#i was forced to switch from android to apple

[waver22]

Back after 7 months with a new phone

Does that mean I’m going to post regularly?

Hah nope

[yandereunsolved]

» 🪙 Yandere Connor — RK800 » 🪙 (part 2)

➜ (part 1), (part 3) ➜ cw(s): yandere themes, kidnapping, self-harm mentioned (reader), starvation (reader), suicidal ideations (reader), force feeding, & manipulation ➜ tags: @bimboghostface, @savas-q1, & @aceofheartsssss

You have screamed your voice raw in hopes that some unknown savior will take pity. You have cried your tear ducts dry until your eyes swell and become bloodshot. You have cut into your skin with whatever you can find for just a modicum of control. More times than you can count, you have done these things. Each time the consequences increase, but the probability of escaping does not.

Each new place he—it, that thing you dared call your friend and perhaps even your crush, has hid you in has become progressively more dilapidated. Plush armchairs and soft carpets once softened the torture of your solitude; now splintering wooden floors and asbestos-filled walls are left in their wake. Places so damaged you question why Connor chooses them. It should go against his programming, or whatever's left of it.

But why should you care?

He deviated and showed you once again how dangerous unchecked androids are. Now small groups of rebellious preprogrammed code run amok, causing havoc—at least from what little you've been able to gather. Connor isn't keen on informing you of the goings-on of the outside world. He prefers to reassure you, which does little good (because fuck him).

A familiar shuffling behind the door alerts you. Your head snaps up like a startled deer, staring at the door like a predator will come through. He's drenched in blood when he comes in, red blood. His beanie has been lost. His multitude of jackets have tears and bullet holes. But he looks okay for the most part. The word must really hate you.

"I have news that will please you," he murmurs in that babying tone you have snapped at him to stop using.

He approaches you, kneeling down, a bag stuffed into one of his pockets.

"We'll be at a compound soon—one where my kind are able to live freely. And you have been granted access too. It has all of the necessities and even a bit of luxury."

He takes out the bag, unfazed by his own appearance but noting that it's disturbing you. He pulls out a packet of crackers and some applesauce. No. No, no, no, no.

"Connor, please, let me go," you beg with the panic rising in your voice.

You quickly shake your head as tears prick your dry eyes. You fruitlessly kick at him and yank at the chains holding you down to this place. You can feel the bile rising in your throat and the arduous aches in your muscles struggling to keep it held down, struggling to keep you awake.

Other things arise. The regret of being too weak to fend him off. The sorrow in being denied the right to take your own life.

A plastic spoon is inserted into your mouth with the apple mush oozing off it. You try to spit it out, but he wipes your face and more forcefully inserts the next spoonful into you.

"Nutrition is necessary for human survival, to thrive, yet you deprive yourself of it. Convincing me to let you leave would be much easier if you stopped proving that you are unable to care for yourself."

"I just want to go," the soul-crushing defeat evident in your voice.

Without missing a heartbeat of yours, he responds, "You can't. I-I need you here."

He shoves not just one cracker, but three, into your mouth. You almost choke, but he makes sure you are unable to. Maybe it would just be better if you choked on them. Or your vomit. Or even the shitty plastic spoon he keeps forcing into your mouth.

"You're being selfish," you finally manage to get the words out.

"You're being selfish. I have sacrificed the entirety of my being for you. And still you try to harm yourself. Do you hate me that much?"

He retracts the food from you. He stares unceasingly at you. His LED switching from red to colorless, one of the only parts of him that he has kept since his deviancy.

"Do I hate you?" you incredulously, rhetorically question. "Yes! I hate you! Is that what you want to hear? A confession of how much I loathe you for fucking up what little good was in my life?"

The tears well up and escape down your face, getting wiped off by Connor's attentive hands. You can't stop the shaking or the meltdown his presence has placed upon you.

"I hate you. I-I hate you. I h-hate y-you!"

The last syllable is barely out of your mouth when hands come up to cup your face, squishing your cheeks. Still having a meltdown, your teary eyes are just barely able to make out the abnormal pinkish hue on his LED. A color you've never encountered, even with him being deviant these last months—years, whatever.

"I understand," nearly inaudible, "and I suppose I always have. Your human nature causes you to think irrationally. You aren't able to see the 'bigger picture,' as humans call it. You have suffered at my hands. That I apologize for."

The acknowledgment of his transgressions breaks you down further. You can't quiet the wails escaping you, snot dribbling from your nostrils. Your body rocks itself back and forth in a pitiful attempt at comfort. You can't stop. It won't stop. He won't stop.

It validates him. He continues his tirade, sure that it will have the intended pacifying effect.

"I should be more attentive. But I'm so busy making sure that neither of us is caught by the authorities."

Excuses.

"When we get to the compound, all of that will change. You will have a higher standard of care. Me at your side. Your brain will stop merely surviving."

Promises.

"Then your love for me can bloom."

Resolution. His mission completed with you as his lover.

You quiet. He mistakes, or quite possibly dissmisses, your transition from an unfiltered meltdown to a horrified shutdown as an opportunity to cradle you. And for the first time since your kidnapping, you embrace him back—not out of some sweet, loving bond, but out of need. The need for someone else's closeness, touch—affection, even if it's all wrong. The desperation seeps out of you in droves and into your actions. Your mind and body want to claw at his synthetic skin, tear him apart, and thrive off the warmth of his parts.

