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Comment by giancarlostoro | Hacker News Reader

> Android shouldn't be considered Open Source anymore

That idea died for me long ago, I had used Android since 2009 till 2020. I gave up on the dream of a Linux phone. Ubuntu had a nice sleek Phone UI they were working on. The issue is if nobody builds the phones and no carrier cares, nobody will pick it up. You need to push yourself into the market.

Microsoft could fill this weird gap if they wanted to the key things would be they would have to truly open source the OS. I could see Amazon trying again, but they'd need to invest a lot as well. It's an uphill battle needing a serious flagship phone. Your other problem is most apps need to be migrated.

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Amazon was hopeless even with the apps, because they had their hooks into things even worse than google. They are shameless. Most other tech companies large enough to even try would be as bad or worse.

All that type of money went to llms, who is going to spend that on a phone os now? Not who should, but who actually would? They gave up on browsers, they gave up on mobile oses. There is a real risk that the next step is the US gov takes X% of google instead of enforcing antitrust in a year or two.

Linux phones will never take off because banking and media/drm apps, and by extension social media apps, will just boycott them and kill it off. The tone has been set, this comment applies to any major player trying to break into the mobile market moving forward.

This is honestly very bleak news.

Yeah, I'm disappointed in their efforts. I do like the Kindle tablet for my preschooler because its cheap and gets the job done, though we limit her screen time.

I'm just name dropping from the perspective of a big org that could fund such a thing correctly, but they would need to start over IMHO.

I'm not sure of another big player who could invest billions into such an endeavour.

I don’t even think Microsoft could. Google bullied them out last time with windows phone and the YouTube app debacle.

Until we have serious antitrust legislation against Google and Apple wielding their market power against any new entrants we are stuck with a duopoly.

At the very least, Google needs to lose Android, and probably YouTube as well.

"At the very least, Google needs to lose Android, and probably YouTube as well."

Wishful thinking department unfortunately. Modern US capitalism wouldn't allow that to happen—and a large majority of users are so addicted to the electronic heroin provided (seemingly for free but not) by the likes of Big Tech—Google et al—to care let alone do anything about the problem.

Given the state of the Kindle and Fire TV interfaces, I hope Amazon keeps far away.

I would strongly argue that they would have to start over completely.

Not sure porting the apps would be such a big problem.

You could probably get away with porting only a tiny fraction of all apps.

I only use ~10-20 apps. If I was sure those work reliably I'd not hesitate to move.

Here's a list for anyone who's interested:

* Firefox * Money / bank * Identity * Maps * Email / calendar * Public transport * Chat (Whatsapp, signal, telegram, Facebook messenger, hangout, slack, discord..) * Camera * Music * Podcasts * YouTube * Taxi * Renting bikes * Parking * Digital "postbox" (not email) * Gym * 2FA * Calculator * Phone/SMS * Google Drive

Everyone only uses ~10-20 apps, the problem is that no one uses the same ~10-20 apps.

But I think we mostly do use the same 10-20 apps!

Open source is a relative thing. Compared to iOS, Android is "incredibly open source!"

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