0.5% of the starlink node network deorbits each month currently, though potentially more.

They're already having a negative, contaminating effect on our upper atmosphere

Sending up bigger ones, and more (today there's some 8,800, but they target 30k), sounds ill-advised.

1: https://www.fastcompany.com/91419515/starlink-satellites-are... 2: https://www.science.org/content/article/burned-satellites-ar...

However 10 years in Musk time is at least 30 years in real time

Had me going for a minute there.

Poe's Law strikes again!

Why are OEMs like Samsung just letting this happen? A lot of power users who buy flagships will leave for iPhones if Android ceases to be an open platform. (This segment is what is preventing the “green bubbles = poor” narrative from taking over.)

> This segment is what is preventing the “green bubbles = poor” narrative from taking over.

In the US maybe. In Europe, not so much. With Apple having a market share of "only" about one third and WhatsApp being the de facto default messaging app, this discussion never happened here.

Therefore your argument doesn't apply to Europe at all. Android is more than the "hacky" part. Albeit I'd really love to keep that.

whatsapp is a different form of the same malignant cancer, or so the unremovable meta-ai overlay seems to say.

> A lot of power users who buy flagships will leave for iPhones if Android ceases to be an open platform.

99.9% of people who use Android have never, and never will, install apps outside the Play Store, and aren't even aware that they can do so.

You think 50% of the 3.6 billions of android users know that?

There are countries like China, Russia, Iran, and Venezuela where installing an APK is the primary or only way to get most software, including essential bank and government apps.

Outside of the Western market, installing Android apps not from Google Play is a completely normal and regular thing. In countries like India, Brazil, Indonesia, Nigeria, and the Philippines (which represent a massive portion of global Android users) it is a standard part of using a phone.

I have never seen people in the EU talk about the bubble colours. Texting is virtually dead in the EU as I know it, it's all in messaging services.

It's not like they didn't try, but Google illegally smashed them.

> Judgment of the General Court of 14 September 2022 — Google and Alphabet v Commission (Google Android) > > The General Court largely confirms the Commission's decision that Google imposed unlawful restrictions on manufacturers of Android mobile devices and mobile network operators in order to consolidate the dominant position of its search engine

https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/202...

Press release:

https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/202...

Samsung's fought Google on a few different fronts over the years and conceded most of those fights.

why would I leave for IPhones? I want the other direction of freedom.

This would enable/catalyze an order of magnitude more child abuse than anything that can happen on the worst cesspits of the internet.

I don't see how a content blocker would do that.

Now imagine they had a CBDC.

I thought most liberal governments gave up on those.

What do the OEMs have to say about this? A lot of them, including Samsung, have their own app stores. Surely they'd not be willing to cede control?

OEM will of course retain more rights than device owner as it's always the case on android

Samsung's store contains virtually no original third-party software, anything that's worth installing and is not from Samsung is available on the Play Store.

You know, you have to wonder what they did wrong.

Sure the Play store was dominant when they started their own store. Yet companies tend to have excellent success if they control the OS on the device.

They could have offered no commission for 5 years, or some such.

Does anyone reading this know if the contract they had to sign with Google, to have the Play store pre-installed, reduced their ability to compete?

I mean look at the whole Epic thing. They could have offered them commission free use of the store, and used that to draw users in.

It's like they weren't trying.

They probably weren’t. Samsung does just enough work so that they could feasibly create their own fork of Android in the event of Google trying to fuck them.

The Galaxy store is more of an insurance policy than a real product they expect people to use.

> Samsung does just enough work so that they could feasibly create their own fork of Android in the event of Google trying to fuck them.

This is the right time.

Have you used a Tizen device lately? It's awful for UX, UI, and backend functionality with Smartthings.

soft porn

new funniest satoshi candidate just dropped

It will be unambiguously clear to history (maybe even in a decade) that SCOTUS's decision in TikTok, Inc. v. Garland was the worst ever since Korematsu.