25 ms·

'The tyranny of apps': those without smartphones are unfairly penalised

• doctor_radium 2y ago
  > And at the bakery chain Greggs, you can collect loyalty “stamps” for free food and drink and get “exclusive app-only gifts”. You currently get a free hot drink just for downloading the app. > McDonald’s is running a high-profile promotion called Deal Drop, where it offers items at “bargain” prices, such as a classic Big Mac for £1.49 (normally £4.99) and a children’s Happy Meal for £1.99 (normally £3.59) – but all of the discounts are available exclusively with the company’s app. The article paints a painstakingly detailed photo of the UK's app culture, but fails to explain exactly why app users are entitled to such discounts. What exactly is McDonald's doing with your data that is worth a whopping £3.50 Big Mac discount, and more?? Why is the app so important?? I have never found an article that does more than scratch the surface on this topic. Any suggestions?
  • cue_the_strings 2y ago
    I think such discounts are not as much because of the data, they're a way to tier your customers, similar to coupons. That way you both get to take the full price from people whose time is expensive enough that they won't bother with the apps, and also those who wouldn't pay the full price but have enough time to use the apps. I never eat McD's, but I see the pattern everywhere. If you make between the minimum and average wage in Slovenia and don't own property, you practically can't get by without dedicating 6h per week to grocery shopping in various different 'discount' chains (Lidl, Hofer AKA Aldi Sud, Euro Spin), keeping up with the weekly discount catalogs and using all the app discounts (more recently).
  • tim333 2y ago
    As a user of Greggs and McD (UK) I can maybe offer some insight. Fairly obviously the discounts are to encourage customer loyalty so you keep going to McD rather than somewhere healthier. Also to get you to come back - if you haven't been for ages they may offer a 99p big mac to get you back in. As to why apps rather than paper coupons, my closest McD has a typically had group of about 20 people waiting for the 50 items they ordered with new stuff ordered every 30 seconds or so. The last thing the low wage rushed staff need are customers going can you explain this coupon to me an is it valid for extra fries on Friday etc.
    • owlbite 2y ago
      I've also seen it explained that it's part of their toolset in extracting maximum "value" from a customer. Richer customers self-select to pay higher prices without the app as they can't be bothered faffing around to find the digital coupon/deal/whatever combination (you can, of course, only use one of the wide range of deals at a time). Poorer customers will invest the time in finding and using a deal. They both get the same sandwich, but McD got them to pay different prices for it.
      • tim333 2y ago
        Yeah probably that too. I can't actually be bothered to use the McD app although the Leon one with free coffee for £25/mo is good.
  • james_in_the_uk 2y ago
    Most forms of direct marketing require unambiguous consent in the UK (likewise for data collection used for direct marketing). Culturally, many Brits are relatively suspicious of authority and will not consent to the use of their data 'just because'. Loyalty apps are a great invention: they give advertisers a direct channel to the consumer, and the consumer a way to receive something of value in exchange for their deliberate engagement.
    • deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
  • echoangle 2y ago
    I think the idea is to get as many people as possible to install and set up the app, so they then have more incentive to become repeat customers. Theyre probably making some loss on new signups and hope to get it back later on.
  • eesmith 2y ago
    Market segmentation through user profiling and individualized discounts based on the entire order, making it hard for people to tell if they are being treated "fairly." Get more people to use McD's app. When they order, give them a personalized coupon giving you a discount. The discount is different for everyone. Use the response rate, plus information about your buying habit (always buys a family-sized order on Fridays) to optimize the discount. Raise the non-app prices so the people using the app think they got a deal ... while the overall price is on average higher than if McD's had flat rates for everyone. People tend to think flat rates are more fair when the services are identical, and get pissed off when they find it isn't.
• computerthings 2y ago
  So, what's this story getting unfairly penalized for? It's been bumping around between page and 2 and 3 after it had more than 80 upvotes and not even half the comments; meanwhile there's a story with not even half the votes, that is also older, which is firmly near the top.
• doctor_radium 2y ago
  I was in a full service restaurant a few months ago, and they were steering everybody to scan a QR code for their menus. Had eaten there several times before and this was new. I demanded a physical menu, even though the waiter said it might be outdated. Wanted a beer, but the drink menus were no more. I stared the waiter down and snapped, "WATER!" You must push back or else they'll think their lazy changes are fine. Maybe next time they'll expect me to bus the table?
• hamilyon2 2y ago
  App store monopoly hurts us way more than it is talked about. Suddenly, not only we are not to chose which devices to use to access what could be a simple website. Now unrelated third party decides if we have access to it based in, for example, country of residence. Or at all. Apple routine forces censorship on our phones as if it was it's property. I still believe it was a tragedy that Microsoft folded their attempt into mobile. To explain my level of desperation, I feel our next best hope here is China.
  • fsflover 2y ago
    Our next best hope is GNU/Linux smartphones. Sent from my Librem 5.
    • nicce 2y ago
      They can’t handle the masses, unfortunately. That needs alot more money and infrastructure.
      • fsflover 2y ago
        Not yet, but it's achievable, just like my relatives are using GNU/Linux on desktop without problems.
• jmclnx 2y ago
  I for one will never ever do any kind of banking or monetary transaction on a Smart Phone. As for other apps, I just have a couple of simple games and Firefox, which I only use when in waiting an office for am appointment. So far where I am, it is not an impediment.
• harrisoned 2y ago
  I have a big issue with this, and the truth is that the majority of people simply do not care and/or do not understand the implications. By tying your service to a smartphone your are basically refusing to provide service if the costumer doesn't agree to Apple's or Google's TOS. If the app doesn't complain about emulation or something different than Android or IOS you are in luck, but that's not the case with most banking apps. And that's only talking about people who don't have it by choice and have money to buy one. For me, once, it went beyond: I took my first dose of the Covid vaccine, and the second dose's date would still be announced. I asked where it would be available to the nurse, "On the Instagram page of the <local health body>". "But i don't have Instagram" i said, and the nurse shrugged. It requires both a phone and a social media account with your real info, but since absolute nobody complains about it they just do because it's easier. This will continue as long people are complacent with it. In some places the government is required to provide you services, by law, by any means available and not depending on 3rd party service, but they do require apps anyway and people stay quiet. Phones as an alternative is fine, it's a tool, but should not be an obligatory device for you to be considered an human being.
  • zevv 2y ago
    Yes. This. Sure, I own a smartphone, it runs just plain android but without any google accounts or services because I do not agree to Googles terms of services. I never did, and as an European citizen especially with recent developments I feel that has been the right choice. The thing is, without google account there is no play store, and without play store I am not able to install the majority of apps - no banking, no parking, and all the other services people complain about in these threads. This is my choice, and I stick to it. I'm also pretty vocal about it and complain when needed. Doctors office informs me I only can get medicine with the app? Apparently they can make exceptions when you complain, because I'm allowed to get medicine with a simple phone call. My bank tried to force me to use their app, but apparently they still do have an alternative login method when you complain. Sure, I know it's a fight I will lose in the long run, but I enjoy it while it lasts.
  • gs17 2y ago
    > if the costumer doesn't agree to Apple's or Google's TOS. Or if Apple or Google arbitrarily decide that they don't like that customer. You don't have to have done something wrong, they can decide that you're likely associated with someone who did.
• alabastervlog 2y ago
  The entire history of technology is our becoming dependent on one invention after another, such that anyone with any interest in the area(s) that invention touches no longer has a realistic choice not to use it. They may technically be able to, but only through outsize sacrifice that leaves them worse off than they would have been before the thing was invented.
  • arrowsmith 2y ago
    Hi Ted.
    • alabastervlog 2y ago
      I was channeling Burke’s show Connections, actually, but sure, that too.
    • dennis_jeeves2 2y ago
      I too was thinking that...
• tdeck 2y ago
  One thing not mentioned yet is what happens when you've got a cheaper phone filled with photos and videos. At various times I've had to spend a few minutes deleting things just to download some stupid 100 meg app that I need to use for a total of 5 minutes to complete some basic task.
  • philipov 2y ago
    Is your cheaper phone unable to interface with a computer? I'm no advocate of an app-based economy, but your phone shouldn't be the archive for your photos.
    • tdeck 2y ago
      I back my photos up using adb backup, but I don't keep them in cloud services.
    • layer8 2y ago
      That doesn’t solve the problem of having to spend time deleting photos and later restoring them back from the archive.
      • philipov 2y ago
        plug in USB cable, drag and drop entire directory from one drive to another with file explorer, is the only reasonable way to manage photos. Get everything off the device at the end of each day. Why would you ever put things back on the phone?
        • tdeck 2y ago
          And then if I want to look at my photos while I'm out, or show them to someone, I don't have them on my phone anymore?
          • genewitch 2y ago
            I hear you; in practice I can use my nextcloud server for this, or if I have tailscale turned on in the phone I can even use the synology photo app. Being forced to upgrade phones... Ugh. I don't have a solution if you're not me and you're not paying me, though.
• pimlottc 2y ago
  > Some of the best savings rates are offered by app-only providers – made up of banks and “electronic money institutions” (EMIs), which do not have their own banking licence, but put your money in a bank that does. Okay, this wins for euphemism of the week. "We're not a bank, we're a money institution!"
  • robocat 2y ago
    "Bank" is a highly regulated word.
• jebarker 2y ago
  When visiting the UK last summer we tried to go to a train museum. There were three public parking lots around with different app based parking systems. We were unsuccessful in using any of them due to various issues relating to poor cell service, lack of UK phone number etc. In the end we had to leave without visiting the museum. It was farcical.
