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I'll only buy devices with GrapheneOS
- pjmlp 1y agoThe fallacy is that AOSP (which GrapheneOS forks from), and Chromium used to install it, are both dependendent on Google engineers, money, and the willigness to keep the platforms open, to some extent.
- gradientsrneat 1y agoA fallacy which the author acknowledges. > "I guess the best way to degoogle right now is to buy from Google" Google has a monopoly on sort-of-open-but-not-really smartphones. And interoperability on ARM desktop isn't looking pretty either.
- pjmlp 1y agoThis looks the same kind of situation when I noticed FOSDEM corridors started to be full of Apple laptops, but apparently the irony is lost on new generations.
- hungmung 1y agoI remember about 10 or 15 years ago somebody pointed out that a big chunk of the GNOME devs used Apple laptops, even at public appearances, and it answered a lot of my questions about the state of the project. (and I say this as a user of GNOME)
- estimator7292 1y agoI think that perfectly explains why GNOME is the way it is. Funny enough, that's also why Windows is in the state it's in. Funny how that works.
- jajuuka 1y agoThey really don't. It's just that development of custom roms like GrapheneOS are centered around Pixels. Plenty of other devices have unlockable bootloaders. The custom rom scene though is so small that concentrating on a couple devices is the only way to keep development moving forward though. Same reason why Asahi Linux is the only option on Apple Silicon Macs.
- wkat4242 1y agoMany have unlockable bootloaders (though the number is rapidly declining with Samsung closing up). But not many have relockable bootloaders. This is one of the things that grapheneos have set as a minimum standard, hence the reliance on pixels. There's a few other specific things that the titan chip provides which they rely on but the relocking is the main thing.
- ycombinatrix 1y agoTo be more specific - relockable with a custom AVB key. I think most devices can relock with the default Google AVB key.
- wkat4242 1y agoWell they can but not with custom firmware installed. As grapheneos is custom firmware, the google key makes no sense in this context.
- subscribed 1y ago"unlockable bootloader" is the requirement to flash anyone alternative on the phone, yes, but the GrapheneOS you mentioned will support _any_ device that is "flashable" and secure enough: https://grapheneos.org/faq#future-devices https://grapheneos.org/faq#future-devices Currently it's only Pixels from 8 up. Other alternative firmware projects don't seem to be too concerned about security (eg they don't support relocking bootloader, don't support secure boot, don't release patches for months), so they're not really in the same ballpark ALTHOUGH I agree that they still might be better option than stock OS on the device abandoned by the vendor.
- subscribed 1y agoThere's simply no choice with hardware now if someone wants it to meet some secure baseline. No other vendor makes secure android hardware.
- neodymiumphish 1y agoIs your alternative that someone should build a complete from-scratch alternative OS that can still be booted on the same hardware? For the time being, AOSP and Chromium are still open source, so why not piggy-back off of all that labor and development to provide what GrapheneOS users want at minimal cost and effort?
- pjmlp 1y agoIf the goal is to be fully free from backdoors and development being cutted out at any time, yes.
- neodymiumphish 1y agoIf the source is fully open (it is) than detecting and disabling backdoors is completely possible. Not to mention the fact that other OS projects face the same risks. If Google cuts development of AOSP in favor of some closed-source alternative, the GrapheneOS team could simply continue development of AOSP on their own.
- wolvesechoes 1y ago> If the source is fully open (it is) than detecting and disabling backdoors is completely possible There exists a possible world where a group of underpaid FOSS devs forked Chromium and AOSP and effectively developed it further. But it is not our world. > the GrapheneOS team could simply continue development of AOSP on their own. They won't be able to do so.
- neodymiumphish 1y agoWhich makes the idea that a group like them could build their own OS from scratch all the more unattainable... That's the point I'm trying to make. At least if Google ever drops AOSP, it would be when it's still an intact OS available to continue development on. Additionally, I suspect a group like Graphene could get a lot more support developing AOSP's replacement in that instance, considering how many other manufacturers and devices utilize AOSP-derived software.
- phendrenad2 1y agoNah I consider that a fallacy. I'll call it the fallacy of the oranges. Let's say I control all of the orange trees in town. People resell my oranges. I begin using really strong insecticide that resellers try their best to wash off. I keep upping the strength and they keep trying to remove it. At the same time, there is one banana tree in town, and conveniently for my analogy, no pesticides are needed for bananas. As oranges continue to become worse, people will keep eating them, and saying that "there's no way people can switch to bananas. If they could, they would have already. And besides, there's only one tree..." Yes but these things can change. And eventually, people will switch to bananas en masse. People will truck in bananas. And we'll all act like we predicted the great banana switch the whole time. Like MySpace to Facebook, or Digg to Reddit. Or GSuite to Outlook. Or Skype to Zoom.
- hollow-moe 1y agoImo, Graphene wants to be a "Google certified" ROM OEM, they don't make devices but software. A good and secure ROM for sure but they're still begging them for Play Integrity[1] and "sandboxing" GMS isn't fighting Google. [1] https://grapheneos.social/@GrapheneOS/112878070618462132 https://grapheneos.social/@GrapheneOS/112878070618462132
- jasonvorhe 1y ago"Taking legal steps" isn't "begging" though.
