> But pretending that Apple is somehow the worst, when they are categorically far from it, is just disingenuous and frankly boring. Apple is pioneering an extr

> But pretending that Apple is somehow the worst, when they are categorically far from it, is just disingenuous and frankly boring. Apple is pioneering an extremely anti-consumer system and once they prove it'll be tolerated (and extremely profitable), every other manufacturer will do the same, so I don't think it's completely unfair to paint them as being one of the worst participants in the idea. I definitely don't think Samsung or Google are better. They're the same and they'll participate in the same type of schemes. The problem that I have is that everyone is going to do this. We'll have artificially restricted supply on everything we buy and the total cost of ownership will increase accordingly. I don't want that system, but I'm going to be forced into it because not enough people can understand the long term, negative consequences for the average person. > Buy a different brand, then. I do. I've always bought LG phones after they've been on the market long enough to be discounted. I try to get them for $300 or less and my cost average on phones for the last 6-8 years has been about $100 per year. I also pay $<20 per month for a phone plan that only includes 1GB of rate limited data and I limit my usage to important things like tethering my laptop for RDP. It's easy to use "vote with your wallet" as a response to criticism, but some of us actually do. I do it because I can see a terrible future where parts serialization, planned obsolescence, and subscription repair plans foster an era of non-ownership. If we let it happen it's going to be nasty and anyone who's not rich is going to suffer pretty badly IMO.