there’s a lot of valid stuff in here, particularly the expandable storage part. i was wrong there, i distinctly remember being frustrated at the offset because of media i’d read describing the opposite. i should’ve double checked that, thanks for calling me out on that.
i still think the issue with the updates is a major concern. when a person hears that they’re receiving 7 years of updates, they expect to be receiving updates in a timely fashion and to receive as many as those updates as possible.
i think throughout many of your points here you’re creating plausible deniability for fairphone in their marketing, which is in line with what you said at the end. i promise you, people are not doing this extensive research like you are. chances are, they watch an MKBHD video about the phone and then decide because of a lack of tech literacy. that’s not necessarily a bad thing, people follow different paths in life and have different interests. i couldn’t tell you anything about the technology of the door and hinges i just installed in my bedroom. but a person is entitled to be made aware of all of these asterisks and i feel like that discussion is not happening enough.
to imply that fairphone technically accomplishes their promises, and technically that this is okay because it’s what the industry does, simply isn’t good enough for me. if this marketing was pushed in another direction, as in to say “we can’t give you the service of other phones at an equal price point. we do our best to get you the best hardware as we can, but that comes with limitations, and we try our best to mitigate this with software, but we’re only a small team so these updates and patches come out very late” then that gives another image. but they don’t, they use catchy slogans even on their website like “Reliable, secure and ready to do business. The perfect match for your company’s values”. i feel like doing research into all of the drop-downs in their website will give you a different impression because you find some more honesty there, but i hope we agree that the reason these things are not mentioned/inferred on the front page is because they know it isn’t as pretty, and the average person who ‘just wants a phone’, and lives a more ethical life, won’t be pursuing that.
i think that any individual point that i reply to will wrap back around to the misleading marketing anyway and i don’t want to create a post where i just make the same point 15 times (to an extent i feel i already may have), i dont think anyone would want to read that. the main point being that you have a level of tech literacy that allows you to research the specifics of these caveats but a normal person simply does not understand and does not want to. these people who are buying a device that is worse than alternatives at a similar price point, understanding that the tax they’re paying is for their ethical values, deserve to have a better understanding of what they’re getting into. deliberately avoiding this is a big concern to me.
i can understand if my post came off overly negative, i also replied to my own thread on the linked post saying that we shouldn’t make good the enemy of perfect, and that when a person understands all these things, if the fairphone still fits your needs then it’s a great option. i have a bitter taste in my mouth from the way that fairphone handles marketing, especially when they adopt the moniker of Ethical and Sustainable. and i want to share some of these potential concerns with people who may be less tech literate.
there’s a good chance we simply disagree here on the importance of this, and that’s fine. i think we will and that’s why i opened this with “there’s a lot of valid stuff here” because i understand this isn’t where everyone draws their line in the sand. i hope other readers can see this discussion and understand where their priorities lie. or at the very least, make a more educated purchase.