- gausswho 1y agoThis is not what they've claimed. Their pursuit of their own hardware phone next year could rattle the phone duopoly. If, and a big if, the intelligence agencies of the world will allow it to be sold.
- jajuuka 1y agoIf Pine64 can't pull it off with millions in funding then I'm not sure how Graphene is going to accomplish that.
- gausswho 1y agoThose operations, much as i respect them, did not reach the attention that GrpaheneOS has. Have they reached a takeoff velocity that more principled players didn't? Wouldn't be the first time we sang that chorus.
- pjmlp 1y agoAs someone seeing this going on since OpenMoko, was at Nokia when Nokia 770 Internet Tablet was shown to employees for feedback before going public, it has always been the same story regarding getting these devices actually flying off the shelves from consumer shops. Some enjoy more attention than others, savy people buying them online, and eventually fade away for the next attempt, while general public continues unaware of their existence.
- playforclaude 1y agoThere is no winning. Get an iPhone, or a dumbphone.
- wkat4242 1y agoAn iPhone is even less open
- playforclaude 1y agoNone of these options are "open". You just have to decide what you really want from a communications device.
- jasonvorhe 1y agoA Pixel with GrapheneOS is pretty much as open as it gets. Any iPhone or Samsung is a downgrade from that.
- playforclaude 1y agoHow do you see that playing out in the medium to long term? Google have made it very clear that they're done with the "open" side to Pixel, and they have comparatively unlimited resource to throw at the issue.
- tiagod 1y agoGrapheneOS team have published that they're working with a smartphone manufacturer that is working on releasing a phone that matches their security requirements.
- wkat4242 1y agoBut even then, Google will keep hampering AOSP efforts too in the long run. They're also introducing a new requirement that sideloaded apps must be validated by them.
- jdboyd 1y agoThe problem with GrapheneOS as a way to protest what Google is doing with Android is that you have to buy a Google Android device to be able to use it. Buying a Google device to be able to protest what Google is doing with their Google devices seems counter productive. I don't know how good /e/OS is, but at least there is a place to get it factory loaded on cell phones and install it on phone brands other than Google. And then there is Lineage OS, which I've had good luck using the extend the life of phones in the past. I haven't tried it since Play Integrity started being such an important feature, but I suppose that just pushes one to be even more open source on their Lineage device. I've been wanting to try Lineage again, but I misplaced the phone I want to try it on.
- ementally 1y agothere's already a comparison mentioned in the article https://eylenburg.github.io/android_comparison.htm https://eylenburg.github.io/android_comparison.htm
- lawn 1y agoGrapheneOS is luckily working with another OEM but that's still 1-2 years away. Buying a phone from Google is hardly ideal, but the effect is limited by the earnings being nothing but a blip in the grand scheme of things. Having an alternative OS is important enough to offset it IMO.
- gitaarik 1y agoYeah this was also my reasoning, that's why I got a second hand OnePlus 9 Pro and installed LineageOS on it. Well actually iodé, which is a privacy oriented fork of LineageOS with MicroG and a firewall installed. It works flawlessly, I'm very satisfied with it.
- jdboyd 1y agoThe OnePlus One was my favorite phone to hold ever, but it was sadly let down in software reliability due to the the melt down in the relationship with Cyanogen.
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- hoppp 1y agoThe more I read about google removing sideloading the more I feel like the internet has become an animal farm from George Orvell, and we are on one side of the fence. Are we on the farm or outside looking in?
- phendrenad2 1y agoThis is going to be like a dam breaking. A small trickle of privacy-conscious developers will put cracks in the wall, and once there's a tiny opening, people who are privacy-conscious-if-convenient will follow through, expanding the hole, and then, the flood of people who want true freedom on their devices (for a multitude of different reasons) will find that hole purely by random and pour through, destroying market share and revolutionizing the mobile market. And little secret sneak peek: Corporations will notice this and align themselves with it, seeking profit. It's going to be glorious. We're already at a point where smartphones have reached hardware stagnation, and white-labeled devices are coming. There will be no 6G. Smartphones and laptops are converging. The idea that a computer that happens to be smaller than most gives a random company the right or ability to build a wall around it and collect a tax is going to look, in retrospect, really silly.
- mercenario 1y agoI think a better idea would be to bet in running/adapting linux on smartphones. I have actually looked into this in the past. It could be very awkward in the beginning with most of the things hard to use because they were made for desktops but as popularity rises every linux app would move more and more towards being easier to use on both desktop and smartphones.
- mkidd 1y agoI looked at several alternatives before settling on GrapheneOS. Many made claims that sounded good but only GrapheneOS had deep technical documentation. I'm not an Android developer so some of it goes over my head but I've written detailed software documentation. I know you don't write what is in their FAQ or revision history if you don't know what you are doing. I've been using GrapheneOS for about a year and it has worked well. Only have two minor issues: 1) I'd like the ability to have timestamp data added to the EXIF image info. There is an option to have the GPS data added, so timestamp really ought to be an option too, though I certainly understand why some users would choose neither. I'll probably end up writing a Perl driver for exiftool to add the timestamp based on the image filename which is YYYYMMDD_HH_MMSS_MSEC. 2) There aren't many fonts and Roboto supplies 1037 glyphs. The card suit symbols are missing which matters to a bridge player. E-books that display correctly almost everywhere don't on GrapheneOS unless the e-book explicitly includes a font with glyphs for the suits.