I want a computer that I own

What does it mean to "own a computer"?

Do I own my M1 MacBook Air? Did I own my TRS-80 Model 4, an 8-bit, Z80-based computer circa 1983? Well, I didn't lease either one of them, I bought them outright. Apple can't demand their hardware back now any more than Radio Shack could have demanded theirs back then. So that's owning, right? No?

You say I don't own my Mac because I can't put a different operating system on it. It's true, I could run multiple operating systems on the TRS-80. Sort of. There was TRSDOS, CP/M, and... several nearly-interchangeable TRSDOS clones. Of course, I can run a lot more on the M1 if you count virtual machines (including all the TRS-80 operating systems), but I know that's not what you mean. You can run any OS that's been ported to the Mac on the Mac, though, and there's already work being done to port Linux and NetBSD. Do I not own the Mac because Apple's security measures make it difficult to do that porting?

You say I'm dependent on the largesse of Apple and they can "take things away" from me as long as I'm using the Mac. And, it's true they have a potential level of control over what I can run on macOS that Radio Shack didn't have over TRSDOS. Yet for practical purposes I depended on the largess of Radio Shack, too, and when that stopped, the writing was on the wall for that compuer line. Not the same thing? No, not exactly, but I bet you can't name a Mac application that you can't run because Apple pulled a hidden switch that stopped it from running. You can name a few that you could run a decade ago -- or in a very few cases, a year ago -- that you can't now because the OS changed, or the hardware changed. I can't run my once-beloved crazy writing brainstorming app, Dramatica Story Expert. But that's because its developer is legendarily terrible at keeping up with modern Apple hardware. It isn't because I don't own my computer.

You say that things aren't "private" on the Mac. What's that mean? The local data on the Mac is more protected than the local data on the TRS-80 was, I can tell you. Forget encryption, stuff rarely had plain text passwords! Data that isn't local is a question mark now, but it was a question mark then, too -- to the degree it was possible to have non-local data on places like BBSes and Compuserve and even the early Internet. I have way more data "in the cloud" now, but in many ways it's a lot more secure, because we weren't just thinking about security in the same way three or four decades ago. As for ad tracking, I'd argue that's a really important conversation about privacy, but it's not a conversation about "owning my computer" unless we're really stretching the metaphor.

And in the final analysis, "you don't own your own computer" is a metaphor, a semantic sleight of hand. I'm surely playing a semantic game here myself, but my issue with a lot of these arguments is that they're presenting as something that they maybe aren't. They're maybe less about liberté, égalité, fraternité than they are about nostalgia for a (remembered as) simpler, more tinkering-friendly time.

Perhaps we're going to return to a time where it's difficult to put an OS on your computer other than the one sanctioned by its manufacturer. Is that great? No. Does it mean we don't really own our computers? I'm just not sure I buy that.

[To vainly try to head off the "but iOS" responses: I'm explicitly talking about Macs in this example. And no, I don't expect Macs to ever be locked down to the degree iOS is. That's a rant for another time, though.]

I'll play the (intentional) Devil's Advocate here to present an alternative viewpoint.

I like iOS, but not Android. Let me explain why.

I personally love Linux, Unix philosophy (I'm even sometimes an old beardy zealot about POSIX standards and the old way), and inherent customization possibilities.

On the other hand, I don't want to manage my phone like a desktop or laptop computer, or a server because of a plethora of reasons. First, user interface is not very suitable for that. Second, there's a lot more finicky things to manage. Last but not the least, that management task is continuous.

iOS takes all of these away. Complete backups are built-in (I know android has it, but I don't know how bulletproof is this). Defaults are sensible. Settings do not change spontaneously. OS behavior doesn't change drastically from device to device (Every android vendor tunes their OS and background process policy differently, creating a lot of WTH moments and more finicky management tasks). Updates are not slowed down by the vendor, the operator, the distributor and today's weather.

While iOS is a pretty strict walled garden, devices are set-up and forget. Even you forget that you have an iOS device, because you use it without thinking.

Radio security, isolation and its reasonable and unreasonable parts are discussed here extensively. As a HAM radio operator, I can only say that, radios can do wreak a lot of havoc even with informed tinkering, without any bad intentions. If you take a relatively cheap SDR and listen to your neighborhood spectrum (just see the traffic, not decode anything) your jaw will drop. It's a very crowded up there, and there's a lot of non-public traffic.

Another stuff about custom ROMs and Stock ROMs is SIM services. Yes, many of the SIM menus just sit here unused, but there are useful ones like mobile e-signatures. I carry my e-sig with my phone, in my SIM. So using it requires a verified and official software stack. As far as my experience goes, no custom ROMs run these services (intentionally or unintentionally).

I manage my family's Android phones, and I personally use an iPhone. As far as I can see, it's much easier to leave an iOS device on its terms and it'll fare better.

Feel free to discuss, counter or just burn this comment down. :)

Most old flip phones support up to 3G, which is being phased out.

The 4G ones run either Android (so a worse experience with the same spyware) or KaiOS (which is still fine but not very available).

It is interesting thought, especially as few days back someone in HN wrote completely opposite view, that everything should be controlled and spied on (and for the love of universe I cannot find it again, it was on first page of HN I would appreciate link ...), because with progress we are becoming more powerful and more destructive - so any human in future with enough knowledge, would have ability to destroying entire humanity.

Where is the middle ground between those two ends?

Maybe it is similar to what we have now?

You pay for it with your money, the loss of privacy is the scam that is enabled by the mass consumer's apathy and lack of knowledge.

I also want to own my device, not rent it from a manufacturer.