[ubermonkey]

You're trusting somebody no matter how you do it unless you own all the hardware that supports your ecosystem.

The Free Software world has had ample opportunity to produce something as carefully assembled, as smooth, and as capable as iOS, and what we got instead was Android.

I've watched the whole FOSS world happen in my career, and there are places where I cannot IMAGINE choosing a closed source solution, given my druthers. But it's also become super clear to me that the FOSS world isn't interested in producing polished user experiences. Sure, you or I could cobble together a FOSS-only phone-and-syncing stack, I guess, but I don't care to. Most people aren't us; doing so is beyond them.

Suggesting a normal person use something OTHER than iOS at this point is questionable at best.

[nine_k]

A bazaar cannot produce things that are coherent and smooth: it takes a vision of a single person to control a large amount of aspects, implemented by other people the way the leader prescribed. That requires the cathedral approach.

Sometimes it works with a right BDFL, for some time (like Python). It also works with solo projects, and with projects with large commercial support (like Blender), especially those which don't normally accept your pull requests, except as a proof of concept (SQLite).

But the normal open-source model produces things like Linux, git, ffmpeg, VLC, etc, which are wonderful and have immense power, but are hardly sleek or excessively coherent. And each of them is much, much smaller than macOS or iOS.

[seanw444]

Something I've come to understand is that just as we have "time vs. space" tradeoffs in, well, primarily computing (but can be applied to virtually everything), we can also reduce essentially all preferential decisions down to "freedom vs. convenience".

The kind of person that uses Apple products/services cares about convenience. The person that uses the third party Android ROMs, in particular, cares more about the freedom.

[ubermonkey]

FOSS people who see themselves as digital freedom fighters LOVE to trot this out, but I don't think it's true in any meaningful sense.

It's more accurate to frame it as preferring low hassle to high hassle. Or to preferring well-designed tools to haphazard efforts. Or, from the other side, preferring some degree of DIY to turnkey products. (In particular, I think this is a HUGE piece of it; lots of hackers want to build their own toolchain, and then they get to feel noble because they're doing it for "freedom.")

I'm pretty "all in" on the Apple ecosystem. Each step of the way, I thought pretty deeply about my choices, and still ended up with an Apple option. But to characterize this as me caring more about convenience than "freedom" implies that I have somehow given up or endangered MY freedom, which isn't the case.

I'm able to do anything I want to do in this ecosystem. Macs are general purpose machines; I can build from source, and I can run code from any repository I want.

iOS is closed by design, and the result has been a very stable and predictable platform that I do not believe is possible WITHOUT that closed nature. I can't hack code on my phone, but I also don't WANT to. There are lots of appliance devices in my life I don't want to hack, and that I just want to USE.

[seanw444]

You're right, you have the freedom to choose a device with less freedom. And that's fine. I'm not trying to be condescending to people who prefer convenience. It's a reasonable preference to have. I don't see how this disproves my point though.

I will admit, Macs are much better in the software realm, but the hardware has almost no internal upgradeability. There's some, but it's less. That's my point. And yes, many non-Apple computers also have that same problem. My gripe isn't with Apple. It's with companies who don't give maximal freedom with their devices, as I prefer more open systems, personally.

[ubermonkey]

"but the hardware has almost no internal upgrade-ability"

Sure. But this is also true of most modern, lightweight, thin laptops. And I'm pretty sure it's true of any phone worth using.

My experience is that a certain sort of FOSS person prefers theoretical freedom to actual usability.

[nehal3m]

I am one of those FOSS people. I was all in on Apple up until about 6 months ago (iPhone 13, 13" M1 MBP, AirPods, an iCloud+ sub and some peripherals). My wife still is.

The main reasons I left are repairability and upgradability; forms of freedom that you simply cannot deny Apple isn't great at, from design all the way up to policy. Privacy was also a reason. It is true that you have to place trust somewhere up the chain when it comes to the way specific software handles your data, but things like where it is stored and how it is encrypted are in your own hands when you DIY.

These things are not theoretical; if I want to use a different Wi-Fi adapter, a new SSD, RAM, a replacement screen, speakers or barrel jack then I can. There are parts available for very reasonable prices as well as the manufacturers' repair manual. It doesn't require solvents or esoteric tools.

Now I use a business notebook with Linux that is worse than the M1 in some respects, but in hindsight I'm willing to give up the battery life and cool runnings for the ability to repair and upgrade (and ports! Ethernet, yay!). Same goes for the phone (I went for a FairPhone).

