Table of contents:
- 1. Google is tracking you
- 2. Smartphones are crammed with pre-installed applications
- 3. Chaos reigns in system updates
- 4. Android interface changes all the time
- 5. Too much depends on Google services
- 6. Fewer Android components are open source
2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44
It might be time to switch to a different mobile OS.
1. Google is tracking you
Android collects a ton of information about you. If you do not change the default settings for your account, Google receives information about who you call and write SMS messages, what you are looking for, which sites you visit and which applications you install.
The company can easily find out where you are going and where you can go in the future. All this information is extremely useful for advertisers, and Google earns revenue primarily from advertising.
2. Smartphones are crammed with pre-installed applications
Often, smartphone manufacturers and mobile operators can install whatever they want on Android. This helps them make their brand unique. And if you like standard Samsung applications, then you literally have to get hooked on Samsung smartphones.
Pre-installed video services, games, office suites, and other tools can be useful, but often they cannot be removed. They take up precious memory, and sometimes because of this, the device works slower than it could.
3. Chaos reigns in system updates
Sometimes Android updates come out regularly, but more often than not they are a mess. It all depends on the manufacturer of the device, and sometimes even on the operator. And when a major update comes out, it sometimes never gets to most smartphones, since new versions are usually available only for more or less new devices.
Another major problem is the lack of security updates. They do not come out as often as we would like, so even relatively new smartphones remain vulnerabilities that have long been discovered and fixed.
4. Android interface changes all the time
Remember Android Gingerbread? It was this version of the operating system that posed a serious challenge to iOS. In 2011, an Ice Cream Sandwich update was released, which changed the theme and replaced the physical navigation elements with virtual ones.
A few years later, with the release of Android Lollipop, Google introduced a new material design. It is relevant to this day, albeit in a modified form. But later in Android Pie, the company completely got rid of the three virtual buttons at the bottom of the screen, which broke the habits of many users.
Constant change is not a bad thing at all. But because of them, it seems that Android is something still incomplete and, as a result, untrustworthy.
5. Too much depends on Google services
In the early days of the mobile operating system, you downloaded applications from the Android Market, not from Google Play, and visited sites through a standard browser, not through Chrome.
Now an Android smartphone without a bunch of Google apps, for which you definitely need an appropriate account, is something out of the realm of fantasy. And even if you download a program from a third-party developer, it is likely that you will need a Google account to use it.
6. Fewer Android components are open source
When Android first began to evolve, its launcher, browser, maps, and other applications were open source. This allowed third-party developers to modify them as they liked and make them more useful.
Now Google does not allow modification of its services. Therefore, craftsmen have to create applications from scratch or take outdated software as a basis. For example, the calendar in LineageOS - one of the most popular replacements for proprietary Android - looks about the same as in Android KitKat in 2013.
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