[darepublic]

people have been hard on rabbit r1, but ultimately it is a step toward future I feel. And they bury further down in the article that it requires permissions that the android won't grant.

[fortyseven]

It's fine to take baby steps, but you can't sell a proof of concept as a real product. People will hate you, and it'll taint their perception of similar products going forward.

[alpaca128]

So why don't they sell a phone with customized Android that does what they want, like every single Android brand other than Pixel?

The Rabbit R1 is doomed to be obsolete as soon as Google and Apple add similar functionality to their OS.

[radiorental]

Because its Teenage Engineering and hardware designwankery, not product design, is what they do.

Need a BT speaker? That'll be $550 thank you, btw the speaker cones are completely exposed because it looks cool.

[agsnu]

Probably because a competitive phone is a much bigger effort than a special purpose device

[rys]

It’s way more fun to set a huge pile of VC money on fire.

[karlgkk]

What future though? And it’s easily replaced by a hardware button on a phone. I expect Google and Apple will release theirs this year.

[aitchnyu]

I got a Bixby button on my Samsung. Am I living in the future? /s

[multimoon]

That’s just because it needs installed as a system app (read: shipped with the ROM) to access system level permissions. Android will grant them, since it grants them on the Rabbit’s ROM like android would to any system app.

It’s still just an android app.

[dbbk]

> it requires permissions that the android won't grant

No, it really doesn't.