Tim Apple isn’t reading my texts and monitoring my bank apps so they can target me with ads.
I’m sure we all have a different perception, but my current view is that Google sells you a phone that they need to push ads and harvest vast amounts of data from you in order to make money on the phone, and Apple somehow needs to do this less.
Which company do you feel takes privacy more seriously? From what I understand, Google primarily makes their money from advertising.
They also managed to remove a feature from the fucking clock app. It’s not much, but seriously, it’s like a headless chicken running toward a cliff from the business end.
Google pay being shut down is news to me. I still pay contactless with Google pay and also for paying on websites…
Google pay is being shut down?
Seems like Curve pay could be an alternative
Google Pay is different in America, right? To me it’s just contactless.
uh, not sure, I’m in Europe as well
I was thinking about NFC payments, yea
Sorry I should have clarified. Google pay moved the payment features to Google wallet, but the biggest loss was the person-to-person payments are now gone. I never understood why they had multiple apps that did the same thing. I seem to also remember a time where there was a Google pay and gpay app that lived side by side, so there were a total of three apps when there should have been one.
oh, I didn’t know this
Yeah that’s what I’m thinking too. Android’s only advantage over the Apple ecosystem is being able to install apps. If that goes away there’s no reason for me to stay.
I will pay hard cash money for some devs to bring postmarketos to quality hardware vendors.
I’m all for buying a pinephone, but man are we missing out on the full potential from some genuinely good OEM hardware stuff like razr flip.
Aside from google doing google things, android has been a bloated java pos toy OS for nearly a decade now. It completely wastes the full potential of superior hardware by running everything on a shitty JVM known as the ART that was designed for when devices had <512mb of RAM. A Nintendo 3DS can do better multi process tasking than modern android which regularly kills app threads for no reason other than to screw with you because you dared to switch to a different app for 5 seconds.
Android was supposed to be the big apple killer because of its closeness to a desktop OS with heavy emphasis on widespread features and functionality. Even technically speaking, rooting got you there if you wanted to run whatever straight on the linux environment or swap kernels.
Its nothing but a ripoff iOS clone now. Android 7/8 was probably the peak of development and usability, and even back then people were complaining it didn’t have groundbreaking improvements like 6 or lollipop.
I don’t think that it’s the lack of quality hardware what is stopping adoption of Linux on phones. There are many resons why I don’t consider someting like PostmarketOS viable as a daily driver for most.
First of all some apps are just not available on Linux. Banking apps are a prime example. Most banks are now requiring some form of app where I live and they don’t even consider Linux. But that’s also another problem in it self.
Secondly: driver support. Drivers aren’t something one thinks about when talking about phones. But they are needed and mobile phones being what they are, most manufacturers aren’t really open to do anything in that regard.
As an Android developer I’m also annoyed by the restrictive power management of Android. But it’s there for a reason. On PostmarketOS my phone would be dead after sitting around all day doing noting. On Android I can maybe squeeze two to three days of use out of the same phone. And that’s not even with the OEM rom.
That being said, I hope for a future were all of the current issues can be solved and we finally have a viable alternative to Apple and Google.
To be clear, I’m in no way trying to defend what Google is doing.
I honestly don’t care about apps. I switched to GrapheneOS and opted to not use Google Play Services, so my app selection is very limited, especially for things like banking apps. It turns out I can just use the website for the vast majority of them, and I can fill in the gaps with FDroid apps.
The main things stopping me from using a Linux phone (eg PostmarketOS) are:
- MMS compatibility - I use this a lot with family, and getting everyone on Signal or something isn’t going to happen
- battery efficiency - the best I’ve heard is 8 hours with light use, and there are still issues receiving notifications in standby mode
- hardware quality issues and drivers - every phone supported by PostmarketOS either has a bunch of unsupported hardware (ie no camera support), or the hardware is poor (ie the PinePhone has crappy audio)
I don’t need a flagship with top tier driver support, I just need basic phone things to work. I’m even okay with poor camera quality, provided I can take pictures of things and clearly read the text later. I don’t need much in terms of app support, and I’m willing to help port things I need. But my phone needs to work as a phone, and it needs to do so all day without needing to charge until night.
Yeah, I tried to use it as my daily driver a while back and what bugged me most was the terrible battery efficiency. Running the full desktop version of Firefox certainly didn’t help. At that point the camera also didn’t have any drivers. Since theres been some progress and we now have a work in progress driver for that model. Frankly it’s amazing that this works at all and I’m incredibly grateful for anyone working on this.
