FSF Issues Their Rebuttal To Apple's New iPhone, Watch & Apple Pay

[droidhacker]

All I can say is Android can blow me

Android can actually be programmed to do that....

and I hope that Ubuntu, Tizen and Jolla all make proper inroads sooner rather than later so we have choice and competition.

None of those will succeed. At least not more than marginally. They'll catch a few die hards like you, but that's about it.

It's none of Google business what I am listening to when and where I am going in what car, and how fast. I dont like their ad driven privacy raping methodology.

I'm really not sure what this has to do with any of the above....?
Google drives Android, but Android is NOT GOOGLE.
Android is an open source operating system. Whether it is loaded with Google or not is dependent on who is actually responsible for the system image that you happen to be using.

If you pull the Android GIT and generate a build for one of the Nexus devices that it directly supports, that build will be fully FREE of Google. The only binary parts that it will need outside of the entirely open source AOSP tree are a few *hardware* drivers from Broadcom, LG, and Qualcomm: https://developers.google.com/androi.../blobs-preview

Now if you happened to have hardware for which all of the hardware WAS supported by open source drivers (or at least all of the hardware you're interested in using...), then you'd be able to build a *FULLY* open source AOSP... but there is none. At least not phone hardware. And until there actually is, then it doesn't matter at all if you are building Android, Tizen, or Ubuntu... they all still need some binary hardware drivers to function. I don't know too much about Tizen, but I do know that Ubuntu's approach is to actually use the binary drivers for Android, so you wouldn't even be switching binaries.

*ANYBODY* can build a google-free Android build for a Nexus, just follow the instructions:

https://source.android.com/source/building-devices.html

And it will work. WONDERFULLY. You can make and receive phone calls, SMS, picture messages, browse the interwebz, take pictures and view them in the gallery, get woken up by the alarm clock, track your appointments on the calendar, send and receive email... its pretty well equipped. The main things that you will find missing from it are the play store (apk files can be loaded *directly*, no need for any store... or there are plenty of free stores you can pick, like Amazon), and any/all synchronization with google services.

So please do explain why you find it necessary to complain about how Android is so... closed... when it is actually entirely open.

Oh yeah, almost forgot.... AOSP accepts patches from *ANYBODY*, as long as the patch makes sense. Just learn how to use Gerrit.

https://android-review.googlesource.com/#/q/status:open

[user82]

Tell that to the KNOX bootloader on my S4 which prevents not only flashing custom ROMs, but downgrading to legitimate official past version ROMs.

Exactly. If you want to modify stuff get a Nexus or at least Sony. Both work fine with a standard "fastboot oem unlock".
Samsung is the Apple of the Android world.

[droidhacker]

Samsung though does an excellent job in allowing customers to do what they want with their phones and tablets.

You on drugs?
You really should try to read the source code that samsuck releases. Its nightmarishly bad quality and wouldn't even compile if they didn't hack the kernel build scripts to be lenient on things like mismatched types.

And that, of course, only helps if you can figure out HOW to load your code onto the device. Everything after S3 has been pretty solidly locked down.

I speak AS both an owner of a Samsuck device who uses that device all the time (Galaxy SR -- basically an S3 with a keyboard), and a software developer who is pretty much at the core of SR and S3 development and maintenance for OSS Android.

[stiiixy]

Android can actually be programmed to do that....


None of those will succeed. At least not more than marginally. They'll catch a few die hards like you, but that's about it.


I'm really not sure what this has to do with any of the above....?
Google drives Android, but Android is NOT GOOGLE.
Android is an open source operating system. Whether it is loaded with Google or not is dependent on who is actually responsible for the system image that you happen to be using.

If you pull the Android GIT and generate a build for one of the Nexus devices that it directly supports, that build will be fully FREE of Google. The only binary parts that it will need outside of the entirely open source AOSP tree are a few *hardware* drivers from Broadcom, LG, and Qualcomm: https://developers.google.com/androi.../blobs-preview

Now if you happened to have hardware for which all of the hardware WAS supported by open source drivers (or at least all of the hardware you're interested in using...), then you'd be able to build a *FULLY* open source AOSP... but there is none. At least not phone hardware. And until there actually is, then it doesn't matter at all if you are building Android, Tizen, or Ubuntu... they all still need some binary hardware drivers to function. I don't know too much about Tizen, but I do know that Ubuntu's approach is to actually use the binary drivers for Android, so you wouldn't even be switching binaries.

