471–480 of 907 posts
It's a lost cause. We need to focus on pmOS: https://postmarketos.org/ With both Android and Chromium, we're ultimately at Google's mercy. btw, does anyone know if Huawei is following along with this in their fork?
They are moving to their own completely proprietary OS called HarmonyOS NEXT.
I've been using Android phones since the OG Droid (2009) because I could install software on it. My next phone will be an iPhone if this doesn't change.
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Why do you think their bank "isn't even trying to be secure"?
Because SMS is not considered a secure 2FA mechanism anymore, and hasn't been for a while. If that's the default for that bank, and not GP going out of their way to pick a legacy access path, then they're about a decade behind what's considered industry standard -- which today is querying a second factor not just per login, but also per important operations (money transfers, dispositions, changes in settings), with t…
I think the government and large businesses like it that way, as it makes the mobile network providers as a sort of credit check (or “are you worth dealing with”) mechanism.
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The fact this is a thing is part of the problem. We should not be downloading executables and running them from random third parties in order to do mundane tasks. If they absolutely must have an app, it should be a web app, end of.
Here's a question, what if the executable was thoroughly sandboxed? Like Firecracker level with virtualization? And once you're there, what's the difference between that and a webapp? I don't think apps are going away so users need to have a switch that says, "I don't trust this company with anything". Extremely limited Internet access, no notifications, no background activity at all, nothing. It needs to be like app…
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> Feel free to complain, but don't forget you can make choices. Of course. I can make a choice. When the choice is between being able to login to secure services with my SIM embedded e-signature, use mobile banking and conduct official business and not being able to do any of these things, making choices are easy. Running Linux on desktop is easy mode when compared to phones, and yes, I started using Linux on desktop…
What about when your smartphone is required to verify your identity so you can work / earn a paycheck? What about when it's required in order for you to engage in commerce? We're headed down a very slippery slope and the destination is a very dystopian reality where those in power can prevent someone from participating in society on a whim. I believe the destination has previously been described as the beast system o…
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"just use a second phone" cannot be the answer because 99% of people will just scoff at that. Instead of buying a second phone, why not just buy one that works? And that's to say nothing of the environmental impact.
> "just use a second phone" cannot be the answer It is the best answer at the moment. You can keep an absolute basic phone with all the banking and such apps loaded and nothing else. You treat it like an appliance. Your daily driver will be separate and can be running PostmarketOS or LineageOS etc. There are several benefits off the top of my head: 1. Since you only install banking/govt type apps on your "important"…
With this being the trend, you're already more likely to leave what you called "daily driver" phone home, and only take the "important" one with you.
Anything that reaches a certain threshold of value to society and requires enormous effort to build and maintain has to fall back to a capitalist, for-profit, closed-source structure. That's all that's happening here.
Of course, small stuff like a software library that doesn't require much effort to build and doesn't provide much value can remain open-source. I personally think this obsession with open-source software is simply an obsession with communism and getting things for free, and not wanting getting rewarded for the value of the stuff you build, etc.
I'm going to say something that probably will get me down votes: Why do we have to beg Google to keep Android open? Seriously. So many open source projects have risen out of real and concrete needs and successfully made their way into our every day lives. A new platform needs to rise that breaks out completely from Google. I've given PostmarketOS a go (with a PinePhone) and while today I can't say it isn't a daily dr…
It's better to have a billion dollar corp footing the bill for the massive amount of work it takes to maintain Android. If it comes to needing a fork so be it, but if they can be convinced (or strongarmed) to be more supportive of an open ecosystem and FOSS Android projects, everyone wins.
That's great and all but it's just a drop in the bucket of the amount of work needed.
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Yes but how do you build a consumer software business on top of a licensing scheme that legally allows anyone to share their copy of the software with anyone else, and allows other businesses to resell your software at half the price?
Few companies have done it successfully like Red Hat, Odoo ERP and Sensio Labs (the company that builds Symfony framework).
But that wouldn't hold up if games were released under a FOSS license. There would be nothing stopping me (maybe trademark law? I'm sure there are workarounds) from setting up "SteamForFree", rehosting every game with the same user experience as Steam, and offering access for a small monthly fee to cover hosting costs and make a tidy profit.
I'd like to offer source code, allow modifications for personal use, while prohibiting redistribution and certain types of commercial use (e.g. companies over $x million in revenue). That's a pretty fundamental mismatch between what I feel comfortable with in order to protect my income and what FOSS licenses allow.
The discussion between open-source and closed-source is essentially a discussion between communism and capitalism. Anything that reaches a certain threshold of value to society and requires enormous effort to build and maintain has to fall back to a capitalist, for-profit, closed-source structure. That's all that's happening here. Of course, small stuff like a software library that doesn't require much effort to buil…