
Why I don't like smartphones - antitamper
https://www.devever.net/~hl/smartphones
======
IkmoIkmo
I don't really see how some of his points support his position.

e.g. I don't own a smartphone, because it's a consumption device rather than
both consumption and production, is just silly. So is a photoalbum, so is a
book, so is a TV, so is a music player. A smartphone is all in one and it's
incredibly useful. Beyond that, it is in ways a production device. It's a
messaging device, a photo and video taking device, it's great for email, I
record audio for my college classes on it etc. Sure you can hardly build
software or write books on a smartphone in a practical way, but that's
throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Further, smartphones are
increasingly becoming production devices, too. They're becoming bigger, more
powerful, and some can now be plugged in to monitors and bluetooth keyboards
and create a reasonable windows production environment, others have
interesting note-taking capabilities.

Web design is another one... Bad web designers have ruined web design, just
like they were ruining web design before smartphones. Further it doesn't seem
like a reason not to use a smartphone, either.

I'm in total agreement with him on centralisation... it's a slippery slope, I
think. For example I'm still playing games from 15 years ago, because I
actually own the software. But many of today's games, even though they have no
multiplayer component, would not run if in 15 years their servers shut down...
because there's calculation or storage being done in the cloud that is
essential to the game running. We don't physically own copies of our software
anymore, but rather we own, in a way, a sort of thin client and some login
details that we have to hope will last as long as we'd like to use them.

This was always a problem, back in the day, too... but at least the software
was available. Take any popular MMO, if the servers shut down, people have
copies and can run their own servers. In future, this may not be possible
anymore. Anyway games are just an example, but it's a trend that's a bit
worrying. Although, it's not specific to or exclusively because of
smartphones, it's a larger trend.

~~~
cableshaft
Almost every app (and many games) being made nowadays are thin clients making
api calls where all the work is done on the server.

I don't like it. I like having games from decades ago and still being able to
play them long after the companies are dead and its employees working on other
things.

On my own time I try to come up with software that can run entirely without
the need to communicate with servers, or even without internet access.

The only problem with that is the software becomes that much easier to pirate,
but oh well, I guess. I care more about the longevity of my work for my
personal projects than whether or not I'm going to make the megabucks with
them.

And honestly, for a few games I've worked on for companies in the past,
pirates are the only thing keeping those games accessible at all.

~~~
CydeWeys
> Almost every app (and many games) being made nowadays are thin clients
> making api calls where all the work is done on the server.

This is not true of games. Can you name any? Yes, multiplayer games require a
server component, but they're not thin clients. And games that are not
multiplayer generally don't require a server at all except possibly for DRM.
People don't like wasting their data plan unnecessarily and they like being
able to play in subway tunnels.

If you think about the economics of it, this makes sense. Margins are razor
slim; you need to be able to profit off of whatever is left after the app
store takes its cut of your $0.99-4.99 retail price. Having to run and
maintain a fleet of servers to handle your games simply doesn't make sense.
Better (and easier programmatically) to take advantage of the powerful
processors on the devices themselves and have the games run locally. Think of
something like Civilization, that has a mobile app; why on Earth would you
want a central server that would have to run god knows how many millions of
AIs when the phones could simply calculate that themselves?

~~~
losvedir
> _Can you name any?_

Clash of Clans is like that. Even when you just want to do some non-
multiplayer thing like rearrange your defenses, if you have no connection the
game won't start, and if it loses connection it kicks you out.

~~~
CydeWeys
I haven't played the game, so maybe this is my unfamiliarity showing, but I
thought that Clash of Clans was an MMO strategy game. In that context, how is
there any meaningful singleplayer component that could work without a
connection to the servers? You talk about rearranging defenses, but isn't that
against other players? How could that possibly work if the server can't be
reached to actually update the shared game state?

------
TheAceOfHearts
The section about mobile devices being for consumption instead of creation
really resonated with me. I still use my smartphone every day, but none of my
uses are related to content creation; it's mostly a time killer while I'm away
from a desktop.

I've become pretty strict about installing applications on my smartphone. It
seems like so many applications just wanna track everything you do and blast
ads in your face. And the worst ones even start showing random notifications!
To me this just shows a total lack of respect from their part. I always regret
installing applications that behave this way.

What's most surprising to me about mobile is that somehow it just keeps
getting worse. I've been a smartphone user since the Nexus One came out, and I
currently own a Nexus 5X. I don't think I've ever had a smartphone that was as
buggy and crashed as often as this!

If you're on Android, I strongly suggest installing Firefox with uBlock Origin
and Ghostery. It makes the mobile web much better. But overall, doing anything
on mobile feels like a painful chore.

~~~
CydeWeys
I am a software engineer today because I learned to program in TI-Basic on a
TI-82, a calculator which is so inferior to modern smartphones in all ways
that that fact needs no further explanation.

And yet the TI-82 came built-in with everything you needed to write and run
your own programs, on the device. Modern smartphones do not. In that one sense
they are significantly less capable than those TI calculators.

~~~
soared
> Modern smartphones do not

Excluding so many apps and web apps that enable you to write and test code on
mobile/tablet? Excluding all the content writing and note taking apps?
Excluding 'game builder' apps? I don't agree with your point. Android lets you
run android sdk anyways.

~~~
CydeWeys
Can you link me to some of these apps that let you write code on the phone
itself? (Preferably Android, as that's what I have.) I haven't actually used
any, and I'm curious.

But the important point is -- the phones don't _come_ with them. The TI-82
literally had a button that you'd press to access programs, and the submenu
within was "Run" or "Edit". That discoverability was very important. The kinds
of people who would search for and use apps to write programs on the device
are the kinds of people like us, who don't need it. (I do all my Android
development in Android Studio on a workstation, for obvious reasons.)

~~~
detaro
IMHO apps like Tasker are an interesting example. They (mostly) work in the
app-ecosystem, but people use them to work around limitations in other apps.
Especially Tasker is "strong" enough that other app authors offer hooks for
Tasker to control the apps.