  • jamesfmilne 2y ago
    As a North London resident, the parking app situation is just as farcical for me. There are at least three different apps for parking around me: RingGo, PayByPhone and JustPark. I went to East London recently to visit the Velodrome, and discovered yet another one: Evology. It's always great fun, standing around in the car park trying to wrangle your cards whilst creating yet another account to pay for 30 minutes of parking. Then, of course, there's the 50/50 chance that my iPhone has decided to offload the parking app you need because you haven't used it in the last month or so. And occasionally RingGo will decide to log me out, and when I go to log back in for some reason the last password I have in my password manager doesn't work, so now I also have to reset my password. Agreed, paying for parking has turned into a total farce.
    • ryandrake 2y ago
      If people just stopped paying for parking en masse, things might change. I'm in the US, so maybe my attitude is different, but if I parked in a parking lot that didn't let me pay without installing some weirdo app, I would just park without paying and let them come after me if they can find me. If they send me a bill, I can refuse to pay. If they send it to collections, collections will probably not pursue over such a small amount. And if the debt collector does pursue, I can send them a dispute letter, forcing them to prove I have a debt obligation, which 99 times out of 100 will make them go away.
      • aucisson_masque 2y ago
        Yeah yeah yeah. They sell the debt at lower price to companies specialized in debt collection, the longer you wait then to pay them the more they are allowed to collect from you. If you try not to pay at all, they put you in court against lawyer working for the company whose only job is to collect debt, so he knows his job pretty well and the bonus is that you end up having to pay the lawyer fee. Of course you could still refuse to pay that, get cops to show up at your house and then you have to shoot to get them to leave. At some point of course you would think it's a bit much for a parking ticket. If you don't like it, just don't use it, like everyone else does.
• jfengel 2y ago
  It feels on a par with illiteracy. The motives and circumstances are different, but it's got a similar level of assumption. It's kinda rare and requires significant adaptation, so it's just way easier to assume it doesn't happen. I don't think that a law to help people get smartphones is the answer, the way we made literacy education mandatory. But it's rapidly going to be seen as a handicap.
  • mindslight 2y ago
    Literacy skills increase monotonically though. If you learn to read adult novels while in grade school, you can still continue reading grade school books as well. Whereas if you learn tech to the proficiency of understanding how corporate apps are attacking you, or if you simply take administrative control of that computer you carry everywhere, then you can then find yourself unable to engage despite having higher than the basic skill level.
  • lucb1e 2y ago
    I don't think a skill is the same as a leased possession Literacy is something the state funds for you to acquire and that can't simply be taken away A smartphone is something you need to acquire and manage yourself, and it furthermore needs to comply with the rules set by an overseas corporation: you can choose between Apple or Google services but neither of them needs to take you as a customer while they're gatekeeping access to certain government and most transportation services
• Glyptodon 2y ago
  My city has parking meters that I can't use because the website has a broken credit card form and the app "isn't available on your version of Android." And of course they don't accept cash. It's a farce.
  • joshdavham 2y ago
    You’re in Vancouver, too?
    • pcthrowaway 2y ago
      City of Vancouver parking meters have to accept cash still. If you try putting a quarter in and it doesn't work (as is often the case because of tampering with the coin slots), I believe you don't have to pay for parking.
      • jrochkind1 2y ago
        going back to pre-smartphone but still true, in the US at least, it is generally illegal to park at a broken meter and you can get a ticket -- because otherwise there would be incentive to break the meter so you could park there for free.
        • rrr_oh_man 2y ago
          > because otherwise there would be incentive to break the meter so you could park there for free Never in my life would I have thought of that.
          • ryandrake 2y ago
            You must not be a security researcher or QA tester :)
        • rangestransform 2y ago
          This is only an issue because the US somehow became allergic to enforcing vandalism and property crime laws aggressively
• QuadrupleA 2y ago
  I avoid apps too if I can. So rare that the app does anything a website can't. Indeed most apps are implemented with embedded browsers. It's about tracking, and push notifications. Full stop.
  • jampekka 2y ago
    Cue HN's anti-PWA brigade.
    • genewitch 2y ago
      I wanted to make one but I wanted it to work without networking but be able to trigger notifications on a timer. I don't know anything about cellphone development or JavaScript so I gave up and made a discord bot instead.
  • Zak 2y ago
    If I'm forced into using an app when a website would have done just fine, I give it a one-star review.
  • kjkjadksj 2y ago
    Embedded browser with a 450mb app size of course. I wish you can sort by size on app store. It is a signal for quality when you find a 4mb app that does the same thing as a 450mb app.
  • elric 2y ago
    > It's about tracking That's exactly what it is. That is the only real reason. More tracking, more data harvesting, more control for the publisher at the expense of user agency.
• fifticon 2y ago
  My doctor/'s office was just forced to switch to app-instead-of-website for patient interation. Ironically, the old and this new software came from same megacorp I work for (different department, same story). The old web interface was rather good and rather sensible-practical-sane. It was almost as if someone had asked a doctor what he actually needed for his patients, and then understood his answer and also managed to actually implement and deliver it. The new smartphone app.. Not so much. It looks more like some MBA types managed to solve "what is the cheapest thing we can get away with, lawfully?" Internally, I know it is because the original dev team has been gutted, development outsourced to india, and just a skeleton crew from the original team manages the chinese-whispers process with the huge indian team. As a result, the use case flow (IE the only way you can operate it..) of the app, goes as follows: 1 close the app 2 launch the app and sign in 3 do ONE action 4 enjoy the result of the action 5 repeat from 1.. You might wonder why that is.. Well, that is because your software is not allowed to display any errors - because that might indicate there were bugs.. So instead, whenever an error happens, you just display the '... still loading..' animation... forever. So, technically, there are no errors, no bugs.. "IT IS JUST TAKING TOO LONG TO RESPOND". (spoiler: it will NEVER respond, because hidden behind the screen, is a series of unhandled web api errors..) But again, as an "internal" employee, I have seen our management claim all this is a huge success (client paid/pays). Back to using it: When I have to interact with my doctor, I write the texts on my PC, and mail them to myself. Then I cut/paste them from gmail into this wonderful app.
  • Boogie_Man 2y ago
    At what point does this constitute a hostile action against the user and what degree of retaliation is appropriate? Open question for everyone.
    • PaulDavisThe1st 2y ago
      what retaliation are you imagining and against whom? who is even "the user" here?
      • TeMPOraL 2y ago
• donatj 2y ago
  Xfinity sent me a new cable modem this week. Came with zero instructions for set up, just a QR code. Scanned the QR code and it took me to install an app. I begrudgingly installed it. The app had me hit next a few times before scanning a different QR code on the bottom of the modem. That was the entire process. I guess you just have to pay for installation if you don't have a smart phone? It offered for $150+ when I agreed to the new modem.
  • mistrial9 2y ago
    there will be more of this.. This has to be regulated IMHO
  • ryandrake 2y ago
    Do your best to make these decisions cost them, even if it's only a few pennies. Call their customer support up and tie up one of their representatives as long as possible. Who knows, if enough people do that, and they log the reason, then maybe, just maybe these SuperUltraMegaCorps have a chance of changing their mind.
  • jmholla 2y ago
    You also have to pay them monthly to not use their equipment. It definitely isn't a racket.
• jampekka 2y ago
  > The consumer group is among those to have highlighted Lidl’s loyalty scheme, Lidl Plus, as one that is only accessible via an app, with an email address also required. At least here in Finland Lidl Plus is one of the few which can be used by just entering a phone number. That said, all "loyalty programs" should be outright banned. They stifle competition, make pricing less transparent and discriminate against the less well off.
  • robocat 2y ago
    > loyalty programs" discriminate against the less well off. The opposite: supermarket loyalty cards are often designed so that the well off pay more: i.e. it is the well off that are being discriminated against. The barriers are designed to allow poorer people to pay less. The topic is called price discrimination. All the poorer people I know use loyalty cards because they judge them to be valuable (despite the extra hassle). The less well off often get lower prices (plus valuable rewards) because of the loyalty programs in New Zealand. I often use my friend's loyalty accounts: so I get the item discounts but they collect the loyalty rewards/cash. Also I like to screw the data surveillance up - I don't get tracked so much and my friend's account is spammed with higher cost items. Coupons are designed for the same purpose. Allowing poorer people to choose to trade their time/hassle for savings (according to their values).
    • jampekka 2y ago
      In loyalty programs the benefit percentage often increases as a function of money spent, disproportionally benefiting the more well off who spend more. I've yet to encounter a loyalty program that would do the inverse (probably there are some that cap the benefits, which could be interpreted to be to this direction). Neither have I seen a loyalty program that would only accept poor people. Price discrimination is anything where the same product is sold at different price for different buyers. All loyalty programs are price discrimination.
      • robocat 2y ago
        > disproportionally benefiting Only if you think a $50000 discount on a Lamborghini is disproportionate compared with a $500 saving on a Kia.
• LinuxBender 2y ago
  I think this article is city-centric. I am in a rural area in the US and I have only had a smart phone for 2 years and have never installed any apps beyond Mumla that I use for my own self hosted uMurmur server. I have never browsed the web from the phone. My life today is just as it was in the 1970's in that regard. All the businesses here have printed coupons. There are local printed newspapers. I have zero dependency on any "smart" features of phones unless one considers texting to be a smart feature given that was not a thing in the 70's. I do not expect any of that to change. The people here like keeping things simple. With exception of Amazon to get things small shops here do not carry I could even kill my internet connection and life would go on just fine. I would probably even get healthier. All the local businesses know me by name so I guess that makes up for a lack of cookie tracking.
  • PaulDavisThe1st 2y ago
    > I think this article is city-centric. It's an article about the situation in the UK. If your "rural area" is in the US, it is not surprising that it's a bit different than anything in the article.
    • LinuxBender 2y ago
      That makes sense. I think the US tries to mimic big city behavior in the EU so it's probably just a matter of time for big cities in the US to have the same problems. Maybe that means I have a few more decades for any of that to find it's way to me. Curious how prevalent this behavior is in the rural parts of the UK.