*ANYBODY* can build a google-free Android build for a Nexus, just follow the instructions:

https://source.android.com/source/building-devices.html

And it will work. WONDERFULLY. You can make and receive phone calls, SMS, picture messages, browse the interwebz, take pictures and view them in the gallery, get woken up by the alarm clock, track your appointments on the calendar, send and receive email... its pretty well equipped. The main things that you will find missing from it are the play store (apk files can be loaded *directly*, no need for any store... or there are plenty of free stores you can pick, like Amazon), and any/all synchronization with google services.

So please do explain why you find it necessary to complain about how Android is so... closed... when it is actually entirely open.

Oh yeah, almost forgot.... AOSP accepts patches from *ANYBODY*, as long as the patch makes sense. Just learn how to use Gerrit.
https://android-review.googlesource.com/#/q/statuspen

It's called choice. I'm hardly a 'die-hard' for wanting it. Besides, Google have the contracts wiht big auto-companies to create smart cars. It's gonna open a whole new can of wriggly privacy worms and vendor lock-in if we dont get in soon to keep our shit open, we'll soon be inundated with free oral sex apps sucking away constantly while we are driven to work only to ask for more Zinga coins at 'peak' times.

[Dukenukemx]

Not dissimilar to the old days of PCs, really. Apple remained somewhat exclusive, combining hardware and software, and keeping both under their control. Whereas Microsoft, sticking to a software focus, had every incentive to see *everyone* using their software, regardless of whether they bought hardware from IBM, Compaq, or any of the myriad companies who started building compatible machines. One of these companies ended up ruling the desktop software for decades, and well... it wasn't Apple.

Apple nearly went out of business back in the early 90's until they made the iPod. That iPod is the reason Apple not only survived but grew exponentially. The iPod evolved into the iPhone and the iPad. At thise point the luster of Appleness has worn off and their walled garden is starting to bite them in the rear.

Unfortunately, there are far too many of them! Unfortunately

These kind of businesses rely heavily on those kind of customers. Blizzard is another company that survives off fanboyism. They will consume them for what they're worth and then get bought up by another company for their name. Just my prediction.

All I can say is Android can blow me, and I hope that Ubuntu, Tizen and Jolla all make proper inroads sooner rather than later so we have choice and competition.

It's none of Google business what I am listening to when and where I am going in what car, and how fast. I dont like their ad driven privacy raping methodology.

Trust me I wish I could use Ubuntu or whatever instead of Android. I have a Raspberry Pi that I was thinking of turning into a carputer but the software just isn't there. Though the good thing about Android is that it's open source and you don't have to use Google services. The bad thing is that many devices sold with Android are usually locked down, making open source almost pointless.

You on drugs?
You really should try to read the source code that samsuck releases. Its nightmarishly bad quality and wouldn't even compile if they didn't hack the kernel build scripts to be lenient on things like mismatched types.

And that, of course, only helps if you can figure out HOW to load your code onto the device. Everything after S3 has been pretty solidly locked down.

I speak AS both an owner of a Samsuck device who uses that device all the time (Galaxy SR -- basically an S3 with a keyboard), and a software developer who is pretty much at the core of SR and S3 development and maintenance for OSS Android.

Honestly the last Samsung I have is a S3. I enjoyed it over my HTC devices which are a big pain in the ass. The MyTouch4G Slide I have for example requires me to ground out the device with a wire just to S-OFF it. That's honestly absurd.

I will always gravitate to devices that allow me to easily root and install custom roms. I have no interest in jumping on one foot while patting my head and rubbing my belly to be able to do what I want to do with it.

[drspinderwalf]

Honestly the last Samsung I have is a S3. I enjoyed it over my HTC devices which are a big pain in the ass. The MyTouch4G Slide I have for example requires me to ground out the device with a wire just to S-OFF it. That's honestly absurd.

I will always gravitate to devices that allow me to easily root and install custom roms. I have no interest in jumping on one foot while patting my head and rubbing my belly to be able to do what I want to do with it.

A fellow wire-trick HTC owner. Yep, my old Sensation took an awful lot of pain to get fully unlocked. Before that, my Hero pained me for quite some time before getting unlocked. In contrast, my wife had her Galaxy S4 taken care of within an hour.

The whole smartphone situation is absurd in the end. AOSP+FDroid is quite enjoyable for me to use, but I really feel that AOSP-based ROMs are just kinda floundering until Google gets the next part done. I'd be happier with Tizen/Ubuntu/Debian, particularly because I don't have a clue how updates work in the Android world... am I supposed to assume that I'm safe just because I'm running 4.4.4? I don't feel particularly safe when updates have months of silence. Perhaps it's my ignorance but it doesn't smell right to me.