On the other end of the scale, I have a python interpreter on my android phone
(although I don't use it very often)

------
jvandonsel
If you had offered someone in 1916 a device that they could put in their
pocket that would let them instantly communicate with nearly anyone on the
planet, tap into a large fraction of the world's knowledge base, read books,
navigate across the country, take photographs and movies, and play almost any
song ever written, what do you think that person would say?

"No thanks." ?

The smartphone is one of the most significant inventions of the last 100
years.

~~~
ekianjo
Smartphones are just portable computers. There is nothing new to them apart
from the fact that 1) they have internet mobile connection 2) their form
factor makes them very practical to carry.

Technology-wise, we already had about everything when we had laptops and
modems attached to them. It's just become much more convenient but it's still
the same concept.

~~~
msabalau
Smartphones outsell computers 5 to 1 and for the next billion smartphone users
a smartphone will be their first computer. Dismissing them as mere refinement
of what went before is to ignore the scale of their impact on the world.

One may as well dismiss laptops with modems as "more fully featured
telegraphs", or "smaller mainframes".

~~~
CydeWeys
> for the next billion smartphone users a smartphone will be their first
> computer.

Smartphones will be their first and last computer. Laptops, let alone
desktops, are being permanently bypassed.

~~~
joonoro
>Smartphones will be their first and last computer

No, unfortunately smartphones are toys at best. Nobody uses them for real
work, just consumption and browsing facebook. When they go to work, they will
use a real computer.

~~~
chakalakasp
That's just... not accurate. I know lots of people who do real work on
smartphones. Hell, I'd be dead a few times by now if I didn't use mine as a
radar HUD while photographing tornadoes. (While also using it to report
digitally directly to the weather service, and running a GPS tracker so that
they both can see me on a map and so that I later can geotag photos taken on
cameras that don't have integrated gps). To say nothing of how much I use my
phone to take photographic and text notes. Don't make the tremendous mistake
of assuming that just because you can't find a use for a smartphone in your
line of work that nobody else can or does.

------
barnabee
Most people don't want or need root access to their smartphone but will
complain (no matter how much you tell them security is their responsibility
when acting as root) when installing random software they found on the
internet results in their banking details being stolen followed swiftly by all
their money.

There are products you can buy in pretty much every category if you need a
general purpose computing device, but most people are better off with a locked
down device that reduces significantly the amount of harm they can
inadvertently expose themselves too.

(As an aside, I use an iPhone and can perform - with varying degrees of hassle
imposed by iOS' restrictions - many of my day to day "creation" activities,
with the bigger annoyance coming from small screen size than the locked down
nature of the device. In some cases, in fact, the tools available for mobile
OSes are far better than those on the desktop/web due to the incentive created
by app store ecosystems.)

~~~
logicrook
I always find fantastic how these kinds of arguments can be made blatantly
ignoring that they basically are a plea for authoritarian governments.

Do you realize how bad basic freedoms are? Most people are better off without
them, because many would harm themselves. And can you imagine the gains if
instead of letting people speak for themselves, we has a single entity vetting
everyone's discourse? Man, dictatorship is so great, so efficient.

~~~
icebraining
The difference is that you purposefully opt-in to a smartphone, but can't opt-
in (at least, not on an individual basis) to a regime. Would a totalitarian
state be as objectionable if people had to chose to move there, and could
leave as easily as one can change phones?

~~~
Laforet
People who are born in such a regime usually don't get a (easy) opt-out but I
digress.

My feelings towards AAPL was pretty mixed from day 1 and has changed
surprisingly little over the past few years. I genuinely applaud their take on
many issues such as strong encryption and the ability to side-load your own
apps from source. On the other hand I am very alarmed by the fact that backing
up apps from iOS device is no longer possible from iOS9. It might be an
improvement for security, version control or whatever, but it made me very
reluctant to pick up my iPad again knowing that I have less control of the
platform than ever before.

Keep in mind that iOS devices must phone home for activation and repeat the
process every three years. It is rather unlikely yet not entirely impossible
that one day Apple will cease to provide activaton for older devices and
render them useless. In that sense I don't really own my iPad but paid a
premium for the priviledge to able to use it, only as long as Apple allows me
to. Suffice to say I refuse to be subject to the same tyranny again.

~~~
icebraining
_People who are born in such a regime usually don 't get a (easy) opt-out but
I digress._

That's my point - it's not useful to compare the loss of rights in states to
the loss of rights in smartphone platforms, because the latter are easily
opted-out.

~~~
throwawayaway
The point people are making is that if it's the only thing on the shelf it's
not easy to opt out.

~~~
icebraining
[http://www.ubuntu.com/phone/devices](http://www.ubuntu.com/phone/devices)

[https://shop.goldelico.com/wiki.php?page=GTA04%20Complete](https://shop.goldelico.com/wiki.php?page=GTA04%20Complete)

(soon?) [http://neo900.org/](http://neo900.org/)

~~~
throwawayaway
Hope springs eternal!

~~~
icebraining
Hope? I'm fine with my Nexus tablet and feature phone.

------
wvh
I've got a Jolla phone running Sailfish, which is reasonably open. I'm happy
with it because as an advanced user I can enable developer mode and modify or
fix things. It's a stable and usable system. But Jolla doesn't seem to be
doing so well right now. Before that I had a Nokia N9, the only Maemo phone,
precurser to Sailfish. Another capable although minimal system. That didn't go
anywhere either, because Nokia sold out to Microsoft – who by the way don't
seem to be doing so well either in the mobile space.

Also Firefox seems to have thrown the towel in the ring already.

I'm waiting to see what Ubuntu comes up with in the phone/tablet space. It's
certainly taking a long time.

I don't understand that with all the people concerned about rights and
privacy, and all the open-source affectionados, there just doesn't seem to be
that much of a market for alternatives to the big two of Android and Apple
iOS.

Is it because of locked-down hardware? Or that Linux on desktop and mobile is
not a (funding) priority? Or are people that addicted to downloading low-
quality apps (i.e. the "eco-system")? Or is there simply not enough demand?