...

If he can have a mission beyond his own makers, then you can have one beyond your captor's.

[teaboot]

How old was your previous phone before you got the iPhone? Because like all the things you're complaining about have been a problem for probably like at least half a decade for a lot of phones, at least in my experience. And definitely not just an iPhone problem. My Samsung has all the same problems except maybe it trying to force me to use face id. It's been an awful experience. And I'm not saying you shouldn't complain about that because it IS bad and annoying and just overall very scummy. It just feels like your post would feel right at home in 2018 lol and makes me wonder when the last time you got a new phone was or what kind of phone you had before

I will use a phone beyond the death of the screen if I can, so im isually like 4-7 years behind everyone else.

My favourite gen 1 ipod was only operable by screen reader by the time the battery finally gave out, and my current phone (was gonna switch away from but kind of changing my ind now) is an android a friend didn't want with a smashed screen and it's fine.

Apple just feels genuinely so much worse and less intuitive by comparison

[ms-demeanor]

got a question I was hoping you could answer!

why do all apps have to go through an app store? why doesn't anywhere have their app downloadable from the internet or something?

was wondering this because lots of issues with apps seem to stem from having to comply with app store guidelines and whatnot. So why not avoid that problem and make the app available off the appstore? And if part of it is because they're easier to find in the appstore, why not do both? why not also offer the download on a website or something?

there's gotta be some reason why there's afaik no one who offers a download for their app without the appstore right?

There are absolutely other ways to get apps, and the one that springs immediately to mind is the F-Droid App Repository.

Sideloading is the process of loading an app that doesn't come from your phone's OS-approved app store. It's really easy on Android (basically just a couple of clicks) but requires jailbreaking on an iphone.

The reason more USERS don't sideload apps is risk: app stores put apps through at least nominal security checks to ensure that they aren't hosting malware. If you get an app from the app store that is malware, you can report it and it will get taken down, but nobody is forcing some random developer who developed his own app to remove it from his site if it installs malware on your phone unless you get law enforcement involved.

The reason more developers don't go outside of the app store or don't WANT to go outside of the app store is money. The number of users who are going to sideload apps is *tiny* compared to the number of users who will go through the app store; that makes a HUGE difference in terms of income, so most developers try to keep it app-store friendly. Like, if tumblr were to say "fuck the app store" and just release their own app that you could download from the sidebar a few things would happen:

Downloads would drop to a fraction of their prior numbers instantly

iOS users would largely be locked out of using tumblr unless they fuck with their phones in a way that violates Apple's TOS and could get them booted out of their iOS ecosystem if they piss off the wrong people.

Ad revenue would collapse because not a lot of advertisers want to work with companies that are app-store unfriendly

They'd be kicked off of the main app marketplaces

So most people who develop apps don't want to put the time and effort and money into developing an app that people might not pay for that then also can't carry ads.

Which leads into another issue: the kind of people who generally make and use sideloaded app aren't the kind of people who generally like profit-driven models. Indie apps are often slow to update and have minimal support because you're usually dealing with a tiny team of creators with a userbase of people who can almost certainly name ten flavors of Linux and are thus expected to troubleshoot and solve their own problems.

If this is the kind of thing you want to try, have at it. I'd recommend sticking to apps from the F-Droid Repository linked up above and being judicious about what you install. If you're using apple and would have to jailbreak your phone to get a non-approved app on it, I'd recommend switching to another type of phone.

(For the record, you also aren't limited to android or ios as the operating system of your phone; there are linux-based OSs out there and weird mutations of android and such - I am not really a phone person so I can't tell you much about them, but they are out there!)

[mostlysignssomeportents]

An interoperability rule for your money

This is the final weekend to back the Kickstarter campaign for the audiobook of my next novel, The Lost Cause. These kickstarters are how I pay my bills, which lets me publish my free essays nearly every day. If you enjoy my work, please consider backing!

"If you don't like it, why don't you take your business elsewhere?" It's the motto of the corporate apologist, someone so Hayek-pilled that they see every purchase as a ballot cast in the only election that matters – the one where you vote with your wallet.

Voting with your wallet is a pretty undignified way to go through life. For one thing, the people with the thickest wallets get the most votes, and for another, no matter who you vote for in that election, the Monopoly Party always wins, because that's the part of the thick-wallet set.

Contrary to the just-so fantasies of Milton-Friedman-poisoned bootlickers, there are plenty of reasons that one might stick with a business that one dislikes – even one that actively harms you.

The biggest reason for staying with a bad company is if they've figured out a way to punish you for leaving. Businesses are keenly attuned to ways to impose switching costs on disloyal customers. "Switching costs" are all the things you have to give up when you take your business elsewhere.

Businesses love high switching costs – think of your gym forcing you to pay to cancel your subscription or Apple turning off your groupchat checkmark when you switch to Android. The more it costs you to move to a rival vendor, the worse your existing vendor can treat you without worrying about losing your business.