I’ve actually been rather lucky and managed to convince most of my friends to join me on Signal so we barely need to rely on SMS anymore. But last time I checked there weren’t any real Signal clients availabe for Linux phones. Of course, one could always use the desktop version but that still requires a phone to be linked to. Someone has managed to get the Matrix/Signal bridge working and rely on Matrix for the final delivery but that seems like too much tinkering for me :D
Don’t get me wrong, I think the work that’s been done is amazing, my point is that it’s still not daily driver ready. I want to help out, I just don’t have the time anymore with a full-time job and kids. If it was daily drive-able, I could probably spare a few hours here and there to improve things (port apps, track down bugs, etc).
I hope it gets there before I need a new phone. Last year I switched to a Pixel 8 for GrapheneOS and cut out most of my Google Play apps, so I should be good for a few years, but I’d very much like to ditch Android entirely next time.
For now, I got my SO to use Signal, but that’s it.
The only way to log into my bank on the website is to use the phone two factor authentication app, which only works with Google Play Services… 💩
I’m considering getting a dedicated login device which can sit on my desk all day doing nothing else.
Which 2FA app is that? I use Aegis (replaces Google Authenticator, available on FDroid) and Symantec VIP (from Google Play, but via Aurora and runs w/o Google Play Services). Is it something different?
In Sweden, all the major banks joined together and created BankId. It is now pretty much a monopoly on id verification. Even some government agencies use it, which is problematic for multiple reasons.
Debate by former PM: https://www.svd.se/a/y6VqmE/utredare-infor-statligt-bank-id
Edit: typos
Most of them don’t support generic 2FA codes and sadly require some sort of proprietary app that talks to their servers. Setting them up usually also requires some sort of identification; think receiving a pin in the post. As far as I can tell, the only other option for me is to rent some sort of pin generation terminal from the bank which is, of course, ridiculously expensive.
That sucks.
Unfortunately (or fortunately) banks here (US) generally only support SMS 2FA and occasionally support email, and a handful use the their app (but fall back to SMS).
I actually switched to Fidelity (a brokerage) as a primary bank because they were the only one I could find that supported real MFA using the Symantec VIP app, which fortunately works fine without Google Play Services.
Two things especially worth noting from the article.
If you have a non-Google build of Android on your phone, none of this applies.
This means that at least GrapheneOS will be unaffected for now. Other ROMs without gapps will be unaffected only as long as you don’t install gapps. Since Graphene has a sandbox for them, I’m assuming it’ll be fine. That is, unless Google decides to lock the bootloader entirely.
In September 2026, Google plans to launch this feature in Brazil, Indonesia, Singapore, and Thailand. The next step is still hazy, but Google is targeting 2027 to expand the verification requirements globally.
So most users worldwide still have at least 1.5 years until it’s implemented. Plenty of time to get a Pixel and install Graphene on it. Or to figure out some other plan.
Don’t get me wrong - this is insane, unreasonable and horrible news for everyone. We should push back as hard as physically possible against it. However, at the very least we still have some time to figure things out before the policy rolls out.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Google stop allowing BL unlocking soon… Following Samsung and Xiaomi (although Xiaomi technically can be unlocked, in reality you’ll not be able to do so nowadays unless you pay someone to do it via remote USB shit for you)
Imagine the custom ROM situation was as bad for phones as it currently is for tablets. There is just one supported tablet which is new.
I’m getting Huawei
Literally just as bad lol
a million times better*
Aaaand you have no idea what you’re talking about. No need to engage further. Have a good life.
Yes. Would be a protest buy.
I would spend more money and get Chinese os to just not fund Google.The way I see it this is the last drop in the bucket for android openness anyways.
Fair enough- at least you’re not under any illusions that they’re less restrictive and scummy.
Consider a Volla Phone with UBPorts.
UBPorts can also be installed on Fairphone.
Well. They will try anyway.
Mobile desperately needs hardware with first class open source drivers and firmware to get away from Google/Apple/Microsoft controlled software platforms. Phones have been super powerful for a long time beyond what most need. We can take hit in theoretical peak performance to build up a better ecosystem until the market is large enough that the big money has to address the market
It exists and will exist for a pretty hefty premium. Not because the makers want to. But frankly the interest in owning and controlling your hardware is more rare than we’d like. So like any niche hobby the hardware will be expensive.
Democracy is dead. Welcome to the neo dark ages. Take up arms.
Well, I mean, we have yet to see an actual serious cyberattack right? Aren’t security needs going to increase, not decrease?
The ability to filter information using proprietary devices and software in the kernel of all of these garbage devices is the core issue. Trusting the owners of that code is to surrender your right to unbiased and unfiltered information. I am not at all concerned about hacking or security by small insignificant players. I am massively concerned about the extremely powerful using the leverage they have normalized and embedded to become tyrannical neo feudal lords in a fascist society. Google IS the biggest danger by orders upon orders of magnitude. Trusting them is to give up democracy entirely.
