reading the sibling comments... the current state of smartphone software is absolutely disgusting. Great were the days of the PC, where you could just install any OS, could make and restore backups of the whole disk. With smartphones now you have to beg the manufacturer of a device you paid money for just to maybe be allowed to install a different OS. It is sad that so many people supported this shit in the past and still do.
This. I really like the idea of a pocket supercomputer like modern smartphone hardware. But I despise the software ecosystems that apple and google have built for them, with constant surveillance, lock-in, ads, tracking, horrible UIs and centralization.
True. I like the analogy. The sad thing is that this is purely a software limitation. The hardware would be capable of so much more, it is more powerful than desktop computers of just a couple of years ago.
for the way I use computers these days, it could very easily replace my laptop with a proper monitor and docking solution (but not my tower server/gaming machine)
yeah mine was a way to build anxiety via doom scrolling and downloading time wasting games. When I'm on a laptop/desktop, I'm usually actually working or killing time, but since I don't have one with me at all times, it's much easier to limit time wastage.
this is a simple problem. Google is doing weird stuff, not replying to your questions - clearly not something you want to have a relationship with. So move away from google, cancel your card, problem solved.
'simple' in that the solution is obvious.
If this obvious solution is unrealistic for you, then you have made yourself too dependent on google, or are just unwilling to solve the problem. In both cases just stop whining.
for me, one of the best games is Andor's Trail. Magnificent map making, funny dialogue, tons of content. It is not finished yet, but has been a lot of fun to play for years.
Even when chrome was new, it was known that it included heavy tracking by google. I briefly checked out iron back in the day, a chromium version without google tracking. But I realised that even just opening the settings resulted in requests to google (for some spelling library if I remember correctly). So obviously it was difficult to remove all the tracking, and it was clear that it would be difficult to keep removing it in all versions.
Also it was clear already back then that google would try to capture as much of the browser market as possible, to control the browser, many online services, and just get the power to do whatever it wants. Now they are pushing hard for DRM in the browser, to take power away from the user.
Firefox is definitely not perfect, but back in 2008 it was obvious that we, the users, should not support chrome. So I stayed with firefox, and don't need to swtich back now.
This, exactly this!
Spending money on DRM is supporting DRM, even when stripping it afterwards.
Not too long ago I heard about some fantasy series that I really wanted to read. It wasn't available as DRMfree e-book, so I got the paper books second hand. Reading them reminded me again how much nicer e-books are, especially when travelling.
I have since gotten recommendations for two more fantasy series which appear very interesting. Again, no DRMfree e-book available. This time I decided I will just not read them.
Imagine how quickly we could get rid of all DRM if everybody simply stopped buying DRM! The world would be so much better! To me it feels like a moral obligation to not support any kind of DRM.
Luckily there are plenty of authors and distributors who support DRMfree books, games, audio. Let's make the world a better place, for ourselves and for the next generations, by simply refusing DRM!
google has one of the worst spam filters. It can be done much better, and google could do it much better.
But I suppose they are just big enough now. Can't reach your contacts that use google? Well, just sign up to google as well, then you can reach them.
People like you are the reason google can behave like that.
funny how they are at 7 already. Maybe they can finally release versions 5 and 6 without DRM? I would pay for them, as I had a lot of fun with 1-4. But I never considered going to DRM darkness for 5 or 6
Your gaming setup sounds similar to mine, but more sophisticated. I also have an offline win7 gaming PC. Unfortunately many games still require windows, but for some it is possible already to play on Linux. And it is just too much effort for me to keep a windows installation reasonably secure, to prevent games from phoning home. So offline it is.
To install games, I put the game installer (in most cases bought from gog) on a USB storage device. This doesn't happen too often, I don't have as much time for gaming as I would like to.
Like the sibling comment, I too would be interested in more details about your setup
