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Comment by NonNefarious | Hacker News Reader

Ah, the fraud of Android: the great "open-source" OS that was going to free us all from vendor and telco tyranny.

Instead, users wait months, years, or forever their telco to dribble out a hacked, proprietary version of Android for every model of phone, one at a time.

It's incredible that an OS created in modern times lacks a proper hardware-abstraction layer and driver model, which would allow users to install an updated version of it on they day of release... without breaking all the crapware that vendors have laden it with.

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As far as I ever understood, the point of Android wasn't to help users as much as developers: it took a fragmented ecosystem of custom platforms and united them behind a single development SDK; which, post-iPhone App Store, became an easy sell to manufacturers for adoption as the iPhone started getting all of these new sort-of-features while their platforms stagnated due to their small-percentage marketshare making it not worth writing an app for them at all. Remember: the original Android G-1 was a locked-down device that we were only able to install custom core software on due to jailbreaks.

What do telcos have to do with any of this? The only piece of software that has anything to do with my telco is running on the SIM. They do not and, as far as I know, can not load software on my device, let alone control something OS-level like software updates

In the US carriers do affect the update process for carrier locked phones. I'm sure there are other places where similar practices take place.

huh, I've never seen something like that in the EU, except on early Samsung and HTC smartphones. These days you get completely standard Android even when buying on contract

I have. One of my previous phones was Vodaphone-unlocked so I could use it with my carrier BUT it displayed the vodaphone logo on boot/shutdown

> When you'll get Android updates

> Update schedules vary by device, manufacturer, and mobile carrier.

> If you have a Pixel phone, learn when you’ll get updates.

> If you have another Android device, contact your manufacturer or carrier for info.[1]

[1] https://support.google.com/android/answer/7680439?hl=en

A lot of US carriers provide the OS updates with branding and junkware rather than the device manufacturer.

Also for others concerned about privacy, your carrier can push applets onto the SIM card itself which can do a lot. Malicious actors in the past have exploited devices via applets such as Simjacker and WIBattack

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