Capitalists genuinely hate capitalism. As the FBI informant Peter Thiel says, "competition is for losers." The ideal 21st century "market" is something like Amazon, a platform that gets 45-51 cents out of every dollar earned by its sellers. Sure, those sellers all compete with one another, but no matter who wins, Amazon gets a cut:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/28/cloudalists/#cloud-capital

Think of how Facebook keeps users glued to its platform by making the price of leaving cutting of contact with your friends, family, communities and customers. Facebook tells its customers – advertisers – that people who hate the platform stick around because Facebook is so good at manipulating its users (this is a good sales pitch for a company that sells ads!). But there's a far simpler explanation for peoples' continued willingness to let Mark Zuckerberg spy on them: they hate Zuck, but they love their friends, so they stay:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/08/facebooks-secret-war-switching-costs

One of the most important ways that regulators can help the public is by reducing switching costs. The easier it is for you to leave a company, the more likely it is they'll treat you well, and if they don't, you can walk away from them. That's just what the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau wants to do with its new Personal Financial Data Rights rule:

https://www.consumerfinance.gov/about-us/newsroom/cfpb-proposes-rule-to-jumpstart-competition-and-accelerate-shift-to-open-banking/

The new rule is aimed at banks, some of the rottenest businesses around. Remember when Wells Fargo ripped off millions of its customers by ordering its tellers to open fake accounts in their name, firing and blacklisting tellers who refused to break the law?

https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2016/10/07/497084491/episode-728-the-wells-fargo-hustle

While there are alternatives to banks – local credit unions are great – a lot of us end up with a bank by default and then struggle to switch, even though the banks give us progressively worse service, collectively rip us off for billions in junk fees, and even defraud us. But because the banks keep our data locked up, it can be hard to shop for better alternatives. And if we do go elsewhere, we're stuck with hours of tedious clerical work to replicate all our account data, payees, digital wallets, etc.

That's where the new CFPB order comes in: the Bureau will force banks to "share data at the person’s direction with other companies offering better products." So if you tell your bank to give your data to a competitor – or a comparison shopping site – it will have to do so…or else.

Banks often claim that they block account migration and comparison shopping sites because they want to protect their customers from ripoff artists. There are certainly plenty of ripoff artists (notwithstanding that some of them run banks). But banks have an irreconcilable conflict of interest here: they might want to stop (other) con-artists from robbing you, but they also want to make leaving as painful as possible.

Instead of letting shareholder-accountable bank execs in back rooms decide what the people you share your financial data are allowed to do with it, the CFPB is shouldering that responsibility, shifting those deliberations to the public activities of a democratically accountable agency. Under the new rule, the businesses you connect to your account data will be "prohibited from misusing or wrongfully monetizing the sensitive personal financial data."

This is an approach that my EFF colleague Bennett Cyphers and I first laid our in our 2021 paper, "Privacy Without Monopoly," where we describe how and why we should shift determinations about who is and isn't allowed to get your data from giant, monopolistic tech companies to democratic institutions, based on privacy law, not corporate whim:

https://www.eff.org/wp/interoperability-and-privacy

The new CFPB rule is aimed squarely at reducing switching costs. As CFPB Director Rohit Chopra says, "Today, we are proposing a rule to give consumers the power to walk away from bad service and choose the financial institutions that offer the best products and prices."

The rule bans banks from charging their customers junk fees to access their data, and bans businesses you give that data to from "collecting, using, or retaining data to advance their own commercial interests through actions like targeted or behavioral advertising." It also guarantees you the unrestricted right to revoke access to your data.

The rule is intended to replace the current state-of-the-art for data sharing, which is giving your banking password to third parties who go and scrape that data on your behalf. This is a tactic that comparison sites and financial dashboards have used since 2006, when Mint pioneered it:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/12/mint-late-stage-adversarial-interoperability-demonstrates-what-we-had-and-what-we

A lot's happened since 2006. It's past time for American bank customers to have the right to access and share their data, so they can leave rotten banks and go to better ones.

The new rule is made possible by Section 1033 of the Consumer Financial Protection Act, which was passed in 2010. Chopra is one of the many Biden administrative appointees who have acquainted themselves with all the powers they already have, and then used those powers to help the American people:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/18/administrative-competence/#i-know-stuff

It's pretty wild that the first digital interoperability mandate is going to come from the CFPB, but it's also really cool. As Tim Wu demonstrated in 2021 when he wrote Biden's Executive Order on Promoting Competition in the American Economy, the administrative agencies have sweeping, grossly underutilized powers that can make a huge difference to everyday Americans' lives:

https://www.eff.org/de/deeplinks/2021/08/party-its-1979-og-antitrust-back-baby

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/21/let-my-dollars-go/#personal-financial-data-rights

My next novel is The Lost Cause, a hopeful novel of the climate emergency. Amazon won't sell the audiobook, so I made my own and I'm pre-selling it on Kickstarter!

Image: Steve Morgan (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:U.S._National_Bank_Building_-_Portland,_Oregon.jpg

Stefan Kühn (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Abrissbirne.jpg

CC BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en

 - 

Rhys A. (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/rhysasplundh/5201859761/in/photostream/

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

[dervampireprince]

An important update about Patreon, specially the IOS/Apple app.

From November 2024 any new memberships (I think that also includes if you were to leave and rejoin after November 2024) and purchase a membership to myself or any other Patreon creator via the Apple app store, Apple is going to add on a 30% fee that subscribers have to pay and all that extra 30% will go to Apple, not to the creators. If you already subscribed in the past via the IOS app, you won't be subjected to this new 30% charge. As long as you signed up via the website/Android, using the IOS app won't charge you, only subscribing via the app will. So please be aware subscriptions to Patreons will cost 30% more money if you do it via the IOS app, it's cheaper so sign up via the website/Android.