All mobile devices are proprietary. Android is a scheme to make a Linux kernel that has everything ready to deploy except the actual hardware drivers for the processor and modem. Manufacturers take this kernel and add their proprietary binaries at the last possible moment. That source code is not available anywhere. The hardware documentation is not available anywhere publicly. Every device model is just different enough that reverse engineering one does nothing transferable to any other. The level of reverse engineering is extreme and requires destroying many devices using things like fuming nitric acid and fluorine solutions just to have a small chance at reading some parts of embedded memory. These are some of the most dangerous and hazardous chemicals humans make, and you still need xray equipment, special microscopes with stepping automation to stitch images, and a ton of time.
This is moving to a tyrannical surveillance state of fascist authoritarianism. Open source software is a major front on the line of real democracy. This is a nuclear bomb released on that democracy. You fear the wrong pirates and criminals. The biggest threats always come from within. Trust as a mechanism is fundamentally antithetical to democracy. Everyone demanding trust is a traitor to democracy. Trust is the key of the fascist kingdom. Once that key is held, democracy has failed regardless of whomever is aware of the situation. Democracy requires fully informed citizens with skepticism and the liberal right to decide for themselves even when they are wrong. This is impossible without full access to information. The source of that information cannot be filtered at any level. We already have the narrowest bottleneck of available information sources in the last 1000 years of history. There are only 2 relevant web crawlers. All search queries filter through one or both of these two and the results from these are not deterministic. Two people searching for the same thing at the same time will get very different and very biased results. This is individualized regardless of any protections people imagine they have in place. Outside of the internet there is no real unbiased media. A dozen people own it all. Even the garbage claiming to comb all sources is drawing the line and dictating what is center right or left is. Anyone at the grassroots level is impossible to find because there are no organic unbiased search results. The results are all filtered junk full of agenda and bias.
This is the real big picture abstract issue in play. When the maga traitors said this was a coup, they absolutely ment that. Mobile devices are all rental garbage someone else controls. Your computer likewise has a secret operating system running in the background that you do not control. In Intel it is called the Intel Management Engines or ME. This started with Intel VPro in 2008. AMD adopted it is 2013. Arm has one too.
All that is left is to steal your right to have a digital front door by eliminating DNS filtering and all of these devices will be controlled and connected directly by someone else that is watching and listening at all times. You are already in tethers as a digital slave that can be bought and sold for exploitation and manipulation without your consent or knowledge using your digital presence. You have not effectively realized the implications of that surrendering of rights to citizenship with full autonomy. The next step is to redefine the word citizen to be functionally equivalent to slave. “You will own nothing, and you will be happy about it” because if you are not, you will be dead. This is the death of democracy. My words will echo in your head years from now. The dystopia to come is beyond anything you can presently imagine and there is no way to stop it now short of taking up arms and playing Luigi if you are able.
The consolidation of wealth is what really made Caesar. That was the death of the republic. It was not Caesar. We are all a product of our time and environment. It was the consolidation of great wealth. All that wealth did not give a shit about Rome, it went to Constantinople for better opportunities at first chance because consolidation of wealth is treasonous. It is as it was, just look at outsourcing and off shoring, or the disgusting mismanagement of banking and housing that have made the American worker completely uncompetitive with Asian counterparts at the same standard of living. No, I have no fear of the boogie man or foreign state actors. I am terrified of the criminal that normalizes domestic trust, actively manipulates and exploits me, and steals my purchased property. That is a real monster.
Increasingly, I think people like yourself should be working to develop systems that don’t just use all this shit. Or systems that use the old shit that doesn’t have all of this modern baggage you speak of.
I know it seems impossible. But it also seems like no one is trying.
honestly the hardware seems to be the harder part. for software we could just fork android and tear out the restrictive parts.
For sure. Especially if you want all the modern features, low energy usage profiles, speed, compactness. Etc
I can see why nerds that see what is happening in great detail go off the way they do.
Wtf is this
I guess it’s time to buy a linux phone
Ok this needs harsh pushback, because phones are affordable, computers are not. There needs to be a massive project dealing with making phones platform agnostic.
Have you shopped for those items recently? You have 200 buck computers and 2000 buck phones.
Yep but also 200 buck phones.
Yeah, definitely. My point is that phones are not inherently more affordable than computers, like it was 20 years ago.
My current phone, a Pixel 7a, cost me around 350€ (let’s say it’s roughly the same in $). There is definitely cheaper options. And most of these options will give you a decent phone.