~~~
morganvachon
> _Before that I had a Nokia N9, the only Maemo phone_

The N900 begs to differ with that statement. It ran Maemo 5, and (in my
personal opinion) was the best phone of its era hands down.

~~~
vinay427
Not to mention the N9 was marketed as a MeeGo device, not a Maemo device.

------
Tomte
"Smartphones are unapologetically devices for consumption"

I see. The author has never noticed anyone taking pictures with their
smartphones.

And Snapchat is also pure consumption. Except that users are taking pictures
(and videos). And modifying them. And transforming them.

~~~
mathgeek
Fair point regarding creation, specifically A/V content. What are your
thoughts on the rest of the argument beyond that point?

~~~
cowsandmilk
nothing I do on my smartphone relies on the cloud more than what I did on my
PC.

I've been told Facebook is the most popular iPhone app by time open. Facebook
did not become more cloud-centric with the smartphone, it was always a web
site. Its place in the cloud has nothing to do with battery life.

The only apps I can think of that used cloud computing instead of local
computing are voice recognition. And that was likely driven by the desire to
have a huge corpus of data for learning rather than on-device battery life.

------
wangchow
Consider that smart phones have only been around for a little more than a
decade. It took several decades of development for general-purpose computers
to become viable to the mainstream, so the smart-phone technology is just in
its infancy.

While the battery consumption issues are definitely a problem, progress is
being made to curb them:

[http://news.mit.edu/2016/neural-chip-artificial-
intelligence...](http://news.mit.edu/2016/neural-chip-artificial-intelligence-
mobile-devices-0203)

Really we need innovation in the hardware space in addition to less bloated
and more refined APIs. Perhaps more efficient Virtual Machine layers that sit
on top of the OS layer. Or even get rid of those entirely and force C++ only,
but then the precious security sandbox is gone. In any case, it seems a lot of
the OS changes being made are feature-driven more than anything. They are
trying to compete on features instead of stabilizing and refining the core.
Or, maybe we need a new mobile OS design and some open hardware to support it.
Personally, I think BB10 had a lot going for it with QNX and C++ APIs, but
because they don't have the precious "apps" consumers demanded it became even
more bloated with the sluggish android runtime.

What's more, Device manufacturers push higher-resolution displays and faster
CPUs and GPUs--all things that impact battery life. But why not improve upon
these gradually while bolstering battery life instead? Consumers won't buy it
that's the problem and hardware manufacturers just want to sell units to
satisfy shareholders.

The problem is no different than the junk-food industry: consumers don't know
what's best for themselves or what they need, yet they develop strong opinions
about what they want and companies, hungry for market share meet those
demands.

~~~
Tempest1981
> hardware manufacturers just want to sell units to satisfy shareholders.

Sure. Don't underestimate the importance of staying in business, or having
enough market share to attract developers.

------
joosters
This person would be happier moving to a pre-computer environment - take a
look at their pet hates:
[https://violations.devever.net/products](https://violations.devever.net/products)
\- including:

* AMD x86 CPUs

* Intel x86 CPUs

...leaving, ARM CPUs, I guess? Windows ARM machines are also on the list. (And
surely ARMs should be blacklisted according to his reasoning; he is unhappy
with Intel's secure enclave, while ARM has similar features).

Some people will never be happy.

~~~
hengheng
I have seen Kernel programmers walk around with MIPS laptops.

------
madeofpalk
The irony in this article is, due to the lack of a sensible line width, it is
much easier to read on a phone than a PC

~~~
mirimir
Just don't fullscreen the browser ;)

~~~
silon7
Perhaps browsers should have p { max-width: 72ex; } by default. And a user
setting for this, just like default font size.

------
scrollaway
Off topic (sorry): Can someone explain to me why firefox's "readable view" is
randomly not available on some pages, such as this one? I had to manually add
"max-width: 700px" to the html element to read this without straining my eyes.

[And funnily enough, author complains about ruining web design when his page
is far more readable on a vertical-layout smartphone browser than a 1680x1050
resolution monitor...]

------
ggreer
The content consumption/creation distinction is a useful one, and I agree that
phones are definitely more geared toward consumption. Still, I think the
author drastically underestimates the benefits of smartphones, especially when
it comes to the non-technical crowd.

Let's see what's been using my phone's battery lately. In decreasing order of
usage:

• Nike Running

• Strava (cycling app)

• Safari (mostly Hacker News)

• Mail

• Messages

• Notes

• Health

I also use imiwa (Japanese dictionary), Anki (spaced repetition), Maps, Dark
Sky (an _amazing_ weather app), and Kindle. Thanks to my phone, I take more
photos. I read more books. I can summon an Uber. Yes, some of these uses are
purely content consumption, but many are incredibly useful. While a dumb phone
and some dedicated devices could do many of these things, they couldn't do
them as well. For example, if someone texts, "Where are you?" I can reply with
my GPS location and a map. That feature alone has saved me tons of time and
frustration.

Even if all the issues raised by the author are valid (I don't think they
are), there's still the fact that without my phone, I wouldn't be quite as
knowledgeable, as cultured, or as healthy. Those are the criteria we should
use when evaluating these devices, not idealogical ones.

------
cowsandmilk
pfffft... the first line shows an extremely limited world view.

Plenty of people are creating using smartphones. Sure, no one is programming
on a smartphone, but plenty of people are creating art via the cameras and on-
device editing tools. And doing so much more spontaneously than when you had
to awkwardly carry around a camcorder waiting for inspiration to hit.

Similarly, lots of people only use PCs for consumption. It is their
reddit/hulu/netflix device.

Both PCs and smartphones are used for creation, just for different types of
creation.

~~~
lottin
Yes I see people taking pictures with their phones but do you really call this
creating art? I think it gives them the _illusion_ that they're creating
something, and maybe that makes them happy, but personally I think it's an act
of self-delusion, and quite annoying too.

~~~
vinay427
I would agree with this. From my experience, most people in my demographic use
smartphone cameras for sharing moments on Facebook, Snapchat, etc. which
directly fuels content consumption. Relatively few seem to really aspire to be
hobbyist photographers.