It is also getting rid of the first-of-the-month billing option. I have the choice to switch now, or be forced to in November 2025 when every creator on Patreon will be forced to switch to subscription billing (which means if you joined on the 4th of August you'd be charged on the 4th of every next month, etc). This also means pay-per-creation that many creators use who make content like long video essays only once or twice per year and thus only charge their Patreon members those one or two times a year they upload, will be forced to charge their Patreon members every month once November 2025 hits. This forced changed is only happening because Apple is demanding it, wants a cut of every creator's earnings, and has threatened to remove Patreon from the app store if they don't force these changes.

I know me being forced to charge you guys the date of you signed up on every following month, but it does screw me over a big. It screws over creators who give out physical rewards like sticker clubs, in fact Patreon used to advertise first-of-the-month billing as being for creators who had physical rewards to mail out. Why does this matter to me when I don't offer physical rewards? It's not the biggest deal for me personally, but I do collect audio requests on the first of every month, the Patreon outro is recorded once at the start of each month based on who is there on the 1st of the month and I will not be re-recording it every day when new people join. And my brain just finds everyone being charged on the same day easier to keep track off.

I'm sure some of you will prefer the new billing method. I know some people have been bothered if they sign up on the 31st of one month just to be charged again the next day, but that has always been written out when you sign up for memberships, you could have chosen to just wait a day before joining.

So I'll be making the switch now, because if I wait until they force me in November 2025 I will have forgotten and it'll catch me off-guard. So any new Patreon members will be charged recurring on the date they signed up (e.g. if you signed up on the 17th of August, you'd be charged on the 17th of each month. I have no idea how this works if you sign up on a leap day or on the 31st of August when there's no 31st of September, I don't know if Patreon picks a day earlier or a day later).

Now, what does switching mean for existing Patreon members? Nothing. If you signed up before today then you'll keep getting charged on the first o each month. Which feels a bit unfair for old Patreon members to not get to switch to the new system, but Patreon forces you to stay on the old one. I don't know if cancelling your subscription and rejoining would allow you to join the new system or not, I don't know if Patreon would remember you.

Sorry this is sudden, Patreon just sent out the email at around 3pm today and I only just saw it

[the-sleepy-archivist]

Online Privacy and Security Tips

I am a firm believer that people should be able to be anonymous and secure online. Over a lifetime of trial and error, I've slowly learned the best ways to protect myself, and I'd like to pass on that knowledge to anyone who wants to hear it.

Last updated May 2024 (added links to news articles about PimEyes being used to identify someone in real life)

Switch to Firefox for your main browser on Windows and Android

Avoid any browser based on the Chromium project (like Microsoft Edge or Google Chrome), as Google has a major conflict of interest that prevents it from truly having users' privacy interests at heart. It makes ~70-80% of its revenue from its highly targeted advertising business, for which it must collect as much information about you as possible. That means that no matter how badly certain parts of Google want to build privacy into the browser, business interests and pressure will always supersede them, or at least force a compromise that still enables some tracking. Firefox is owned and maintained by a non-profit, so it does not have that same conflict, and it shows in the features it builds (and does not build) and the way it treats its users.

I made a list of my favorite Firefox extensions if you want to make your internet experience more pleasant and/or more secure!

Note: on iOS (i.e. iPhones), Firefox' functionality is limited by Apple restrictions and I do not recommend it - using Safari with Extensions like Adguard or 1Blocker is more secure and will give you a better experience. I made a list of my favorite iOS Safari extensions too!

Use a reputable password manager

I suggest 1Password (avoid LastPass and all of the password managers built into browsers, they're not safe). A good password manager increases your online safety by:

Helping you avoid password reuse (a common cause of account hacking)

Generating complex passwords that are difficult to guess or brute-force, and

Allowing you to keep records of all the different sites you have accounts on (so you can quickly change passwords in the event of a breach or delete your accounts on them when they outlive their usefulness)

Delete old accounts you no longer need

If your data has been deleted, no one can steal and leak it if they manage to hack the company.

Sign up for alerts from HaveIBeenPwned (HIBP) to be notified when your data is leaked in a site hacking.

This allows you to quickly change your password, hopefully before anyone is able to decrypt it (if it wasn't stored properly) or use it (if it was easy to guess). If you have reused that password on other sites, be sure to change your password on those sites either.

Note that some leaks don’t actually have any info about what website they were stolen from; if criminals just dump a huge text file onto a hacking forum that has your username and an accompanying password in it, HIBP doesn’t necessarily know what site they hacked to get that info. This is where a password manager like 1Password will come in handy, because 1P can actually use HIBP’s API to check each of your passwords and see if any of them have been leaked before. It will alert you if you need to change a specific password, even if you weren’t aware that site had been hacked.

Note: 1P only sends the first 5 characters of the password hashes to HIBP, not the passwords themselves. You can read more about the feature and how it preserves your privacy here.

Assume all profile pictures on any site are public, and avoid using your face for them if possible

New AI-powered sites like PimEyes can take an image of you, identify your face, and search for it in other, unrelated images around the internet. I searched for myself using a recent image that had never been posted to the internet before, and it immediately identified me in completely separate images I was using as my profile pictures on Facebook and LinkedIn and provided links to my accounts there. In this new AI era, assume anyone who snaps a picture of you can link you to your identity on any website where you have publicly posted your face before. This is not hyperbole; fans used PimEyes to identify a cameraman at a Taylor Swift concert using nothing more than a screenshot of a video taken of him by a concertgoer. Note: for what it's worth, you can submit an opt-out request to PimEyes if you are worried about someone using it to find your accounts online, but it requires you to submit images of your face and your government ID to the company...

