My family uses MMS for group texting. That’s largely how we communicate. In the US, most plans (at least for everyone in my family) has unlimited texting. I agree with your point (from a previous post) about it being insecure and privacy lacking, and have tried to get others in my family to switch, but they won’t. None of them are tech savvy and get anxiety when they think about doing anything out of the norm on their devices.
I was running /e/ OS for a while, but after an update, could not send MMS messages. I posted on the forums, but no one there had an answer, and the issue was never fixed. I eventually switched back to a Samsung phone with G**gle’s version of Android on it, just so I could participate in my family’s conversations.
You didn’t ask me, but I am using it on 2 Fairphone 3s, and a Fairphone 2 in my family.
It is pretty great, in that you have full Android, but no Google. This mean most Android apps work, and if they have trackers, etc. these wont work as the APIs enabling them are not present or rewritten to function differently.
It is an absolutely viable solution for RIGHT now, but I’ll add that what Purism is doing on the convergence front makes the Librem 5 still totally relevant and important.
I was not aware you were using /e/ os, I have looked at the Fairphone and the /e/ os does look pretty good as it does not come with all the Google issues android does.
How have you found the fairphone? I really like the look of it for many reasons.
If you live in Europe, the Fairphone is a beacon of great for many reasons. The fact that they are still supporting the Fairphone 2 is great evidence of their commitment to product longevity and repair-ability.
If it had a radio that better supported US channels, I would recommend it to all.
It is snappy, plenty of storage, good camera, and well built. You can replace everything by design, to include upgrades (like the new 3+ camera module).
Runs standard Android with Google just fine as well.
I can’t comment on /e/ specifically, but it is based on LineageOS, and in my experience LineageOS is great as long as you have a phone that supports it. I have installed LineageOS on Motorola and Xiaomi phones, and I think that LineageOS is better than what Motorola and Xiaomi install by default and LineageOS has some nice additions that make it better than stock Android in my opinion.
Some of the big points for me, are being able to lock and turn off the screen by double tapping the status bar, and that you can use display and font resolutions not available on stock Android.
One thing I dislike is how /e/ locks their apps in, exactly how Samsung and all the others do. They are pretty much insisting you use an /e/ account to take advantage of their cloud services. If you don’t all of those apps are just taking up space and processor overhead. I really dislike that.
That Fairphone 3 is not yet supported by Lineage OS (which is shame considering this is what /e/ is derived from, and if they were upstreaming, I wouldn’t have this problem) is the only reason I’m using /e/ instead of Lineage.
SMS is still needed for 2 factor authentications. It’s the only standard that covers all smart/feature phones. Banks cannot rely on i.e. WhatsApp as this is not available on all phones.
I switched carriers, got a new phone number, and ported my old phone number over to Google voice, which is linked to the new number on the new carrier. I did this to save money with a lower cost carrier and to make my number more portable so that those who know me will recognize my number when calling from Google Voice. But the phone’s actual number has changed. So it was a shock to me when Duo Mobile to get in to my employer’s network just worked automatically under this new configuration. Duo Mobile must use the phone’s IMEI number. It seemed a bit spooked to me that Duo Mobile knows the actual phone itself and not the phone number.
…