~~~
tommorris
Yeah, before the smartphone, all photography was serious. Nobody wandered
around with a 35mm compact taking photos of their friends and family and
holidays in Disneyland. Everyone was trying to make great works of art with
their cameras.

------
woofiefa
It's absolutely horrible that we have come to accept that not having full
control over our devices is acceptable in any way. This will sadly be the
leverage to completely end general-purpose computing.

Why is a mobile device not just a small form factor? Why does it also have to
remove all our rights at the same time?

~~~
eddieroger
Because the market has spoken and clearly wants what Apple and Samsung and HTC
are selling. The user base of Hacker News isn't that of the world. Not
everyone does their job in front of a computer, and the idea of making this,
to them, miraculous device in their pocket a computer is terrifying. They
don't want full control of the computer they already have at home.

Answering your question: It doesn't have to remove rights, but the economics
of making a device that doesn't makes that device unfeasible.

~~~
amelius
> Because the market has spoken and clearly wants what Apple and Samsung and
> HTC are selling. The user base of Hacker News isn't that of the world.

Solution: define the world as "everybody on Hacker News".

------
veddox
The author has a couple of valid points, the one I definitely agree with the
most is the one about centralization. I'm tired of hearing about some cool new
app/program that sounds really great, but when I go check it out, it almost
always turns out to be tied to the cloud in some way. It makes me want to say
"Guys, great software, but can't I just buy it and run it on my own hardware
without having to trust you with all my data?"

On the other hand, many of his points are also definitely geek-only
(especially the one about not controlling one's phone). While I myself tend to
agree (which is one reason I personally do not own a smart phone either), most
people really don't want or need full root access to their computing
platforms.

~~~
dozzie
> "Guys, great software, but can't I just buy it and run it on my own hardware
> without having to trust you with all my data?"

More importantly: "Guys, great software, but how am I supposed to use this
after you go out of business?"

~~~
izacus
Or get bought out by one of the corporate behemoths and killed off in 18
months.

------
musha68k
Is it 2008 again? Small, efficient cars work just fine for a lot of people for
most day-to-day tasks, not everybody wants to drive a truck all of the time.

If we talk education OK, but things have gotten _much_ better since the
iPhone/iPad first came out: you can buy your kids a Raspberry Pi Zero for $5
(a $5 truck!) and plug it into an old TV so they can start exploring the
endless possibilities of a mostly open general purpose computing device -
seriously, how cool is that?!

That said, programming isn't the only creative thing you can do with a
computer - e.g. iMovie on iOS was great the last time I used it, I also
learned to play my first piano songs on the keyboard with Garageband (on my
_phone_ )!

------
thedaydreamer
Glad to know somebody else also recognising position:fixed problem. It's
really a nightmare. Is it really difficult to understand for their product
managers to see that blocking top 20% of user's mobile screen just to hang a
navigation which serve no purpose whatsoever is not cool.

~~~
lunula
I assume they do it because other people do it. Because Facebook, LinkedIn,
whatsapp, twitter and instagram are supposed to make you cool. Why would you
break your site usability this way just to remove the need to copy the URL
when you post it somewhere else?

------
raesene9
I'm not sure that this article is that contentious. Modern smartphones are
unabashedly consumer devices made for the mass market and several of the
criticisms in this article are features that most people don't want/need.

What most people want/need from a smartphone is a device that lets them do
things (e.g. send messages, keep up with friends, make phonecalls, browse the
Internet) without getting in their way. They're not really in the market for a
general purpose computing device like a PC.

If you want that kind of device in a smartphone there are less mainstream
options, but I don't regard it as surprising that larger companies don't
actively cater to them (it's a niche market place)

Personally I've got a range of computing devices that I use for different
tasks. When I want to read a book, or surf the Internet I use my iPad. When I
want to write some code or do my technical job, I use Linux.

Now there's the obvious argument that people should have the freedom to
control all their computing devices, but that freedom comes at a cost, which
is that freer devices are, I would suggest, harder to maintain.(i.e. you need
to understand more about the operation of the device in order to manage it).
If you're a technical person, you may not see this as a problem, but remember
mass-market consumers aren't necessarily very technical...

~~~
VarunAgw
But I am neither getting freedom nor security with smart phones. My 2 year old
smart phone have never received a security update. It has become a piece of
crap just within 2 years.

~~~
raesene9
I'm guessing you have an Android device? Yep those Android security is nasty.
the conficts of interest between the OS manufacturer, the handset manufacturer
and the carrier have caused a load of fragementation and lack of support.

My personal opinion is that, unfortunately, regulation is the only way to
solve that issue, as the market does not appear to be addressing it well.

~~~
VarunAgw
Yeah unfortunately! A 10 year old desktop Computer running Lubuntu can be far
more secure than my phone

------
decasteve
In some ways I agree but it's mostly a pervasive error in perception. Often
smartphones are over-marketed as productivity enhancing devices, and that
somehow smartphones and tablets are making PCs obsolete.

I see them as overpriced for what they provide and I agree with him that a lot
of the power available in a smartphone's hardware goes under-used.

------
Eridrus
People keep yelling that smartphones are insecure, and I wouldn't necessarily
say they are wrong when your adversary is a TLA, but they are much safer than
desktop computers.

If you look at what a modern exploit kit is targeting, it is most certainly
not mobile devices, it is very much desktop browsers and plugins.

They have far less malware than desktops, despite the scare tactics about how
much malware has been in app stores in the past, this has largely been
resolved in reputable app stores.

Partly because app stores actually let companies examine the software online
before people install it, so now there is malware scanning for every single
thing you install.

But mostly because these devices have enforced permissions models where users
will get suspicious if a random app wants to read your SMS messages.

Sure, a determined adversary can hack your phone, but they can hack your
desktop too, and that's exactly what they're doing.

------
ikeboy
>With a PC, I don't have to perform some arcane operation to actually have
control of the device. Moreover, it seems to be common to discriminate against
people who have the gall to “root” their device, or to disable some
functionality of the device if such “rooting” is performed.

