I don't think people have much choice these days. If you want a smartphone then you will either get something from Apple or from Android people. There are other choices but are they mainstream? In my local shops I can't see anything else. Android or Apple.
That's why I'm buying PinePhone and going to waste lots of my life to make it fit my needs, but I hope once time is spent I will be happier human being ;)
Well, choice is about compromise. You have to choose between freedom and convenience, but you can choose. I'm saying that as a person who used 4 linux phones as daily drivers for last 10 years (n900, n9, jolla, xperia with sailfish).
> There are other choices but are they mainstream
Well there are. Maybe they are not mainstream because people value convenience over freedom, which is unfortunate to me, but who am I to dictate them my values.
At least there are always some linux phones to choose from, and hopefully fabless/new open platforms would even increase the amount of such. I mean, 10 years ago it was nokia or nothing, today there are pinephone, fairphone, librem
They could literally put in a button to let you install what you like. In fact they already did this in the past.
There are many open source products that have had huge investments without monetization.
Like what?
If you read the rest of my comment I specifically mentioned some sort of mechanism for turning off the walled garden protections. I would imagine it would work something like secure boot. I have a motherboard that lets me turn off that machanism if wanted to via the BIOS software.
If the only way for it to happen is through lobbying politicians and requiring it by law (not a solution I would prefer) so be it.
Also it is quiite clearly a general computing device as it has all the characteristics of one. It isn't a matter of belief.
Well you are free to provide a platform that is as convenient as ios and as free as linux.
In practice that's not easy to say modestly since convenience require quite an investment in design and developement which free platforms tend to lack.
So in reality it's either a well monetized platform (which is either a walled garden or just sells your data), or free platform which is far behind in terms of convenience and support.
> Also it is quiite clearly a general computing device as it has all the characteristics of one. It isn't a matter of belief.
No, it's exactly your belief. Apple doesn't advertise it to you that way, they doesn't say you'll be able to run whatever you'd like on it, so I dunno where did you get this misconception that they should provide you such an ability.
Respectfully you obviously don't understand what I wrote.
I was quite clearly talking about the ability to run an alternative OS on the platform. Not whether there Lineage OS or similar is as good as iOS.
You can install whatever operating system you want on a Laptop or a PC. You can already run other ROM images on Android (though some phones you have to root the device which is not okay.
It isn't about an OS already being there. It being able to run whatever OS might be available.
> No, it's exactly your belief. Apple doesn't advertise it to you that way, they doesn't say you'll be able to run whatever you'd like on it, so I dunno where did you get this misconception that they should provide you such an ability.
There is no misconception on my part. If you look up what makes a general purpose computer, that includes things such as PC, laptops, servers and smartphones. The iPhone has all the properties that make it one.
So whether you like it or not, it fits all the criteria. It doesn't matter what Apple market it as or whether they artifically lock it down. That doesn't fundamentally make it a different thing.
I got it, and explained how it will hurt monetization of their product. Android is a different story with different (I dare say way more scummy) strategies of monetization.
The point is you can't have a convenient platform which doesn't produce revenue allowing to make it convenient and rewarding the investment.
As to whether it would hurt monitisation. I don't think it will and even if it did I don't care they have more money than most countries do. If they must be required to by legal means so be it.
Also they already kinda allow some of this when you enable developer mode via a Mac with the appropriate iOS developer account. So there is no reason why they cannot do this tomorrow without the paywall.
> So there is no reason why they cannot do this tomorrow without the paywall
Sure you don't when you are dismissing economics of software development so vigorously. Try to look at things from the perspective of economic incentives, not pure technical standpoint. You'll understand why free platforms are way less convenient, and closed platforms are as they are.
> You should be able to run whatever you like on it.
You are contradicting yourself. People are explicitly choosing iphone, a walled garden. Then you say that that's a wrong choice because you believe it's a general purpose computing device and should work differently.
If people buy it then, well, they are fine with it.