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I'm calling BS on this. There is no way you can get years of extra support out of Qualcomm for $1m.

As for e-waste, well unlike other major manufacturers every Google phone can be unlocked and you can install any OS you want. So there is no need to discard the hardware after support ends. You just have to bear the support costs yourself. Too expensive? Well, you're the one saying it's not too expensive, so why not start a company to provide extended support for devices like this? Charge $1 per device, that's a healthy profit over the $0.10 you claim it costs.

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> You just have to bear the support costs yourself. Too expensive?

I ported Android 12 on thousands of Android devices. I'm already bearing the support cost myself.

Small proof, Android 12 on 17 of devices I bought with my money to support that cost, 7 days after Android 12 is released https://twitter.com/phhusson/status/1447824974396497924

That's really great! I'm glad that you can do that.

But (and I'm sure this will be an unpopular sentiment) you realize that it doesn't fully address the article's concerns about security. Nor does it provide the experience people expect from tested manufacturer updates (which are far from perfect, but still). This is not the same thing as manufacturer support. You could provide that level of support even as a third party, but it would be a lot more work and it would require the cooperation of Qualcomm and other vendors. You'd need to start a company and charge for your work to make it feasible.

Well, I'd say the existence of phh's ability to do this despite being in an environment that's unsupportive (or even hostile) is proof the model works. It would flourish with a regulatory bump keeping the manufacturers in check and unable to continue this poor support lifecycle.

This is about their profits. It's not about security, environmental responsibility, or the users. Regulatory authority exists to promote the interests of the people when the interests of the corporation's profits conflict with them.

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