Guess what? Most computers come with unfree operating systems, you need to
perform an arcane operation (install Linux) to regain control, and many sites
actively discriminate against Linux, including bank sites. (First result I
find is [http://stealcode.blogspot.com/2008/07/citibank-doesnt-
like-l...](http://stealcode.blogspot.com/2008/07/citibank-doesnt-like-
linuxubuntu_27.html), it's admittedly old but still proves a point.)

Edit: also, much of my internet commenting, including this one, is done from
smartphones. Does that count as creating?

~~~
Aoyagi
Windows provides incomperably more control than any of the stock mobile OSes.

~~~
ikeboy
Than iOS, sure, but more control than stock android, given the inherent
limitations of the hardware? I think not.

You can make your own programs and install outside apks without rooting, just
need to change a setting.

There's slightly more control in that programs can modify other programs when
running as root on Windows, but not on Android. But I don't think that can be
described as "incomparable". What specific features are so huge that you don't
think a comparison is possible?

~~~
Aoyagi
Can you, on stock Android, just go and delete system files? Or even do
something as simple as editing hosts? Kill system processes? Make multiple
users with various rights? Set file/folder permissions? Share files over local
network? Install drivers for new hardware?

And just for the record, I'm talking about 7, not 10.

Comparing the amount of (sub)items listed in control panels with what you get
in the settings of most stock Androids should give enough of a hint ^^

~~~
ikeboy
You can definitely share files to network, and install drivers (apps) for new
hardware. Except new hardware often can't be installed directly, but that's
more of a hardware limitation similar to laptops than an OS thing.

See
[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.hp.android...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.hp.android.print)
for an example of a "driver" for new hardware.

Editing hosts isn't possible without rooting, but you can get the same effect
by running a DNS server on device and changing Android to use it.

I challenge your assumption that we should look at unrooted android versus
Windows. Which of those things can you do on Windows without being an
administrator? Unrooted stock is sandboxed, but so are Windows nonadmin
accounts.

~~~
Aoyagi
Obviously I mean sharing (and everything else) without installing some 3rd
party application from who knows where. I remember looking into that when I
was testing an Xperia for some security system.

See, this is why I bloody hate when people call everything "app". There's a
distinct difference between "a driver" and "an application". A driver can
interface with applications or it can be bundled with one, but they're not the
same thing. And I'm quite sure that "driver" you linked to operates on one-way
application level similar to sending an email to the printer which then does
all the work itself. And it has to use that "share" function, but I guess
that's expected as there's no "print" one, heh.

And really, having an own DNS server is not only different effect (because it
works only if you use that server, plus it can be circumvented more easily),
but it's also a completely new element. Not very practical.

Admin account is the default on Windows. That's what you get when you install
it (by default anyway) and using it doesn't void any warranties.

And that's not even all the things, heh.

~~~
ikeboy
It's a bit weird to complain about a missing default feature as a "freedom"
problem.

How would you define the difference between driver and app without mentioning
any OS details?

>And really, having an own DNS server is not only different effect (because it
works only if you use that server, plus it can be circumvented more easily),
but it's also a completely new element. Not very practical.

You can set up a DNS server with another app, and change your network to use
it.

>Admin account is the default on Windows.

A complaint about defaults, rather than what's possible, is not a complaint
about freedom.

The warranty issue is a good one. But that has to do with freedom of the sale
contract, not freedom of the phone. My phone came with no warranty because I
got an old refurbished one, voiding the warranty means nothing to me and
doesn't impinge on my freedom.

~~~
Aoyagi
I've never said anything about "freedom"...

Driver is used by applications as an interface between the OS and the
hardware.

It's not just that it's default. The OS was clearly designed with that in
mind, whilst Android makes it pretty clear that rooting it is undesirable.

If you root it and if you get access to the shell, then you can probably do
everything I asked about. But you have to go through hoops and loops to
achieve that state.

Or, of course, you can use 3rd party solution, but that doesn't count as a
capability of the OS.

------
Philipp__
I liked many facts that are provided in this text. Kinda feel the same way
about many of those things. But! I kinda do not have courage to leave
smartphone and go for standard cheap cellphone ala 15 years ago. Because I
would then have to carry an iPod with me... So music and emails, (I am still
student so it is relatively rare occasion to have to respond from phone) are
reasons why I am still bind to it. But time I spend on phone is low. Like
really low. Especially low since I bought new MacBook, and I usually carry it
with me, so those moments when I am forced to use phone for anything (besides
listening to music while in transport) are extremely rare. Probable once or
twice a month.

I always felt there is something wrong with all those smartphones. Mostly
because I had a feeling they are time wasting devices (don't get me wrong
there are still a certain percent of people who do real work and are very
dependable on smartphone and that's ok, but I am not one of them, as for now
at least...). When you look at all those apps people install, like 5 different
IM apps, 5 social network apps, 10 games, 5 productivity apps... like what the
hell? I used to "consume" phone like that, but after few years got really
tired, so I introduced life rule that made me feel much better about these
devices. Do not install anything that you do not need (Thinking like "Oh, this
could come in handy for X situation", no!). Use one app for one task... So I
use stock apps and one app for every need I have. So it makes it 5 additional
apps besides default ones. And after all that decluttering I found that I
simply do not use smartphone as smartphone. I use it as a phone. (Only "heavy
usage" could be music where I have Spotify, SoundCloud and Music app
installed). I kinda felt better, like I had few more hours packed in a day, so
it would be better for me to spend them differently, sit down, order some
coffee in cafe and stare through the window, better than staring at 4.7 inch
screen, scrolling dozens of unimportant informations...

Those reasons are all less technical but equally important in my opinion.

~~~
t0mislav
> When you look at all those apps people install, like 5 different IM apps, 5
> social network apps, 10 games, 5 productivity apps... like what the hell?

I agree, this is so wrong, broken. It shouldn't be like that.

------
jnevill
Does the author also not own a television? What did the author think of older
cell phones since the same argument applies? The same arguments have applied
long before smart phones as well. Did the author not like CD players? Perhaps
he/she railed against newspapers too.

