Your phone is about to stop being yours • Hacker News Board

Re: Your phone is about to stop being yours

#141

Post by empyrrhicist » Tue, Apr 28, 2026, 5:15 PM UTC

pngwen wrote: post #68

This change has served me well! I have been a Mac OS X users for years who used an android phone. As soon as google announced their impending walled garden status, I went out and bought into the ios eco system. I have really been enjoying my iphone, ipad, and apple watch. You see, the only value that Android really offered me was the ability to run my own code on my own device. Since they are taking that away that ju…

> the vastly superior apple experience

After switching away from GrapheneOS to iOS after RCS stopped working for me, I can safely say my experience has been the opposite. The camera is the only thing better for me on iOS - everything else is buggier and worse. A few of my favorites:

1. Safari is buggy as hell, and requires installing apps to run things like ad blockers.

2. The settings are ALL over the place and very hard to navigate

3. The gestures are clunky - often have to try a couple times to get one of the settings quick menus to drop down

4. Why is the date not displayed at the top of the screen with the time outside of the lock screen?

5. The pin unlock is horribly broken - I have to slow way down to use it compared to Android.

6. Apple maps is hot garbage. I had to install Google Maps anyway to get decent performance.

7. The handling of audio devices seems intentionally malicious - like if I call someone from my car through car play, it shouldn't send the audio out through the phone earpiece. If a call begins with phone earpiece audio and is underway, it shouldn't switch several seconds in to bluetooth headset half a house.

I'm going back for my next phone.

Re: Your phone is about to stop being yours

#142

Post by unyttigfjelltol » Tue, Apr 28, 2026, 5:16 PM UTC

dethos wrote: post #75

To be sincere, they were never truly ours. A proof of that is they were able to come up with this, and you don't have a way to reject it. What we actually need are (open) alternatives, not to double down on Google's ecosystem and Google-controlled OS. We need to control the device we bought and be able to run whatever we wish on it. Just like we do on PCs.

Security is essential for an appliance like a smart phone. I fight the general purpose computing battle on my desktop with Linux, but on my phone I just need something that won’t be hacked.

Re: Your phone is about to stop being yours

#143

Post by HWR_14 » Tue, Apr 28, 2026, 5:16 PM UTC

tossit444 wrote: post #110

pngwen wrote: post #68

This change has served me well! I have been a Mac OS X users for years who used an android phone. As soon as google announced their impending walled garden status, I went out and bought into the ios eco system. I have really been enjoying my iphone, ipad, and apple watch. You see, the only value that Android really offered me was the ability to run my own code on my own device. Since they are taking that away that ju…

So you moved into a walled garden in an attempt to escape what's essentially a 3 foot picket fenced garden.

If there are two walled gardens, you might as well choose the prettier one.

Re: Your phone is about to stop being yours

#144

Post by stuaxo » Tue, Apr 28, 2026, 5:16 PM UTC

NDlurker wrote: post #30

>Android's openness was never just a feature. It was the promise that distinguished it from iPhone. Millions chose Android for exactly that reason. Google is now revoking that promise unilaterally, on devices already in people's pockets, because they've decided they have enough market dominance and regulatory capture to get away with it. This is why I've stuck with Android for the past 15 years.

Same

Re: Your phone is about to stop being yours

#145

Post by anonymousiam » Tue, Apr 28, 2026, 5:17 PM UTC

Anonyneko wrote: post #133

I've resigned to the fact that I'll need to use two phones, one with locked down Android/iOS for banking applications and government services (those require strong bank ID around these parts), another with some kind of a Linux or unlocked Android for literally everything else. Oh well, such is life, most people don't care enough about this to pressure Google/Apple/banks/governments into yielding. A big reason why a n…

In my informed opinion, anybody who does banking on their phone is taking a big and unnecessary risk. I wish I could say more.

Re: Your phone is about to stop being yours

#146

Post by Freak_NL » Tue, Apr 28, 2026, 5:17 PM UTC

jordand wrote: post #51

drnick1 wrote: post #8

I don't care, I run Graphene, and my phone is definitely mine. Most Android apps just work, and the ones that don't are the kind of malware I am happy to do without.

I'm running GrapheneOS too and while I've experienced the same, I'm dreading the day any of my banking apps update and suddenly start demanding full Play Integrity API support (GrapheneOS only has Basic) causing them to fail to open. Hasn't happened yet but it could.

It always feels like my phone experience is just a pleasant intermezzo. My banking app (ABN Amro) works, government apps (DigiD) work, everything just works, and I get security and a certain degree of distance between me and Google. I can use F-Droid to install useful apps, and incidentally use Google's app store for apps I need because the rest of the world uses them. GrapheneOS rocks.

Borrowed time. I hope not, but that's the prevailing feeling.

Re: Your phone is about to stop being yours

#147

Post by spogbiper » Tue, Apr 28, 2026, 5:17 PM UTC

Jackevansevo wrote: post #105

I don't understand, there was all this regulation for force apple to allow alternative app stores, and now google are pulling this move? How is this not the same walled garden approach apple was forced to change?

this change makes Android more restricted than it was but still not as restricted as Apple. If anything I'd guess the EU vs Apple situation made Google more confident that they could get away with this change.

Re: Your phone is about to stop being yours

#148

Post by seszett » Tue, Apr 28, 2026, 5:17 PM UTC

i_am_jl wrote: post #135

catlikesshrimp wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Will your 4 unpublished apps be in your android-alternative apple device? Android will still have the ability to install non-google-distributed programs. The problem is the ominous momentum, but it is still more open than the apple alternative

I'm not the commenter you replied to, but I'm doing the same math they are and coming up with the same answer. From my perspective iOS is better than Android in a number of ways but Android always won out overall for me, in large part because of the freedom regarding software. Remove that freedom from the equation, I think the balance tips towards iOS.

I always wonder what these unspecified ways that iOS is better than Android actually are.

These posts always have a few comments like that, but they never actually say what they find to be better on iOS.

Re: Your phone is about to stop being yours

#149

Post by stuaxo » Tue, Apr 28, 2026, 5:18 PM UTC

criddell wrote: post #61

NDlurker wrote: post #30

>Android's openness was never just a feature. It was the promise that distinguished it from iPhone. Millions chose Android for exactly that reason. Google is now revoking that promise unilaterally, on devices already in people's pockets, because they've decided they have enough market dominance and regulatory capture to get away with it. This is why I've stuck with Android for the past 15 years.

For you, is the openness of Android appealing as a matter of principle or does it enable you to do things you couldn't otherwise do?

Not op, but I used to be a mobile app.

I use this to occasionally build and install Android apps from github.

These are often out of date and need some tweaks but I can do it on a whim (I certainly wouldn't bother if there was a paywall).

Re: Your phone is about to stop being yours

#150

Post by akramachamarei » Tue, Apr 28, 2026, 5:18 PM UTC

JoshTriplett wrote: post #120

gowld wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Millions chose Android for exactly that reason. Millions? Are you sure? Even so, Android has billions of users who want secure app management by default.

Don't buy the FUD claiming this is about "secure app management".

Just to play devils advocate, the petition is a bit of FUD too, no? I ask as an F-droid user and downloader of unofficial apks. Speaking purely from my own experience, all the side-loaded apps I care about are fungible; I could get them or similar quality equivalents from GPS. With the exception of a 4chan reader, that hasn't been hosted there and likely won't be. I don't mind the 1 day wait too much.

I understand political dissidents and those living under authoritarians may have much more concrete Fs and Ds but for me (us?) it's mostly U.