The Handwavy Technobabble Nothingburger.
Any application that could be done on a blockchain could be better done on a centralized database. Except crime.
Dear tech consumer’s diary.
The battery of the Xiaomi phone was starting to conk out, and I decided to try and replace it; ordered a new battery, found some useful disassembly guide for the MI 5S – and destroyed the display when trying to open the phone… 😠
I am not good with hardware.
I was using the phone for about 5 years now (and – except for the battery – satisfyingly so); thus, I gnashingly took this as a sign to get a new device.
As I wanted to continue my slow degoogling process, I thought a refurbed Huawei would be a good idea – it comes without any Google apps, that sounded like a good idea.
Of course, it was plain stupid.
Because even if you manage to install some popular app with F-Droid or Aurora, it often does not work without these darn Google Play services…
The phone itself was too big and too heavy, and I just did not want to use this everyday. And I returned it.
It somehow begs the question what justifies this annoying form factor of clunkiness in current smartphones – but this was already posed multiple times and ultimately answered: reasonably sized devices are simply quite the slow sellers!
I never will understand consumer’s choices.
Nevertheless, I discovered some cute little phones like the Jelly 2 or the Palm Phone (via takemy.money) which rekindled some hope in me again. Still, they are not what I was looking for.
Searching for the best phone for degoogling ultimately leads you to GrapheneOS – and they support – Google’s Pixel phones! Badum tss!
Quite some twist in this degoogling story.
From the newer Pixel models they recommend I chose the 4a because of its size, its price, and the convincing reviews for a budget device. I expected something like an Android version of the iPhone SE 2020.
I think it’s exactly what I got – a new Pixel 4a from the German Google store where it was offered even cheaper than many used ones on second-hand platforms.
(No idea why it is not available in the Austrian store… Thanks to LogoiX this was hardly an obstacle, though.)
Now let’s see when I get the courage for installing GrapheneOS on it.
Btw. the b0rked display of the Xiaomi still bugged me pretty much. So much, I decided to give myself another chance, order a spare display and try to replace this too. This time I was more experienced, and of course luckier. I managed to disassemble the phone without any further damage, exchange the display and put everything back into place again. Almost a brand-new phone. Well, the fingerprint sensor had to go, that was baked into the old display and not possible to remove. Finally, it even got Android 11 via the PixelExperience – now it’s in such a good shape I would not have needed a new phone in the first place. Bad timing.
Two good and incoherent questions.
What Is Trauma-Informed Design?
What is Hammock-Driven Development?
Computer Science was always supposed to be taught to everyone, and it wasn’t about getting a job: A historical perspective.
The WIMP (overlapping Windows, Icons, Menus, and mouse Pointer) interface was invented in order to achieve computing education goals. For the purposes of education, the user interface that you are using right now was invented.
Relevant: “Software I’m thankful for.”
I am currently looking into Fish, the friendly interactive shell – or: “finally, a command line shell for the 90s”.
Relevant:
How animal uses of fire help to illuminate human pyrocognition.
Fire defines us as a species. Charles Darwin recognised this, claiming that fire was humanity’s second-greatest discovery, after language. Yet we haven’t devoted sufficient resources to examining the behaviour and cognition necessary to use and control it. We can get a complete picture only if we investigate the pyrocognition of humans and animals, alongside the established perspectives on the origins of fire.
Make Amazon Pay!
Hypersurveillance Turbocapitalism.
Infiltrating Amazon: What I learned going undercover at the corporate giant.
Every day as I started my shift, I would don our robotic armature. We would grab what’s called a TCI device—which looks like a giant smartphone—and strap it to one arm, and with the other hand pick up a scanner. We’d log into our device, and from that moment on no longer be in control of our actions. Instead, this device would determine where we would go, what tasks we would be doing, and how good an employee we were.