I’ve been using Android for quite a while. Over a decade, in fact; my first Android device was a Chinese-made 7in Android tablet “aPad” running v1.6. Now, however, I’m essentially done with smartphones (whether iOS, Android, AOSP, or some flavor of GNU/Linux). Instead, I’m moving to a “dumbphone”, a flip-phone running Kai OS, and below is my journey and my reasons why.
Android gave freedom
To give some background, I’ve always preferred Android over iOS. One reason for my preference is the fine-grained level of control the user has over the basic system software. You can change nearly everything about how the device looks and feels. Want a different color for the menus and keyboard? Done. Want big icons? No problem.
You also aren’t locked in to a specific manufacturer or OS developer (Apple/Google) supplied software for any particular task. If you want to use a different browser, file browser (yes, an actual folder system the user can access unlike iOS), wallet app, all of these can be changed. My Samsung phone can run both Google Wallet (formerly Pay) and Samsung Wallet (sometimes also Samsung Pay) at the same time. iPhone you are locked to Apple’s Safari browser and Apple Pay.
Another important part of the freedom I loved about Android was the low-level choice of software. All the above changes can be made with little technical skill or effort. They are available right from the inbuilt Play Store (or the Samsung store; Samsungs come with both). But an even deeper level of freedom is the ability to install any compatible app, whether from the inbuilt repository “store” (Play/Samsung stores, etc.) or not. You could also add additional repositories, like the excellent Free (libre) Software repository F-Droid.
Moreover, you could trivially unlock the bootloader and run a version of Android that comes without any Google services if you don’t want to be involved with them at all. Indeed, several smaller manufacturers offer models that come without Google services as a selling point. Moreover, after the US sanctioned Chinese tech manufacturer Huawei, for a couple of years they had their own version of Android that has no Google software due to sanctions.
One phone I owned had CyanogenMod installed, which added advanced features and controls not available in the standard Android. Try that on an iPhone! Oh, wait, you basically can’t. Apple controls tightly both the software and the hardware. They are also rather slow to integrate new features. Apple only recently got an official calculator on the iPad, and time-delayed (scheduled) texting is also a relatively new feature on iOS, while it’s been around for years on Android.
I know some of these points are highly technical and the average user is unlikely to make use of either an alternative “app store” or a different Android version. But they are important to technical users and for the future of the system, because technical users and hobbyists have made Android the success that it is. And these people generally seem to feel Android and hardware manufacturers including Samsung are heading in the wrong direction with their recent decisions, which I will now elaborate.
ADV implementation will destroy user and developer freedom
I’ll start by examining Google’s proposal, which they already initiated. They refer to it as “Android Developer Verification” (ADV), and it’s a technically-enforced measure to require Android developers, regardless of where they distribute their Android apps (such as the Play store or another “store” like F-Droid), or even if they do so, to submit real personally identifiable information to Google, as well as payment of a fee to Google. All this is allegedly to improve security. Yet Google has a track record of allowing malicious apps to be widely distributed through the Play Store which they control directly.
As a result of this change, Google will have full control over developers’ ability to create Android apps. Unlike existing software which requires some effort to install “unapproved” (non-Play Store) apps on Android, a process referred to as “sideloading”, the ADV will absolutely block users from installing apps from “unverified” developers. It may even cause already-installed apps to stop functioning, depending on how exactly it is finally implemented. The code to implement ADV has already been inserted into AOSP, the open-source version of Android on which every mainstream smartphone you can buy is based. It is no longer a setting that can be disabled by a savvy user, who would probably know better than to install malware on their phone, and who probably make up the majority of so-called “sideloaders”.
Samsung, too, working to destroy user freedom w/One UI bootloader lock
Next we have Samsung, probably the largest Android manufacturer, who has configured their latest Android build, One UI, to no longer allow the phone owner to install any other OS (“ROM”) by unlocking the bootloader. In fact, they have completely removed the option to unlock the bootloader. This change applies across all models, as they all use One UI. As an example of how this could affect you, if you own a Samsung and you want to install a de-Googled (Google Mobile Services/Google Apps ie Maps, etc.) Android version, you will be completely unable to.