The first argument is based on a terrible premise that only exists to support
authors decision to not have a cell phone.

The second argument is just as pitiful as clients have nearly always been
centralized. Just because your favorite protocol isn't used often on the
device doesn't make this terrible argument stand up.

The third argument... I can't even remember what it was because it was stupid,
or perhaps my eyeballs rolled so far into the back of my head that I wasn't
able to read anymore.

------
m52go
> They have ruined web design.

Ironically, the site itself looks super good on a smartphone. I didn't check
the source (because I'm on a smartphone...), but it doesn't seem to have any
CSS styling applied to it.

~~~
elboru
I had to resize my browser window in order to read this article in my PC. I
don't get this kind of "geeky" designs, is there a technical reason why they
don't even add basic CSS? I'm not talking about making the articles look
"good", but making them readable.

~~~
zanny
It is an incredibly modern advent this idea that you can never actually use
the entire screen to render text for anyone except for mobile viewers.

If you cannot read across your screen, you are probably sitting too close to
it. I'd rather have wider text that I have to turn my eyes slightly to see all
of then narrower text that requires active scrolling.

And I don't know of a single OS that you cannot snap your browser window to
half the width of your monitor on the edge, which would make this as
presentable as anyone in this comment section wants without the site
maintainer having to assume _everyone_ wants narrow text.

~~~
m52go
I'm not sure I agree. There's a reason newspapers, magazines, and other
traditional media use narrow columns as well...it's much easier to read.

~~~
zanny
Traditional news presents information with more vertical space in the first
place. The balance is between effort exerted to scroll text that is
horizontally compressed vs effort moving your eye across the screen.

If you were to put your content on the screen in such a way that you were not
padding with whitespace, but instead were doing a multi-column layout _like_ a
newspaper, that would be the best of all worlds I imagine, but it would look
extremely disjointed to viewers and you would have to lock the vertical
scrolling. But websites are not optimizing space for readability with columns
- they are just padding the text body, creating more hand work in exchange for
less eye work without considering their efforts are making people exert more
total work when they have to scroll more, whereas traditional media is not
just padding whitespace, it is introducing vertical columns of text adjacent
one another.

------
adamrezich
I don't understand this post. Smartphones give you access to the Internet at
all times. They are not very well-suited to creation, but are fairly well-
suited for communication and consumption. Either that's what you're looking
for in a device, or it's not. It's quite clear that consumers want these
devices, so what's the problem?

I would never replace my computer with a smartphone, but that hardly seems to
be a valid argument for why one shouldn't "like them".

I don't get why this has so many points right now.

------
jqm
I've never actually owned a smartphone. Well.. that's not true. I had one of
the first internet connected phones (I think) back in 2001. I used the
internet like 10 time on it. It was (as you can imagine) pretty horrible.

Fast forward to now. I don't want the internet at all times. I don't want a
$100 a month phone bill. I don't want a $500 device that can fall in the
toilet. And most especially, I can't abide little tiny screens. I have $12
Nokia flip phone. My monthly phone bill is less than $25 on pay by minutes. I
also have an internet phone at home which costs maybe $30 a year or so and I
use for most outgoing calls.

I look at everyone, (including my GF who couldn't live without her smartphone)
and wonder what it is I don't get. Sure, mobile net could come in handy at
times. So I went and got a nexus 7. It hasn't been powered up in 6 months and
that was just to make sure a web app I was working on displayed correctly. I'm
a tech guy. Not a Luddite (I don't think). But I just really can't stand
smartphones for some reason. All that poking at a little tiny screen... when I
have a keyboard and 2 27" inch monitors in the next room along with a couple
of laptops. A spiral notebook at the cost of 33 cents works really well for
keeping shopping lists and notes. And the form factor is a lot better too. I
guess I'm getting old. I just don't get it.

------
secstate
As an Android user with a fairly vanilla Moto X install of L, I'm pretty
satisfied with my ability to change the OS. F-Droid is a big victory here too,
with regards to being able to find F/OSS mobile apps.

I can't say anything nice about iOS's app ecosystem.

All that aside, this is a hilariously misdirected rant on par with Stallman.
The purity of the vision of freedom advanced by RMS (or the OP) is to be
admired for it's theory, but no more capable of being reality than Marx's
vision for Communist Russia.

~~~
petra
What's your usecase for f-droid ? For most apps there,except ad-blocking, you
can find nicer versions in the play store.

~~~
secstate
Because F-Droid only indexes open source software and lists the license. On
the play store, who knows what state the source is in for a given app.

------
foxrider
Ok, so these seem biased, because majority of Android smartphones can in fact
be use as equal devices - you can connect a keyboard, fire up VIM or anything
else in chroot and you are good to go. If battery power is what you are after
- not only there are amazingly long lasting android phones, there are
aftermarkets batteries for any model with removable lid.

He even directly addresses the point iOS devices are blackboxes.