Never post the same (original) image on two accounts that you do want to keep separate

Even a simple reverse image search can allow someone to link your different sites together (i.e. don't post the same vacation sunset photo on both Facebook and Tumblr because anyone can use that to link those sites together. Even if your Facebook or Instagram images are private, a follower of yours on one of those sites could still find the Tumblr you are not comfortable sharing with anyone. Marking your Tumblr as hidden only discourages search engines from indexing it; shady companies can and will ignore that and index it anyway.

[itscorvid]

I 100% agree. But I also kinda like that I just can’t use my phone some places. I lean on my phone for entertainment when I’m bored but I do appreciate when I can’t because it forces me to be creative, I’ve really lost that natural incentive cense getting a phone.

Don’t get me wrong I still love having the world at my fingertips and being able to entertain myself. Also there’s a HUGE plus to being able to use a phone for safety, communication and navigation.

But it also kinda sucks that I couldn’t function normally in a day without my phone. Besides the constant need for entertainment, and the fantastic benefits of being to connect with friends and family. I genuinely couldn’t functionally navigate society without some kind of electronic device. I use my phone to buy train tickets, I need some kind of computer for school. Jobs need to be able to contact you at all times. Everything needs you to have a phone number or email. And I’m sure there’s even more I can’t think of because it’s just so ingrained in society and how I live.

I say all this as someone who grew up in the age of technology and naturally appreciates everything it has to offer, but I’d be lying if I never wished it wasn’t so deeply embedded into society now.

Not just the way it affects my habits as a person, but also because of the position it puts all of the business who sell and service technology in.

Think of how inconvenient it is to try and communicate with someone with an Android when you have an iPhone, particularly in group chats. At least where I live, most people use iPhones, and I’ve had more than one friend switch from an Android to an iPhone because of convenience. I know that’s a great business move on Apple’s part but I feels icky to me. Sometimes I wonder if they’ll end up having a monopoly.

Not to mention the planned obsolescence of technology in general that’s frankly disgusting. The constant aging out of their own technology and active steps to make their older models dysfunctional, and repair of them more difficult so they can sell newer phones is beyond infuriating to me.

And worst of all, I like their products and will continue to use them. Despite the fact there is technology out there to make not only more sustainable and long lasting, but just objectively better, phones and even business who do this, I will keep using the same phone provider out of convenience.

It just makes me wonder what could be in the world of commercial technology if major success in the industry didn’t come from profits, but from genuinely making the best technology. More/better cross platform communication, longer lasting products, better storage that didn’t cost extra.

I hope I get to be a part of a society, even if it’s just locally, or interpersonally, that motivates this model of success from genuinely achieving the full potential of what your “technology” could be.

smartphone storage plateauing in favor of just storing everything in the cloud is such dogshit. i should be able to have like a fucking terabyte of data on my phone at this point. i hate the fucking cloud

[lazeecomet]

I don't understand my coworkers sometimes

My manager came up to me to complain about the new iPhone she bought. The complaint was that it's now USB C and that it apple was forced to switch to it

The root of that complaint is that she has lots of 20$ lightning cables and now she's out a lot of money on all the spare cables she has. She was saying that apple should have a buyback program to help consumers recoup the cost of all those cables

And she dismissed when I brought up the change from 30 pin to lightning, the fact that USB C is cheaper, and any other thing I could think of as to why the switch was probably best for the consumer or why it was pushed through

Maybe she wanted me to wallow in her misery with her but I have never used a phone with a lightning cable so I have no sympathy and think the change was good because now I can charge my work iPhone with my existing android chargers

[g-kat423]

I might have to cave due to Apple’s planned obsolescence because my phone is acting up big time to the point of not functioning even as a phone. Why is my phone randomly crashing and only showing a black screen with a spinning gray circle while it still has battery, thus forcing me to do a hard shutdown that takes longer than normal?? I was worried it wouldn’t turn back on this time.

I’d go without a phone if I could, but there are things I need that only a smart phone can provide and I can’t just switch to android because I have years of stuff from always having apple products since the iPod touch era. I’m gonna try to keep holding off though until it bricks.

[theshampyon]

Derailing the joke here, but like... the tweet in the OP screenshot is a huge twisting (or straight-up lying) of what the EU wants from the iPhone, and all manufacturers, and all of it is entirely reasonable.

USB-A and 30-pin connector? They want a standardised near-universal connection (USB-C) instead of a proprietary one like Lightning. Y'know, so people aren't forced to turn only to Apple for replacement cables. We went through that shit with every other manufacturer 20 years ago, and we hated it then too.

Charger + extension cord included in the box? Actually the opposite. They want you to be able to use any charger, and not generate additional e-waste by needing a whole new one every time you upgrade your phone.

Replaceable battery? Who doesn't want to be able to just swap out a bad battery instead of having to replace the entirety of an otherwise perfectly functional phone? Again, that used to be standard. You used to be able to swap the battery of your mobile phone as easily as you swap the batteries in a flashlight.

60Hz display? Can't find a single piece of information about that. Might be a twisting of the 2025 ecodesign requirements? But the only display requirement I can find is about resistance to scratch, drop, and splash damage. Oh, and a general requirement to have energy efficiency labelling on the package, like we get on other appliances.