      • crusty 2y ago
        I realize this might not be a kosher comment for HN, and i aphid for that. But you seem to have imagined some inherent divide between the mechanics of urban and rural (and apparently foreign and domestic) lives or at least governance. With this imagined division, you are free to ascribe whatever outcome that affects cities to whatever cause, since you live in a different state of existence. I'm not saying that as an insult, but rather because I don't think there's an inherent difference, I just think rural communities are harder for companies to monetize, for multiple reasons - think density and average income. But like Amazon, they will get there, and unlike cities, rural communities have less ability to resist and less ability to support a diversity of options. Think about the takeover of Walmart and Dollar General/Tree. I don't think there's anything special inherent to your rural community that protects you from all this "progress". You're just living through the time before it catches up to your community. And i bet if you think about the effects of the arrival of changes like Walmart's rural expansion, you might find that they upset rural life as well, reducing wages, extracting money from the local economy instead of allowing it to continue to circulate locally, and then investing driving distances, and the associated costs in fuel and time among others. My guess is that you will go from blaming cities for their problems to blaming cities for your communities problems once they reach you. But maybe if you reevaluate your perspective, you could help your community prepare to resist those changes while you still have time.
• joshdavham 2y ago
  I’m fascinated by this phenomenon of apps proposing solutions that are far worse than the previous existing solutions. For example: 1. Parking apps are worse than parking meters. 2. Tinder is worse than IRL speed dating. 3. Duolingo is worse than language classes. 4. Airline apps that are worse than just printing a boarding pass. 5. Etc It really makes me frustrated as someone who builds software and generally thinks it improves the world…
  • pqtyw 2y ago
    > 1. Parking apps are worse than parking meters. I certainly don't agree with that one. I really don't miss having to pay for a fixed number of hours and then having to figure out what to do if I'm running late (or wasting money if I get back early). > 4. Airline apps that are worse than just printing a boarding pass. Unless the app is exceptionally horrible you can just export it to Apple/Android wallet which is much more convenient than having to find a printer. Duolingo isn't really a replacement for classes (which are obviously a magnitude or few more expensive) but self learnings books, tapes and such (IMHO it's mostly inferior to those too but not by a such high degree). Can't disagree about Tinder/etc. though.
    • lambda 2y ago
      I'm kind of puzzled by your first point. In my experience, parking apps require you to pay in larger chunks of hours than paying with coins used to; many times I have to pay for a minimum of 2 hours of parking with the app when I could pay for just 10 or 15 minutes of parking with coins.
      • svelle 2y ago
        The parking app I use in Berlin, easy park, works in the sense that I pre-select a timeframe I think im going to park which then gives me an estimate for how much it'll cost and reserve that amount using my CC. When I end the parking before that timer ends, the actual time I've parked will be taken and only that amount is charged. It used to be even better in the sense that you'd only start and then end parking without having to pre select a time. But I think too many people, me included, forgot to end the parking when taking off and paid way more than they actually parked for.
• jrochkind1 2y ago
  Where I live in the US, only fairly recently have I started encountering parking where you cannot pay without doing it over the internet on a device. I haven't seen any where you need an app specifically, but you do need a smartphone or internet capable device. I am very annoyed by this.
• LVB 2y ago
  I write small utility apps that are often used by friends, families, the teams my kids are on, etc. None of them are overly complicated or aiming for award-winning polish. While I personally like installed apps, many people seem to prefer a link they can click. To accommodate that, I've been leaning towards Flutter as an acceptable compromise. The installed app has some better characteristics regarding device integration and storage, but I've been pleasantly surprised at how well the web versions work. When run on phone it’s hard to tell (visually) that it’s not the app. (UX is laggier though.)
• maelito 2y ago
  That's why I'm building a Web map app. The Web is universal. It's already very capable.
  • aspenmayer 2y ago
    Maps seem like a distinct failure mode of web apps. How do you load the map data on the website to navigate or orient yourself if you got lost outside the network coverage area?
    • maelito 2y ago
      As far as I know, Google Maps used to not work outside of network coverage for like 15 years ? It already reached 1 billion user without the download area feature.
    • febusravenga 2y ago
      It's easy. You can download data for certain areas you expect to be in offline mode and move all routing logic to app. It has been done many times in many apps. (ok, it only easy conceptually in reality it's quite big chunk of conscious dosign of app as a whole and no lesser chunk of actual work )
• deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
• deeg 2y ago
  To play somewhat of a devils advocate, 30 years ago this article could have been titled the tyranny of the internet. Is this much different from that.
  • rex_gallorum2 2y ago
    30 years ago, the internet was a novelty, nothing more, and it remained so easily for another ten years after that. It wasn't until the widespread adoption of smartphones that permanent connectivity came to be taken for granted. It was actually very easy to get by without any of it until quite recently, when legacy options for all kinds of things began being phased out.
  • arp242 2y ago
    Eh? 30 years ago would be 1994. Most people did not have internet in 1994. But let's use 10 years: you absolutely could get by without internet 10 years ago. It would have been a bit of a hassle for a few things, but internet access wasn't needed for lots of every-day basic activities like parking a car, ordering in a restaurant, using tickets at a concert, etc. Also: it was easy to use internet at a library, often at zero to no costs. You didn't need to have a personal device only used by you.
    • rex_gallorum2 2y ago
      Absolutely. The internet stopped being something you accessed and became something you were connected to 24/7, and that you have a persistent, high-speed connection. That was a huge shift.
  • lucb1e 2y ago
    You'd be right if, 30 years ago, people were required to download proprietary software and run that on a locked-down computer (you don't get to have administrator-level access to it) in order to do simple things like pay a parking meter Internet is (increasingly: was) an open system that you can connect to on your own terms. Browsers do your bidding, for the most part anyway and you can switch if you don't like one of them. However, you can't simply install an open source version of Google Play Services on your phone and if the Deutsche Bahn app doesn't work for you, there is no alternative that you can install to talk to their server and buy that train ticket (no equivalent to installing a different browser aka 'user agent')
• donatj 2y ago
  I know people who love having specific apps for everything, but I generally find them a much worse user experience than the browser. Can't select/copy text. Sometimes if it's a terrible developer you can't paste. Can't arbitrarily zoom in. I know Android now lets me copy from the screen but it still flows incorrectly sometimes, like copying from a PDF.
  • ThinkingGuy 2y ago
    > Can't select/copy text… can't paste. Can't arbitrarily zoom in. Don’t forget “Can’t block advertisements and tracking”
• simonw 2y ago
  A factor not mentioned in this article is people not being able to install apps because they've run out of space. I've seen this a bunch with people who buy the less expensive phones with smaller amounts of storage: they take photos until their phone is full, and now if they need to install a new app they have to delete something else (including potentially their photos) to make space for it.
• ryandrake 2y ago
  I guess I’m just lucky (or don’t live in UK). Nothing in my daily life requires a smartphone. Banking is either with a local branch or on the web. Making an appointment with a doctor or dentist is a voice phone call to the office. All my routine bills can be paid by check or over the postal mail. All my usual restaurant spots have paper menus. Sometimes I go a week or so and forget that I have an old iphone7 in a drawer with a now drained battery. I don’t think I regularly use a single app on it besides the browser. Here’s hoping this doesn’t change!
• karaterobot 2y ago
  I see that this thread is full of a lot of very valid complaints about the hellish world we've created. But my reaction when these things come up is to point out that we effectively demanded this with our revealed preferences. We're at the triangulation of people preferring to use their phones for most things, while also demanding the lowest price possible. At a certain point, it's natural for companies to realize they can make more money—which is their reason for existing—by discontinuing products and lines of services that can be replaced by cheaper alternatives. I think everyone (over a certain age at least) has had the thought that brick and mortar stores all seem to be gone, and the realization that it's because everyone shops online, and then, if they are self-aware, the realization that they're part of that process. This is that at a somewhat zoomed-out scale. Government services are a different case. I suppose they feel cost pressure as well, but it's right to expect them to accommodate more people than private businesses.
  • jmholla 2y ago
    I don't think that's the case. Just because companies have successful business models doing things this way doesn't mean this is what people want or that it's the only way. It could just as easily be this is the most profitable way (which does not equate with delivered value) and these decisions are made by a subset of people who profit off of the fallout.
  • edelbitter 2y ago
    If my revealed preference is that you should pay extra to subsidize my shopping, does that really make you any more complicit in the redistribution scheme?
• IshKebab 2y ago
  This is mostly overblown, but the really annoying cases are the UK government themselves! Both the NHS app and HMRC app provide access to things you can't get to just from the web, even though they are just webview apps!! It's so dumb. But generally... just buy a phone and download the apps. I imagine in the 1800s someone wrote an article "those without telephones are unfairly penalised". This is just a modern version.
• 2shortplanks 2y ago
  One thing this article doesn’t mention is how this all falls apart when you spend time in more than one country. My UK bank (Barclays) won’t let me install their app on my US iPhone (i.e. my phone that uses a US based iCloud account). Tesco won’t let me use their loyalty app. I can’t install an app that’ll let me order Starbucks or McDonalds in the UK (I only have access to the US versions of these apps). I can’t watch Star Trek because the US paramount plus app detects I’m in the UK and I can’t install the UK version. I could switch to a UK iCloud account but then when I’m in the states everything falls apart the other way round.
  • gambiting 2y ago
    Yep, as someone who also travels between countries regularly, it's complete nonsense. "This app isn't available in your region" - what do you mean, I am literally in your region.
    • fnikacevic 2y ago
      The sad part is sometimes just switching languages/locales on your phone (i.e. changing the language from US English to British English) fixes this as it's all the code checks.
  • aucisson_masque 2y ago
    Is this the same on Android side ? I know that you can more easily sideload app there so it could be an issue only on iphone walled garden.
    • lawgimenez 2y ago
      Android app can still geolocate the user so yeah, still the same issue.
    • lazycouchpotato 2y ago
      You can add multiple Google accounts - one for each country, and switch between them on the Play Store. That's how I'm able to access apps from my home country and resident country. As for using the apps themselves, you might run into issues depending on what restrictions they have - IP address, SMS verification, etc.
