Because all updates are the exact same size - and could never suffer from inflation?
Not exactly a solid argument.
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The Chinese complained they had to teach history and geography to the savages from the west all the time.
What happened to the west? It is amazing! I could never imagine 30y ago. Everybody watch the movie Idiocracy and hopefully you do not recognize yourself there.
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Guys, you have obviously no idea what an enterprise with 20 employees cost per month (especially at salary rates in Europe). Multiplied by 12 it would be 1-2 million per year. And this is only to cover the cost. Now divide this by the license fee and you will get the number of licenses you have to sell, to cover the cost. Now, I heard investors are not interested in 10% ROI. So you can multiply those numbers by 1,5 at least to please the investors. Lets say you need 3mil/y to operate and license costs 50ā¬ and we ignore the fact that in this license are included the license fees for the 3rd party software. Just assume it is 100% for you. You need 60000 licenses per year to cover the cost and have some ROI at a minimum.
Higher cost makes a product less competitive. This is why I said, if you can not make a competitive product, just close and die or make it open source.
The worst thing is that Europe did not invest in technology when it should, no it is almost too late. Of course they could, but obviously they work not for you and me, but for the US manufacturers, because they are also trying to play dirty against the competition from the East (Huawei).
These are not games for children and unfortunately I do not see any adults in Europe.
It is very sad situation.
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To be fair, the XA2 started support at the end of 2018 (SFO 3.0). I would say 80% of the license sales happened more than 4 years ago. Take a look at the phone market and find me a phone released in 2018 that had official updates for more than 2 years.
50ā¬ / 6 = 8.30ā¬ per year or 0.70ā¬ per month. The API costs of Foreca (Weather) are probably barely covered. Now add to that basic support/updates to the OS, you canāt make money. Is 5ā¬ a month nice? No, but itās better than no SFO.
In a world where āprivacyā phone are sold 1000ā¬, delivered 5 years later with an almost no usable OS. 5ā¬ is āfineā.
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And how switching from 50ā¬ one-time licences to 5ā¬/month subscriptions is supposed to help? SFOS has always had its problems, so there will always be certain group of less ādevotedā people who will just stop paying disappointed by e.g. problems with VoLTE in their networks, semi-working camera, echo issues, and everything else. And Jolla will just keep waiting for Sony to fix it in binary blobs, as always, because on the Xperias thereās isnāt much they can do with whatās broken on the Android side of things.
So, at the end of the day, instead of getting full 50ā¬, from quite a number of less die-hard users Jolla will get only maybe ā¬15-30 before they quit disappointed with issues. We can regularly read such stories on this forum, it isnāt just theory.
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So why Jolla wonāt release the Weather app as a separate commercial app at a price covering its API cost, rather than just completely cancel it? Iād happily buy it if it just guaranteed that it would continue to work. As simple as that. It is a separate app depending on a 3rd party commercial service, so why not charge for it separately.
It is unrealistic to believe that thereās any noticeable amount of people who have been continuously using the XA2 for 6 years. Hardware ages quickly these days, you know? The XA2 has been simply very slow for quite a long time (among others Sailjail finished it off), and on SFOS it lacks VoLTE, a MAJOR issue in many networks which already abandoned 3G and 2G or are in the process of doing it. It also lacks 5G support. So in case of a device that for quite some time has been simply semi-functional as a phone and slow A.F. it is utter nonsense to keep calculating its licence costs across 6 years as if it was still a modern, fast and fully functional device that it just isnāt, and hasnāt been for quite some time.
Majority of users upgrade their phones every 2 years, maybe up to 3 years in the very worst case. Iāve used the XA2 about 1,5 years, then Iāve been using the 10 III since July 2022 (i.e. also 1,5 years) and the 10 V will arrive on May 31 if I donāt cancel it due to that monthly subscription cr*p. So it is always around 1,5 years per licence for me, and probably itās quite typical for many other people. Thatās the actual licence life time, and not after you upgrade to another phone and the old one catches dust in the drawer. It is not important if the actual licence remains valid if the hardware is no longer really usable.
So letās not exaggerate with such funny calculations. This bizarre way even the giant price of the Jolla1 (399ā¬ or so, really a lot for such a low-end that it was even in 2013) could be translated into 399ā¬ / 11 years = 3ā¬ a month, only because some people still have it and play with it from time to time. This way you could say that in 2013 people should have actually paid 660ā¬ for it, so that it equals those 5ā¬ a month that Jolla now expects. Letās be serious.
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iPhone XS!!! I am not that sure, I have to check but it still gets updates today.
When they sold the licenses they advertised the weather app. You assume (wrongly) that their business model was based on licenses to people like us, and ignore the fact that the russkies kept them alive all this time. During the Rostelecom ownership, community was neglected, now when there is no more easy money, community is again the focus: community phone, subscription support money paid of course by community cause there will be no new users.
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Please let me know if you find something. Thanks!