And then we have the issues with proprietary radio firmware...

[Spittie]

[...]

I swear, I don't even like iOS and the iPhone, but you people just have to write the dumbest things and make me defend Apple.

Just watch the MASS of apple advertising, and realize that it only gets them <15% of the market. Meanwhile, Android is just laying back with 80%. This isn't a war, its comic releif.

That's because Android cover the whole market, while iPhones only cover the top-end. It's a marketing choice, Apple just decided that pursuing the low-end low-revenue market is not in their interests.

They have a new NAME for the same CPU, with a slightly boosted (but still low) clock speed. It may be 64bit, but its a weak 64bit, and only 2-core.

What? That's just not true. First, they don't have a new name, the A8 is called Cyclone just like the A7.
Second, the clock speed alone doesn't mean a thing. The A8 destroy everything ARM at IPC. Its single-core performance is much, much better, even with a low clock speed. Which is a good thing, since it reduces power usage.
Third, "weak 64bit"? wtf? Apple implements AARCH64, which is the architecture from ARM. Which is implemented in every 64bit core, like the Cortex A7.
Fourth, 2 big, powerful cores > 4/8 small cores. Apple so far is the only one that gets it, but there is hope with Nvidia's Denver. More cores is just a gimmick for the Asian market. Most phone applications need great single-threaded performance, just like most desktop applications. This isn't likely to change soon, and when it will Apple will add more cores.

You can start here: http://www.anandtech.com/show/7910/a...cture-detailed and http://www.anandtech.com/show/7335/t...ne-5s-review/3 and http://www.anandtech.com/show/7335/t...ne-5s-review/4 and http://anandtech.com/show/8514/analy...oc-gx6650-more

Also, note that the A8 is the first cpu shipping at 20nm, beating even Intel to it (ok, not 100% fair as 14nm Broadwell should come out in the following months, but still.)

They are crippled by a weak-ass powervr GPU that can't even drive a modern QHD display.

"weak-ass". Sure, the iPhone GPU can't compete with an Adreno 410 (Snapdragon 805), but with the ~50% boost in the iPhone 6 can easily compete with the Adreno 330 (Snapdragon 800/801), which is the one included in most current flagships.

The displays they picked are 1-2 year old. The smaller one isn't even FULL HD -- more like the TWO YEARS AGO Nexus 4. The bigger one has finally made it up to LAST YEARS Nexus 5. Wait a couple of weeks and see the updated 2014 Nexus 5 packing a QHD on an Adreno 420.

Apple is, again, the only one getting it so far. The race to "moar dpi" is stupid. The screen quality is much more important than the dpi (once you have enough of them), and Apple is king in it.
Also, the "low-res screen" allow them to have better performance and better battery life with no impact on the end user. You might see the difference between ~300dpi and ~500dpi when you have the two screen side by side, but ~300dpi is more than enough for daily usage. You won't see the pixels, trust me, and it's still pretty fucking sharp.

What they are selling as the "6" is already at least a YEAR out of date, and is NO legit improvement over the last iteration. It will be funny IF people start to realize this.

It's an incremental update, as always. Bigger screen (might be an improvement or not, depending on your preferences), better cpu, better gpu, better battery life, better camera, thinner.

You know, it's the standard in the Android world. For example, what did the HTC One M8 bring over the M7? The stuff I've just written up there.

Yes, some/many of there things are catching up to Android. Is that a bad thing? I can see it as a "finally, fucking welcome to 2014", not as a "it's shit since they've added this feature X years later".

And in all that comment, you still managed to miss the only real complain about the 6, which is the rumored no upgrade to ram. Congrats.

[droidhacker]

It's called choice. I'm hardly a 'die-hard' for wanting it. Besides, Google have the contracts wiht big auto-companies to create smart cars. It's gonna open a whole new can of wriggly privacy worms and vendor lock-in if we dont get in soon to keep our shit open, we'll soon be inundated with free oral sex apps sucking away constantly while we are driven to work only to ask for more Zinga coins at 'peak' times.

CHOICE is about being able to rewrite the code to do what you want.
And do please learn a bit about what you are complaining about or you just look foolish. The so-called "android-auto" amounts to the equivalent of VNC. No google apps on your phone? Then also no google apps on your car screen.

[droidhacker]

Honestly the last Samsung I have is a S3. I enjoyed it over my HTC devices which are a big pain in the ass. The MyTouch4G Slide I have for example requires me to ground out the device with a wire just to S-OFF it. That's honestly absurd.

