It's a sad fact of life that if you want a good phone that will age okay, and be supported for at least a few years with OS/security updates, and will have decent customer support if you run into issues, you're just gonna have to get a phone from one of the big guys.
Making a phone is hard. Every time I see one of these niche phones that tries to appeal to a crowd with offers of "privacy" or "user control" I think it's neat and it would be nice if it was realistic. But it's just gonna be another poorly-supported phone, offered by a small company that doesn't have resources to handle the inevitable complications of selling a smartphone, and where you have the option of being either in:
* Google's privacy nightmare Android ecosystem
* Un-Googled Android where you can't use the Play Store and a bunch of apps you'd want to use don't work
* Some kind of Linux distro for phones that will probably have an even worse app ecosystem than the previous option
> It's a sad fact of life that if you want a good phone that will age okay, and be supported for at least a few years with OS/security updates, and will have decent customer support if you run into issues, you're just gonna have to get a phone from one of the big guys.
This is not true. Librem 5 will have a lifetime support, beating both Google and Apple, because Purism upstreams all their drivers to get the main Linux support [0].
Any app from Debian repositories should work (except possibly problems with the small screen). Many apps are already available [1].
That's the number 1 problem by far. A lot of programs run on it, but that doesn't mean they're usable. Until we start seeing responsive linux apps, the linux smartphone is going to remain a gimmick.
The only people seemingly interested in tackling this problem are Librem and the KDE team (with Plasma Mobile/Kirigami).
>* Some kind of Linux distro for phones that will probably have an even worse app ecosystem than the previous option
I have a pinephone and it's the first phone I've had with what I would consider a decent app ecosystem. All the apps I use on my laptop run on it just fine.
I never needed customer support for a phone and never done any updates (I have not updated my phone for like 3 years, because I know the next update disables call recording).
I'd love a phone with good specs, as many open parts as possible and with all schematics and BOM so I could fix it myself if something goes wrong.
I had the secure enclave in my iPhone 8 fail about 6 months after I bought it. Solution was to spend about half an hour on the phone with Apple while they ran remote diagnostics and then take it to an Apple store 30 minutes drive away. 10 minutes spent with Apple store employee while they ran even more diagnostics resulted in them handing me a replacement phone and I walked out.
The ability to fairly quickly resolve my hardware problem greatly impressed me. I expect I could get a similar level of service with a Samsung device at a non-Samsung retailer, or if I bought the phone originally through a mobile phone operator's storefront and brought it back to the same store for warranty, but there's no promise of that.
For something which is critical to the operation of my life, I have chosen to compromise on some desires and will likely continue to buy iPhones in the future simply because they work fairly well and when they don't I can get it fixed rather easily and with minimal downtime by Apple itself.
I would never give my phone to the support under any circumstances. I just don't trust that they'll handle my data securely and who knows where my phone will land - some subcontractors instead of disposing it could try to refurbish. I've seen cases where someone bought a phone still with someone's data on it.
I look on forums to see what kind of problems people have with a particular phone and if there is nothing serious, then I consider buying it.
If something happens to my phone I destroy it myself and get a new one.
That's a very security minded methodology. But I cannot comfortably afford to throw away a phone which is under warranty when it has a hardware issue.
The Apple store employee made sure to show me they were executing the erase of my phone before I left the table. I had to put in my passcode to initiate the erase.
I think the browser itself gets updates, but I have not updated the OS. I also only visit a handful of websites that I trust.
If I want to "wander off" then I am using Tails on a dedicated computer.
Making a phone is hard. Every time I see one of these niche phones that tries to appeal to a crowd with offers of "privacy" or "user control" I think it's neat and it would be nice if it was realistic. But it's just gonna be another poorly-supported phone, offered by a small company that doesn't have resources to handle the inevitable complications of selling a smartphone, and where you have the option of being either in:
* Google's privacy nightmare Android ecosystem
* Un-Googled Android where you can't use the Play Store and a bunch of apps you'd want to use don't work
* Some kind of Linux distro for phones that will probably have an even worse app ecosystem than the previous option