[Polylactic_acid]

The don't buy it argument has never held up. Look at phones, the options for a removable battery, sd card slot, 3.5mm jack are all gone on all but the most primitive/weird models of phones.

If the general public goes against your preference then your preference will no longer be an option. For cars this likely means that the only way to get a car that isn't spyware/ad tech will be buying an old car before this happened. That option eventually becomes more and more difficult until you give up and accept whatever the corporations are pushing.

[judge2020]

This is a problem of society zeroing in on the most convenient technology. You still today are not forced to buy a phone nor a car, but if you want any chance of making a living more than 5 miles away from your home (well, depending on how far you can walk or bike) you need both a cell phone for receiving work-related communication and a car for getting to/from work on time. The problem is that 99%+ of society sees that receiving cooler, better tech (like a faster phone or a more efficient car) is a worthy tradeoff for the issues that only <%1 of consumers aren't happy with.

[cycrutchfield]

Better buy a bike then. I’m glad that a small minority of luddites can’t hold everybody else back from making progress.

[gpvos]

I'd like technical progress to be in service of the user and all their rights, not of corporations that apparently value covering their asses above creating value for their clients. Legal measures ensuring the ability in all situations to physically turn off privacy-invading features, plus the right to repair and tinker, would be a good start. Forcing free software would be even better.

[cycrutchfield]

You absolutely have the right to use the power of your wallet to try to force those changes. However, again, the vast majority of consumers have voted with their wallets and they do not care for the same set of features that you care about. The vast majority feel that it would make the product experience significantly worse. What use do I have for a headphone jack when I have AirPods? What use do I have for a replaceable battery when it would make my device thicker, heavier, and much less pleasant to use?

It’s a good thing indefatigable contrarians like you don’t get to drive product decisions.

[Polylactic_acid]

I somewhat agree its a good thing that all tech is not driven by complaints but the problem is virtually every single phone is the same thing. When changes something and you don't like it, you better get used to it because next year every single android phone will have the same change because they all target the mass market unless you look at ultra budget android go phones.

The AirPods might be really nice and not nearly as problematic as the initial reactions predicted but they are still massively more expensive than wired headphones and made a huge collection of existing working headphones obsolete.

[gpvos]

Indeed, another problem is the infinite stream of waste being produced.

[Polylactic_acid]

Not everyone would agree that active cameras pointed at you and phoning home in otherwise semi private situations is progress.

[cycrutchfield]

There’s an easy solution if you don’t like it: put a piece of tape over the lens. I’m not sure what y’all are doing in your cars but if you like to get wild then by all means do so, just take precautions.