• 0 Posts
  • 6 Comments
Joined 2 months ago
Cake day: August 18th, 2025
  • CerebralHawks@lemmy.dbzer0.comtoOpen Source@lemmy.ml•What will you do after Android starts restricting FOSS apps?English
    113·
    4 hours ago

    Nothing.

    My daily driver is an iPhone. We’ve always had the problem of limiting sideloading (to be nonexistent for most people) and it’s never been a problem for me.

    I also have a Galaxy S10, but all my apps on that come from the Play Store.

    This won’t affect 99% of users, just like it doesn’t on iPhone.

    I just hope now that they’re taking sideloading, and they’ve already taken memory card slots, headphone jacks… and they’re still taking a cut off the back end by selling your personal information… maybe the cost will come down. But I doubt it. Android makes sense when it’s cheaper than iPhone. I mean, iPhone makes sense to be expensive. It’s a pocket Mac, it’s made by a computer company. Sure, they have telemetry but it’s not an ad company like Google. So for a phone that’s less powerful and still has the same restrictions, and I’m paying with my personal data? I expect the phones to be cheaper. They really should be cheaper.

    But I’m gonna let you in on a secret. Smartphone performance plateaued a long time ago. All these new phones are kind of a scam. Okay, so the Pixel 10 has the benchmark performance of an iPhone 11. The Galaxy S25 is like 40% faster than the iPhone 16 Pro until it hits load (like the top 1% of games, maybe) then the iPhone is like 10% faster… Who Cares? My 2019 Galaxy S10 is still a viable daily driver in 2025. So, I think I’m done chasing the latest model for a while. If Apple Health comes to iPad (I’m not sure if it’s there or not), I’d even consider replacing my Android phone with a newer phone next, like a gently used Galaxy S24 or S25 (I mean in a few years). These new phones talk about performance numbers, but for most people, they don’t really mean shit. Phones don’t slow down like they used to. They got a lot better and it wasn’t even that recently.

  • CerebralHawks@lemmy.dbzer0.comtoPrivacy@lemmy.ml•Why Signal over Jabber/XMPP?English
    51·
    1 day ago

    I use Telegram. Eek? It’s just my wife and I though. All these things I’ve heard about Telegram? Never actually seen them in mine. I have looked at groups, but I’ve only seen memes, crypto crap, and what look like scams (“post this in 5 Reddit threads to get invited to the actual group”). There’s nothing of value out there that I’ve seen. So I just use it to message my wife, because texting wasn’t good enough when we started using it (both our phones have RCS now) and I don’t use Facebook, and she doesn’t have an iPhone (so, no iMessage).

    I completely reject this notion that you have to pick one and stay with it. My messaging apps include iMessage, Session, Signal, and Telegram. I also have a fork of Telegram that lets me use it from my watch (as in, it has a watch companion; official Telegram does not). I also have Discord (need it for a couple things).

  • CerebralHawks@lemmy.dbzer0.comtoPrivacy@programming.dev•Vandals deface ads for AI necklaces that listen to all your conversationsEnglish
    8·
    5 days ago

    At no point does the article even try to explain what the Friend device (that’s its name) does. A bit of a sharp oversight for a site like Ars.

    Nobody calls them out in the comments, maybe because nobody cares? As a self described technologist (that they claim to serve), I’m curious. So it listens to everything said around you, obviously it’s a microphone, a chip, and some storage. I’m guessing it pairs to a phone which does the heavy lifting, since the device will retail for only $129, it doesn’t seem it would have a very powerful chip. So I’m assuming it’s a dumb recorder that pairs with an app over Bluetooth?

    What’s funny, though, is the CEO of the tech company says defacing the ads was the point and he wants people talking about his product. I don’t mind talking about it in spite of that; I’m outside the target age range anyway. This is not a product I would consider buying.

    There is one comment that stands out in the article’s comments. They’re clearly trying to get Meta or Google to buy it. I don’t know why Google would, though — they already have Android. And Facebook already listens to what you say on phones on both platforms. This sounds like more of an explicit opt-in from users, but neither of those companies cares what you want with regards to privacy. And yet the masses still flock to them.