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Ask HN: What Apple alternatives are you switching to?

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Re: Ask HN: What Apple alternatives are you switching to?

#191

Post by IncRnd »

scoopertrooper wrote: post #71
gjsman-1000 wrote: post #26

To be honest... None. It's a choice. You might wholly disagree, but recent events aren't enough to get me to switch yet, because I think the competition has too many tradeoffs. I can get my photos scanned against a CSAM database... or I can have Google tracking my location constantly regardless of what they say (as they've been proven to be misleading in the past)... or I can use a Linux phone and say goodbye to batt…

Exactly, I think people are just getting a little too worked up over this whole thing. Apple computes a hash of each image you upload to iCloud then check it against a list of CP hashes. Of all the things in the world to get worked up over, this is ridiculous. I get it, the mechanism they're using has apparent flaws, and maybe some whacko could somehow get access to your phone and start uploading things that trick th…

> Exactly, I think people are just getting a little too worked up over this whole thing. Apple computes a hash of each image you upload to iCloud then check it against a list of CP hashes.

If that is what is supposed to happen, then it makes no sense for any new code to run on the device!

> Of all the things in the world to get worked up over, this is ridiculous.

Well, it is not crazy to get worked up over Apple saying they will check uploads to iCloud by checking what's on your phone - instead of simply adding code to iCloud. That seems obvious not ridiculous.

Re: Ask HN: What Apple alternatives are you switching to?

#192

Post by RealStickman_ »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #93
ByteWelder wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are plenty of Android flavours that don't have Google apps, like https://lineage.microg.org/ In my limited experience so far, LineageOS works much better than it used to on my HTC Desire. Battery life has been better than any of my iPhones (3G, 4S, 5S, 7 and XS) ever had. That said, if I had to chose between a Google Android phone and an Apple phone, I'd still pick the Apple one. Luckily there are more choices…

microG is still sending information to Google in order for apps and services to work. It does NOT free you from Google.

Use Lineage without microG then.

Re: Ask HN: What Apple alternatives are you switching to?

#193

Post by fartcannon »

acheron wrote: post #58

It should be obvious that anyone who says “I’m concerned about privacy, so I’m going to switch to using Google products!” is not a serious person. If you’re actually going to switch to using open source hardware phones and whatnot, then good luck I guess. I can see where more progress in that area would lead to general improvements, so it’s not entirely tilting at windmills.

You're looking directly at an example of Apple not caring about privacy and you still can't see it. Apple does not care about your privacy. They care about your money.

Re: Ask HN: What Apple alternatives are you switching to?

#194

Post by giancarlostoro »

gjsman-1000 wrote: post #26

To be honest... None. It's a choice. You might wholly disagree, but recent events aren't enough to get me to switch yet, because I think the competition has too many tradeoffs. I can get my photos scanned against a CSAM database... or I can have Google tracking my location constantly regardless of what they say (as they've been proven to be misleading in the past)... or I can use a Linux phone and say goodbye to batt…

It's only a matter of time before Google starts doing the same thing. I can't imagine Google wont do it eventually.

Re: Ask HN: What Apple alternatives are you switching to?

#196

Post by mapgrep »

On laptop I moved to Qubes a few years ago, on a ThinkPad X1 carbon which is an amazing machine. I keep a c2014 MacBook around for miscellaneous things (e.g. syncing Spotify local songs to my phone over local WiFi, which I have not figured out how to do in the Linux client).

For phone I’m very interested in /e/os and the one phone you can get new with it preinstalled, the Teracube 2 (wired has a Teracube review of the very similar previous model).

I am looking at photoprism running on a home server (intel nuc) synced via PhotoSync (can sync photos via sftp). It actually looks really cool and uses tensorflow to do some sort of AI photo sorting locally.

By the way, while there’s a learning curve to this stuff, it feels very empowering and educational once you’ve put in the work. It feels like the future. Compute and storage is cheap. I think hosting things on your own server is the inevitable future. Once you’re set up it just hums along. This stuff will eventually be sold in appliance form (see Helm email server for the model).

Re: Ask HN: What Apple alternatives are you switching to?

#197

Post by fartcannon »

traceroute66 wrote: post #106
acheron wrote: post #58

It should be obvious that anyone who says “I’m concerned about privacy, so I’m going to switch to using Google products!” is not a serious person. If you’re actually going to switch to using open source hardware phones and whatnot, then good luck I guess. I can see where more progress in that area would lead to general improvements, so it’s not entirely tilting at windmills.

> anyone who says “I’m concerned about privacy, so I’m going to switch to using Google products!” is not a serious person Amen to that ! To modestly paraphrase an old saying.... With Apple, you buy the product. With Google, you are the product.

With Apple you lease the product. Because you don't own anything about it.

Re: Ask HN: What Apple alternatives are you switching to?

#198

Post by baby-yoda »

been thinking about the same the last week+, and for phone I can't help but want to go back to a Nokia feature phone. Email has been off my phone for a year and a half, no notifications. Trying to quit WhatsApp as well so not having it is a feature. The models available now aren't quite there yet but I am hopeful. Really, my ideal would be:

  - Good/great camera, 8+ MP; Front facing optional. Dedicated shutter button/quick access from sleep
  - GPS and HERE maps
  - Simple, native "apps" - Phone, Alarm, Calendar, Contacts, threaded SMS/MMS, weather, podcasts, flashlight. Email optional
  - High quality screen (3", OLED, high PPI)
  - 4G connectivity, 5G optional
  - Tethering/Hotspot capability
  - USB-C
  - Candybar form factor with number pad would work, but would prefer an E71/72 reboot
Thats basically it. Given how inexpensive something like the just released 6310 is (~50 EUR), it would be nice to have a "high end" feature phone around the 250 EUR/$300 price point. Long battery a nice side benefit as well.

Re: Ask HN: What Apple alternatives are you switching to?

#199

Post by withinboredom »

thealistra wrote: post #123
AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm reasonably confident that Google listens to every conversation I have within earshot of my phone. It isn't uncommon to find things in my news feed that are related to things I have no interest in but a friend or coworker had just mentioned to me in passing.

At work you have the same IP. Your coworker may have googled what he was taking about. This is a much easier explaination than a constant mic monitoring for arbitrary phrases

Don’t people have data caps where they’d notice if a ridiculous amount of audio was sent to a server?

Re: Ask HN: What Apple alternatives are you switching to?

#200

Post by IncRnd »

zepto wrote: post #141
jrockway wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple's using my electricity and my silicon to call the cops on me. We have no idea what hashes they're checking images against; we can't see the raw data, and we can't see the hashes, and we can't see what they're sending to their servers. There is no technical reason why this needs to exist. If they want to scan iCloud photos for something, they can do that on their servers. iCloud is not end-to-end encrypted. Law…

> iCloud is not end-to-end encrypted Yet. Have you considered that this might be a necessary precursor to making iCloud e2e?

Scanning people's on-phone photos clearly has nothing to do with being a precursor to e2e encryption. The photos get transferred either way, so one has nothing to do with the other.
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