Open-sourced iOS with option to switch to Android? Closest I can find is the demand that they allow side-loading apps, so EU customers aren't locked into the Apple App Store ecosystem. I wouldn't be surprised if there was a future proposal to allow alternate operating systems on phone hardware, which would necessarily apply to all phones and all potential operating systems. They definitely don't want to create a situation where Android has an even bigger share - the EU has already had anti-monopoly battles with Google over the ubiquity of Android in the smartphone market.

SD-card slot? Again, can't find anything matching this. Can't even find anything that could be twisted into this.

All of this is either twisting or lying about upcoming changes to EU laws around Right To Repair and Eco Design. They're trying to make any electronics sold within the EU more repairable (including a requirement that replaceable parts be sold for up to 15 years after initial manufacture) and more eco-friendly (to reduce the absurd amount of e-waste we generate with high-turnover items like phones, tablets, and other such devices).

The picture, BTW, isn't even about the EU's demands. It's from a 2016 installment of "The Joy of Tech." It's about the need for unifying vision in design and the idea that not every user-level request for specifications will be reasonable or worthwhile. It was a bit of a straw man even then, but it's more so now that it's transposed over an entire different argument about basic consumer rights and environmental safety.

ok this looks ultra mega based, are you kidding me? can you imagine the bullshit i could get up to with this bad boy? fuck yes i want ten

[netscapenavigator-official]

I FEEL you so hard. Have had my iphone XR since 2019 and it works ok (battery life is still ok and it doesn’t crash ALL the time) but i can’t wait until it’s practically a brick so i can switch to an android without guilt. The faceID kills me and I’m practically never using it (got a thin scratch in the glass above the selfie camera 2 years ago, so i have to make sure no light is randomly bouncing on the scratch when I unlock my phone, or the halo blocks everything) and it’s like having a babysitter version of a phone. I’m not allowed to use any applications not vetoed by Apple Inc. and almost all features are so much less customisable… sure, and iphone is great in some regards (5S and XR have been surprisingly good models in my experience) but for the past 3 years I’ve felt soo limited by Apple’s philosophy

Well, good news (or bad depending on how long you want to keep that phone), the iPhone XR is most likely next on Apple's chopping block of support. The iPhone 8, 8 Plus, and X were all dropped with the release of iOS 17, last September. If Apple keeps on their linear path, this September, with the release of iOS 18, the iPhone XR, XS, and XS Max will all be dropped. Apple usually gives phones two years of security patches after they're dropped, however, so it depends on what you consider a "brick." I, unfortunately, have an iPhone 12-series phone, so I've got at least two more years of updates left, four if I wanna push my goal to the security update deadline.

Also, for the Face ID issue, idk if you've tried this, but try doing a rescan. Go to Settings > Face ID & Passcode, and click "Set Up an Alternate Appearance." I don't know if all iPhones have this. I think they may have added it for the iPhone 12-series and newer, but if you have it, give it a try and see if it helps smooth over Face ID. By teaching it what you look like with the scratch interfering, it may be able to better compensate for it. If you're phone doesn't have that, you could always try tapping "Reset Face ID," too, to force it to re-scan. Although, with damaged glass, I don't know if it'll let you.

The App Store is another point of contention for me, too. I have a 2011 MacBook Pro that's been "obsolete" since 2017, when macOS High Sierra stopped getting updates. I wiped the drive clean and put Linux (Zorin OS) on it, and it's actually been really great. It runs like it's native. The problem, though, is that using Linux has opened my eyes to just how few free & open-source apps support iOS because of Apple's bullshit App Store requirements and $99/year developer fee. A lot of the apps I use on this computer are great, and they support Android, but they don't support iOS. It's a real bummer, and I'm just tired, in general, of not being able to do the things I want with my phone, so unless Apple decides to get really cool, really fast, this will certainly be my last iPhone. (Especially with iOS 18 coming with RCS Message support, almost entirely eliminating the difference between iMessage and Android to iPhone messaging.)

And I'm not trying to shit on Apple too much because Google is worse in plenty of ways. I have plenty of Apple devices from an iPhone, to an M1 iMac, to an Apple TV, etc. Apple makes really good hardware (with the exception of its repairability). Their problem is that they hold themselves back with their own greed. We've seen it with plenty of devices. The Apple Vision Pro is a great example. Apple thought they could use their brand image to make the device successful, but they recently had to cut production in half because demand fell off so steeply. If VisionOS was open and easy to develop for, then I'm sure it could've been a success, but Apple's desire to control everything has gotten in its way. I mean, who wants to develop for a $3,500 headset where you have to pay $99/year for a developer account, and then $400 for an Apple Vision Proprietary Port to USB-C adapter?

The Mac is honestly in the same boat. I saw a YouTube Short of a developer explaining why they dropped Mac Support, and it makes sense. To make an app on each platform you have to:

Windows

Have a PC

Code the app in any application of your preference.

Compile for Windows

Linux

Have the same PC

Code the app in any application of your preference.

Start a Virtual Machine and open the project inside it.

Compile for Linux

macOS

Buy Mac hardware ($600 for the base model Mac mini)

Pay Apple $99/year for a developer account

Code the app in Apple's Xcode

Acquire and add a Code Signature to the app so that macOS doesn't throw a fake error when attempting to open it.

