The scandal from 20 years ago, instigated if I recall correctly by a CD manufacturer ran by BMG (that Sony had a 50% stake in)? Sony-BMG hasn’t existed in almost 2 decades dude.

Additionally, Sony Mobile is pretty open source friendly. Despite them being a tiny player in the smartphone market, they’ve contributed more to AOSP than any corporation outside of Google. They allow bootloader unlocks, they do prompt releases of kernel source code, and they even release bootable AOSP ROMS for their devices.

I won’t certainly excuse the rootkit scandal that Sony was semi involved in, but it’s crazy that people still clutch pearls about it 20 years later, while simultaneously happily signing into Steam and downloading games with kernel-level anticheat.

They do it everywhere. It’s just pretentious nonsense.

The only reason Pebble has come back is that Google agreed to open source the software after the original pebble founder pleaded with them.

This is probably a cheap “thank you” for that.

Pebble in its current state is absolutely not a big tech megacorp lol

In London, yeah probably.

In a wetherspoons in the north east? You could get 8 pints for that, if you’re down for some cask ales.

Haven’t had an Xperia for a while, but I always really liked them.

It feels strange that the Xperia 5 V hasn’t had a successor yet.

The one child policy and the nightmare that will cause is not just a social policy.

And yes, China’s infrastructure is very very impressive, however it’s also true that when everything has been built in the past 30 years, it’s inevitably going to be a lot more efficient and modern than a country that has a lot of legacy baggage. A prime example of that is probably the UK, who are still trying to keep Victorian-era rail infrastructure working. Tearing out old stuff and replacing it is time consuming, complex, and expensive.

I don’t use YouTube as a music source, but that’s a cool addition for others regardless

The nexus mods app is native. You’re thinking of Vortex, their old one.

Android is far less open than it has ever been.

Sony got a lot of shit for making their phones skinnier and 21:9 but I honestly think it was great

The screen being less wide meant typing one handed was easier, and I frequently have my apps split one on top and one below

If only their phones weren’t so bloody expensive upon release. It’s always the same with them. Good phones that cost way too much, they get panned in reviews for it, then 3-5 months later they drop the prices because people aren’t buying at the full price… but by that point the reviews are already out there and public opinions are set! So stupid!

It isn’t. And the only source in the article is that a far-right conspiracy theory site said they’re considering it.

after reports in Guido Fawkes suggested it was possible.

That’s the only source? A far-right conspiracy website?

In fairness, what better place is there for Substack users to see it and consider leaving the platform?

It’s all well and good being oh so principled like you’re making yourself out to be, but phones are expensive, and the above user is being completely rational for wanting to settle on a Pixel 9a for $250, especially when the other OEMs have plenty of their own problems.

Get off your moral high horse.

Live and let live is pretty much the antithesis of organised religion

I’m a very vocal critic of LLMs, I think they’re so overhyped and overused it’s hard to believe.

But I’m also getting really tired of people purposely putting extreme effort into tricking the LLM into saying something harmful if someone were to follow it blindly, just so they can make a clickbait headline out of it.

And what the hell is up with the major “ChatGPT is Satanist [if you instruct it to be]” angle? Are we really doing the Satanist moral panic again?

ffs, criticise OpenAI for being closed af, being wasteful, being strong political lobbyists, for stealing work, etc. You don’t need to push disingenuous stuff like this.

Oh look, one of Lemmy’s many resident tankies.

Nazi gold didn’t disappear after the Nazis fell. They still pocketed it all, despite knowing where all that wealth came from, and did fuck all to help rebuild Europe.

Other things like their appeasing attitude towards Russia, reluctance to allow weapons exports to Ukraine, and willingness to export weapons to awful regimes are all unambiguously current.

You’ve not heard of shady banking, Nazi gold, reluctance to stop dealing with Russia, women not being able to vote until the 70s, and Nestle?

Switzerland gets aggressively simped for online, and there’s certainly some nice things about them, but there’s also some pretty awful things.

Graphene won’t magically fix your dud battery.