A $200 computer will bring you to basic office stuff and playing facebook games.
A 350€ computer will be capable of similar computing power as a 350€ phone, plus the form factorc comfort. I struggle to do basic office stuff on my high end phone, for instance.
Also I live in a 3rd-world country
So does Google.
ahh give em a bit, most of the first world ones are trying to head that way ;)
Oof, time to bite the bullet and switch email providers. Shit like this is why I’ve spent the last couple years de-googling my life.
Do it! It’s not that bad. Everyone’s got different needs, but I switched to fastmail and have been enjoying it.
If you’re making the switch anyway, get yourself a domain name from a separate company to run it through. That way in the future you can keep using your domain even if you switch mail/web-hosting providers.
I have a domain and an email address through it, but my problem is I can’t find a domain name I like enough to both keep and give out to others as a long term contact point. The one I have right now is silly, and not easy to communicate over the phone.
It’s a me problem, but if I ever figure out something I’m will to keep and is available, that’s the goal.
Have two:
The silly one for personal or non-professional stuff like Steam
The professional one for the ones you are meeting irl.Yeah, that’s the part I’m having trouble with. Can’t decide on something serious, easy to communicate and that I like. Definitely a me problem.
How about “MyEmailDomainDotComButThatWasTheWordDotNotADotSymbolDot.com” - super easy to communicate
Damn, someone beat me to it!
The domain I use professionally is simply my full name. Then I use a catch-all so I can give out a mailbox specific to who it’s for. Often that looks like YourCompany@MyName.com That way if I get spammed I know who to blame.
Two minor concerns about this approach:
-
Will the lesser known domain name make your emails more likely to be filtered as spam? I don’t know the answer, but I am fairly sure it wouldn’t help.
-
Will having your email routed through a middleman open up security issues? Probably solveable with diligence and awareness, but I recently had a non-technical friend with this setup get his Gmail breached because he was forwarding it to an email inbox on his personal domain from decades earlier that he forgot about, and didn’t have 2FA on the domain webmail. IMHO an easy oversight for anyone, honestly.
- The domain name has no effect on spam filters, it’s all about which server is sending it and if the domain is properly configured with MX records, DKIM signing keys, etc… A custom domain with mail sent from a major mail provider won’t get sent to spam any more than a new gmail account.
- Mailboxes for a custom domain work exactly the same as any other email. There is no forwarding to another mailbox or provider unless you configure it to be that way. You should be pretty careful with what settings the mail server is configured with though, because encryption is optional…
-
This is dystopian.
Remember that brief period in the US where, for a fleeting moment, Lina Khan went after a few companies for monopolistic practices?
Yeah man, those were the days.
Is that even legal? Monopolistic behaviour.
of course it is. apple has been doing it from the very beginning. now android gets the same walled garden.
The US Government hasn’t given a shit about harmful monopolistic practices in a long time. They only pretend to care from time to time to force large companies to start donating to politicians.
“A long time” would be “Since Trump got back in”, since Biden’s administration was actually doing a lot to tackle monopolies. They just did a shit job of advertising what they were doing.
Right, because the single anti-trust action against Microsoft in the 90s is definitely all that was justified during the rise of the tech giants.
the biden admin was not in the 90s. look up Lina Khan.
Okay? My point is that it’s absurd to say that the USFG has been hard on monopolies until Trump’s second term.
Like anyone cares outside of EU.
Fuck Google
The moment I don’t get to run my own stuff and F-Droid, I’ll be switching off smartphones.
I’ll probably go with one of the other roms on an older phone or possibly one of the Linux phones. It won’t be exactly what I want, but it’ll be better than their walled garden bullshit. That’s precisely why I left Apple way back when.
Or we just… ignore them?
LineageOS and GrapheneOS could just be like “well, go on, then.”
There’s a market for everything and the FOSS and maker markets would eat up an open Android phone, even if the only apps you could install were community-created.
Those would be great if they worked on cheap handsets. TracFone users should have better security too
Dumbphone with tethering
A mini laptop/cyberdeck
A modern mp3 player
A small, modern point and click camera
hey gramps, where’d you get that gear, 2007?
It’s not a cyberdeck unless I have trodes and a halo, chummer. But some kind of netbook would be great.
I had an Asus Eee PC and I fuckin’ loved it. Is there anyone still making a functional laptop in that form factor anymore?
I don’t know, but if you find one, let me know. Because if Asus made a new one under their ROG branding, I think I’d be willing to pay the extra cost.
Damn I’m gonna need cargo pants to carry all this