Compile for macOS

If you want to upload your app to the Mac App Store, get Apple's blessing that it follows their guidelines.

Wait at least 24-hours before updates are published so Apple can approve them.

Give Apple a 15-30% cut of any money made from the App.

I used to thing that macOS had shit app support because developers just didn't want to support a niche market, but now I know it's the opposite that is true. Even if Linux has an even smaller market, it's as easy as clicking another button or booting up a free Virtual Machine and then clicking said button. You can use all the same hardware and programs. It's literally free to compile for Linux, and it expands your user base.

Meanwhile, for macOS, you have to spend a minimum of $700 just to make the app. Then, if you're not an A-List developer, you have to give a portion of your proceeds to Apple so you can put your app on their App Store for the exposure. Who the fuck would wanna do that?

Apple's death grip on their products worked for the iPhone and Apple Watch because they were both relatively new products to their respective category, but in a market where technology is starting to plateau, I'm simply no longer interested in supporting this behavior, mostly because I want to be able to use my favorite FOSS on all my devices, not just the non-Apple ones.

[sainteldaily]

Review: The iPhone 15 Pro is the best pitch to switch from Android – it’s just not for me

The iPhone is the best-selling smartphone on the planet and, in the US especially, it’s clearly a dominant force. I’m an Android person by choice, but once in a while, I spend time with the latest iPhone to take a peek inside of Apple’s garden, trying not to get trapped within its walls. Over the past several months, I’ve been using the iPhone 15 Pro off and on and, well, I’ve got thoughts. more…

[toyotaofnorthcharlotte]

Toyota of N Charlotte Spilling the Details on The 2024 Toyota Land Cruiser

We haven’t gotten a new Land Cruiser model since 2021, so when Toyota announced the 2024 Toyota Land Cruiser coming out next spring we all got pretty excited. The last Land Cruiser was an 8-seat luxury SUV with a focus on the off-roading capabilities that the vehicle has always been known for. This model was a bit pricey (about $80k) and lacked great fuel efficiency so there are definitely some modifications being made for the new editions. Our N Charlotte team is here to give you all the info we have so far - so let’s get to it!

2024 Toyota Land Cruiser: Features and Performance 

Built on TNGA-F high strength steel global truck platform 

Rear differential that evenly distributes engine power to the rear wheels (providing optimal traction control)

Multi-terrain select with CRAWL control for off-roading on rough terrain

Full-time four-wheel-drive 

6,000 lb towing capacity

MSRP in the $50,000 range

Emphasis on off-roading performance capabilities

i-FORCE MAX turbocharged 2.4L four-cylinder hybrid powertrain with 326 horsepower and 465 lb-ft torque

Seven color options including Ice Cap, Wind Chill Pearl, and Black Meteor Shower

N Charlotte Toyota Will be Getting Three New 2024 Land Cruiser Models!

The Land Cruiser 

Rectangular LED headlights and RIGID LED fog lamps that can switch from white to amber light

18” wheels with 265/70 all-season rubber (or 20” wheels with 265/60 tires)

SofTex leather seats with heated, ventilated, and power adjustments

New High-tech 12.3-inch multimedia touch screen system with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto

Premium package available - adding leather seats, 14-speaker JBL sound system, head-up display, digital rearview mirror, and sunroof

The Land Cruiser 1958

18” wheels (245/70 all-season tires)

Round LED headlights, LED fog lamps

8-inch multimedia touch screen system with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto

Manually adjustable fabric heated seats and steering wheel

Rear locking differential and CRAWL control 

2400-watt AC inverter for off-roading accessories

The Land Cruiser First Edition

Round heritage LED headlamps

Roof rack and rock rails

Exclusive interior design - only 5,000 units will be produced for North America

New high-tech 12.3-inch multimedia touch screen system with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto

Two-toned paint exterior options

Mud flaps behind the wheels, rear door guard, and a tailgate light 

Toyota of N Charlotte Will Keep You Updated on the 2024 Toyota Land Cruiser!

There are still more details to come on the 2024 Toyota Land Cruiser! Follow us on our social media to learn more as we anxiously await its arrival in N Charlotte. You can find us at 13429 Statesville Road. Take exit 23 off I-77 in Huntersville.

[toyotaofclermont]

The 2024 Toyota Land Cruiser is Coming to Toyota of Clermont Next Spring! Here’s What We Know.

Yep, the Toyota Land Cruiser is making a triumphant return to the road and our Clermont dealership! This is great news for off-roading enthusiasts, as well as anyone who felt like the 2021 luxury SUV model of this vehicle didn’t fit their lifestyle. The 2024 Toyota Land Cruiser is going to be smaller, more capable, and more affordable than its predecessor. Let us walk you through the details! 

Let’s Get Into the 2024 Toyota Land Cruiser Performance and Features

MSRP around $50,000 range

Emphasis on off-roading performance capabilities

i-FORCE MAX turbocharged 2.4L four-cylinder hybrid powertrain with 326 horsepower and 465 lb-ft torque

Seven color options including Ice Cap, Wind Chill Pearl, and Black Meteor Shower

Built on TNGA-F global truck platform (made from high-strength steel) 

Rear differential to evenly distribute engine power to the rear wheels for optimal traction control

Multi-terrain select with CRAWL control for rocky terrain

Full-time four-wheel-drive 

Towing capacity of 6,000 lb

Three New 2024 Land Cruiser Models 

We’ll be getting three different versions of the 2024 Toyota Land Cruiser, so our Clermont experts are here to give you the rundown on each one. 

