| ▲ | Lord-Jobo 4 hours ago |
| Insane how bad this has gotten. So few options left to truly own your smartphone |
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| ▲ | goku12 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] |
| We really need to make this into a website for 'hostile smartphones' or a 'list of smartphones to avoid', and popularize it among the normal folks. This is relevant to them even if they don't unlock the phones themselves. They could pay someone to unlock it and upgrade it - but only if the phone can be unlocked. The manufacturers will do something about it when their hostile behaviour starts to affect their bottom line. They have been ripping us off for far too long. |
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| ▲ | jajuuka 24 minutes ago | parent [-] | | I think this is living in fantasy land. Normal people aren't hyper concerned about boot loaders, sideloading or custom ROM's. There was an uptick many years past simply because this offered new functionality, but anymore there really isn't any reason to outside of small things like removing the Google Search bar from the home screen. But the amount of effort versus the result does not balance out. Normal people just want to buy a phone and use it and they can do that today. They don't want the added complications. There is a reason Amazon is so popular and massive. The goal should be to add simplicity and not add complexity if want something to be popular. |
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| ▲ | Kim_Bruning 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Room for new competitors! |
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| ▲ | pixl97 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | "The market will fix itself!" Narrator: "In fact the market did not fix itself" | | |
| ▲ | phendrenad2 an hour ago | parent | next [-] | | I can buy a smartphone or tablet that's 100% unlockable and has all the bells and whistles right now, and get it delivered in 24 hours, and not pay significantly more than average. I think the market is working just fine. (To which people usually say "for now". Well yeah, the sun hasn't gone supernova... for now) | | |
| ▲ | bigyabai 16 minutes ago | parent [-] | | Yes, and heroin users can go buy fruits and veggies if they want to improve their health outlook. The fact that better alternatives exist does not mean the market will reward them, which is the point the parent is making. |
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| ▲ | ixwt 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Narrator's Narrator: "The overwhelming majority of consumers don't care about the bootloader, so the market forces do not have an incentive to keep it unlocked. This leads to the market not 'fixing itselt'. " | | |
| ▲ | throwaway48476 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | People are not and cannot be rational actors in the market owing to imperfect knowledge. Externalities are common. | |
| ▲ | goku12 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | This isn't the 'market not fixing itself'. This is the 'market being actively manipulated and enshittified'. Don't forget that it's much easier to leave the boot-loader unlockable or even unlockable by just the owner, than it is to keep it locked and under control of a remote corporation. They went out of their way to enshittify it. | | |
| ▲ | jajuuka 21 minutes ago | parent [-] | | This isn't true. It's far more secure to lock the boot loader and block root than it is to leave them open. This is a basic security measure from the OEM. They didn't just wake up yesterday and go "let's mess with those nerds." |
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| ▲ | kachapopopow 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | if the market is not solving the problem then the natural conclusion is that it is not a problem that needs solving, pretty sad about it that not that many people care about these things. The opposite is pretty much true when it comes to security I am generally forced to use an apple device since I can be relatively sure that my keys will be safe (not including state sponsored actors, at that point I would have bigger problems). Now something for the market to actually solve would be poor hardware security in general making locked bootloaders serve no purpose, having strong built-in security at the SOC would diminish the advantages gained with locked down systems and would allow us to have BYOK without compromising on the general populations security. | | |
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| ▲ | preisschild an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | GrapheneOS is working with an OEM that wants to support this (+ the added security requirements for GOS) |
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| ▲ | charcircuit 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Being able to install a new os is orthogonal to owning a device. It's an additional feature that most users won't use. |
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| ▲ | goku12 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Being able to install a new OS is not an 'additional feature'. It's the downgrade of a capability that's inherent to the device. It's the same as making a carseat heating a subscriptions service. Whether the users use it or not is entirely irrelevant. | | |
| ▲ | charcircuit an hour ago | parent [-] | | >that's inherent to the device It's not inherit to the device. Accepting updates signed by a specific key is inherit to the device. |
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| ▲ | woodrowbarlow 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | the "ownership" framing is because bootloader locks allow vendors to unilaterally make decisions about how your device operates after you purchase the device. |
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| ▲ | nkrisc 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| When my mother was shopping for a new smartphone she definitely was not considering whether or not she could install a different OS on it. |
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| ▲ | goku12 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Your mother's unwillingness to install a different OS doesn't mean that everyone else who wants it should be denied too. I'm genuinely curious. What's your motivation in making up such a pointless argument/justification? | |
| ▲ | lawlessone 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | cool, When i was shopping for a new car i wasn't considering if it was a 4x4 because i live in a city with a mild climate | | |
| ▲ | stronglikedan 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | I hope you at least considered whether it was AWD cuz that shit is the bee's knees regardless of climate! |
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