I was excited to dive into my new smartphone only to once again waste precious time uninstalling bloatware before I could enjoy it.
    • The Quuuuuill@slrpnk.netEnglish
      241·
      19 days ago

      and the most delicious kind of money of all: dark money! ooooh it’s so good because the sources of the dark money offer you a lot of it, and they specifically ask you not to ask questions, which is so good for you because these bloatware programs make your device sell worse and provides no value as a sales platform because it turns out that billboards and radio spots are, surprisingly, the most effective form of advertising.

      but! you have a sense of solidarity. you have faith that by never offering a phone without bloatware, your entire industry will ensure that all phones won’t have bloatware. you rest easy at night knowing your phone won’t sell poorly, at the end of the day, because every phone is like this. your contributions to a surveillance and propaganda machine that should punish you in the market because won’t because all your peers are your allies in this.

      and it gets better! every time someone else’s phone gets more bloatware and more dark money attached, then everyone else appears comparatively better, allowing them to get worse. ooooh you love it so much when you get to take more dark money. and all it costs you are several thousand lives far away from your big mansion. you don’t even have to see the suffering

        • Infomatics90@lemmy.caEnglish
          71·
          19 days ago

          you have to be careful what packages you remove, some can softlock your device.

          • Sanctus@lemmy.worldEnglish
            2·
            19 days ago

            The big one that matters is Verizon Software Manager. Used to be DT Ignite or something. They try to disguise that garbage forced installer as something genuine. I forget what it is on AT&T but I think it still has DT in the package name. The Verizon one is like some crazy package name thats not the name of the software at all. Must be the name of the company that makes it.

            • Infomatics90@lemmy.caEnglish
              31·
              19 days ago

              everytime i factory reset my device so much bloat/spy/malware gets installed automagically

                • Infomatics90@lemmy.caEnglish
                  41·
                  19 days ago

                  naw, it gets tiring. Either A) im going back to the flip phone i have or B) once i save up enough money ill get a pixel and install graphene.

      • Ogmios@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        61·
        19 days ago

        You get to feel like a super cool insider in a shadowy club secretly ruling over all the foolish little people who aren’t clever enough to be deemed worthy of receiving dark money!

  • PresidentCamacho@lemm.eeEnglish
    532·
    19 days ago

    For the same reason we have every fucking other problem in the world right now.

    Capitalism.

    You cannot align incentives towards growing the wealth of a microscopic yet astronomically lecherous group of monsters and expect society to not just crumble under the weight.

  • Cris@lemmy.worldEnglish
    34·
    19 days ago

    Because it’s profitable to include.

    Why would companies care as much about the minor brand value decrease in the eyes of more technical users when they can make more money right now by making things shittier?

  • Carighan Maconar@lemmy.worldEnglish
    342·
    19 days ago

    Because people keep buying Xiaomi and Samsung shit that’s loaded with crap (at least over here, I understand this varies massively by region).

    • Something Burger 🍔@jlai.luEnglish
      143·
      19 days ago

      Base Android is also loaded with crap, directly from Google. Android is the worst mobile operating system, with the exception of all the others.

      • 0xD@infosec.pubEnglish
        7·
        19 days ago

        Base Android (AOSP) is not, what you probably mean is Google Android.

        Look at GrapheneOS, that is a usable, privacy-focused Android without bloat.

          • sunzu2@thebrainbin.org
            31·
            19 days ago

            You ain’t wrong but it is currently the gold standard

            You ain’t getting away from glowies, but at least corporate marketing trash can’t track you that easily

            • humble peat digger@lemm.eeEnglish
              2·
              16 days ago

              I’ve used it for many years. Lineageos is a largest rom sure .
              The issue is that google fucks with base android more and more. Now they made it that there is that yellow logo on boot - your android is insecure. Then banking apps are not working.

              Updating from android to android on lineage was a chore on oneplus 8t.
              And I ended up not being able to rollback to stock because I wanted to trade in for A new model.

              It just makes it harder to use roms.

        • ElectroLisa@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
          1·
          19 days ago

          Almost none of the devices are shipped with anything but Google’s Android, and manufacturers don’t provide you alternative versions of Android

      • humble peat digger@lemm.eeEnglish
        1·
        19 days ago

        I guess we just have a simple task - to make sure that all android phones are running base android.
        How do u propose that could be done?