• bxparks 2y ago
  United Airlines used to accept credit cards to pay for meals during the flight. It worked great. At some point they dropped that and replaced it with something that involves their slow bloated buggy app that crashes on my phone. So I stopped buying their meals.
  • dehrmann 2y ago
    I'm 50% sure you can set this credit card through their website.
    • bxparks 2y ago
      Yeah, I remember reading something like that, but isn't the United app required to pay for the meal on the flight, so that they know which credit card to charge? To be honest, I have never been able to understand their payment process, and since the United app doesn't run on my phone, I just gave up on the in-flight meals.
      • filleduchaos 2y ago
        The discoverability is horrible, but in this case there actually is a somewhat accessible way to pay: if you visit https://united.com/inflightpayment https://united.com/inflightpayment, you can add your card details for a specific flight before the flight (possibly also during the flight using in-flight WiFi, but don't quote me on that). I actually find it more convenient than presenting a card in person, because my country uses chip-and-pin cards and many American (soft-)POS terminals break when presented with one. There's also less of a chance of my bank arbitrarily flagging the transaction as suspicious.
• montroser 2y ago
  I never install apps, and I don't have any problem with private companies offering discounts or whatever via apps. The market will do its thing. But where I have a big problem is when my local government requires me to install apps to do basic things like parking. It would almost be okay if the apps were developed in house and were open source. But of course they're not. And anyway there's no reason they can't just be web based. So now I just don't pay for parking and I pay the ticket if I get a ticket...
  • einpoklum 2y ago
    > The market will do its thing. Markets' "thing" is concentration of capital and the whittling of service/product providers until just a few major ones, or a single one, is left, and then they collude on pricing, bypassing/preventing regulation, psychological manipulation of customers etc.
    • grg0 2y ago
      Yup, it will certainly do its thing.
• nmstoker 2y ago
  It's unfortunate the article accepts the questionable argument about apps being more secure - companies say that to soften people up to handing out personal data access that apps enable.
• thyw123129 2y ago
  Resist! If a bank forces you to use a surveillance device (smartphone) to do Internet banking or forces you to install invasive apps on your PC, don't. TAN apps were still reasonable. TAN generators too, though the hardware sucked and used an insane amount of batteries. Then banks forced apps and smartphones and that is the point where to say no thanks. They are still required to perform transactions by filling out forms with a pen. It sounds like a lot of work but it really isn't. Use cash or credit cards and cut down the number of manual transactions.
• mharrig1 2y ago
  My anecdote for the pile is that my apartment complex uses one of those apps to pay for laundry services, but is slightly less expensive than the coin based counterparts on the same machine. What's even worse is that the app is incredibly poorly made such that occasionally some payments just fall into the void and either start the machine for free or require a double charge. Anytime I have reached out to complain about these I just get told to bring my phone closer to the machine.
• techorange 2y ago
  My greatest aspiration in life (yes, hyperbole) is to retire and get rid of my smartphone, and I can imagine it’s just going to be harder and harder as time goes on. I went into a restaurant recently and asked for a menu and they looked at me like I was from another planet.
  • ThinkingGuy 2y ago
    Agreed. After 27 years of working in IT and having to carry a mobile device (first a pager, then a flip phone, & now a smartphone) for on-call duties, carrying a mobile device has always felt like a punishment to me. The days when I can walk around device-free are the happiest, most stress-free times of my life. But the tech companies are making it harder and harder to do.
  • nicbou 2y ago
    I went on a trip without any tech. No smartphone. I made it five days but could have gone for longer. It was interesting to see how the system worked from without, and how people reacted to requests that would have been banal in the nineties. For the most part, it went well. Very few things were unavailable. I only remember hotel phones being missing or broken. However it was impossible to handle things back home and my life would have started falling apart after a few weeks of ignoring emails.
• deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
• bdcravens 2y ago
  In the late 1980s and early 1990s, you started to see more and more interactive phone systems appear due to touch-tone phones being common place. However, I grew up poor, and for quite some time we still had rotary phones (when we could afford to have a phone that is), making those systems inaccessible to us.
• s3graham 2y ago
  """Many tech experts also argue that apps are generally more secure than websites...""" "Many", like, maybe the ones who are trying to sell you on an app development contract? But not many others!
• pipecmd 2y ago
  ...following some excerpts from an article in the NZZ (swiss newspaper): "Right to an offline life and much more: French-speaking Switzerland is becoming a global pioneer of a new digital fundamental right". Source: https://www.nzz.ch/schweiz/die-romandie-mausert-sich-zur-weltweiten-pionierin-eines-rechts-auf-digitale-integritaet-ld.1857060 https://www.nzz.ch/schweiz/die-romandie-mausert-sich-zur-wel... Neuchâtel is including "digital integrity" in its constitution, and other cantons could follow. The National Council had criticized a proposal as purely symbolic. But the consequences are visible in Geneva. The first time it could be dismissed as an accident, the second time not: that's what Alexis Roussel, the driving force behind a fundamental right to digital integrity, says. Roussel, a member of the Pirate Party and former president, is in good spirits. After Geneva in 2023, his home canton of Neuchâtel also enshrined the new fundamental right in the constitution on November 24. Both times the people voted yes by a very clear margin: 94 percent in Geneva and almost 92 percent in Neuchâtel. From the new legislative period in 2025, the Neuchâtel constitution will therefore guarantee not only the right to physical, mental and psychological integrity, but also the right to digital integrity. The new right only applies in relation to the state. It includes, for example, the right to security in digital space, the right "not to be monitored, measured and analyzed", the right to an "offline life" and the right to be forgotten. [...] In Geneva, Alexis Roussel is already seeing the first consequences of the right to digital integrity. Secondary school students there no longer use the office software Microsoft Office, but the non-commercial alternative Libre Office. The education department explained the change to the newspaper "Le Temps" by saying that Microsoft has been receiving personal data such as names and email addresses since an update to its licensing terms. However, the canton is only allowed to process data at foreign companies if they are "adequately" protected there. [...] In the canton of Neuchâtel, too, the new fundamental right is already being mentioned in concrete terms in political debates. The liberal municipal councillor Catherine Zeter said on RTS television about the planned closure of the post office in Boudry that the company would probably prefer to offer its services only digitally. But, said Zeter, this "completely" violates the right to an offline life that the people of Neuchâtel have just decided on with their new fundamental right.
• ComposedPattern 2y ago
  It's funny how people in this thread keep saying "well if you're going to complain about people being penalized for not using apps, you might as well complain about people being penalized for not using telephones/cars/internet"... and yes, I am going to complain about all of those things. I imagine that many or most homeless people don't have reliable access to any of the above. I have an anxiety disorder that makes it hard for me to drive or talk on the phone, and I'm sure there are many people with more extreme conditions for whom it's impossible. There are people like Richard Stallman and members of certain religious communities who have strong moral objections to using certain technologies. Society should accommodate all sorts of people and all sorts of ways of living.
  • cbozeman 2y ago
    [flagged]
    • lsecondario 2y ago
      > Society is about conforming. This is an expression of personal preference. It is a common preference but not universal.
      • Neonlicht 2y ago
        Society is what people invented so that different people can live together. If you do not conform you're banished to jail.
        • cbozeman 2y ago
          [flagged]
    • vladms 2y ago
      > I don't like paying taxes. If we replace "taxes" with "paying for an army, paying for police, etc." than the above statement seems strange. I can understand "I don't like what society choose to build (with the taxes)", but some things can't be let to the free market. > I have to go do the fucking IRS's job That's a society choice. I have no experience with IRS, but other countries have tax systems that are much more automatic (come prefilled with most info for example). But taxes are maybe a bit higher (because if you don't do the job, someone needs to maintain the systems that allow the automation).
• ksec 2y ago
  And in the good old day. Apple will force its hands on these sort of issues. But 10 years after Apple Pay and the Claims to replace your wallet. They are still millions miles away from doing it. In many ways Apple without Steve Jobs feels more Google and Microsoft but with better taste of software and hardware. >"So the people who make the company more successful are the sales and marketing people, and they end up running the companies. And the ‘product people’ get run out of the decision-making forums. The companies forget how to make great products. The product sensibility and product genius that brought them to this monopolistic position gets rotted out by people running these companies who have no conception of a good product vs. a bad product. They have no conception of the craftsmanship that’s required to take a good idea and turn it into a good product. >"And they really have no feeling in their hearts about wanting to help the costumers.” *
  • Carrok 2y ago
    > 10 years after Apple Pay and the Claims to replace your wallet. They are still millions miles away from doing it. Clearly we have very different experiences here, because Apple Pay has effectively replaced my wallet. I don’t carry any cash and carry one or two cards for the rare times when tap to pay is unavailable.
• modeless 2y ago
  The US government hands out smartphones with service for free. Elsewhere you can get used phones for practically nothing. Most places have wifi these days so you don't even need to pay for service just to use an app at a store. Not having a smartphone is a choice. Nobody is obligated to support you in that choice. It's not "unfair". Not everything you dislike is "unfair". What's actually unfair is the app store monopolies that dictate what you can and can't do with the phone you "own". But I don't really expect The Guardian to understand the true issue.
• aucisson_masque 2y ago
  Just saying, 99% of the app could be replaced by a browser bookmark. Of course some companies don't want it so they make their website unusable to smartphone. There isn't really much that technically would prevent people from using their web browser to pay the parking or to pay McDonald. You can have geolocation on browser too, save your account, take picture and so on. It's just better for these companies if we have their app because we can't use ad blocker and just close the browser. The app, it can send data 24/24. For instance, I have yet to find an llm or ai chatbot app that doesn't force me to have the Google play store enabled on my phone and to be logged in with my Google account. What the FCK they care if I have a Google account on my phone to be able to use chatgpt, deepseek, Mistral, lama and others ? More and more do that, recently the app I used to use to track food quality (Yuka) did that too. The more thing goes, the less app I use and the more I rely on web browser. And those who refuse to work in browser, i just ditch them. I feel like we reached a plateau years ago and now things are going downhill with android and iPhone.
