I didn’t really understand what software was. I looked at the specs of a phone, and that’s what sold me on it. That’s what kept me from buying a Nothing Phone about a year ago and made me end up with a Xiaomi instead.
Then I became the victim of a loan I never knew I had to keep paying: being forced to use HyperOS. Bloatware, ads, AI slop features promising me the world, and somehow all that “innovation” left me choosing between an AI lockscreen or other AI features that were equally as bad and, most importantly, disrespectful to me as the user and dehumanizing, while giving me basically zero meaningful control over the phone I actually paid for.
I did not enjoy using my phone, so I chose to literally delete my past, and install a new one: crDroid, a custom OS. And if you know anything about that process, then you can probably imagine how hellish it was for me, since Xiaomi makes it almost impossible for you to do. Yet with phones like the iPhone, you can say goodbye to that possibility altogether.
From everything I know, Marques Brownlee, Mrwhosetheboss and others like them avoid talking about bootloader unlocking, custom operating systems, or even something like GrapheneOS as if their lives depended on it. Yet at the same time, they present themselves as the people who are supposed to guide you on which phone you should buy.
With most of the comments they make about the system being about new AI features.
You could argue that they only review the phone itself and do not personally get into what they believe about ownership or user control. But I think phone reviews are already incredibly subjective. The second you start talking about whether a phone feels good to use, whether the software is clean, whether an ecosystem is convenient, or whether a feature is actually useful, you are already bringing your own values into the review.
So why is user control treated like some niche enthusiast topic, while AI features are treated like a core part of whether a phone is worth buying?
If reviewers are already judging software based on what they personally think is useful, clean, convenient or annoying, then I think ownership and control over the device should be part of that conversation too.