[JeremyNT]

> This taints the whole Pine64 brand for me. I totally want a Linux phone and a Linux tablet. But I don't know if I should trust a brand that treats their customers like this.

Frankly, it seems like this isn't the device for you. I agree, you should probably wait. But words like "taint the brand" seem incredibly strong to me.

These devices are for developers and tinkerers, not the general population. The goal is to get these devices into as many hands as possible, hitting a price point as low as possible. This allows for more people to get access to the hardware and start tinkering, helping to build out the (woefully lacking, at this time) software ecosystem.

To be honest, I feel like they have done a really good job of setting expectations around this, so I'm not terribly sympathetic to this class of complaint. I ordered a PinePhone and am patiently waiting for it to ship. I'm glad it's so cheap! It's not going to be a device to replace my primary phone (yet), it's a project to tinker with. As such I don't want to spend much more money.