So yeah, I call bullshit on this one, even thou I can see where he is coming
from with this.

~~~
camillomiller
Creation doesn't mean necessarily "programming". Design, art and music
creation, photomanipulation... We have many surrogates of that on our
smartphones. Although I think that considering iPads, iPhones and smartphones
barely as devices for consumption is a limited vision, I have to admit that
the discrepancy and "inequality" of these devices is evident. The problem is:
most of the people wouldn't be creators anyway. Those who are on a Pc/Mac,
usually are those who try and find ways to be creators on their smartphones
and tablets.

By the way, you don't necessarily have to "call bullshit" on someone who
simply put forward a singular/unusual vision that happens to be different than
yours. You can simply "disagree".

------
rdl
I think a lot of these issues actually could be addressed.

Right now, it's essentially a choice between iOS and Android. No serious third
platform (Windows Phone, Tizen, BBX, third-party Android ROMs like Cyanogen,
etc.)

Apple is decent (but not great) user experience, but has a few serious flaws:
Apple's morality policing (and other restrictions) keeping apps users do want
off the platform, as well as restricting people to using Apple cloud services
for a lot of functionality, and not allowing some core OS functionality to be
overridden. Apple's cloud services would be less of a problem if they didn't
suck.

Android (well, the two versions; Google vs. the open version) have much more
flexibility, but kind of suck. (way better than they used to be, but still
inferior to iOS on a strict functionality basis).

I think it's inevitable that more and more computing moves to mobile (the next
2b people on the Internet may ONLY use mobile). Maybe Apple's cloud and
policies will improve. Maybe Android will improve in quality. Maybe a new
platform will emerge.

"Locked down" is awesome IFF it is locked down to the owner; if the owner has
to do some small amount of work to lock down a different config, that's ideal.
The "owner" might be an individual for a personal phone, or a corporation for
a fleet of phones.

------
erhardm
Just because you won't outrun your chain, doesn't mean you're not a slave.
Maybe a happy one, but still a slave nonetheless.

------
wcummings
>They have ruined web design. But I should probably write a whole article on
that. Suffice to say however that I am very, very tired of the epidemic of
(often massive) position: fixed headers on websites nowadays.

I have a blackberry, these bars eat up a lot of screen space on small devices
break the page-down functionality. Can't stand them.

~~~
jesseg17
I agree, fixed headers are terrible on mobile devices, But I think it's a
little far to say that they have "ruined web design".

------
mirimir
I agree with most of his points.

I also hate the ergonomics. Screens are too small, and input methods are slow
and error-prone.

------
Lanari
For me the only reason why I hate smartphones is that they don't offer me
much, and the battery life is a huge problem. The only thing they offer is
exclusive apps that I can't use on PC, and since I'm a tech guy I need to use
them to be aware of the tech of today.

~~~
jhasse
You can emulate Android on a PC :)

~~~
Lanari
Yes. But you never be sure how they exactly work... as an example I tried only
famous apps on the beginning and only lately I knew that apps can crush and
freeze... I don't know what I except, it's embarrassing to never except
that...

------
Chris2048
Here's a good argument about smart devices; To be practical they require a
lowering of security.

think google/facebook etc logins. Think lastpass.

I bought a crappy tablet from amazon, and was just about to add my credentials
to it ([http://www.ibtimes.com/amazon-selling-40-android-tablets-
com...](http://www.ibtimes.com/amazon-selling-40-android-tablets-come-pre-
installed-malware-2181424)), then realised if the tablet was compromised,
anyone able to remote-in to it would have access to one hell of a lot through
my single-sign in accounts.

Security for these things is improving, but it's still not there yet.

~~~
soared
> anyone able to remote-in to it would have access to one hell of a lot
> through my single-sign in accounts.

How is this different to desktop, where most people autofill or lastpass all
their accounts?

~~~
Chris2048
It's possible motherboards can be compromised as well, though I've not seen so
many reports as such. Another aspect to this is for a regular PC, you often
install your own OS, while the tablets have a pre-built customized
android,many many features locked down.

------
lisper
A really weird thing happens when I try to access this site. In Safari it
fails with the error, "Safari can't open this page because it cannot establish
a secure connection to devever.net." It also breaks the back button. WGET also
fails with "Unable to establish SSL connection." OpenSSL does this:

    
    
        [ron@mighty:~] openssl s_client -host www.devever.net -port 443
        CONNECTED(00000003)
        write:errno=54
    

But it works in Firefox and Chrome without even a warning.

------
jokoon
Smartphone are really bad for power users. Android is good, but to me it
doesn't allow users to really do what they want with it.

It works well, but if you look at its software design, it's miles away from
what you could do with linux.

I just WISH there was some code editor designed for a touchscreen. I have this
idea of a graphical code editor like scratch.mit.edu, except the editor
already has this code hierarchy, and it shows text directly. This would be
perfect for a touchscreen.

------
brandonmenc
These are all reasons why I wouldn't replace my laptop with a smartphone, but
that's not what a smartphone is for in the first place.

------
NEDM64
This doesn't make any sense. Smartphones are completely different devices than
PCs. They shouldn't even be compared.

Good thing is just that we can do so much more on a smartphone that we needed
a PC before, and by that, I mean sitting in a desk.

And no, smartphones aren't for media creation OR consumption. Smartphones are
for interpersonal communication first.

------
petrosianii
You guys should check out this HN thread. It deals with some of the same
issues we're talking about here.
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11036843](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11036843)

------
ekianjo
> They are unequal devices.

I guess what the author is trying to say, but a better wording would be
asymetric.

------
max_
This article reminds me of this [http://blog.codinghorror.com/all-programming-
is-web-programm...](http://blog.codinghorror.com/all-programming-is-web-
programming/)

------
ausjke
I don't like staring at the small screen that will damage my eyesight along
the way, I also don't like some unnecessary time wasted on it.

However its benefits outweighs those drawbacks way much, so no, I do like my
smartphone.