    • Matriks404@lemmy.worldEnglish
      71·
      19 days ago

      At least Samsung phones are only bloated with Samsung apps, which in most part you can uninstall or disable. Although it’s still fucking stupid that when you buy a new phone you need to do a lot of maintenance just to make your phone work as it should, and not slow down because of shitty apps.

    • woelkchen@lemmy.worldEnglish
      5·
      19 days ago

      I mind the Google crap more than I mind the Samsung stuff. At least Samsung’s browser supports ad blockers since ages. That Chrome POS is just useless.

    • Mwa@lemm.eeEnglish
      2·
      19 days ago

      i buy samsung cause parts aka easier to source parts.

      • Infomatics90@lemmy.caEnglish
        24·
        19 days ago

        fixing phones is the biggest scam ever. once you open the phone you are always going to have problems with the phone. they are not made to be opened and repaired.

        • RaccoonBall@lemm.eeEnglish
          51·
          19 days ago

          As much as I hate this saying, it sounds like a skill issue

          I’ve done repairs on all my phones. New buttons, screens, batteries, ports, etc. I’ve never caused an unforeseen new issue by doing so.

          • Infomatics90@lemmy.caEnglish
            11·
            19 days ago

            Its not so much a skill issue, more so phone repair stores are the scams. they break stuff that wasn’t broken in the first place and get you to come back with the that issue or say it was also broken. Source: used to work in the phone repair industry and knew people who did this on the regular and is a standard.

            • RaccoonBall@lemm.eeEnglish
              1·
              18 days ago

              What you describe is literally a skill issue though, if they’re breaking unrelated components.

        • VeganCheesecake@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
          1·
          18 days ago

          Depends on the model, and the manufacturers would certainly prefer you replaced it, but I’ve privately fixed a few phones for friends/family. Fucked up and broke the first one, but the ones after are pretty much all still running without issue.

    • Infomatics90@lemmy.caEnglish
      11·
      19 days ago

      you can argue that iphones and pixel phones etc… have bloatware/spyware/malware as well.

    • Infomatics90@lemmy.caEnglish
      144·
      19 days ago
      1. buy a laptop/desktop
      2. boot up windows and setup with fake shit
      3. download and flash your favourite linux distro
      4. disable secure boot
      5. boot from usb.
      6. ???
      7. profit!
          • Cris16228@lemmy.todayEnglish
            62·
            19 days ago
            • Internet Download Manager (IDM): Yee, I know it may not increase your download speed but was kinda good to have the main folder of downloads and every file by category downloaded in a subdirectories: Images, Documents, videos, etc. Using JDownloader 2 but it’s not the same
            • Affinity Designer: I know there is “Inkscape” but I still prefer affinity for it’s UI and because I’m used to it
            • AMD Adrenaline: Yeah, maybe was a bloatware and shit but kinda liked the built in record feature and tweaks you could do
            • Infomatics90@lemmy.caEnglish
              52·
              19 days ago

              fair enough, nobody is forcing you to switch, but Inkscape is there, and i am pretty sure there is a replacement program for on-the-fly recording (never looked into it, i don’t really play games like that)

              • Cris16228@lemmy.todayEnglish
                3·
                19 days ago

                I tried Xubuntu years ago because my PC was shit then kinda abandoned it, got tired of windows and installed Linux. After a big update, Linux broke and trying to reinstall it I… Picked the wrong partition and deleted windows lol

                Inkscape is nice but in used to Affinity Designer and kinda love it. For Adrenaline I’m sure it exists but steam built-in feature is enough.

                I love my Linux and fuck Micro$oft

          • AWildMimicAppears@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
            1·
            18 days ago

            I want to add here my deeply missed Playnite. There is nothing under Linux that comes close. I’ve settled for the combination of steam, heroic and lutris, but that is not even close for sure.

              • AWildMimicAppears@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
                1·
                15 days ago

                i already use heroic, but my issue is that there is nothing where i can add ALL games regardless of source; in playnite i was able to add everything from amiga 500 games over ps2 games to current pc games, with great costumisation, integration of steamgriddb, addition of pcgameswiki links, the ability to start scripts and programs at the launch and the end of the game, is well controllable by gamepad (heroics gamepad support works, but where your selection jumps if you press up or down is a bit of a mystery; and pressing b to return to your library after looking at a game places you cursor somewhere not clearly defined, not to the last selection.) and offers a huge selection of plugins.