• raintrees 2y ago
  I chose to use a flip phone over a previous Android phone around 10 years ago when ISPs/Phone providers showed that security lapse issues for them was just a cost of doing business. I used to store private client info in Exchange and sync it, but I could not, in good conscience, continue to do so with the knowledge of that information's exposure. I recently worked with NetGear support to have a new router replaced after we determined the firmware was known to be problematic, and the only way the level 2 support person had of correcting it required their app. So fortunately, there may still be ways around working with IT without a "smart" phone, and I will continue to blaze that trail as needed.
• cwoolfe 2y ago
  Yes! I've often said "software engineers should be doomed to use what they create. Or at least watch others try to use it." One example is our local Costco parking garage. They replaced the old push-button ticketing kiosk (which had nothing wrong with it) with one that had a touchscreen. Many times the line is backed up and one day I saw why. The guy was pushing the touchscreen button as if it were physical, and it wasn't registering the tap. He was using multiple fingers and mashing instead of using one finger and doing a clean tap inside the digital button.
  • mitthrowaway2 2y ago
    Perhaps while wearing gloves, because it's really cold outside?
  • nicbou 2y ago
    They should be forced to use it from scratch on a cheap Android phone using spotty signal.
  • febusravenga 2y ago
    Times where SWEs decided about these things are long gone. It's all in hands of product managers, designers and other business oriented people.
• Mystery-Machine 2y ago
  I don't have a permanent address nor a permanent (mobile) phone number. It's impossible to do so many things without these. I have to use my mother's address and my mother is currently suing me in court, so go figure how much mail reaches me. Without a permanent address, you can't open a bank account, you can't use many government services,... It's a "required" field on many online forms. It's such a pain because they don't need those info to give me the services they offer...
• EasyMark 2y ago
  This is why I wished all apps were backed by webapps of similar capabilities. I know that I personally see how it goes with the website first before I install an app. I prefer the browser sandbox by far to the phone OS
• NotYourLawyer 2y ago
  I hate the app-ification of everything. 95% of apps could just be a web page, and should be.
• IOUnix 2y ago
  Yeah, that's how that works. The world moves on and progress happens. You don't have to necessarily like it, or embrace it. But if the entire world is moving a certain direction and you decide to not move with it, that fine. But it's a choice you're making. You may not like that the entire world is going from horses to automobiles, but if you refuse to embrace them you can't be surprised when the grocery store is now a 3 hour walk away.
• deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
• mixmastamyk 2y ago
  Ticketmaster is the worst of these for me. They have a near monopoly, and started forcing this shit on everyone a few years ago with covid as the excuse. Now going to one of their concerts is like taking an international flight. Forget privacy, forget having a paper stub as a souvenir (not even an option), forget paying with cash. As I avoid ticketmaster, I've avoided most concerts the last few years... only going to small local venues, which provide the options above.
  • mglvsky 2y ago
    Even for those who is OK with Ticketmaster - there is little "surprise" - hostile location/IP-based blockings. Do you want to buy some tickets for concert in Germany while being on trip in non-EU country? No way - we are just blocking you! They even learned to detect whether a client use VPN so latter could not circumvent this ridiculous obstacle.
  • MiddleEndian 2y ago
    Ticketmaster is the one of the shittiest apps I've ever used in my life. Constantly have to reactivate because it forgets your info, it fails to display tickets, it shows ads, etc. But I recently discovered you can just view the tickets in your mobile browser instead and it will work fine for whatever scanners the venues use.
  • steelframe 2y ago
    I'm all-in on this. If the only way for me to attend an event is to deal with an app on my phone, I automatically assume there are a few dozen other activities or events I'd enjoy doing more during that time and choose to go do one of those instead.
• MandieD 2y ago
  The big group that keeps getting ignored are older people who actually do have smartphones, but find them increasingly difficult to use as they age, due to how fiddly touch interfaces can be and visuals designed by and for people in their 20s, not 70s and 80s. Typing on a smartphone is impossible for my 70-something father, even on the larger models.
  • miltonlost 2y ago
    Touchscreens also frequently don't work with older people's skin which is often dry. They often literally cannot type because the screen doesn't pick up the electrical currents in the drier, more insulated fingers. Physical keyboards wouldn't have this problem.
    • MandieD 2y ago
      Yeah, I’m pretty sure that’s what my dad’s problem boils down to. He worked in construction for half a century, specializing in concrete, so heaven knows what that did to the skin on his fingertips.
  • gs17 2y ago
    Same for my parents (ironically, my 90-something grandmother can use an iPhone with no problem). My dad has Raynaud's (poor fingertip circulation), so touch screens sometimes just won't work for him anyways. Making things app-only is practically discrimination.
• sylware 2y ago
  Solution: restore noscript/basic (x)html interop, where it can do a good enough job (like most online services where doing a few years ago...).
• FpUser 2y ago
  Toronto, Canada. Tried to pay for street parking using their machine and with credit card. It spat out some gibberish on display that flashed too fast to read. Parking ticket guy was hanging around so I asked him WTF is going on. He said I must use the app or he will give a ticket. I tried to argue with him that they must still accept the other form of payment and I do not want to pollute phone with the app. He said that he does not give a shit and will issue ticket regardless of what fucking Toronto's parking website pages say.
• LorenzoGood 2y ago
  My grandfather does not have a cellphone, however he seems pretty creative about getting around situations where he would need an app. For example, my sister had some sporting event where the only way to get a ticket was to use an app, so he snuck into the hand stamping line, and entered the event.
• exe34 2y ago
  I don't mind having a phone, but the only way I'll put personal information on it is if I have root access and can run a firewall. anything else and it's not my phone. more and more apps are starting to reject rooted phones. I'm dropping them for now, but I worry that at some point I'll have to carry a decoy phone for essential apps. or maybe I'll learn to just not put anything more personal than the stuff required to use the essential ones like health care and transport.
• grg0 2y ago
  I've left gyms and restaurants because of this crap.
• blackeyeblitzar 2y ago
  I hate having to use a metro app or bank app or app for conferences or whatever. Who knows what the privacy and security of all these are. I am sure it’s a matter of time before they all get breached.
• danjc 2y ago
  Not the point of the article but for most apps, there is no technical reason for them to be installed apps rather than web apps.
• la_fayette 2y ago
  In Germany you would mostly be forced to fill forms on paper and send it back and forth by mail, do payments in cash or use support hotlines on the phone, which take a long waiting time to get to somebody... Apps would be fine :-)
• dwedge 2y ago
  Another thing that irritated me is app designers assuming I have email on my phone. I don't, I use it for work and will use my laptop when I want to check email. Too many apps send you a "magic link" in your email to login with no alternative.
  • lucb1e 2y ago
    I do have email on my phone and it still doesn't work: the app that triggered the email doesn't have a URL bar so I can't paste the link into there. The link is often also not a real link but the epitome of phishing. After resolving the tracking link to the real link, I need to somehow trick an app into sending a system broadcast event for the OS to notice that there is an app that wants to overwrite valid HTTP(S) URLs and handle them inside this app instead of in a browser What ever happened to the protocol part of the URL to direct the data to the right software handler, I will probably never understand
• deergomoo 2y ago
  It mentions parking which is a similar category of annoyance, but I think the multitude of mutually incompatible apps for EV charging pose a real barrier to adoption too. Maybe not in a way people are explicitly aware of, but it certainly makes up part of the stories about difficulty and inconvenience with public charging. I can pay for petrol with any card or, if I'm feeling really old school, by going into a building and handing a person cash. Someone like my mum, who still likes to draw the cash she'll need for the week and spend that, wouldn't even entertain the idea of having to download and maintain a suite of apps for every brand of charger. Apps are a good convenience option for those that want them, but they shouldn't be the only option, especially not for something as essential as fuelling your car. I would welcome regulation on these, even a baby step of "all chargers must accept contactless payment". I'd like to see manned charging stations and cash options too—and I say that as someone who pays for everything by card—but I fear in the short term that might hamper infrastructure rollout.
• postepowanieadm 2y ago
  Not a single word about covid related apps?
  • dennis_jeeves2 2y ago
    One word: Orwellian.
• riedel 2y ago
  It is even worse: people with smartphones not running software from either Google or Apple are penalized. I have huge problems right now because the only second factor from one of my banks (that also has the inbox for my insurances) is a Android app that requires play protect.
• ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago
  I was just whini- er, talking about this, this morning. The main issue is that end-users not only accept crappy software, they pay for it (sometimes, quite a bit). They also recommend it to others, give it good reviews, and subcultures of "tech-macho" workarounds to bugs cause people to actually prefer crap. It's infuriating (to me, but not, perhaps, to many tech companies). As long as that keeps happening, the quality of software is going to remain in the shitter. It doesn't make economic sense to write good software. Writing high-Quality software is a lot more expensive than writing crap. My software tends to be pretty high-Quality, but that's mainly because it is free software, and I tend to work alone, so its scope is quite limited. I would not expect a commercial company to develop software the way that I do. It would just cost too much.
• afandian 2y ago
  I'm glad to see people talking about this. I'd love to see a new right: The right to not have your phone on you. For whatever reason. Maybe it was stolen. Maybe it's being fixed. Maybe the battery is dead. (Maybe you don't want to get a Google or Apple account. But that's not the only use case.) All public services and essential services (government services, banks, car parks, etc) should respect this right. It's bizarre that people think it's such an outlandish request.
  • causal 2y ago
    The increasing necessity of the Internet is also why giving companies the power to exile someone from the Internet is an extremely broad power that is increasingly like a prison sentence. E.g. the recent cases of publishers demanding ISPs cut off users who have pirated content.