Apple-ization, duopoly, centralization, corporatism, all against freedom
Both ADV and One UI bootloader locking shift Android from an operating system that at least respects some user freedoms to an environment that is completely hostile to freedom. Seeing as Android and Apple are effectively a duopoly for smartphones, which are increasingly required to participate at a basic level in society (especially, though not only, in the EU), this is a serious blow to digital rights. They are also both American companies, and both are rather close with the US federal government.
Google and Samsung are thus working to move the smartphone experience in a direction where user control is diminished, and centralized, corporate control expands. They are becoming like Apple in this regard. In fact, computing in general has been shifting this way for several years, with the move to cloud (Internet) based services for nearly everything, where the home computer is merely a low-capability “thin client” and all your files are stored on someone else’s computer, who either data mines it to train AI, charges you for storage, or both. And who can cancel your account and delete your data at any time.
But the above-described proposed and implemented changes are not the only reasons I’m leaving Android after more than a decade of use. In fact, my dissatisfaction goes deeper than that and reaches to complex philosophical and social questions that are profoundly impacting our world.
Tyranny of duopoly: smartphones increasingly needed for daily life
As I noted, smartphones are increasingly becoming, not optional, but required to complete basic tasks in society. While they aren’t required yet here in the US, trends are heading in that direction. More than half of states offer a digital version of their state ID card or driver license (which, in a country with infrastructure largely designed around private auto ownership, is something nearly everyone has) that can be used in at least some official capacity. One bank I use is only accessible through the app; their website only serves to prompt you to download and install the app. And an investment firm I use requires you to have a smartphone in order to run TOTP app-driven 2-factor authentication, which must be enabled in order to move funds at all. Smart speakers and smart devices increasingly require the use of apps for all functionality. As an example, Alexa/echo smart speakers originally had a web interface one could use to interact with and change settings, but now must only be managed via the app. Multiple internet providers and router providers I have used in the past and the one I’m currently with, required use of an app to set up service or to change settings. I think one of the ISPs would have been able to set up service without use of an app, but I’m not sure – I wasn’t on my anti-smartphone kick at the time. Even if you want to accomplish tasks in real life, such as attending an event, ordering food at a restaurant (especially if you want to take advantage of any coupons or discounts), you increasingly need a smartphone.
I reject the need to do so, and anyone that demands I use a smartphone in order to deal with them in some regard, especially regularly, will find that I will do business elsewhere. (It is now, therefore, time for me to move banks).
Engineered to be limitless distraction
On a social level, smartphones are what I term a “distraction engine”. They serve as a pacifier to prevent us from experiencing the discomfort associated with boredom. Smartphones, unlike the real world, provide endless entertainment, and everything about them is unlimited. In contrast, humans are not well-adapted to an unlimited environment. Not by choice (I recall as a young child wanting to live forever), but we have lived limited lives since time immemorial, and, crucially, we will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. In the past, life was always naturally curated by factors outside our control, and we really had no idea of another way of being. While this was not always good, it was not always bad either.
FOMO, mass and social medias
Telecommunications, and the Internet in particular, especially social media, has given us a great fear of missing out. Unlike any other time in history, we can see far off places and far off people. Obviously, this can be beneficial, bringing us closer together and finding our shared humanity. But it also encourages us to compare. And the comparison doesn’t always or even usually work in our favor. Thanks to the Internet, we can compare every minute detail of our lives to people who are richer, more beautiful, more capable, more impressive, more anything than us, and see ourselves as falling short of that. (And we wouldn’t be wrong in such analysis.) We no longer look at our lives in comparison to the few people we actually interact with, which would be natural. We compare ourselves to extreme examples of everything, and the opaque algorithms behind it all make sure to highlight such examples because that drives engagement, which results in ad views, and thus makes them money. We live in a world where everything is in hyper drive, and we need to slow down for our mental health.
Much ado about.. everything?
