Am I the only one surprised there were even that many in the first place?
I can't believe you've never heard of Zoogle, Bokia, Pamsung, ACKOOO, ACKOOO2², Votorola...
Don’t forget uPhone, GRE, Hawaii, Mulberry, Lentuvo, and Hitsubishi.
Chinese companies love the ACKOOO type names. LPOWERB, SUPERQ, FKPHONE, that kind of thing.
With all the shitbrands on amazon and similar sites I was only half surprised but still 100% more surprised than I should have been.
Most of them were not real manufacturers, but slapping their name on Chinese white brand phones.
The movement for free and open source software has not achieved a world in which most people use only FOSS. But it has achieved a world where there is a lot of diversity in technology, including many Android smartphone brands you haven't heard of.
Were they real or just shit novelty, scams, or rebadges and sister brands of those multi brand companies like BBK?
LG was the shit. Best DAC, first to the multi cam game, clean looks, innovative designs, pristine screens.
I miss my fingerprint reader on the back 😭
Same, but on the Pixel series. The rear scanner was so perfectly placed. My finger fell right onto it and it read so much faster than the stupid in-screen one is.
With the swipe down gesture to notis 😪
V30, V35, V60, they put out world-beating designs without any of the shitware.
But fuck one goat (V20 bootloop)...
The only LG phone I ever had, it just randomly decided to not boot one day. Apparently it was a common issue, and they were not giving any refunds, at least when I asked. I swore off of LG then, and I wouldn't be surprised if many other people did as well.
I think the phone was the LG G4: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/LG_smartphone_bootloop_issues
LG and HTC. The Razor Phone 2 was also pretty cool but didn't sell well so they didn't make a third gen
HTC was truly a pioneer.
My first Android phone and it was amazing. Now I see that they make a "blockchain phone," I hope it’s a fucking joke.
Smartphones have reached a maturity level where upgrades aren't really exciting. Sure there are the usual hardware power upgrades (and even those don't really open up new applications), but in terms of features they're not coming out with anything really novel. Last thing I could think of is bringing back folding which I do find appealing, but not for the cost or the reliability issues.
I want a phone with a built in projector.. and a bigger battery.. and something else I haven't thought of yet.
I miss new features and innovation.
Since we have neither, give me modularization to let me have ^
Phone makers: hmm this isn’t selling. Guess we’ll only make phones that look like and do the exact same things as every other phone.
LG failed because for some stupid reason, they decided to sell 9 million different phones between countries.
We are heading towards a future of Apple, Samsung, and Google, with even the latter two struggling to stay afloat.
And to be fair, Google deserves a lot of the blame for this happening.
Tell me you only live in an American bubble without telling me you live in an American bubble.
Google, sure. But Samsung has more marketshare than Apple.
https://www.counterpointresearch.com/insights/global-smartphone-share/
20% Samsung 17% Apple 12% Xiaomi 10% OPPO 8% Vivo
I'd doubt Samsung will be struggling to stay afloat. They're so diversified they could pick one of their departments to throw money at and just run at a loss in perpetuity, if they felt like it. Apple makes phones, computers, and phone and computers accessories.
Samsung makes phones and computers. And appliances. And chips. And container ships.
And insurance, and healthcare, and construction, etc. They are involved in so many different industries it's almost hard to believe.
Huawei and Honor can both survive purely on domestic sales before you even worry about ROW.
No idea why you think there are only three brands, or why you think the US is the only market that matters (it's fairly obvious you are US based)
Absolutely nothing good came from them ending the Nexus program. I LOVED all the variety in Nexus. The Pixel phones are just shitty iPhone clones with barely better features.
what was their added value despite cutting down price with their poor hw and integration, shitty drivers?
I mean, FairPhone, Librem, PinePhone have real value and strategy, sure not perfect but this Vitamin (real chinese/french mark), LIPOq or VARK chinese knock-off phones, really, what did they expect?
those craps were like throwaway cameras in the 90's.
But I loved my HTC 10. And let's not forget about LG. Also, Sony, Motorola, Nokia are just a shadow of their former selves.
Today your main choices are Apple, Samsung or a Chinese brand (Oppo, Xiaomi etc). Sure, there are those niche phones like Pixels and Fairphones used mostly by nerds, but they are a tiny market.
apple & china robbed us of so much, if you're a gadget guy.
i had sony phones, laptops, palm pilots, panasonic bit and bobs.
i get that technology has advanced infinitely in the last 20 years, but we are on a very narrow path at the moment.
Wow. I can hardly name 50 brands, let alone 500.
They all did the same, without innovation there won't be another big smartphone brand.
Somebody pls come along and make a phone with headphone jack, micro sd slot, and fingerprint sensor.
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