------
paulftw
Most of these reasons can be applied to modern cars, apartment complexes,
smart TVs, etc. Title should be "why I don't like this century"

~~~
paulftw
speaking of web design - did smartphones ruin that blog's design?

------
oxplot
> Supposedly, with Android you are free to install software from arbitrary
> sources ...

Certainly. Go to Settings -> Security and tick "Unknown sources" option.

> With Android devices there is a distinction between “rooted” and “unrooted”
> devices, which sounds suspiciously similar to “jailbroken” and
> “unjailbroken”.

Sounds like it, sure. But as majority of top Android manufacturers have an
official page [1][2][3][4][5] describing how to unlock their bootloaders so
arbitrary OS can be installed, that similarity disappears.

> With a PC, I don't have to perform some arcane operation to actually have
> control of the device.

Ask your average PC user how to install a different OS, or even how to re-
install the same OS and you'll soon find, the process is "arcane" on all
platforms. Also note that I found all the official links I listed, to
unlocking various android phones, in 5 minutes.

> Moreover, it seems to be common to discriminate against people who have the
> gall to “root” their device, or to disable some functionality of the device
> if such “rooting” is performed.

Nothing stops a PC app developer to put in checks on what ISP you're connected
to for example or whether your user has root access. I use Cyanogenmod on my
phone and not one app so far has discriminated against me having root access.
Point is that it's very uncommon.

> I believe there are even online banking applications which reserve the
> right, in their terms, to detect if a device is “rooted” and refuse to
> operate on them.

Yes, they are the developers and they set the terms. There are also banks
whose websites simply reject a particular browser by name, not because it
lacks a certain functionality.

[1]: [http://www.htcdev.com/bootloader](http://www.htcdev.com/bootloader)

[2]: [http://developer.sonymobile.com/unlockbootloader/unlock-
your...](http://developer.sonymobile.com/unlockbootloader/unlock-yourboot-
loader/)

[3]:
[http://developer.lge.com/resource/mobile/RetrieveBootloader....](http://developer.lge.com/resource/mobile/RetrieveBootloader.dev?categoryTypeCode=ANRS)

[4]: [https://motorola-global-
portal.custhelp.com/app/standalone/b...](https://motorola-global-
portal.custhelp.com/app/standalone/bootloader/unlock-your-device-a)

------
anonymfus
Why "smartphones"? If he uses mobile phone which he does not consider
"smartphone", he is hypocrite because most of the listed problems apply to
them ever more than to so-called "smartphones". If he does not use any mobile
phone, he just should name the article "Why I don't like mobile phones".

~~~
taneq
Really? The issues OP lists:

* For consumption but not creation - a 'dumb' mobile is even more so, you're stuck with the built-in functionality and can't install any other software.

* Not real network clients due to battery limitations - arguably true for 'dumb' phones as well but they don't have the 'powerful CPU and fast network connection' that OP bemoans wasting.

* Massive centralization / shift to "the cloud" \- 'dumb' phones have limited or no online presence.

* Ruined web design - 'dumb' phones have little or no web browsing capability and web pages don't target them.

* Insecure - can't really argue that one.

* Malevolent / locked down - technically applies to 'dumb' phones but they were never advertised as general purpose software platforms.

I'd say most of his points stand.

------
frik
Oh just to inform you, at least support HTTP too, your HTTPS is broken.

------
Aoyagi
My problem with modern smartphones is that they are turning from productivity-
focused devices into toys...

------
skywhopper
"Smartphones are unapologetically devices for consumption."

The vast majority of social media posts being written, photos and videos being
taken and edited, and music being recorded and performed with these devices
show this is wrong. Anyway, how did most people use their desktop and laptop
computers 10-15 years ago at the peak of popularity of those devices?

"They are not real network clients."

This isn't even actually his complaint. His complaint is that smartphones have
too-limited battery life. The smartphone battery life we have today would have
been considered a miracle 10 years ago.

"They have led to massive centralization."

True enough. Unfortunately, that's how the money which funds the Internet gets
made. That said, there's nothing stopping the author from using his smartphone
in a distributed manner and helping to build the infrastructure to support the
same.

"There are no secure smartphones."

There are no secure networked computers, period.

"They have ruined web design."

I'm not sure web design in general has ever been all that great. The people
who practice the art are severely restricted between the demands of their
employers and the limitations of the platform. Smartphones have driven the
latest changes in fashion, sure. Fashion will change, and the older you get,
the less you'll care for it.

"capabilities are all too often restricted by device manufacturers or
carriers."

It's true. But I don't think the smartphone is the problem. Microsoft and
Intel started talking up the locked-down hardware that only runs trusted code
approach 15 years ago or more. Smartphones came along soon thereafter, and are
designed along the same lines. It's frustrating, but for a certain class of
device, one that you want to Just Work for handling the basics of human
communication, I think it's a reasonable tradeoff.

There's still plenty of hardware that lets you do anything you want with it.
It's critical that such devices remain available, but with the rise of DIY
style hardware--Raspberry Pi and Arduino et alia--I'm very hopeful. The gap
between these solutions and high-priced high-performance components will only
narrow over the next decade.

Ultimately, though, unless you're manufacturing the hardware entirely by
yourself, you have to trust someone. You don't want to trust Apple. But we
have to trust the companies who make our wifi chips, our graphics chips, our
CPUs, our USB chips. Even our cables soon may be sophisticated enough that
they might include the hardware necessary to stream what we're displaying on
our monitors directly to the NSA _and_ the MPAA.

Good luck!

------
fiatjaf
I don't like smartphones also, but I hadn't thought of any of these reasons.

------
lo_fye
Old man yells at cloud

------
Polarity
used a iphones for multiple years, but dont need it nowadays. dunno, just dont
need it anymore.

------
nqzero
tl;dr - why i don't like toasters

------
SFjulie1
I love my nokia I bought 1€ on the black market in poland that is charged once
a week, have the radio, and a correct mp3 player that you can use as an usb
key and is not locked, brickable.

In fact I bought 4 of them. I am now awaiting the moment someone will try to
smug my phone and show him my wonder and expect him to say: keep your trash!

Just for anyone thinking I love nokia, just remember how cumbersome their
software were to use. They are so shitty, I don't have a data plan, thus I am
making savings on the accessories, the phone (i dont fear to break it) and the
communication plan. ~400$/year

Compared to my old habits, I am sparing money. I can backup my music, I can
load music easily and I don't care anymore.

The morale of my story is : don't complain about a market when you are driving
it.

So called geeks nowadays are a joke that have high incomes, and shape the
market of computer and electronics appliance by early adopting the most stupid
ideas possible that cost the most.

The inability of "geeks" to influence positively with their habits of
consumption a market on which they are supposed to be more knowledgeable than
the mass makes me wonder about the technology they adopt in companies for
producing. They really seem to not care about costs, recurrent expanses,
adequation to the needs.

------
qaq
How to troll for views 101.

------
dohboy
wow the head up my own butt is high in this one... :O

------
jtth
This is an awful article. It's written assuming you agree with the author
already.

~~~
shopkins
How else would you write an article that expresses your purely subjective
opinion? It isn't titled "Why you don't like smartphones."

------
guytv
Sounds like an old person rants about "the good old days".

