Thanks republicans, very pro consumer, very cool.
Who didn’t need this in their life? I’m so glad the CFPB has also been disemboweled.
It isn’t a gun or a fetus so they don’t care.
You just made me think of this, has anyone slapped a cell modem onto a gun yet? That sounds like something that would happen here
That may lead to FaaS, though, Firearms as a Subscription.
I saw ‘FaaS’ and immediately thought Freedom as a Service, which is exactly the tagline such a service would have
Not a bad idea
Anything as a Subscription is a bad idea, honestly.
They’ll be so happy to tell you how it’s actually your fault for voting for democrats and you better believe them OR ELSE.
(Still applies if you didn’t vote for democrats or even if you aren’t American)
Not sure why anyone is still using Verizon.
US Mobile has access to their networks and it’s cheaper. Same service. Been with USM for nearly 2 years now. My parents and siblings all switched over too. Moved our numbers over with zero issues.
Verizon not in your area? Cool, USM also has access to T-Mobile and ATT.
People need to learn to shop around, especially in the current economy we’re in.
Imagine buying a PC and you can only use it with Comcast or att internet for the first year, manufactured trash
Trust me, pc manufacturers and Comcast are imagining this.
There’s a VERY important distinction here.
The ‘unlock’ that they are talking about here is to unlock your phone’s SIM to be able to be used with another carrier’s service.
This does not mean that the bootloader is unlocked and you will not be able to replace the OS. You will still be stuck with Verizon’s spyware-laden release of Android even when you move to a new carrier.
So, buy your devices directly from the manufacturer and make sure that the phone supports the ability to unlock (and re-lock!) the bootloader. If you need a recommendation, get a current generation Pixel and install GrapheneOS or if you won’t give up Google Play and dependent apps, LineageOS.
Yes, this is great advice. I’ve looked into GrapheneOS, and I’ve been wondering if I could use Google play apps at all on it? Is there a way to spoof that service?
Yes, it has a sandboxed Google Play service and the Play Store app that you can enable which let’s you access apps with hard Google dependencies.
If you want to use it as a regular Android phone it works for everything that doesn’t require Google’s hardware attestation (so, no using your phone for NFC credit card payments mostly). This limitation also affects LineageOS.
Awesome! Thank you for this! 🤝
You’re welcome.
The installation is easy too. GrapheneOS has a WebUSB installation process that is basically plugging your unlocked phone into USB, allowing GrapheneOS WebUSB access, and pressing go. It takes maybe 10 minutes. (I went into it expecting manual jailbreak-level difficulty and was very surprised at how easy it was)
Wow, that’s actually crazy! I can’t wait to buy a Pixel 10 Pro Fold and do it. :D
This is stupid. Part of the agreement to allow them to buy a certain spectrum was that they unlocked sims after 60 days.
What’s the point of all this if rules don’t matter?
I jumped in the hot tub with my phone in my pocket last summer and needed a phone and couldn’t really wait for one to ship from a random eBay or swappa seller so I had to go to Best Buy.
They had nothing carrier unlocked that was newer than the 128GB iPhone 15 for $800, refurbished. All else they had was a couple old pixels and galaxies and they weren’t much cheaper.
Policies like impact the poor folks who can’t afford the cash for phones that are unlocked and are stuck paying high monthly service rates.
Not from us and cannot understand why smartphone needs to be bundled with network operators. Those are 2 separate entities and there is no need for one to be dependent on another. You buy a phone you buy a sim.
If you were already planning on using a specific carrier, buying a locked phone is cheaper.
Like for a extremely frugal example:
A Samsung Galaxy A15 is $200, a locked version can be as low as $60. Still the same 5 year security updates (presumably, unless the carrier fucks with it).
But if you were gonna use X carrier from the start, then then it doesn’t cost you extra. You can still use that cheap plan same as if you BYOD. And it used to unlock in 60 days, so before this policy took effect, you could just switch carriers after 2 months.
So if I bought one before that date I am not held to this?
Use swappa.com or some other way to buy unlocked phones and never have to deal with Verizon’s BS again. You can have the service with no phone issues.
