The Proton CEO thing was vastly overblown. He is a privacy advocate and expressed support for Trump’s appointment for head of antitrust, as well as criticism of corporate Democrats who stand for big business which was misrepresented as a love of the Republican Party. The only mistake he made was to publish those statements using the official Proton account, which he later apologised for.

Some people, especially the American left, love to virtue signal and predictably they tried to cancel Proton as a result of this pretty minor and irrelevant social media drama. There were some good write-ups at the time which exposed how counterfactual the “pRoToN lOvEs mAgA” arguments were, but I guess feel free to skip over Proton if it really concerns you. It is objectively one of the best choices if you value both privacy and functionality (Proton still has support for port forwarding), which I think are far more relevant areas to be looking at when choosing a VPN for piracy.

Nearly every phone made in China comes with backdoors.

Such as?

Here is a comparison of all the various privacy ROMs (and “stock” Android), last updated on June 9 this year.

The person in that other thread who said “iodéOS is a carbon copy of LineageOS” is incorrect. iodéOS comes with a suite of FOSS apps (picked by the community) as optional installs, which is designed to make the transition easier for someone who is brand new to deGoogled Android (similar philosophy to CalyxOS). iodéOS also removes more of the Google services left in LineageOS, such as those associated with the Trust feature, and replaces them with more private alternatives. Additionally, iodéOS has developed a GSI version alongside its officially supported custom device ROMs, which means you can theoretically install and run iodéOS on any currently unsupported device that supports Project Treble.

I have an XZ1 Compact myself and was using it as my primary phone with LineageOS (+microG) and later iodéOS until 3G was shutdown in Australia. Nowadays I use it as a portable music player, although I don’t listen to music away from my desktop that often so it doesn’t see much use. It sounds fine to me, certainly good enough for the overwhelming majority of people I would say.

I can’t really tell you whether it’s a good idea to buy one for this specific purpose, that’s quite a subjective question. It is very easy to install custom ROMs on that phone, though, and those that exist are well maintained. Some of the answers here are overcomplicating or fearmongering; installing custom ROMs is just about reading carefully and following basic instructions. The overwhelming majority of issues people run into come from impatience/inability to read. Bricking the phone is not a realistic possibility unless you are braindead.

It’s very fun. I have played football all my life and always wanted a game like this to play virtually with other people at home. A couple of years ago I had to give up the sport due to a bad knee injury, so to be able to play again albeit in an arcadey video game is so satisfying.

It’s probably not as fun for people who aren’t football fans or players, as I think a lot of the enjoyment comes from aspects that are unique to the sport rather than traditional video game elements. A good comparison is the Camelot Mario sports games on the N64. They weren’t hardcore simulations or anything, but were still focused largely on the core principles of the sport, as opposed to newer Mario sports games or the Mario Strikers series which are very silly and not really designed for sports lovers.

I’ve started playing Rematch, a new small-sided PvP football game where you control one player on your 3v3/4v4/5v5 team (it’s all players, no AI). It seems like something that could run on the Switch 2 in the future, but for now I am playing on PC.

I’ve only played Ever 17, but it was very good. I hope you enjoy it too!

Is that a Pixel 9 Pro XL in a case with a magsafe wallet attached, or are you just happy to see me?

I wouldn’t say nobody, they are familiar to people living in Japan or SEA. If you’ve visited one of the countries they are sold in, you might have come across them (I saw them in a Tokyo department store).

and comes preinstalled with spyware.

What is the spyware?

This has been happening more and more to me lately. Not the end of the world, and I still use Aurora Store for the majority of my apps, but it’s concerning.

This game has a nice learning curve so far. The basic controls are very simple and easy to memorise, and when you inevitably fuck up it’s usually hilarious. At the same time, it is satisfying to start mastering some of the more advanced (though still relatively basic) mechanics and pulling off through balls between defenders or feints that create space. The three different game modes (3v3, 4v4, 5v5) feel like a nice progression too, as space inevitably gets tighter with more players on the pitch which forces you to make quicker decisions. I wasn’t sure if having prior experience playing the sport would help or hinder but so far it definitely feels like the former. The biggest issues so far seem to be the netcode and the matchmaking time (quite long in SEA and Oceania).

Who is praising Game Freak? The video is quite critical of the studio.

Kinda looks like a Rareware game, although maybe I’m just making that connection because I played Donkey Kong 64 as a kid.

I was also on the fence for a long time because I detest console shooters as a result of playing a lot of PC shooters (inability to aim as consistently or as quickly just feels terrible to me), but at the same time, the novelty of a Nintendo-developed PvP shooter always interested me. In the end I couldn’t make a decision myself so I put it on my Christmas/birthday list and a family member bought it for me. I’m glad I tried it, although I don’t like it enough to play regularly.

I can’t keep up with all the various instance wars/feuds but they are amusing nonetheless.

and accusations of everyone being a communist / not communist / slightly communist / whatever else seems to get thrown around on Lemmy.

So true lol

I doubt that, to be honest. People will look for any excuse to avoid spending more on the basis of ethics. The usual one with Fairphone is “well they removed the headphone jack so therefore the entire operation is clearly an advanced greenwashing scheme”.

Not to mention the very legitimate excuse that Fairphone is still yet to support many countries outside of Europe. It is too big a risk for many when every generation to date has experienced isolated technical issues that require direct support from Fairphone to resolve.

There are none on the level of Fairphone. Sony has seen fairly consistent support for its devices over the years and has retained features like the headphone jack and SD card slot, so may be a decent alternative to look into.

Yeah that was the joke. I guess it hit too close to home for some lol