A key problem with this is volume.
Most people fall into the "less tech literate" group, which means that the devices made for that market will be better (more capable and/or less expensive).
Maybe there's a solution (I'm think about "developer mode" and "linux development environment" in Chrome OS); but I think it'll always be not so great in the best of cases.
Like this https://store.google.com/product/pixel_7_pro?
> while also having a locked down iPhone for the less tech literate?
Your post comes across as snobby. Not to mention demonstrably inaccurate. Someone who doesn't want their phone to be a tinkering device may be the most tech literate person on Hacker News. Not everyone wants every piece of tech they own to require tinkering, they just want it to work and get out of their way, so they can focus their tinkering on something else.
And that’s awesome! Personally I’m the same way.
But an overwhelming majority of people do not want to fight with or customize their tech. Opening the tech actually tricks them into causing more problems by clicking random pop up’s on websites that look like system updates or other malware / advert tricks.
A recent discussion on this problem is here [1]. I’m not sure how to solve this. Maybe we need an actually viable Linux phone for tinkerers, while also having a locked down iPhone for the less tech literate? Maybe Apple can introduce a less locked down version of iOS for power users?
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33314291