The Land Cruiser 1958

Round LED headlights, LED fog lamps, and 18” wheels (245/70 all-season tires)

Manually adjustable fabric heated seats and steering wheel

8-inch multimedia touch screen system with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto

Rear locking differential, CRAWL control, and 2400-watt AC inverter for off-roading accessories

The Land Cruiser 

18” wheels with 265/70 all-season rubber (or 20” wheels with 265/60 tires)

Rectangular LED headlights and RIGID LED fog lamps that can switch from white to amber light

High-tech 12.3-inch multimedia touch screen system with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto

SofTex leather seats with heated, ventilated, and power adjustments

Premium package adding leather seats, 14-speaker JBL sound system, head-up display, digital rearview mirror, and sunroof

The Land Cruiser First Edition

New high-tech 12.3-inch multimedia touch screen system with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto

Round heritage LED headlamps, roof rack, rock rails, and exclusive interior design (only producing 5,000 units for North America)

Two-toned paint exterior options

Mud flaps behind the wheels, rear door guard, and a tailgate light 

Can’t Wait for the 2024 Toyota Land Cruiser? Follow Along with Clermont Toyota for More Details!

We still don’t know everything about the 2024 Toyota Land Cruiser at Toyota of Clermont just yet. Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok for updates on its arrival, pricing, etc. Give us a call at (352) 404-7000 to get more information! We’re located just off the Florida Turnpike at 16851 State Road 50, Clermont, FL, 34711. 

[bilbobagginsomebabez]

i'm glad you're confident in your decision.

I think i added a few bits of confusion though. I haven't actually played the game, I was going off of reviews on apple and android. i don't know what the gameplay is like. i was mistaken about the stim aspect. the issues with measuring focus and the application of a sort of transitory relationship between being able to focus on the game and being able to focus on other tasks in real life are the problem.

far transfer also wouldn't appear in their marketing and medical research, it's a concept from educational psychology (the study of how people learn, change, and gain skills), not medical. transfer is when you learn a skill in one place and apply it somewhere else. far transfer is the academic term for that kind of implied causation of "learn one skill once and use it everywhere forever" thing that "focus in game = focus everywhere else" is marketing. it sort of happens sometimes, but we don't know why or how and we aren't sure it isn't combinations of multiple instances of one of the other two types of transfer that are well-studied and understood-can't remember the names right now and can't ask as the partner is snoring next to me. might just be direct and indirect. anyway that's why it's so controversial.

like, far transfer isn't like a mr. miyagi thing. mr. miyagi was directly forcing whathisface to learn kung-fu muscle memory with everyday tasks. that's actually one of the types of transfer--the direct one. the exact same thing applied somewhere else in the exact same way and bingo! applied skill. the less direct one is conceptual and lateral. the core of the thing remains the same but the application changes.

the game is marketing far transfer because "focus" is a million different skills in different situations. "focusing" in one situation may mean keeping quiet, mentally organizing concepts, and taking notes, while "focusing" in another context may be speaking loudly and with purpose while recalling memorized text. very much not the same thing as mentally organizing concepts as they're introduced and still not the same thing as focusing on a dexterity-based task and mastering those skills doesn't help with executive function, which is the inability to activate skills that you already possess. "focusing" represents many different things that require different skills based on the social context.

maybe the game is just trying to train you to endure higher levels of frustration before switching to a new task. that would make sense as an indirectly transferred skill. but not focus

[ID: Two line graphs from the ADHD phone app EndeavorOTC, showing my "focus score" over time. The first graphic shows me starting on October 7th with a score of 36, which rises steadily to a score of 59 on October 20th. The second shows my latest scores, from November 14th to today, December 5th, showing several scores of 63 and 64 but nothing higher.]

It really has been hard to know whether EndeavorOTC is having a solid impact on my focus, or whether it would be lasting if I stopped playing. The initial spike to 59 is nice but also it's in keeping with a skills improvement as you just...learn to play a video game. Since October 23, my scores have been between 61 and 64, and while that does include a recommended a two-week break, it's still a little frustrating not to be able to crack 65, to see such a visible plateau basically "since getting good at the game".

Skills plateaus are natural and I know that, so I'm not necessarily disappointed or disillusioned. As a metric, the Focus Score really just measures how good you are at hitting goals in the game; because ADHD is perception-based it's also tough to measure, outside of the game, if I'm more focused, have better executive function, etc. Especially since the company can be vague about what "improvements" we're meant to see. Which I also understand -- specificity would drive a placebo effect in addition to frustrating people who aren't mapping onto their specific trajectory. But it's still a struggle.

I don't need my headphones as often in public, or audio in general for tasks as often (I did the dishes the other day without a podcast for the first time in probably a solid decade) but that could also be medication, or just...getting older and more tolerant. I think I'm socially more inhibited, which I should note is a good thing -- I'm less likely to interrupt or backtrack to previous conversations or accidentally dominate a conversation. But again, I don't know exactly where that's coming from.

I keep telling myself I already paid for the year so I shouldn't really try to seriously assess any of this until I've been "treating" with the game for a year, which will be another four six-week treatments after this one. That does take some pressure off because the game's already paid for through October and it's only 25 minutes a day, so whether it works or not I might as well keep going.

But patience is something I am still learning, it appears. :D