zlacker

>>kotaKa+(OP)
I've grown increasingly hateful towards both my Android and iOS devices over the last decade. The platforms themselves are increasingly user-hostile, and their appstores are crammed full of shitty, privacy-invading, telemetry-hoovering, dopamine-triggering, ad-filled, lipstick-covered apps that are often garbage compared to the pioneering days of mobile. I miss the days of my old Palm Pilot.

Is anyone working on fixing this? We can do so much better.

>>rkager+DA
Vollo from German is one https://volla.online/. They sell a nice set of devices that run either a custom Android or Ubuntu Touch. Their custom Android has a nice bunch of UI and privacy features.

Fairphone from the Netherlands is another https://www.fairphone.com/

>>foobar+5D
For once Fairphone never updating their phones will work in our favor! If Google roll sthis out in early 2026, anyone with a Fairphone can rest easy that they won't receive that version of the operating system until mid-2028 at least.

>>margal+PE
Fairphones are also LineageOS and postmarketOS compatible, both options are without tracking and without Google's mandated policies.

LineageOS without gapps is really usable if you set aside the "big" social media apps. WhatsApp can be sourced from their website as an APK. The social apps like facebook, instagram, snap, tiktok and others all require Google Play's tracking services (aka gapps).

For YouTube there's multiple better alternative open source apps available, and mastodon, amethyst and the fediverse apps on f-droid are far superior in terms of performance to the Google Store alternatives.