Does that also support videos? JXL was made by google but now it’s removed from chrome so I don’t think it’s making a comeback.

That’s on the platform, your anger is misdirected at the format.

They lose no customers by including it. They lose some by omitting it.

So it boils down to being too expensive to include? Hardly!

You evaluate prior decisions with posterior data. But you fail to take into account the counterfactuals. How do you know how much the FP4 would have sold with a jack?

Claiming that an increase in sales validates the goodness of the decision is not causal.

It is the same logic that would tell you that playing russian roulette is worthwile in case you win and get some reward. That’s backwards rationalization, fitting a narrative.

If market research universally showed that people don’t care about a jack then why do some phones still have it? Are these manufacturers going against the grain? Surely they wouldn’t leave money on the table if it worked like that.

The justification of “they do what sells units” is backwards. It would imply that no product would ever flop. But products regularly do. There is no telling in advance how it will perform, and saying otherwise is falling prey to the problem of induction, whether past observarions justify predictions.

The FP4 could have broke sales records for a multitude of reasons. How can you say which factor caused it when there is only one scenario that played out? We don’t have alternative universes to compare, where they released one with a jack, or another with some other altered specs.

Are we forgetting that companies also have their own bias to make the decisions that increase overall profits? They lost buyers (me included) by this change, but they made up the difference by selling higher margin accessories. Companies will only cater to users if it aligns with turning a bigger profit. If adding an anti-feature is better for the bottom line, then that’s how it goes. Enshittification doesn’t happen accidentally, but by pushing the boundaries of what the users tolerate.

I made the mistake of believing that Fairphone is an enthusiast company, like the Framework of phones maybe. There is some overlap, sure, with the repair-ability aspect and available parts and schematics, but that’s about it.

Other than that, FP wants to be a mainstream brand, the eco-friendly Samsung or Apple; the power users can get shafted with their audio jacks for all they care. While Framework has actual hardware modularity and release updated HW modules so you don’t buy the whole device again for an upgrade.

Looking at FP’s financial statements, I get the impression they aren’t doing too hot lately, so I get it if they need bigger margins to continue operating. Just don’t be a fucking hypocrite and lie about the reason of the jack removal ffs.

How is that a bad thing?

I have to buy them? Every replaceable and repairable stuff is manufactured and has an impact.

About 90% of other brands you can throw them away if the battery goes bad or they break.

I don’t have any of those, for related reasons. The best one can do is to consume less and less often.

Buying a USB-C-2-Jack dongle or BT headset is anything but eco-friendly. It goes straight against the whole brand if you need to buy new stuff in addition to make it work.

Are you a murican? Cuz you really sound like USA is your whole world.

I’m saying it is very hypocritical and goes against their brand. If they simply came out and said: Look guys making phones sustainably cost too much, we need to sell higher margin items like dongles, BT earbuds and cases to have enough cashflow to continue manufacturing and R&D.

Ok, fair enough. I would say.

But trying to justify and greenwashing the whole ordeal is insulting. The tactic is straight out of Apple’s “Think different” book. Paying more for reduced functionality. Only for them to sell you more accessories for even more money.

I guess, I will find out when the need arises. Hasn’t happened in 4.5 years yet.

And an attack on his character is of zero relevance to the topic of Fairphone and jack ports.

Of course they are going to offer dongles too! The profit margins are way better on those. Fuck what the users want, we want money!

Louis Rossman on the topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRdL0StldJM

Very strange how mine can somehow fit a 7000mAh battery, dual SIM + SD card slot and a regular jack. Hmm…

All I needed to know was when they released their BT earbuds just when the jack port got removed to figure out where their priorities are.

I’m stealing signal shaped noise.

A modern high-end BMW can have over a hundred separate ECUs (microcontrollers). All communicating over multiple CAN and FlexRay networks. The complexity is mind boggling, just so you can have subscription based seat heating and other nonsense.

No technician on Earth will be able to debug this black box spaghetti except the manufacturer. If you try to access/reprogram one of these chips (as you should be able as you OWN the damn thing), the microcontroller has OTP (one time programmable) memory that ensures the device can physically brick itself should you try.

The adults: I learned to live with it and now it became part of my identity

The kids: this sucks! everyone’s mean to me and the world makes no sense!

Nvidia RTX: what are matte surfaces?

New road I vengence

We should come up with edible dishes. Edible plates, edible glasses, edible cutlery etc.

I haven’t used those. But KDE Plasma is also similar, so I guess, yes.