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Well I strongly disagree with all of that. You're talking about "uninformed choices of Americans" that are "unequipped to understand," but I was there in 2007 when the iPhone was introduced, and there's a reason that EVERY phone is essentially an iPhone and not a Blackberry. This did not "disenfranchise" anyone, it radically empowered us all (in the same way that google.com did).

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I don't think you're using "disenfranchise" in the same way the parent is. You're being denied the ability to truly own your hardware and run whatever you want on it. You're being hurt in ways you don't even know because by definition you can't, as you don't know what you're missing.

You're ok with this now, and may never change your opinion on that, but you are being harmed by this in the long run, as is the entire market for these sorts of devices. An entire generation is being brought up on devices that they're not allowed to tinker with -- and don't know that anything different is even possible -- and that will have negative long-term ramifications, though we may not be sure exactly what those are yet.

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