For those wondering what happened, the Android Open Source Project (ASOP) launched in 2007, but started decoupling major parts of the project from the main in 2012 instead forcing them to update through Google Play store and over time restricting access to the codebase before just this year deciding to shut down the ASOP.
In their defence, they’ve also made lots of changes to make android compatible with more devices and to make third party stores work better, but they’ve just as often made changes that intentionally harmed development of alternative android-based OS.
To add to this, the only redeeming quality of Android is that the Google Play Store developer account currently only costs a $25 one time fee, meanwhile the Apple App Store costs $99 per year. Google also seems a bit more permissive with its apps. You can still use an adblocker extension when you download firefox, even torrent clients are there. Apple doesn’t really allow alternative browsers, every browser is just Safari reskinned, no extensions, absolutely zero usable torrent clients whatsoever. And, there aren’t really any Tor browsers on iOS (probably because of the same reason why iOS browsers have no extensions), those that do exist seem very badly built, not officially made by the Tor Project, and some even require you to pay for it (which make sense given the $99 yearly fee).
But you know, its capitalism and that could soon change… 👀
I’m glad I chose iPhone instead!
Wait what ? Side loading blocked
Well it was a good run, time to look into custom roms…
Bootloader is blocked so no custom roms. You will take whatever shit they are slinging and like it.
I left them only because Pixels were good enough, clean enough, and custom Roms couldn’t update themselves.
If there’s one that can, I’ll happily switch back.
This is cruel, now I feel like some kind of criminal. Who knew that the most dangerous criminal is an ordinary consumer who wants freedom…
off topic me using android 2015
I remember when I was younger is rooted phone and installed freedom apk. This app was awesome and allowed you to buy stuff from Google Play for free. Does anyone remember this app? I always thought that logo was really weird.
I never heard of freedom APK, but Lucky Patcher worked like a charm!
so will linux foundation drop android using linux kernel?
AOSP
Android Open Source Project
look inside
not open source
mfw
You can still use AOSP to make your own phone, but you’ll just have to built your own apps too, since eventually, all of google play apps aren’t gonna work on degoogled Android.
you’ll just have to built your own apps too
We are well on our way.
I was confused before I made the switch. So many of the most useful kinds of apps weren’t maintained anymore by anyone on the Google Play store. I had this surreal feeling that the app ecosystem was getting worse every year.
And then I installed F-Droid and figured out where all of my favorite app developers went. ¯_(ツ)_/¯
Never forget the possibility of very powerful NFC tags which could automate your day!
As gross as Google’s endless enshittification is, I blame the consumers for most of it. People vote with their wallets and they’ve been voting for the locked up walled garden crap option for the past two decades, especially in the US, where there is literally a culture of “ew, you have a green message bubble!” and chasing a status symbol is way more important than things like actual ownership over your devices, digital freedom and customization. And funnily enough, Google’s hardware sales have started increasing steadily since they’ve started copying Apple’s shitty model.
Ah yes, I too blame the overworked and underpaid population that were never given a real education besides a dysfunctional and authoritarian public school system which contains at least 50% pro-status-quo propaganda and omit real useful information, and teaches kids to obey teachers and the school admin, and subjugate their free will. /s
“I get in line to buy shit phones because I’m oppressed, overworked and underpaid”. Alright. Hopefully the corporate overlords will do something about it, then.
Ah yes, the consumers having no real practical alternative between apple and android means they support all the bullshit Google is forcing onto android /s
How do you propose I vote with my wallet when using something like grapheneOS requires buying a pixel?
Even with Graphene, it’s increasingly likely that it’ll be dead to new Pixels in the coming years. And I say that as someone posting this from a Pixel 9 running Graphene.
GraphineOS is the epitome of paying against your values then using foss without giving back.
Murena sells phones with e/os already installed, and there seems to be others too where you can buy a phone: iodé , jolla, pine64, pureos,
I spent $500 on a Murena only for the thing to brick a month later because the cord or whatever connecting the rechargable battery to the rest of the phone somehow split off. Would’ve been open to shipping the thing back to them for a repair/replacement since a local shop was unable to do so, but they use UPS for shipping and there was no way in hell I was going to deal with the absolute mess it was to receive the phone to begin with a second time.
You did get the fairphone model right? The one brand that’s repairable?
The time to support Android was 15 years ago when you could install any OS on any device, side load anything you wanted, root, mod, replace your battery, have full control over your file system, expand your storage, etc. Or 10 years ago, when Google was selling completely unlocked developer oriented phones, offering most of its services for free, opening sources, and actually innovating in fields like computational photography while also researching interesting concepts like modular phones.
If you feel like you can’t vote with your wallet today it’s because the market as a whole has abundantly shown that it really doesn’t give a fuck about any of those things, and it will always give the dominant position to whoever markets more aggressively or more effectively, even if the business models of those companies go against the consumers’ interests.
People in 2007 jumped at the chance to buy a ridiculously overpriced phone with no physical keyboard, a VGA camera without flash, no MMS or 3G support, no apps or customization whatsoever, no expandable storage, no battery replacement, terrible repairability, locked in to proprietary accessories and software, and so on. This, while the competition at the time was putting out cheaper phones with things like OLED screens, professional optics with xenon flashes, dual SIMs, microSD support, the latest connectivity standards, etc.
And when Apple patent trolled, took away things like the headphone jack, or normalized imposing ridiculous costs and taking huge cuts from developers, did people stop buying their products? No, they bought more.
I’m not defending Google at all. Their decline is abhorrent, but it’s a corporation, and corporations will always choose profit over everything else. It’s really naive to think they’ll offer their customers the more ethical option just out of the goodness of their hearts, especially when the market has been taking for granted or even actively discouraging the things that positively differentiated them from the competition.