  • elric 2y ago
    Maybe the currently shitty transatlantic political climate will force politicians to think about the reliance on 2 US tech companies for every single piece of mobile software. The UK tried to force Apple to Do Evil and failes. Who's to the say the US wouldn't be (or hasn't been) more successful? If I were a politician relying on WhatsApp for secure communications (as many over here seem to be), I'd be very worried.
  • dennis_jeeves2 2y ago
    >It's bizarre that people think it's such an outlandish request. Bizarre but not surprising. Tyranny of the masses.
• fc417fc802 2y ago
  I refuse to use service specific apps (on personal devices) and let the chips fall where they may. So far the vast majority of stuff continues to work ...
• sirjaz 2y ago
  Democratize it and of you require an app on the phone that same app needs to be available on all major pc OSes. Problem solved.
• zzo38computer 2y ago
  I saw on Usenet about "Digitalzwang". Here is the quotation: > The German movement "Digitalcourage" has coined the term "Digitalzwang" (compulsory digitalisation) for this feature. For instance, some public funding programmes cannot be used unless you have access to a PC (a smartphone is not sufficient) hooked up to the internet. > Digitalcourage support responsible digitalisation by offering help in the usage of secure authorisation and encryption but strictly disapproves of any form of compulsory digitalisation. People who refuse using public data networks, whatever their motives, must have equal rights as everybody else. What they describe is not quite what the linked article describes, but is similar and is related. I would further say, that in addition to that (and the stuff mentioned in the linked article), you should not be required to use computers with specific complicated software (including web browsers), or to use computers (including smartphones) or credit cards at all, if that is applicable to whatever you are doing working with. There is also the issue of a smartphone running out of battery power or otherwise not working, even if you do have it. (I have once been in a restaurant where a app is required, although customers who do not have a smartphone can borrow a iPad from them. This is not as bad, but still it is not as good as just not requiring it at all.)
• MisterBastahrd 2y ago
  Some of these website-in-apps drive me fucking nuts. They will switch you to the app, ask for validation through email, and then when you go to check the email, it loses your place in its internal browser, sending it back to the login screen, and so the number you've retrieved is worthless unless you know how to specifically minimize the app on the screen, which it will not tell you beforehand how to do. The bouncing back and forth is annoying and idiotic.
• casey2 2y ago
  This entire article is fodder for techbros to circle jerk about how impactful they are despite any productivity gains being marginal or nonexistent. It's goes further into nonsensical territory when a progressive shows up and starts complaining about how the people who don't want to participate in society are being unfairly punished. That being poor is somehow not only a problem, but also YOUR problem.
• ge96 2y ago
  I bought tickets for a concert, had to download an app Had to give my phone number to reserve a table today Tickets on your phone for airline, it's not all bad saw some elder couple with flip phones (they're able to get by without a smart phone)
• elric 2y ago
  Forcing apps on people keeps the Apple/Google duopoly in place. Every alternative mobile OS fails unless it has an Android compatibility layer. And even then it will fail because Google's anti-competitive Play Integrity API won't work, and many users will be unable to use bank/payment apps.
• HellDunkel 2y ago
  Some even want to unleash the tyranny of apps upon our children at school. Can you imagine? Brainrot is a thing.
• byyoung3 2y ago
  lmao i think its those with smartphones are unfairly penalized
• Pavilion2095 2y ago
  Although I have a smartphone, I understand the problem. It amazes me how many businesses create so many unnecessary obstacles between the user and the purchase these days. It doesn't make sense to me.
• TexanFeller 2y ago
  It’s especially bad for elderly people. I have elderly family members with cancer and other serious issues who struggle because medical offices expect contact to be only in app messages and chats. When these patients call on the phone and say they need to talk to someone on the phone because they struggle with accessing other forms of communication they still often only reply back in the app/website. Some are elderly and rural enough to have grown up without electricity or running water until they were adults(yes, they grew up in the US). They still don’t have smartphones. They have <1mbit Internet. 2FA is a major hurdle for them. Some have vision problems that make reading text difficult. Some are hard of hearing and struggle with the phone too. So many people are left behind by trying to make patient communication efficient for the staff and documented for their electronic records systems. No one is thinking about what’s efficient and effective for the patients they serve, and no one will because doctors have huge debts to pay and have to work for the Wall Street crowd.
  • sobakeitso 2y ago
    I went through this a year ago. My 95 year old dad was in rehab after major heart surgery and they wanted to communicate with him through a clunky android app. It was enraging. He could barely use the TV remote and they wanted him to navigate an app that kept crashing, forcing him to log in with a username and corporate-approved password. Absolute horror. I feel for you.
• 1vuio0pswjnm7 2y ago
  There is certainly an analogy here to servers that respond to HTTP ("websites") that ignore the concept of "user agent", i.e., the user chooses the client, and try to force the "www user" to choose a certain "web browser", usually one funded by advertising. In the case of handheld computers ("smartphones") the situation is even more restrictive. The "mobile user" is forced to use both s specific operating system and a specific client in order to communicate with servers that respond to HTTP ("backends"), where the former is controlled by a company wholly or partially dependant on surveillance, data collection and the sale of online advertising services as a "business model".
• leytohn 2y ago
  [dead]
• steelframe 2y ago
  It's not just those without smartphones who are penalized. It's those without Digital Restrictions Management (DRM) and spying imposed by Apple or Google on their devices. I run GrapheneOS on an older Pixel. It does everything I need it to do: alarms, offline maps and navigation, end-to-end encrypted communications, podcasts, audiobooks, music, photos, weather, and even phone calls. All without any DRM or spying. Now let's talk about the downsides in this article: shopping discounts, parking, entertainment, fast food, and banking. Shopping discounts: The deal is that they get to track me and advertise to me, and they cut some percentage off a purchase here and there. No deal. I've discovered so many great products by moving away from big retail shops that engage in this kind of activity. I mostly shop at Trader Joe's, which has no coupon/discount/loyalty nonsense. For the occasional trip to another supermarket, I simply key in <local area code>-867-5309. Works every time. Parking: I ride my bicycle or take public transportation almost everywhere, so parking is a moot point for me. But for the rare occasion when I drive to a place where I have to pay for parking, most everything accepts a credit card. If it doesn't, most everything else has a website that I can go to in Vanadium or Waterfox. It's actually very rare that I find I actually have no choice but to download and install a DRM'd app in order to park somewhere. In fact I don't recall that ever actually happening to me. Not to say that's not a possibility in the future. Entertainment: I despise large crowds, and almost everything that's exclusively done through Ticketmaster et al. is of absolutely no interest to me. If I'm not sitting down in a cozy venue within 10-15 or so feet from the performers, I'm just not interested. Fast food: I don't eat fast food. Discounted Big Macs isn't my idea of a good time. Banking: My bank's web site works fine on Waterfox. But if I'm going to be managing my money I'd much prefer to do it on my computer. If I want a reasonable return on my deposits I simply park most of my cash in a money market ETF. It's plenty convenient and is simply not a big issue for me. I'll add a few more. Rideshare: I find traditional taxis are everywhere I've recently visited, tend to be driven by more interesting people, and they accept cash, no problem. I've had plenty of bad experiences with rideshares and have never had a bad experience since switching to traditional taxis. Knock on wood. Audiobooks: I get ODM files from my local library. The audio files you download via ODM aren't DRM'd. Ebooks: My offline Kobi reader works great. Kindles can be cracked with WinterBreak. Again, the library. DeDRM is your friend. Email: Fastmail app from apkcure.com. Chat: Signal. Airlines: Check in on Waterfox, take a screenshot of the ticket/QR code. If that doesn't work, check in at the airport and get a printed boarding pass.
• enos_feedler 2y ago
  I have a friend in hong kong who is an international teacher. Wanted to take a sick day but needed to see a doctor to get a note. then needed an app. but the app is only available for hong kong app store users. She basically could not take a sick day from work.
• Kim_Bruning 2y ago
  In many countries, the secrecy of your mail is protected by law (secrecy of correspondence) There is -as yet- no laws as strong for 'telephones'. But people communicate a lot more by mobile phone than by snail mail these days! I think people should be free to do or discuss whatever they want via their phones, just like is permitted for paper mail. Phones should should get very stringent legal protections, including at borders, just like for paper mail.
• fennecbutt 2y ago
  So are those without millions or billions of dollars.
• GarnetFloride 2y ago
  I help run a symposium, and we are back to using paper program books, as our programmer volunteer moved on to other things and we couldn't update the iPhone and Android apps, but we were able to make a web app of the schedule which we'll probably continue using as we don't need to do two different things.
• mschild 2y ago
  I hate this trend with a passion. Digital can make a lot things easier, but frankly speaking for a majority of those use cases a mobile website will do just fine as well. My bank is digital only and doesn't have any local branches. That works for me and is fine. It's not like I'm switching banks every few weeks. They still have an all phone line access as well though. You can call people round the clock to do transfers, get your balance, etc. Even my analog grandmother has her bank account with them. On the other hand, you have restaurants and other businesses that just over do it. There is a restaurant around my work place that I went to once or twice a month. Nothing special but fair prices and good lunch menus. Then they went all digital. Want a menu? Scan this barcode. Want to order? Create an account and place you order with your table number. Want to pay? You can click pay on your phone and enter your details. Don't have a phone? Totally sorry, we don't have any printed back-ups and our servers don't have any card terminals anymore anyway.
• unsupp0rted 2y ago
  > He does own a smartphone – an Apple iPhone he bought secondhand about three years ago – but says: “I don’t use apps at all. I don’t download them for security reasons.” Yes and? He makes a choice and he is being penalized for it. Presumably the benefits for him outweigh the costs. For Richard Stallman they do. There is no innate human right to grocery store coupons or private parking lots.