            • cyberwolfie@lemmy.mlEnglish
              1·
              18 days ago

              While I don’t know all the details, and as far as I know there has been no official statement that it will support Linux, the current rewrite of the codebase that is going on will at least allow much easier compatability with Linux. So there’s hope :)

      • viking@infosec.pubEnglish
        3·
        19 days ago

        Just keep it offline and get yourself a Nvidia shield as a multimedia station. They are excellent.

          • viking@infosec.pubEnglish
            1·
            18 days ago

            Same for my dishwasher. I don’t even understand why that thing asked for a wifi connection in the first place, it’s not like I can remotely unload it or anything. And a notification is perfectly useless when I can just check my watch…

            • HubertManne@moist.catsweat.com
              2·
              18 days ago

              heck I was mad years ago when my microwave wanted to know the year. this stuff is getting rediculous. I need to start a thing like the amish but no internet connections allowed except for computers and phones. well ok cameras and sensors.

              • viking@infosec.pubEnglish
                1·
                18 days ago

                Luckily most devices work perfectly fine without internet. And I get the convenience of being able to switch on the heating or lower the window blinds and stuff from the office before leaving so that it’s nice at home, but we did that back in the 90s with a simple timer.

      • whoknewr@lemmy.todayEnglish
        62·
        18 days ago

        They are a prefect example of I’m a prviliged person who has not suffered so I refuse to believe that the current system causes suffering

  • skuzz@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
    23·
    19 days ago

    Basically, because we don’t own our devices. We are allowed to use our devices by the good graces of the manufacturers that charge a premium for them.

    This really needs to change. I remember the preinstalled app antitrust suit(s) in the early 00s. Those need to happen again, but likely the EU will have to as the US is entering a dark age, and the US will continue to have inferior everything to the rest of the world for the foreseeable future.

    • fuckwit_mcbumcrumble@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
      12·
      19 days ago

      Is it really enshitification if it was like this from essentially the start?

      Outside of like literally the very first few android phones when there wasn’t even apps for the platform, they came bundled with all sorts of shit. I remember my HTC from 2010 drove me insane with the junkware bundled in, and that was about 2 years post Android’s first phone. We’re at like more or less steady state shitification. (varies by phone/brand)

      • Tinidril@midwest.socialEnglish
        71·
        19 days ago

        I used to buy my phones with a specific eye towards avoiding bloat. It was still possible to avoid most of it 8-10 years ago, but not anymore.

        • DaGeek247@fedia.io
          1·
          19 days ago

          This is a wild take for me. I had bloatware on my dumbphone. Hell, the old nokia phones had app/ringtone dlc bullshit in them too. My old palm pilot had bloatware. Where did you get a phone without it?

          • Tinidril@midwest.socialEnglish
            2·
            19 days ago

            Not without it, just a lot less. 1plus used to be not too bad. Not like today where dozens of apps come with everything.

    • BossDj@lemm.eeEnglish
      3·
      19 days ago

      What’s sad is how true this is. Companies enshitify once they have a solid hold on the market. But if they start to slip in numbers, do they ever deshitify to regain trust and users? Fuck no, they triple down on the enshitification to make one last cash grab as they prepare to abandon ship with life preservers full of bonuses for themselves

  • Infomatics90@lemmy.caEnglish
    131·
    19 days ago

    The problem is that most phones don’t support ROM’s like Graphene or Linage, as people installing custom roms is a relic of years past. Next time you get a phone, think about if you want this option for yourself. Also, do keep in mind that some phones have HW backdoors on them, so even installing a stock rom/graphene does not save you from privacy.

    • humble peat digger@lemm.eeEnglish
      12·
      19 days ago

      They made it very hard to install roms.

      There is this orange warning on boot.

      Then banking apps don’t work.

      • viking@infosec.pubEnglish
        1·
        19 days ago

        With a rooted phone you can install Zygisk (magisk + zygote) and then a bunch of modules that simulate system integrity.

        What you need are “play integrity fix” and “playcurl_NEXT”.

        The first module lets you bypass the google play integrity check, the second one will download updated integrity fingerprint files every 5 minutes to ensure that the bypass never fails.

        If you know how to install custom ROMs, this part is not a big challenge.