It isn't as polished, very true. There's some rough edges and it takes a little more work, and yes, sometimes a bit of frustration. But the upside is tangible, it's not some form of feigned nobility.

[yamtaddle]

> Linux

Well, that one's not so bad, but is also mostly a commercially-supported endeavor and has been for a long time.

Now, the Linux desktop is a shitshow, sure. It'll remain that way until they can settle on One Windowing & UI Toolkit to Rule Them All, which looks to be happening never and is definitely in part a consequence of so many very basic parts of the GUI being swappable and having tons of competing options. Though the kernel's attitude toward providing stable driver ABIs (or rather, not doing so) isn't helping.

[soulofmischief]

Is it a shit show, though? Things were more rocky two decades ago, but my computing experience with Linux today is unmatched by any other kernel or operating system. Comparatively it feels like the UX of OS X and Windows are the total shitshows.

[michaelmior]

> as carefully assembled, as smooth, and as capable as iOS, and what we got instead was Android.

Some of us prefer Android to iOS :) Having used iOS as well, the one thing I miss in Android is Continuity. Other than that, I find Android gives me a better experience. I'm certainly an outlier in many ways though compared to the average user.

[chakalakasp]

My favorite part of android is how security patches go through a multi-tiered trickle-down system of testing to make sure they work with the dozens of custom flavors each manufacturer has so that by the time you get patched it's been in the wild for weeks or months. Oooh, ooh, no that's not my favorite thing, my favorite thing is how each cellular company gets to put their own bloatware on top of the bloatware that each phone manufacturer gets to add to it. Oh wait, maybe it's patch support ending for new phones 3 years after they were released. There is so much to love about how Android turned out it's hard to pick just one thing.

[HJain13]

> My favorite part of android is how security patches go through a multi-tiered trickle-down system of testing to make sure they work with the dozens of custom flavors each manufacturer has so that by the time you get patched it's been in the wild for weeks or months.

This is not the reason for security patches taking too long to be released to certain phones; Google has a monthly cadence of releasing security patches and zero-days have rarely (I can't remember a case of that happening but maybe it has happened) missed do you have a source for it?

> Oooh, ooh, no that's not my favorite thing, my favorite thing is how each cellular company gets to put their own bloatware on top of the bloatware that each phone manufacturer gets to add to it.

There are unlocked phones available and honestly this problem is mostly a US problem. Rest of the world isn't in the iron fists of their carriers.

> Oh wait, maybe it's patch support ending for new phones 3 years after they were released.

You can vote with your wallet and choose vendors where this is not the case; Google, Samsung and Recently OnePlus offer 5 years of security updates.

[TheCapeGreek]

>There are unlocked phones available and honestly this problem is mostly a US problem. Rest of the world isn't in the iron fists of their carriers.

In the rest of the world phones are unlocked in terms of being able to use different SIM cards, but mostly the bloatware is still there and can only be disabled (not removed)

[scarface74]

> This is not the reason for security patches taking too long to be released to certain phones; Google has a monthly cadence of releasing security patches and zero-days have rarely (I can't remember a case of that happening but maybe it has happened) missed do you have a source for it?

Yet and still Microsoft solved this problem years ago. Why can’t Google? Hell my 2006 Mac Mini got years of Windows 7 updates after installing Windows on it.

[vxNsr]

This is interesting, they’ll try to tell you it’s because the cellular modem requires extra testing by the carriers and manufacturers, but windows can support upgrades that don’t affect an add-in card cell modem… so what gives?

[oblio]

> they’ll try to tell you it’s because the cellular modem requires extra testing by the carriers and manufacturers

That's crazy, though. It's not like there isn't a module for that cellular modem, and they don't touch that code for every release.

That's like blocking a Firefox update because the Windows driver for the mouse could be impacted.

[scarface74]

Yet Apple is able to send updates worldwide without interference from the carriers and without their “testing”

[kilolima]

I like having a back button.

[howinteresting]

Agreed, I tried using an iPhone as my primary device for 3 years and it was so bad compared to a Pixel.

[kernal]

>The Free Software world has had ample opportunity to produce something as carefully assembled, as smooth, and as capable as iOS, and what we got instead was Android.

You mean the same OS that allows you to build your own open mobile OS as opposed to a closed source locked down OS that permits only 1 app store and 1 payment system?

>Suggesting a normal person use something OTHER than iOS at this point is questionable at best.

It's only questionable if you prefer the prison that is iOS.

[ubermonkey]

Richard? Is that you?

I lol'd at "prison that is iOS."