I have now 3 candidates Volla, Fairphone and PinePhone. I was thinking to buy the last one and see how it works, but need to do some research. The former two are being already checked. One friend has Volla and another one has Fairphone. I was thinking to look into PinePhone closer this summer.
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I would be curious to hear about the other offerings.
Is it purism with Librem 5 sold for 700$ (900ā¬ once imported/ 2 000$ for the US version) with a not finished Os ? Donāt forget about the 720p TFT screen and 3Gb of ram.
Is it the Volla phone 22 sold for 450ā¬ with an android skin ? (Has a UT port, but still)
Is it the Pinephone Pro sold for 600ā¬ ? With its 15 hours battery in idling mode? (Pinephone donāt count, nothing more than a toy).
All the alternative have a lower or equal hardware to the Jolla C2 sold for 300ā¬.
Yes, you can go the DIY route. Buy an old OnePlus flash UT, spend the next 2-month getting the thing to work. (But not VoLTE, 5G, Integrated android apps)
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Thatās entirely due to Qualcomm, the SoC supplier, not Jolla, Sony or Google (Sailfish on Sony Xperia is based on Sonyās AOSP builds). Qualcomm doesnāt mainline support or provide sources, they only provide kernel binaries device makers then use to get whatever OS running on their SoCs. Qualcomm also doesnāt provide updated kernel binaries either, they either charge the device maker a whole lot of extra for them, or simply donāt make any beyond the initial version.
Because of this Google put in a lot of effort to make Android increasingly disconnected from the kernel so device makers wouldnāt get updates blocked by Qualcomm simply not providing kernel binaries for newer kernels. Jolla never had this issue, but like Android, new versions of SailfishOS on older devices do end up relying on whatever kernel binaries Qualcomm will provide.
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While it is true that ARM vendors have traditionally been very bad with mainline/vanilla kernel support Sony(/Qualcomm) has released newer kernels for all SFOS devices but to my knowledge no device has (so far to my knowledge) ever gotten a newer kernel which presents serious security issues.
My Xperia X has issues so I canāt turn it on atm but as far as I recall it was still on whatever kernel was active (3.14? or 4.4?) when SFOS was released for it while Sony also had released 4.9 for it.
My 10II runs 4.14 while 4.19 is also available for it.
I can only hope that the push for ARM in more general compute will result in better support, right now I still stick to RPi (for my SBC needs) and not Rockchip based devices for exactly that reason (which incidentally is a major risk factor as I see it in the prolonged support of the Jolla Mind2).
My wifeās iPhone 7 seems to be still getting some updates. Rarely, but still. Itās a mid-2016 device, IIRC.
Well, I can still just use the free version if they donāt want to sell me the licenceā¦ Plus maybe Waydroid. Or maybe indeed I will just pay 5ā¬ to get AppSupport and then stop paying, if it doesnāt stop its functionality as some people here say.
This is a small-timer manās solution. You are not such a guy!
You didnāt get the idea
Money is not the issue here.
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The fact that they release updates to the regular Android builds doesnāt mean they magically get added to the AOSP ones too. I just checked to find the Xperia 10 III, IV and V all on the same 4.19 (October 2018) and 5.4 (November 2019) kernels they shipped with. Only still supported Xperia to get updated was the 10 II because its shipping kernel (4.14) got EOLād this January. My original Xperia 10 never had the AOSP build updated from the 4.14 kernel it shipped with and its final AOSP build update was in February 2022.
Improvement in this regard really are primarily just Google de-coupling Android from the kernel so devices can be updated without being held hostage by Qualcommās kernel binaries.
Paid subscription is a no-go zone for me also. I hate the idea. I wonāt buy anything based on a monthly subscription.
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I can absolutely understand the need for the monthly fee. Of course, development costs money and unfortunately Joola doesnāt currently have many opportunities to generate enough money for further development on the basis of Sailfish OS.
What I donāt understand, however, is why the jolla store is treated so neglected. How about subscriptions and purchase apps. For example, there would be an option here to charge again for updates based on certain releases. For example, the Android support.
What I also donāt understand is the fundamental exclusion of third-party ports of Sailfish to other devices.
Why is it fundamentally forbidden to buy Android support for these devices? Of course the support is tested on the official devices, but give everyone the chance to buy and test it, or customise the ports. The fundamental conversion of Sailfish OS to an open source OS and the generation of financial resources through an app package could also solve some of the discussions surrounding the QT licence issue.
Also, to come back to the subject of licences, there are definitely construction sites that can be expected to be cleared up if appropriate financial support is provided.
To give you a non-exhaustive list from my side:
- GPS without waiting time
- better compatibility with numerous Bluetooth & hands-free devices
- proper dual-sim support (e.g. hands-free devices)
- up-to-date browser engine
- regular updates of Android support system packages (e.g. webview)
- Camera2 API
Best regards
Matthias
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I donāt get the issue then. Pay 5ā¬ per month to get updates, donāt pay ? No update. You donāt lose the features on your phone.
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