[aboardRat4]

This is all smoke and mirrors.

The core issue is not "Google not allowing a feature", it's that small businesses cannot buy phones, install a patched version of Android without a restriction and sell them to make money.

Until this problem is solved, everything else is palliative.

[leni536]

I recently learned that there is a business doing exactly that:

https://iode.tech/

I don't think it's high volume, I think this is done by some of the microg folks.

But OEMs probably do everything in their power to make this business model unviable or at least not scale.

[microtonal]

It is one of many projects that make alternative, AOSP-based operating systems (e.g. GrapheneOS, LineageOS, /e/OS), and some of them sell devices for an additional source of income (e.g. Murena who develop /e/OS also does this).

[azangru]

> it's that small businesses cannot buy phones, install a patched version of Android without a restriction

Pardon my ignorance; but why would Android need to be patched? Is it because it wouldn't run on the phone hardware otherwise?

[aboardRat4]

>Is it because it wouldn't run on the phone hardware otherwise?

Because those 11 features mentioned in the OP post need to be unlocked.

[pipes]

What prevents this? I always assumed they could.

[shock]

Bootloaders are locked and most of them are unlockable.

[aboardRat4]

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/jan/10/trump-...

DMCA and other anti-circumvention regulations.

[pipes]

That was a good read. But I still thought anyone can take graphene os and put it in a phone and sell it? Maybe there is specific licensing restrictions in the android license that stop this.

[aatd86]

Who wants a bootleg Android that sends all your call logs who knows where? xD

[microtonal]

Ah, yes, the Google/Apple narrative of "if we open the ecosystem, all users' data is at risk". Meanwhile, they are the companies that continuously harvest behavioral data from phones, put backdoors for law enforcement through weak defaults (iCloud backups are not E2E encrypted, unless you enable ADP), etc. All this while, GrapheneOS, LineageOS, etc. provide real, provable privacy.

Please stop parroting surveillance tech company's narratives.

[aboardRat4]

Emm.. as if Samsung doesn't..?