  • rs186 2y ago
    Thank you for pointing this out. However, it seems that HN crowd really doesn't like this kind of viewpoint. "If you cannot do everything without a smart phone, that's the society's fault, not yours.", as echoed by comments under my (also downvoted) comment. Many people here seem to have trouble understanding how the world works. If all you do is complain (which will change nothing) instead of adapt, good luck with your miserable life.
    • mindslight 2y ago
      Because it's dismissive, sophomoric, and can be applied to literally anything you might complain about - eg "If you don't like how the 'HN crowd' votes, then stop coming here". In reality, Exit is not the only option.
      • rs186 2y ago
        Dude you seriously need to go out in the real world and try to understand how things work. Complaining on the Internet never does anything. Zero.
        • mindslight 2y ago
          When and where is the meatspace protest against the Hacker News community's voting tendencies?
  • goodpoint 2y ago
    Privacy is very much a human right and it's being violated all the time.
• karlgkk 2y ago
  [flagged]
  • rwmj 2y ago
    It could have been explained better, but there are lots of reasons to prefer paper over digital and websites over apps. Apps can collect very invasive information, often unnecessarily (my Fuji camera app requires that I enable fine-grained location information in order to open the app at all).
    • card_zero 2y ago
      "Security reasons" might be standing in for an inexpressible distaste about being tracked, even if nothing specifically bad is likely to result from it.
  • skrebbel 2y ago
    > some moron with vague paranoia We really got to get away from this vibe that other people's underbelly feelings aren't valid unless they can back them up with seventy scientific articles. It doesn't matter whether this "moron" has a good or a bad reason to not want apps. Apps make him feel insecure, so he doesn't want them. Why can't that be enough?
    • rwmj 2y ago
      The general attitude of companies that make apps doesn't help. No wonder he feels insecure, even if he can't articulate the specific reason in every case.
    • wtcactus 2y ago
      It's totally enough. He just has to deal with the consequences of his own choices. I know that seems like a novel or even totally alien concept nowadays, but that was what people used to do not long ago: own up to their own choices.
  • truculent 2y ago
    Given the number of older people who are scammed via their phones, this sounds like a reasonable solution to reducing one’s risk surface.
• ChoHag 2y ago
  [dead]
• invalidname 2y ago
  That's like saying the tyranny of credit cards prevents me from enjoying discounts in some venues. Or that the tyranny of educational system prevents me from working as a doctor. No, I don't like installing apps for every stupid parking lot or restaurant. But calling it "tyranny" is clickbait and bad journalism. I pay more for my sons bus pass because I don't want him to have a smartphone. That's a choice I made. My solution isn't to make everyone else pay more because the same discount can't be given without a smartphone. I see why businesses would want to reward me when I let them send me push notifications. Again, not even remotely tyranny. If anything this is tyranny of bad writing.
  • throawayh666 2y ago
    [dead]
  • rwmj 2y ago
    If the app is required - which has happened already (eg. bank apps, car charging) or could happen in the future - then I think it's reasonable to call this bad. Maybe not a "tyranny", we'd probably want to reserve that for the government doing it, but not good news.
    • invalidname 2y ago
      Why? It's a tool. Do you complain when the bank requires you to sign something with a pen? We require computers today for many things. Why not force websites to provide phone service with exactly the same pricing. Guess what the effect will be? Higher prices. The same is true with apps, some things make no financial sense without them.
      • eesmith 2y ago
        I would complain if the bank requires everyone to sign with a pen as there are disability reasons for why someone is unable to sign with a pen. Eg, https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/250d63/was_using_an_x_as_a_signature_ever_legally/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/250d63/was_u... has "We used prints as my partner was dying and lost motor control." Or, think of Stephen Hawking, able to communicate but unable to operate a pen in the later part of his life. Wouldn't you complain if he had been unable to control his bank account because he couldn't use a pen? The relevant Uniform Commercial Code has a wider definition of what counts as a signature than using a pen, § 3-401, https://www.law.cornell.edu/ucc/3/3-401 https://www.law.cornell.edu/ucc/3/3-401 .
• mo_42 2y ago
  [flagged]
  • LadyCailin 2y ago
    Do you consider “going to your GP” a minor area of life, on par with rewards programs? Because if you can only pay for parking or buy bus tickets with an app, I’m not sure how most people get to their GP.
  • fxtentacle 2y ago
    Agree, the article's prime example is also that ppl cannot get LIDL loyalty discounts, which to me seems a bit tame too commonplace for the "tyranny" word choice.
  • KineticLensman 2y ago
    All of the council car parks in my local town now expect you to use a parking app to pay. They removed cash devices and the recent BT switch-off of 3G clobbered the credit card devices
    • beardyw 2y ago
      Paying for parking that way was never very successful. Machines often failed to work even before apps. Apart from the inherent discrimination more people probably pay successfully now.
• JeanMarcS 2y ago
  My brother doesn't have à smartphone (by choice). For example, he cannot access his bank account via his desktop anymore. He have to go to his agency in person. Well we all did that for years so it's just annoying, because he still have the possibility to do it and it's his choice. But what will happen if all the brick and mortar close ? When will it be mandatory to get a smartphone for his bank app, just to have access to his money ? And it's just an example...
  • captainbland 2y ago
    In the UK loads of bank branches have closed. They've opened up "hubs" which are a joke, some are open only have weekend opening hours of Saturday morning and you usually have to travel to a different town to get to it.
  • dumbfounder 2y ago
    Then you will need to use an app.
  • morkalork 2y ago
    I had some hilariously degenerate experiences with this recently. There are basic services that branches won't provide at all anymore like cashing cheques, which can be annoying in some circumstance. But the real dumb one was being blocked from taking a certain action in the online banking with a message like "present yourself with 2 forms of government ID at a local branch". OK. Fine. Drive there, wait in line, blah blah blah. The teller looks at me like I'm crazy when I say that online banking sent me there. They figure it out, do the KYC process, unblock me and I say great now can you do the thing I was trying to do before all this? "No, you must use online banking for that."
  • SilasX 2y ago
    Related issue: how every website seems to migrate to some smartphone-optimized version that looks like a mobile app blown up to a bigger screen that works much worse on desktop. Hall of Shame: Twitter, Facebook, even Vanguard. What's even more confusing/frustrating is that, despite being developed with very elaborate, mature frameworks, they still lack basic UI accommodations, like making clickable elements detectable by add-ons, or allowing you to open up a detail view in a new tab. I get if Joe Shmoe's cobbled-together app forgets some things, but why wouldn't stuff like that be rolled in as a default, with all the development hours applied to it?
• renegade-otter 2y ago
  I use my phone primarily for messaging. In fact, I often forget and have the Anti-Distraction mode turned on, so I only get important comms but no app notifications. SIDENOTE People need to chill out with the word "tyranny". It's like saying that you are being "assaulted" by a different opinion, or claiming that ordinary platform moderation is "censorship". You are not being terrorized, assaulted, or censored. There are people in the world who are truly subjected to those things, and you have NO idea what that's actually like.
  • stavros 2y ago
    I think you're in a very small minority if you think that someone using the phrase "tyranny of notifications" is implying they live under a dictatorial regime. Most people just understand the hyperbole.
    • dmos62 2y ago
      You say it's just a hyperbole as if the comparison being made (dictatorship or violence or whatever) has no meaning for the speaker or the listener.
      • dole 2y ago
        Scary things make people pay attention and click the links. I loathe the casual use of the term “lynching” by people in the public eye but same rules apply, using exaggerated, scary words to sell your weak point. Not saying I agree with it, but it’s marketing and journalism.
        • dmos62 2y ago
          Sure, I understand why people use comparisons. It's just that I'd like to encourage conscious use of language.
  • yallpendantools 2y ago
    I agree on two points in your sidenote. The first is that online moderation is rarely, if ever, "censorship". The second thing is that the majority of us have no idea what it's actually like being terrorized or assaulted. That said, words can take on different meanings depending on context. We can only imagine the tyranny of being a prisoner of war but we can also complain about the tyranny of noise pollution in modern cities; that doesn't mean I think they're equal. I know some people suffer assault domestically but I can also label some perfumes as an assault to the senses; it doesn't lessen the gravity of the former. And yes, Calvin, you are allowed to think your household is a den of censorship and oppression (https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd.it%2Fq4u1lowsmo751.png%3Fauto%3Dwebp%26s%3D55ea00a93f8a2c597a2abb4184a055022b8f91ca https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd....). My problem with gatekeeping words is that it is performative. We can indeed chill out on using these words save for their most extreme interpretations but it doesn't really help anyone suffering from these things and just makes language less colorful for the rest of us. And, once more, nor does their usage dismiss the extent of any of these situations because you don't need to be a genius to know that words can have subtle changes in meaning depending on context.
• mathverse 2y ago
  In my country the same reason is used to make things more expensive and give contracts via nepotism to allow for "alternative use without apps" to companies to make the whole thing through SMS or physical office while making the whole thing expensive for everyone and inefficient.
• nonrandomstring 2y ago
  It is not "unfair". We choose to resist technofascism.
  • underseacables 2y ago
    It is unfair. A close friend of mine has brain damage, is low income, and he can't really use a smart phone. He just has a simple flip phone and it's all he has. It has been isolating for him with working and managing his life.
    • nonrandomstring 2y ago
      Tell your friend what good company he is in, as one of many, many of us, who do not fit a fleeting mythical stereotype. There are hundreds of reasons why people can not or will not use smartphones. Eyesight. Dexterity. Poverty. Location tracking by hostiles. Privacy. Poor memory. Security needs. Environmental concerns... We should not play the victims. Being without one of those cursed things is a blessing. We get good mental health. We get focus and calm. We get a profound sense of freedom, time to think, to create, to talk to real people, to see the world go by. We learn to enjoy being bored. We interact with other real people. We willingly pay more for freedom and privacy. What we lose is being tied up in pointless abusive machinations of an already dying "online" culture, one that is over-extended, fragile, dysfunctional, and we dodge much of the abusive enshitified corporate hell that every living being now hates. Please, big-up your friend instead of painting him as a victim.