        • humble peat digger@lemm.eeEnglish
          11·
          19 days ago

          Thank you. Yeah I was aware that there is magysk. Problem is - it’s becoming too many hacks to deal with. And I bet it probably breaks from time to time and one has to hack/fix it again?

          • viking@infosec.pubEnglish
            1·
            18 days ago

            With playcurl next I didn’t experience any issues yet, it’s polling a new device fingerprint every couple minutes to make sure your device never ends up on a blocklist, and you can trigger this manually in the magisk app as well.

            Can’t guarantee it’s never going to be blocked if Google changes the algorithm, but that would just mean they have to adjust the fingerprinting as well.

    • Cris16228@lemmy.todayEnglish
      5·
      19 days ago

      HW backdoors

      Tell me more!

      And lil papa google now forces GPlay Integrity so custom Roms are fucked

          • humble peat digger@lemm.eeEnglish
            2·
            19 days ago

            It’s android but without google . Given how much google fucks with me, I’m willing to say fuck u to google

            • Cris16228@lemmy.todayEnglish
              2·
              19 days ago

              Google fucks with everyone, now more than ever with this “recommended” (forced) play integrity. Look at the recent ban from Uber, Authy (thank god I switched a few days ago) and some other apps

              I was curious why Hauwei and not LineageOS, GrapheneOS, Calyx, etc

              • humble peat digger@lemm.eeEnglish
                2·
                19 days ago

                tbh recently I just don’t have time to futs with roms.

                Ive used lineage for many years. And would love to use it permanently but banking apps is a problem for me and having to hack things too much is a problem for me.
                Obviously some linux mobile distro would have been ideal. but There isn’t anything usable.

                calyx/graphene - the model selection is just too limited. And I would never buy a google or apple device.
                lineage os doesn’t support oneplus 12R I use now (well there is unofficial rom).

                so I would like to try huawei, the hope is - it’s like android but naturally without google because its designed like that.

        • Cris16228@lemmy.todayEnglish
          1·
          18 days ago

          I’m using Grapheneos and rooting the room will make it less secure 🤷‍♂️ and I don’t see why root my phone

          • viking@infosec.pubEnglish
            1·
            18 days ago

            My primary use case was magisk to enable taking screenshots from otherwise protected apps. Was living in China for almost 7 years, and even though I speak it quite alright, reading is a whole other level. And there are quite a few apps there that I had to use on a regular basis that had this damned flag_secure enabled so I couldn’t otherwise take screenshots to run them through a translation app.

            The second one was system level adblock, since the alternative is for adblockers to install themselves as local VPNs routing traffic to 127.0.0.1; however being in China meant I actually had to use a real VPN to access the free internet, and I certainly didn’t want to choose between ads or privacy. The latter still applies; I’m using a VPN on most days.

            Lastly, being able to use magisk also gives me access to some advanced security apps such as Hibernator (freezes apps, meaning they are basically uninstalled and reactivated on press, so they can’t use data, don’t get updated etc.), Storage Isolation (lets you configure on a per-app basis which folders it might access), App Ops (advanced permission management, which also includes an ignore function that acts like as if a certain permission was granted, but would feed random data or zeros to the app).

            Being able to uninstall everything including system apps is also nice, though that can still be achieved with adb. Browsing root folders when looking for specific data is also nice, but I used that twice in about 5 years, so it’s probably not essential.

      • Infomatics90@lemmy.caEnglish
        23·
        19 days ago

        Well its known that SoC’s have backdoors on them. Usually it calls home to China, so you can guess what that’s for.

    • kirk781@discuss.tchncs.deOPEnglish
      2·
      18 days ago

      That’s true. Graphene is majorly Pixel limited, I guess. And even Lineage has a small set of devices when one considers the nos of OEMs and variants they manufacture per year.

    • Rykzon@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
      21·
      19 days ago

      Even pixel or Fairphone is fairly free of bloatware compared to Samsung and shitty Chinese brands as long as you are not privacy paranoid about Google services.

        • Rykzon@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
          1·
          19 days ago

          And that’s fine, but first people like you (and me to some extent) are in the vast minority and that’s also not an issue of bloatware per se.

          • Infomatics90@lemmy.caEnglish
            2·
            19 days ago

            yeah the only problem is that i have to participate in this hellhole capitalist society. Im trying to figure out what the best VPN is to use, along side if tor is worth using.