Why I don't like smartphones

The first argument is based on a terrible premise that only exists to support authors decision to not have a cell phone.

The second argument is just as pitiful as clients have nearly always been centralized. Just because your favorite protocol isn't used often on the device doesn't make this terrible argument stand up.

The third argument... I can't even remember what it was because it was stupid, or perhaps my eyeballs rolled so far into the back of my head that I wasn't able to read anymore.

e.g. I don't own a smartphone, because it's a consumption device rather than both consumption and production, is just silly. So is a photoalbum, so is a book, so is a TV, so is a music player. A smartphone is all in one and it's incredibly useful. Beyond that, it is in ways a production device. It's a messaging device, a photo and video taking device, it's great for email, I record audio for my college classes on it etc. Sure you can hardly build software or write books on a smartphone in a practical way, but that's throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Further, smartphones are increasingly becoming production devices, too. They're becoming bigger, more powerful, and some can now be plugged in to monitors and bluetooth keyboards and create a reasonable windows production environment, others have interesting note-taking capabilities.

Web design is another one... Bad web designers have ruined web design, just like they were ruining web design before smartphones. Further it doesn't seem like a reason not to use a smartphone, either.

I'm in total agreement with him on centralisation... it's a slippery slope, I think. For example I'm still playing games from 15 years ago, because I actually own the software. But many of today's games, even though they have no multiplayer component, would not run if in 15 years their servers shut down... because there's calculation or storage being done in the cloud that is essential to the game running. We don't physically own copies of our software anymore, but rather we own, in a way, a sort of thin client and some login details that we have to hope will last as long as we'd like to use them.

This was always a problem, back in the day, too... but at least the software was available. Take any popular MMO, if the servers shut down, people have copies and can run their own servers. In future, this may not be possible anymore. Anyway games are just an example, but it's a trend that's a bit worrying. Although, it's not specific to or exclusively because of smartphones, it's a larger trend.

Also I wouldn't make install without a local prefix, something like ./configure --prefix=/home/$USER/usr/ or something along the lines. I mean common prefix is /usr/local, but still you shouldn't install anything globally without using your package manager.

Good thing is just that we can do so much more on a smartphone that we needed a PC before, and by that, I mean sitting in a desk.

And no, smartphones aren't for media creation OR consumption. Smartphones are for interpersonal communication first.

* For consumption but not creation - a 'dumb' mobile is even more so, you're stuck with the built-in functionality and can't install any other software.

* Not real network clients due to battery limitations - arguably true for 'dumb' phones as well but they don't have the 'powerful CPU and fast network connection' that OP bemoans wasting.

* Massive centralization / shift to "the cloud" - 'dumb' phones have limited or no online presence.

* Ruined web design - 'dumb' phones have little or no web browsing capability and web pages don't target them.

* Insecure - can't really argue that one.

* Malevolent / locked down - technically applies to 'dumb' phones but they were never advertised as general purpose software platforms.

I'd say most of his points stand.