cross-posted from: https://piefed.social/c/hardware/p/2144337/commodore-announces-linux-based-flip-phone-with-no-social-media-no-browser-the-callback
Linux-based phone still ‘runs 99% of Android apps’ so you can do more with it, if you wish.
499? hahahhaa
how affordable of them [̲̅$̲̅(̲̅ ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°̲̅)̲̅$̲̅]
That’s a stupid price, one of the main things of brick/flip phones is their low price, HMD feature phones range from about £20 to £70, some new google pixels can go for about this price, so getting something with the price of a smartphone with a fraction of the features sounds scummy.
How could this idea come to mind… Surely that’s great, but who in the team said “Give me a price! 500!! Approved!”
It’s like that era of putting pink ribbons on everything for breast cancer that also signaled you were a supporter of women. Commercialized activism. Be real. This will sell very little. We’ll get some news articles about how it’s trending with Gen z that are rejecting technology and always online culture. It’ll actually only be a small amount of Gen z but you know blogspam going to blogspam.
It’s a crappy product. We need a Linux phone that would actually be a halo product for people to not feel like they’re ripping themselves off to get away from Google and Apple
500$? and they used to make one of the cheapest computers on the market
I’d be surprised if that’s the same company in anything but name after all these years.
There’s no relationship to the original company.
Not entirely true there are members of the original team
So happy with my 2nd hand Pixel 8. No BS, ecologically acceptable IMHO and yes runs most Android apps thanks to GrapheneOS.
They lost me at $499. A phone that is just a phone should be about a hundred bucks max. I didn’t read the article though. Maybe it’s still very computery.
Small production run + half-decent internals probably accounts for a lot of the price.
Having experimented with $100 underpowesed flip phone on KaiOS, lack of apps was a real problem. What (some) people want is the slight inconvenience of a T9 keyboard and an annoyingly small screen to help them limit their screen time, but they still want full functionality of all their apps.
as someone who has been using t9 phones for the last 3-4 years, the tough part is will the software and keys even be good on this. you just don’t know till you use it. It’s true, having an underpowered phone sucks ( I’m using the Sonim X320 now which I believe has 4GB of ram, and it’s soooo nice compared to the Cat S22 Flip ). But a lot of issues on my previous phones (prev mentioned Cat, then the Qin F25) was mostly the software not working well with buttons or the screen size. The sonim I have now works well because the stock apps a designed for the hard ware. $450 or whatever is still too much, but if it covers all the bands and use usable, at least it’s an option.
I know some people who would actually kill for a physical T9 keyboard so they could touch-type. It’s not my cup of tea, but I can definitely see it being a major draw for people who grew up texting on a real flip phone.
Just found out about the Twiddler 4–a single-handheld bluetooth keyboard. too damn expensive at over $200, but something I’d definitely try otherwise.
I thought it woud suck, but with the touch typing + consistent dictionary guessing, it’s really on par with the random chaos of a touchscreen keyboard.
Will make a great match to my T1 device.
WhatsApp isn’t a social media app?
It’s a messaging/chat app, closer to social networking than socual media.
I wouldn’t really class it as such, its just fancy texting for the majority of users
Yeah I use it for that, I don’t use channels or stories etc. Would be nice if I could convince more people to signal.
As a non user, fair enough.
Maybe because it’s owned by Meta?
there is android flip phones actualy?
Look, I love the idea of a Linux phone.
But $500 and it manages my temptations for me? Fuck no.
The whole point of Linux is freedom.
Enough behavior shaping.
Social media is humans being social through media, I am sick and tired of it being categorically villainized especially because the scientific evidence for it being inherently bad is laughable.
No browser is wild. And what does that even mean here? You have to run everything by app now? That sounds like ass.
What is the point of it being linux if it just runs “99% of android apps” but no browser?
To say that social media is just people socializing through media is rather like saying that newspapers are just news on paper.
In both cases it ignores the deliberate, pervasive, and frequently toxic efforts of the platform curators to maximize “engagement” with their audience in pursuit of ad revenue.
When I socialize with people offline, it looks almost nothing like modern social media “services”.
In both cases it ignores the deliberate, pervasive, and frequently toxic efforts of the platform curators to maximize “engagement” with their audience in pursuit of ad revenue.
We are on social media right now, this is not inherent to social media it is a choice forced on it by corporations.
Yeh right, i already don’t use social media on my phone, skill issue
Great initiative but at this price it’s just a scam srlsy…
My sentiments exactly. They’re charging $499 for $5-100 worth of hardware.
This is the “snakes on a plane” of phones.
That is the price if you ship million of units. Realistically, how many units can ship this? 10k? 20k?
Once you consider the price of the plastic shell molds (custom), the custom keypad, the custom motherboard, the custom assembly line, this price is almost cheap.
I wouldn’t even consider a purchase even at a third of the price, but it was a scam if they simply put a sticker on some Alibaba clamshell with stock android, instead here they even partnered with Jolla to have sailfish is as base with the android emulator. That’s much more expensive than just slapping android aosp with a minimal launcher and calling it a day
Jolla phone and that is with much better specs
I would expect to pay $50 for a modern flip phone with hardware comparable to one from 20y ago. But this is running Sailfish OS, has a decent SoC, camera, DAC, and up to 64GB of RAM. This ain’t your grandma’s flip phone.
Not sure if it’s me or you misreading this, but I believe when it says 4GB/64GB it’s one model, 4GB of RAM and 64GB internal storage. 64GB of RAM at a form factor to fit in a phone that small is currently outwith our technological capacity surely
Ah yeah, I misread that. I agree $500 is high for what it is, but it’s also kind of a novelty device that they’ll surely only make a relatively small number of to guage interest. The industry has shifted all of its manufacturing away from making flip phones cheap.
Nostalgia sells
People pay over $1k for a phone. Now that is a scam.
But those phones are mini computers, some of which people use as an actual desktop.
or you can get an actual desktop – and even laptops – for less money and a better experience.
Better experience in my pocket tho? Or calling emergency services?
why does your pocket need any experience?
I keep repeating this for a decade. Buy a used old iPhone (like SE) and get a no fancy phone which is mostly fine for that use case.
The price is unfeasible lmao. You could get an old phone for like 50$ used, put lineage on it, don’t install any app or store and be done with it
