No keys, full of unnecessary electronic gadgets, heavier, bigger, clumsier handling, no manual transmission option, filled to the brim with spyware, subscription based features that used to just be pay once to have it, uses huge wheels and tires that are more expensive to replace, touchscreen controls for everything, full of obnoxious and intrusive driver aids…
I’m going to keep my car until it is a pile of rust. Then I’m probably riding a motorcycle everywhere unless the car market somehow de-enshitifies itself.
Got me a Civic Sport at the end of '24 just before they dropped the manual. It’s great. No cellular, no subscription features, nothing. Just a nice car with good handling and a gear lever.
You still have intrusive surveillance for everything you say and everywhere you go. With the way the government is right now you probably don’t want to give them more data points.
I have an idea for a project that would enable the driver to connect/disconnect the cellular and WiFi antennas on a Tesla via a switch. I did some research and it’s more expensive/complicated than I hoped so I haven’t done anything about it but it’s definitely possible.
It depends on what you want out of your phone. I use Calyx because I like living a foss-as-much-as-possible lifestyle, and they’ve got some pretty cool networking features (sharing VPN over hotspot and across profiles) and I prefer to use MicroG over sandboxed play services. Muerena is kind of for people who want an iOS-like experience without the spying. Ive never actually tried iode myself. Lineage is kind of the base starting point. Its available for a lot more phones than Calyx and Graphene support (You can even install it on some Nintendo Switches!), but its not as Privacy hardened. UBTouch & Postmarket OS are for the brave souls who want to give linux mobile a go. I want to try it one day but I want to use KDE Plasma Mobile instead of Ubuntu Touch. PostmarketOS afaik is the furthest along mobile linux OS with KDE Plasma Mobile, but the phone I would want it on has broken audio drivers ATM so its a no go for me rn.
Give them all a look though, look into threat modeling and what features you might want. You may find Graphene works just fine for you, you may find another project suits your needs a lot more. Its hard to really say one way or another! :P
Not as reliable anymore. Just watched a pine hallow automotive video where he diag a 2019 jeep Rubicon with a bad cam at 70k and they can’t get a replacement for it. Chrysler /Stellantis are the worst. Even Toyota has engine recalls.
Your probably right, 2019 is right around the cut-off when electronic shit started completely overtaking the last 75 years of car improvments. I was given a loaner recently while recall work was being done (Subaru) and the loaner car just felt wrong. Tactile feedback is very important because if your flipping through touch screen menus, your not looking at the road.
It’s funny but I think you nailed the timeline on the head. I got a 2019 corolla (it’s a manual and it doesn’t need a key!) and all I had to do to get it off the internet was pull a single fuse and reroute a speaker wire. The controls are actually a pretty good mix of physical and touch too.
It used to have support for showing maps on the head unit, but that never worked reliably and required special software that has been discontinued. I tried manual updating the software and that feature is gone gone.
I have actually rented a couple corollas since then, and they’ve all been disappointingly worse as far as everything about them is concerned.
No keys, full of unnecessary electronic gadgets, heavier, bigger, clumsier handling, no manual transmission option, filled to the brim with spyware, subscription based features that used to just be pay once to have it, uses huge wheels and tires that are more expensive to replace, touchscreen controls for everything, full of obnoxious and intrusive driver aids…
I’m going to keep my car until it is a pile of rust. Then I’m probably riding a motorcycle everywhere unless the car market somehow de-enshitifies itself.
Got me a Civic Sport at the end of '24 just before they dropped the manual. It’s great. No cellular, no subscription features, nothing. Just a nice car with good handling and a gear lever.
One good thing about EVs is that generally they’re extremely low maintenance.
You still have intrusive surveillance for everything you say and everywhere you go. With the way the government is right now you probably don’t want to give them more data points.
Buy used, out of warranty, and remove all the wireless connectivity? It sucks but I think it will have to be that way if you care about privacy.
Not sure if you can do that without disabling the cars core functions, if my memory serves me.
I have an idea for a project that would enable the driver to connect/disconnect the cellular and WiFi antennas on a Tesla via a switch. I did some research and it’s more expensive/complicated than I hoped so I haven’t done anything about it but it’s definitely possible.
Couldn’t they just get all that from your phone anyway?
https://calyxos.org/
https://grapheneos.org/
https://lineageos.org/
https://murena.com/
https://iode.tech/iodeos/
https://ubports.com/
https://postmarketos.org/
Not if you know how to flash a custom OS.
There’s like a bunch of these now! If I’m already on grqphene would I want to look at the other ones?
It depends on what you want out of your phone. I use Calyx because I like living a foss-as-much-as-possible lifestyle, and they’ve got some pretty cool networking features (sharing VPN over hotspot and across profiles) and I prefer to use MicroG over sandboxed play services. Muerena is kind of for people who want an iOS-like experience without the spying. Ive never actually tried iode myself. Lineage is kind of the base starting point. Its available for a lot more phones than Calyx and Graphene support (You can even install it on some Nintendo Switches!), but its not as Privacy hardened. UBTouch & Postmarket OS are for the brave souls who want to give linux mobile a go. I want to try it one day but I want to use KDE Plasma Mobile instead of Ubuntu Touch. PostmarketOS afaik is the furthest along mobile linux OS with KDE Plasma Mobile, but the phone I would want it on has broken audio drivers ATM so its a no go for me rn.
Give them all a look though, look into threat modeling and what features you might want. You may find Graphene works just fine for you, you may find another project suits your needs a lot more. Its hard to really say one way or another! :P
Interesting thank you for pointing me in the right direction!
+1 for GrapheneOS. Been using it for a couple months now.
Only agree to buy it if the dealership removes the TCU? I’ve heard of that working.
Not as reliable anymore. Just watched a pine hallow automotive video where he diag a 2019 jeep Rubicon with a bad cam at 70k and they can’t get a replacement for it. Chrysler /Stellantis are the worst. Even Toyota has engine recalls.
Your probably right, 2019 is right around the cut-off when electronic shit started completely overtaking the last 75 years of car improvments. I was given a loaner recently while recall work was being done (Subaru) and the loaner car just felt wrong. Tactile feedback is very important because if your flipping through touch screen menus, your not looking at the road.
It’s funny but I think you nailed the timeline on the head. I got a 2019 corolla (it’s a manual and it doesn’t need a key!) and all I had to do to get it off the internet was pull a single fuse and reroute a speaker wire. The controls are actually a pretty good mix of physical and touch too.
It used to have support for showing maps on the head unit, but that never worked reliably and required special software that has been discontinued. I tried manual updating the software and that feature is gone gone.
I have actually rented a couple corollas since then, and they’ve all been disappointingly worse as far as everything about them is concerned.