Sidephone: A minimalist Android phone with swappable USB keypads

Can someone explain the appeal of the swappable keypad? I really see no advantage in having this. Just seems like extra engineering for no real reason.

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m-p-3 an hour ago | parent [-]

Upgradeability and ease of repair.

I can imagine a BlackBerry-style keyboard showing up at some point, or maybe even something that isn't a keyboard (ex: a mini arcade joystick + buttons for games)?

	▲	nosioptar an hour ago \| parent [-]
		They have an iPod wheel/button for it in their site. It'd probably be useless for phone control, but I'd love a flac player with old iPod controls.

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coreyoconnor 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I'd love to try these new phones. My current phone (Google Fold) is terrible. However

1. google pixels are the best android devices AFAICT. Not a high bar, but that's that.

2. due to the prevalence of spam and scam calls: Not having an AI call filtering is a no-go. google pixel's have a really nice call screen.

Course we could have a competent government that would do something about scams (besides encouraging and supporting them). Then small business could actually compete. But the best we get is a rapist and scam artist.

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ChrisArchitect 21 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Speaking of,

wonder how things are going with the Clicks keyboard and Communicator.

https://www.clicks.tech/ (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46467057)

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Neywiny 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Not having support for messaging apps is a bit much considering it's still Android based. Why is it WIP? What's the P to W? Play services?

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a2128 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

They mention in several places that the phone is degoogled and that certain apps won't work due to lack of Play services. They also probably can't redistribute popular messaging apps without a special agreement with the developer, or risking it with Aurora Store or similar. Unfortunately Google is leading a fight to close Android that so far no big entity is really resisting anymore (Epic now having settled their lawsuit and agreeing to never badmouth Android again), with efforts such as Play Integrity API, automatic protection that they're pushing developers to activate, etc. Unless something changes, in the near future "it's Android" won't mean much for app compatibility...

	▲	zx8080 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Seems we all need to actively invest into forking Android or creating a separate mobile OS from scratch. Google will try for sure to boil us all slowly from open Android to the very much closed ios-like state of their OS.

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monooso 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

They support WhatsApp and Signal, according to the website.

"Telegram, Messenger, Threema, WeChat and more" are marked as WIP.

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ftchd 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Apps:

- Whatsapp

- Proton VPN, Drive, Mail

- Signal

- Obtainium

- Uber

- Podcast player

- etc

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Neywiny 4 hours ago | parent [-]

Yes but why are they WIP? On a regular Android phone you just install them.

	▲	monooso 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		None of the apps listed by GP are identified as works in progress. This is the full list of WIP apps, from the website. - Apple Music, Spotify, Tidal. - Telegram, Messenger, Threema, WeChat and more. - DUO, Aegis, and BitWarden.

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raw_anon_1111 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Or I can just use my cellular Apple Watch (like I do now) for my “side phone”…