I’m almost done weaning myself from Apple. Now I’m not going to bash on them too much, they make top notch hardware and software. And for years I enjoyed MacOS’ flavor of Unix which was close to the servers I admin’d. But… they’ve been adding things for 20 years now, and it’s gotten to be tiring dealing with the ensuing bloat. What was said about the iPhone originally was that it was so simple babies could use it. Today though I dread using one because I somehow always end up touching it wrong and it does a weird thing. There are just too many swipes, special areas, taps and pressures which were introduced. I can’t doomscroll on the toilet if I keep opening the camera without meaning to.
The “many wrong ways of touching it” problem only applies to iOS. But notifications are broken throughout the ecosystem. Once again, accumulated bloat is the issue. I simply will never be able to find a happy arrangement of permutations between system notification settings, an app’s own settings, Focus, Screen time, Emergency, VIP contacts, Handoff. All of which interact with each other and end up beeping when I don’t want, and remaining silent when I do.
Calling is broken, I can’t seem to talk to people on the phone anymore. Is it wifi calling? Facetime hijack? roaming? Handoff? I flip switches, stuff happens, sometimes it helps, for a time. Talking with anyone inevitably requires an awkward back & forth trying the call with various random apps/buttons until one of them works properly.
A few months ago I replaced the iPad with a reMarkable tablet. It’s comparing apples to oranges really, but with my wanting to adjust habits, it works as a drop-in replacement. It’s amazing the different feeling with which I pick up the reMarkable. I had accustomed to the dread I pick up an Apple device with. I know it’s going to want something from me, that my just wanting to do X will come with a cost. How about an update? How about a review? Explore the new features from the update we annoyed you into installing. Agree to our new 300 page EULA, better have your lawyer present. iCloud is full! full of what I don’t know I never enabled it, but it is! I just wanted to do a quick thing… Tech today really has a way of derailing you from your initial purpose. They know they got you when you engage, and they’re going to milk it. The reMarkable I pick up without this sense of dread, I know the path to my intended activity will be free of obtrusion. It has far less features, and it’s carefully designed to not get in the way. Therein lies the relief.
On the laptop front, I experimented with an old laptop on Ubuntu & Debian for a few months to see if it was even reasonable to use Linux for work. It is, Slack & Zoom have deb packages, VPN worked, all the dev tools are intimate with Linux, it wasn’t going to be a hair pulling experience. So I replaced the Macbook with a Framework Laptop. A few years ago I would have picked Ubuntu without giving it a second thought, but Debian’s just leaner and today that’s what I crave. The hardware is not as polished, I don’t think you can find more polished than Apple anyway. I love the thing regardless. I also pick it up without the apprehension that it’s going to make me pay an attention toll for using it.
Linux is great, I never should have gotten tempted away from it but these early Apple devices were sexy. Both my laptop & tablet now run Linux, I can SSH into them and do custom things. Which with AI is all the more possible, for example I don’t need to spend days figuring out Framework’s keyboard firmware to do the cool thing I’m after (more to come on this).
Again, I don’t mean to disparage Apple too much, a lot of the ills I describe here are present in tech at large. I got tired of all the superfluous things, 20 years of adding features to have something new to sell is a lot. The time is ripe to say sayonara. I’m also disgusted by the way big corporations are bending the knee to authoritarianism. Something broke in me seeing Tim Cook present a golden trophy to the orange president. If organizations with infinite money don’t say “no” to jingoistic demands for fear of making a little less money, they will no doubt sell out on other fronts. I remember a time when Apple took principled stands against previous administrations. Gone are the days, now they’ll gladly rename whatever the senile demagogue sharpies over. All in the name of appeasement for money, as I don’t believe they buy into the ideas. Windows was never an option, I was seeing Robin deal with it on his gaming rig and it’s appalling how much they treat their paying customers like pieces of shit piñatas. Thanks to Steam’s newly created competition, a ton of games now run on Linux, and it’s made easy with https://bazzite.gg/. So he hopped off the Windows shit train thanks to a friend convincing and helping him to. All the kid wants to do is game a little, give him a break from Norton and the latest news outrage for god’s sake. Microsoft when will you stop reaching for our wallets with one hand and forcing our eyeballs to monetized content with the other? I still haven’t swallowed how you got a whole generation of kids used to in-games currencies and purchases when you tainted Minecraft with your filth. You morally compromised greedy goblins. In the end, maybe my exodus has a lot to do with big tech’s propensity for setting aside principles in favor of cupidity.
It remains to be seen what will replace the phone. I’m encouraged to see a resurgence of “dumb” alternatives with many between dumb and smart. I need to think about this one a little harder, I do like having a camera handy, some mapping is useful, tethering too. One thing I know is that it won’t be so obnoxiously big that I fear shattering it in my pocket when I do anything but stand upright.
2 down, 1 to go.
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