• everdrive 2y ago
  People are writing this off, but it eventually becomes impossible not to own a smartphone; an expensive device, with an expensive monthly plan, and an absolutely terrible privacy record. Eventually more businesses will require smartphone usage just to use their services. There could even be a time when government services require it.
  • agumonkey 2y ago
    Depending on where you live, a smartphone can be bought for 100 bucks and a basic line (voice, messages, 2GB of data) for less than 5 bucks. It's not ideal but it's not a sacrifice anymore.
    • derac 2y ago
      You can also use wifi. Even free wifi. You can get a very nice used phone with many years of updates for 100 dollars. You can find a worse phone for much less if you really want to. edit: You can even get a free phone from your community. Possibly a better one than the a53. Most people have a phone or several in a drawer. https://swappa.com/listings/samsung-galaxy-a53-5g?carrier=unlocked https://swappa.com/listings/samsung-galaxy-a53-5g?carrier=un...
      • agumonkey 2y ago
        Quite true, to the point that my data plan is not used much (I'm way below the 2G threshold) because I'm mostly indoor when I fetch a lot.
      • layer8 2y ago
        Yeah, but you need to be lucky for free wifi to be available for apps that you need to use in specific locations, like the parking meter app.
        • derac 2y ago
          A parking spot that requires an app is certainly onerous, even for a smartphone owner. A good point, but also a parking spot like that which is also not in range of city wifi is pretty rare, I'd reckon.
• kpmcc 2y ago
  Somewhat unrelated to the piece, but this is the second website I’ve seen in two days that appears to not have properly merged an edit? “ The RAC’s head of policy, Simon Williams, says many people are overwhelmed by the multitude of apps they have to use, “when in reality you want one that you like and you’re happy using and that you can use everywhere”. Six years ago the Department for Transport started developing a “national parking platform” (NPP) designed to enable drivers to use one app of their choice to pay for all their parking. It has been trialled by a number of councils, but a big question mark hangs over its future as public funding for the project looks likely to be withdrawn. The RAC’s head of policy Simon Williams says many people are overwhelmed by the multitude of apps they have to use, “when in reality you want one that you like and you’re happy using and that you can use everywhere”. Six years ago the Department for Transport started developing a “national parking platform” (NPP) designed to enable drivers to use one app of their choice to pay for all their parking, and it has been trialled by a number of councils. However, a big question mark now hangs over its future as public funding for the project looks likely to be withdrawn imminently.” I think the other one was an npr piece posted on HN yesterday? Is there a bug with wordpress or are people just getting sloppy?
  • 4ndrewl 2y ago
    The Guardian is also known as the Grauniad for their lack of detail to grammar, spelling etc .
  • aspect0545 2y ago
    I doubt the guardian and npr use Wordpress
  • nooneisanon 2y ago
    Typos and editing bugs are pretty common on The Guardian [source: grumpy Guardian Weekly subscriber]
• rs186 2y ago
  Very weird logic. As the article points out, this is an intentional choice for many people. So you shoulder the consequences, that seems fair to me? I don't currently drive a car, and to be honest, I have anxiety about driving. I could bitch about how US is hostile to people who don't drive, to the point that it's difficult to go to places/get things done, but that's useless. I can 1) move to NYC and never leave the city 2) get a car, work on my anxiety, and start enjoying life or 3) talk to Guardian and complain all day long. 1) is not actually a bad choice, and literally millions of people choose that, but I am working on 2) because that's the sensible thing to do. If I intentionally choose not to drive, not because of a physical disability or not being to afford a car, I bear the consequences.
  • tim333 2y ago
    I do drive and the having do download a bunch of parking apps is a pain the arse. And for each one you have to spend five minutes entering your address card number etc.
  • like_any_other 2y ago
    We all shoulder the consequences of slowly sliding into a society of lock-in and surveillance, which is what unnecessarily requiring smartphones advances. That there are choices along the way doesn't make it fair - if I let you choose which of your fingers I cut off, am I being fair? Wait a few years, and the "choice" will be between living in the woods, and carrying an always-on telescreen with you at all times.
    • rs186 2y ago
      > if I let you choose which of your fingers I cut off, am I being fair? That's not what we are discussing here. You can't use whatever irrelevant analogy you like to prove a point that doesn't exist.
      • like_any_other 2y ago
        It is not an analogy, it is a proof by example that 'choice' alone does not make something fair, contrary to your assertion.
• kome 2y ago
  I didn't own a smartphone until 2022. Now, after three years of carrying this dopamine-slothed brick, I’m ditching it—but first, let’s autopsy the “security” demands forcing ownership. Peak security theater: banks (at least in Europe) mandate smartphones as “safe,” yet the device itself is the ultimate attack vector. - 2FA apps? Single point of failure (SIM-jacking, zero-days, bricked phone = locked out of life). - Mandatory apps? Swapped phishing for supply-chain attacks + 24/7 location leaks. - Biometrics? Your face now lives in a corp database that will get breached. The irony? A YubiKey was objectively safer: no GPS, mic, or app permissions. But we’ve normalized “security” as surrender to surveillance capitalism. Banks want your data, not hardware tokens. Smartphones manufacture threats: - AirTag stalking requires… a smartphone to detect. - Signal/encrypted chat? Tied to a phone number (→ ID → surveillance graph). - “Find My Phone” = backdoor with a UX polish. The system isn’t securing you, it’s securing access to you. Every forced 2FA method is another node to map, monetize, and manipulate. btw. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41310150 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41310150 - old ASK NH of mine, i still welcome ideas.
• ecef9-8c0f-4374 2y ago
  Not only do I need a smartphone for "everything" in my live.(managing my local gym membership for example) I also only have the choice between two us companies: Google or Apple. I had an ubuntu smartphone at some point but it's practically useless. If I want a appointment with my doctor in Germany living in the same street as I, the Californian Company Google has to be involved for some reason.
• wtcactus 2y ago
  [flagged]
  • HocusLocus 2y ago
    I remember the European young folk who had RFID chips implanted in their arms so they could fast track the lines in dance clubs. I wonder how many of those chips are still in arms, today. I'm not denying smartphone adoption. I'm just giving it 20 years to mature. During which time I can observe it from the outside, and better track dystopian policies that may result from it and slow their progress... by using a desktop computer and advocating for arms-length 'security' solutions, instead of installing apps and losing all control. The opaque app sandbox is just as menacing to the user as to the hypothetical hacker. Currently I'm thinking, why should I EVER decide to use a device for which I cannot easily attain God-Mode? That includes defeating end to end encryption so I can see the plaintext the device uses to communicate. If that itself carries another layer of encryption, I will suspect it to be devious by default, and isn't that rational? It just seems like Darwin In Action, and my quick adoption would make me the brunt of some cosmic joke. I will never buy a cellphone without an easily removable battery, either. On general principle. Some things are not features, they are curses disguised as features.
• crossroadsguy 2y ago
  It is not even about privacy and safety or freedom of choice really. Besides very soon - in this duopoly you really will not be owning phones or even access to apps would be limited/controlled to more draconian measures than it is today. Anyways. I took an auto ride few weeks back and an old gentleman picked me up. He did have a tattered smartphone. But he didn't have the UPI app or a QR code (QR is the way here; UPI the instant payment thingie in India). He was not agitated but really looked embarrassed and helpless and told me in broken English he tried a few times but he forgets many kinds of PINs and messes up and his bank account gets blocked and then he has to run around with documents to get it unblocked and then again. I had some cash and I was able to pay him. But it's horrible. There are people for whom cash is the ONLY way. Even going to the bank (or ATM; which anyway is still a difficulty for me) means sometimes half to one day's work gone. Just like that. This has a lot to do with political climate changes. So many people get trampled over without any check and balances because they have the vote without a voice or any real power. I think a lot of us, and for many of us who tap and pay at a Starbucks as if it's bill there lowest currency denomination in our consciousness, never stop to try and understand this and realise this. This is not merely inconvenience in huge part of this planet - it's a real life pain. I don't think even this article considered such a case/life struggles due to smartphones and everything getting tied to a SIM et cetera.
  • mistrial9 2y ago
    ok - but despite this well-meaning story.. the answer IMO is still cash; use it, support it, continue it. The alternatives are not stable over time -- not a joke.
• Arch-TK 2y ago
  Those without smartphones _and_ those who do not wish to install trash on their smartphones, _and_ those who do not wish to use Android (or an Android build blessed by the corporations) or iOS.
• yallpendantools 2y ago
  I had a tangential experience to this phenomenon lately. I moved continents a few years ago. Eventually I had to switch my Play Store country to where I moved. That restricted my access to certain versions of apps but my downloaded apps continued to function anyway. Then, a few months ago, I finally bought a new phone. I quickly found out that there was no way I could get this one banking app from my home country on the new phone (other than switching my country setting again, which isn't worth the potential hassle right now). Fortunately, I could still do online banking with on my browser...right? I try to login to my online banking. They say they will send me an OTP on my registered mobile number. Makes sense, and, thanks to the wonders of roaming, I will be able to receive it. Except...instead of just sending me the actual OTP like any sane platform would do, I had to first confirm that I was, indeed, trying to sign-in to online banking by replying "YES" to their SMS prompt. And due to the wonders of SMS roaming protocol, though I could receive their messages, I simply could not reply to them no matter which gods I invoke. Security design by committee. I curse the manager who though this was a necessary and valuable addition to the whole OTP scheme. It's not so much a "convenience tax" as in the article but, I guess, a penalty for moving countries. I have no choice now but simply to just settle this when I go on vacation to my home country. There is probably no convenient resolution to this even when I am in the correct geospace. PS. I have two banks from home country and I was able to install the other bank's app in my new phone without a hitch. I try to avoid cynicism but this simply has the stink of Managerial Software Engineering Best Practices all over it.