Hmm?
s-off doesn't actually get you anything appreciable compared to what the htc website gets you in their unlock.
But yeah, doubleshot sure was a mess. Not really sure why HTC went super-lock on things. I dealt with one of those for my wife for a while, then decided it wasn't worth messing with and ditched it for a hammerhead. My personal last HTC was the first one they tried to superlock, and therefore the only one that got super-unlocked -- Vision.

The hammerhead is a dream. Yeah, it comes all googly, but plenty open enough to reign in the googmonster with ease.

[droidhacker]

I swear, I don't even like iOS and the iPhone, but you people just have to write the dumbest things and make me defend Apple.



That's because Android cover the whole market, while iPhones only cover the top-end.

Actually, they cater explicitely to the LOW end. It is not a power-user's device and would not satisfy someone genuinely needing a high end device. They're about FASHION, not about anything useful.

It's a marketing choice, Apple just decided that pursuing the low-end low-revenue market is not in their interests.

Which is actually a massive marketing BLUNDER on their part, since you can make more money on volume than on a few over priced sucker items.
What do you think makes more money? Toyota or Ferrari?

What? That's just not true. First, they don't have a new name, the A8 is called Cyclone just like the A7.

Old name: A7.
New name: A8.

Second, the clock speed alone doesn't mean a thing. The A8 destroy everything ARM at IPC. Its single-core performance is much, much better, even with a low clock speed. Which is a good thing, since it reduces power usage.
Third, "weak 64bit"? wtf? Apple implements AARCH64, which is the architecture from ARM. Which is implemented in every 64bit core, like the Cortex A7.
Fourth, 2 big, powerful cores > 4/8 small cores. Apple so far is the only one that gets it, but there is hope with Nvidia's Denver. More cores is just a gimmick for the Asian market. Most phone applications need great single-threaded performance, just like most desktop applications. This isn't likely to change soon, and when it will Apple will add more cores.

You're dreaming.

"weak-ass". Sure, the iPhone GPU can't compete with an Adreno 410 (Snapdragon 805), but with the ~50% boost in the iPhone 6 can easily compete with the Adreno 330 (Snapdragon 800/801), which is the one included in most current flagships.

Correction... most of LAST YEAR's high end.

Apple is, again, the only one getting it so far. The race to "moar dpi" is stupid. The screen quality is much more important than the dpi (once you have enough of them), and Apple is king in it.
Also, the "low-res screen" allow them to have better performance and better battery life with no impact on the end user. You might see the difference between ~300dpi and ~500dpi when you have the two screen side by side, but ~300dpi is more than enough for daily usage. You won't see the pixels, trust me, and it's still pretty fucking sharp.

You're missing the point. The fact that a modern GPU can drive a QHD means that it can absolutely SCREAM with a 1080p.
And actually, APPLE was the one to INITIATE the whole race to high resolution. What they did wrong is that they started something they couldn't finish.

As far as their screen QUALITY goes... its no different than any other LCD. The big quality difference you are talking about actually comes from things like AMOLED (samsuck), which is absolutely HORRIBLE quality, since it pretty much LIES about its resolution, but takes as much GPU to support as a genuine high resolution display would. It comes down to PenTile RGBG, which gives full resolution in the GREEN color ONLY, leaving the red and blue at HALF the resolution they advertise. Not only that, but AMOLED is just plain BAD at accurately reproducing colors. They look washed out and flat.

It's an incremental update, as always. Bigger screen (might be an improvement or not, depending on your preferences), better cpu, better gpu, better battery life, better camera, thinner.

Except that its NOT an increment. Screen size, like you mention, can actually be worse. CPU is the same, GPU is the same (crap), battery life on an apple? Same camera... thinner? By HALF OF ONE MILLIMETER! You need a fucking micrometer to measure the difference.

You know, it's the standard in the Android world. For example, what did the HTC One M8 bring over the M7? The stuff I've just written up there.

Um, lets see... M8 has snapdragon 800 vs 600 in M7. That is a genuine actual MASSIVE difference, both in performance and in power consumption.

Yes, some/many of there things are catching up to Android. Is that a bad thing? I can see it as a "finally, fucking welcome to 2014", not as a "it's shit since they've added this feature X years later".

More like "welcome to 2012, we're going to sell you the same thing that we already sold you last year, which was already outdated then."

And in all that comment, you still managed to miss the only real complain about the 6, which is the rumored no upgrade to ram. Congrats.

So you want me to keep listing all the things that haven't changed? Has to end somewhere. But sure, if you really want to mention it, iJunk6 has very little RAM.
But frankly, who cares? It'll do what they tell you to do, which is about as much as you can expect from a fashion accessory.