By not using GrapheneOS obviously.
Also GrapheneOS is about security not about privacy or freedom. So GrapheneOS is just not really part of the discussion here.
You’re not disproving my point that there is no feasible way for me as a consumer to have a functional device without begrudgingly supporting either apple or android in their walled garden bullshit. No amount of “voting with my wallet” will fix this without a proper alternative
It kinda depends on what you define as “functional” though. Because depending on that it is definitely feasible to vote with your wallet.
In my case for example, I use a fairphone with lineageos and microg. This means I have to live with some minor inconveniences around banking and such. But, for me, this is a functional device and I can do everything I want to do with it.
Which is buying a new/used Google Pixel which is still supporting Google. Even if we got it second-hand, the development for GrapheneOS still depends on Pixel phone device and making it support the newer model which is still in a way, support Google as you still getting their product to then jailbreak it.
they court the nerds with cool tech, then ditch them whenever their shit takes off and the nerds are an irrelevant minority.
Tale as old as time.
Pfft… We’re the ones who are just going to find the exploit in the new walled garden anyway. #GreenJailbreak
No. No it’s not that. The politics of silicon valley are turning fast, and not in good directions.
to be fair they havent been making cool tech for a while anymore either.
I’ll break my sons phone the day that he comes phone with a data harvested machine.
AOKP gang rise
Soo, anyone ELI5. If Android is basically Linux, how hard would it be - given drivers are not an issue - so just make a Linux phone and mass produce it? You probably don’t have that many apps, but it will be possible to call and/or use messaging apps.
Linux is just the Kernel, Android is the OS. There’s a ton of stuff on top of Linux that makes an Android device.
Making an Android device (or Android device hardware) run Linux isn’t hard. In fact, you can just use Termux on pretty much any Android device to run a regular desktop Linux distro run in a container on Android. That way, the Linux distro uses the kernel from the host Android OS and just runs its own userspace parallel to Android’s userspace.
But if you want to make a stand-alone Linux phone without Android, your biggest issue is that you won’t have phone apps. There’s close to no app support for phone-linux. So on your Linux phone you won’t get any banking/authenticator/messaging/games/… apps. You can run desktop apps, but that sucks on a tiny touchscreen display. And many use cases (e.g. authenticator/two-factor/buying public transport tickets) are very cumbersome or sometimes even not possible on desktop OSes.
Now you an make your Linux phone run Android by emulating the Android userspace. That’s possible, but then again you are basically running Android at that point anyway. But Android with one big caveat: It’s not a Google Play Store Certified device, and it will never be if it’s not running full Android.
And missing Google Play Store Certification means no google services and no apps that rely on Google Services or require Google Play Store Certification. That means e.g. no Banking/Authenticator apps and many games won’t run.
Also, if you aren’t actually running Android but some kind of Android emulator, you will always be outdated and buggy.
So essentially you made a phone that
- Runs Linux apps a little better than an Android phone
- Gives you more control
- Allows you to do much, much less in regards to it being an Android phone
People have done it. There are a handful of Linux phones (e.g. Librem 5, Pinephone) that are barely usable as phones due to lack of app support.
They’ve done the opposite as well, so running Linux on a phone originally designed for Android (e.g. PostmarketOS), also barely usable as a phone.
There’s also the middle-ground with custom ROMs, some of them degoogled (like LineageOS, GrapheneOS, /e/ and many others). They run full-fat Android, but without all the Google apps including Play Store, Google Services and of course also without Google Play Store Certification. That’s more usable as a phone, but you will still be cut off from anything using Google Services. There are some hacks and workarounds that sometimes work and sometimes not. You might get stuff to work but it’s a constant race.
The problem is that currently if you want to use a phone as a full phone that covers all phone usecases, it’s got to be an iPhone or a Google certified Android phone.
given drivers are not an issue
All the Linux phones run on outdated hardware because that’s the main problem.
Probably this hard: https://postmarketos.org/
You can, but no one will use it because you won’t have Android apps on it. The lock in is real
Well, time for zoomers to experience our childhood (with phones that could call, send SMS, and play Snake).
That’s a nightmare
I would
Congrats, I wouldn’t and it’s a pain
So how come android is Linux but Linux don’t run android apps? How hard it is to have a simulator like harmony os for unsupported apps?
there are android emulators / compatibility apps like WayDroid that you can run on linux to simulate an android experience but they’re not perfect – and any App that processes payments (banking, utility, parking) outright rejects being in a container and has many tests for detecting so
Android apps are specifically using google ecosystems and would break without such things. It would also mean taking a developers app and putting it in a new market, this requires permissions and they might be under contract.
Linux can run android apps, but having a fully commercial device would need lots of new natives.
Then you’re basically making a ROM and there are many small detections for this. Many apps rely on proprietary closed source code like google play services
You will be able to do some things, but it will be a massive pain. Android is big, really big. Emulating will just mean you’re running Android all over again (and it’s often detected). Making a fork is a lot of work
Jolla looks awesome, have to look into that.
Yeah I’m eyeing that one too. Price is good OS looks good. I need to do my homework
Iam still sad not having titanium backup with root on my current phone :(
Try Neo Backup.
It’s worked pretty well for me in the past.
I’m gonna carry around my steam deck and add a USB camera module, a GPS module, and add some meshtastic radios modules, and I’m gonna daily drive it as the ultimate all-in-one device, and Mr. Google Pichai can’t stop me! xD
good idea however if you ever feel like needing a phone again… i have one word for you:GrapheneOS
Only for Google Pixels
I mean, if google is on track to ban sideloading, there’s not doubt they will also ban bootloader unlocking.
Though graphene is shopping for phone OEMs rn, hopefully there’ll be a graphenephone soonish.
Isn’t GrapheneOS just another android os?