Instant communication about everything, everywhere, also leads us to spend our time worrying. Global interconnectedness causes us to worry about things we can’t really change and which don’t affect us nearly as much as we think they do. While caring about things in the world is a noble cause, we tend to worry about such things over what really does directly affect us. We have information overload, and we need to curate. Curation is the one thing that is anathema to the Internet, and the smartphone brings the uncurated Internet everywhere you go. This has been an unmitigated disaster for mental health, as mobile Internet can also largely be a sewer pipe dumping waste products on you wherever you might go. A recent study found substantial mental health improvement by cutting off mobile internet access alone (not even getting rid of the smartphone itself or being totally offline).
Disconnect from the larger system, decentralize and reconnect IRL
The people around you, who you interact with, affect your life much more than anyone far away (like the politicians in DC), and it is the people around you who the smartphone is most efficient at separating you from. Your children, your coworkers, your neighbors. If you have a close connection with people around you, including those tasked with implementing the diktats from headquarters, the corruption at the top (which is definitely there) might not be as effective at ruining your life. This is why we have jury duty, for example, that one’s peers should judge both the facts and the law as applied in their own community. Reject the urge to have a parasocial relationship with people who neither know nor care about you. Life is more than the public sphere.
While I like to think I use my smartphone “productively”, reading when I have downtime, I now realize it causes me to be more disconnected from people around me. And that is something I wish to change. The “dumbphone”, a KaiOS flip phone, should make this process of reconfiguration easier, as it is designed to primarily perform a productive function, making voice calls and sending brief texts. While not fully open source, and indeed more limited in its capability and user freedom than Android, KaiOS and the limited-capability hardware it runs on makes using the phone as a pacifier and distraction engine much less appealing.
iPrisoners, a digital prison being constructed through smartphones
The smartphone further serves as an ankle monitor in a digital prison being constructed all around us. If you told people 20 years ago that the vast majority of the population would carry around, everywhere they went, a device with several HD cameras, microphones with noise canceling and beamforming, developed and sold by companies that are totally in bed with the government, they would consider you insane. Yet that is how the vast majority of us live. Even in our most intimate private moments, our smartphones are rarely more than a few feet away. A variety of companies use them to track our every movement, and with the advent of smartwatches, our every step and heartbeat. In contrast, the most meaningful parts of life leave behind no paper trail.
Expansive, absorptive, invasive
The smartphone is also an expansive device. It encourages us to use it for everything. Need directions? Smartphone. Need a calculator? Smartphone. Need a camera? Increasingly, also smartphone. It serves the function of many discrete devices, some of which are becoming harder to find. As an example, iPods and Zune music players are no longer manufactured. While it obtains more and more access to every detail of your life, the smartphone becomes more attuned to you. And its access to your life occurs even without AI reading your emails to add appointments to your calendar (and probably show you ads). It is an expert profiler, and that is because giving it this access feels natural; it is in many ways an extension of the self. I don’t want my whole life stored in the surveillance and control environment that the modern smartphone has become. I don’t want to depend on it as an extension of my brain, literally becoming lost without it.
Challenges resulting from rejecting the smartphone
As I reject the smartphone, I have had to make some effort to find replacements for its functions. When I got rid of my smartwatch, I needed to find a watch that would hold up to the abuse it would likely receive at work (sorry, no mechanical watch here!) so I got a G-Shock. I already had a digital camera, but I need a music player, which I have to order when I have the funds. All these will be less convenient to use and carry around. But they will also be less profiled and tracked. The camera company does not know what I took photos of or that I also listen to music or wear a watch, and ditto for the others. The receive-only antennas on an FM radio, or the offline functionality of an MP3 player limit how many data points others are able to obtain about me, if any. And that is how it should be. We should only be sharing with people what we want to share, and the smartphone and Internet ecosystems require us to share more than we would like, and when we don’t really care to. They also produce a permanent record, because our data is valuable, whether to the government (which will probably use all that data they’ve hoovered up in Utah to train Palantir’s AI) or to companies who want to sell us more stuff we don’t need.
Still need a smartphone for a minute, at least
My new dumbphone just arrived, so I will be setting it up sometime this week. I plan to migrate off the smartphone for daily use as soon as it is set up, using the smartphone for a little longer infrequently for the services that require apps until I move off of them completely but otherwise keeping it powered off.