The problem is everyone has a different list of deal breakers that they need in a "dumb" device. It starts off simple, such as calls and texts, but some people want to play music, or get directions from maps, or maybe contact relatives with Whatsapp... Eventually you just end up with a smart phone.

Ideally everyone would just have the discipline to just keep what they need on their phone without trying to fix their problem with an overpriced gimmick that they will give up on after a few months.

Those people don’t actually want a dumb phone. They just don’t want to be spied on. That’s not actually that complicated it just makes other people less rich.

Yes! Also be in control of my phone, not having to "deactivate" bloat and garbage brought to me with every update and preinstalled trash I can only "deactivate" not uninstall.

I do want a smartphone - just not one that is in full control of corporations considering me not really a customer, but an asset for their main business - advertisement. Or well the alternative, a company that thinks I am too stupid to be in charge of my phone (and also introduces more and more advertisement).

This is why I won't buy a phone without an unlockable bootloader.

First thing I do is flash lineageos+microg then root.

That seems excessive. In many parts of the world, WhatsApp is the default app for texting people (ie the one you use to contact a plumber or a restaurant) and not having it means the phone fails at its most basic requirements.

I’ve seen businesses try to push that here. It’s surprising how fast they can suddenly respond to other forms of communication when money is involved.

If you don’t want to live under Zuckerberg’s boot you should fight him every chance you get.

SMS still works.

People tell me this all the time. Yet I've never had a WhatsApp account and I do just fine.

The only problems I've had were a single barber that accepts reservations over WhatsApp exclusively - so I go to the barber two shops over and don't need a reservation. And some women from dating apps refuse to talk on the phone before talking over WhatsApp. That's fine, there are plenty of fish in that sea.

> Every single time one of these new "minimal", "dumb", "lightweight" phones comes up today it's just marketing wrapped around a kneecapped Android device.

Except the Commodore Callback[1], which is based on Linux (SailfishOS). It's pretty minimal and should meet your requirements, in theory.

[1] https://commodore.net/callback/

The size of this thing really puts me off. It’s like two iPhone minis stacked on top of each other, which seems massive for a flip phone.

I spent way, way, way too much time at that site (Partly because it’s a 1990s GeoCities mess).

Compelling, but still wanting a Nokia 33xx brick recall.

Same, the marketing absolutely got me.

Fun Blackberry trivia:

For a while Research in Motion (RIM) / Blackberry had a hiring website at https://rim.jobs , until somebody told them what it meant.

https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=%22rim.jo...

It was a 302 redirect to http://www.rim.com/careers/ around 2008-2010, according to the Wayback Machine. It could have been around for longer unarchived, of course.

.jobs was introduced in 2005, so not by much. Honestly, I'm surprised it's that old. Thought it was part of the new gTLDs.

There are an odd much smaller collection new new-gTLD-like earlier ones that were introduced a long time before the recent ones, it's a real odd historical artifact of ICANN.

For a lot of people there's one app that is a non-negotiable, even for a minimalist phone.

For instance: their bank, or 2 factor for their work. Or a parking app for their building. Society now often assumes you can use an app.

It's hard to cover those cases without using one of the two major OSes.

What's the advantage of blackberry over a stripped-down/limited android?

probably because in these days it's hard to get by without some apps like maps, common messengers, delivery, bank transactions and so on

Agreed. Banking is the killer app imo

In Australia it's pretty great: my driver's license can be provided by an app on my phone and legally must be accepted if it is. So between that and NFC payment support, a phone is the only thing I need to remember to operate outside the house.

It's pretty great as long as it doesn't evolve into them no longer printing the cards and requiring use of their app, consequently on one of their approved OSes.

I mean yes but that is a case of the slippery slope fallacy: the existence of a future possible decision does not affect whether a current decision is a good one.

If they try to move in that direction, we can protest it then. Denying ourselves a useful capability now doesn't stop it from happening anyway, nor make it more likely.

When a pattern is repeated many times, it is not a fallacy to recognize that pattern at the begining.

If I see a tiger crotched in the bushes, is it a fallacy to gather my children and head back to the cave?

Pattern recognition is not a fallacy.

When has this happened before? Presumably you have several examples near to hand since it's "a pattern".

I personally live in a country with a large religious population that rejects the smartphone, so thankfully I personally have not encountered a situation where needing a smartphone is vital. However we've seen many people right here on HN mention how some specific vital service - often government or banking - does require a smartphone.

In my HN Threads feed, the very next item is another HN user mentioning how they have difficulty paying for parking spaces without a smart phone, from this very page. Search "and sadly accept the cost of our principles" on this page to find it.

But I have no interest in winning internet arguments. You win, the cookie isn't worth it to me.

Or you could just take cash, as long as you don't need to drive.

Switch to a bank that has a website.

If they can't do online banking in 2026 your bank might actually just be some guy in a monopoly man Halloween costume.

I don't like website interfaces. Good to have them, but apps are more convenient

For what purpose? If you have a debit card, cash app, etc., what urgent need is there for a banking application?

Uh... Cash App is a banking application.

Yeah. People get confused because they're not a bank, but they offer banking services (as a middleman)

Pay monthly bills?

Sounds great until you're required to install an app to pay for parking.

How do people without smartphones pay for parking?

We don't, and sadly accept the cost of our principles. What I generally do, is to put on the blinken lights, and try to hurry up. Up to about 20 minutes or so, it generally works alright.

Pinephone and Librem 5 fit. Surprised you said BlackBerry without physical keyboard.

Pinephone is close to useless. Fairphone 5 I think is as good as it gets if you want to avoid android. It is annoying though that fairphone 6 is not working with linux.

Actually, the Fairphone 6 is getting quite some love lately, see [1] or [2].

[1] https://catcrafts.net/

[2] https://linmob.net/tags/fairphone-6/

Oh man, remember the BlackBerry 950?

Nope

I do too, but I think we're too deep into the duopoly of Android and iPhone now for anything else to succeed. I need 2FA apps, I need my banking app so that I can 2FA the desktop browser banking. I want Audible or some other audiobook option.

I'd love to go back and get a Blackberry, the pre-QNX one, but I think Android is the least-bad option here. We need certain apps, and Android is the only way we'll get them.

I’d add payment and maps and ability to login government sites or banks and connecting to your car… we are being very efficiently locked in.

This basically collapses to “a different OS than Android.”

The question is why you care about that.

To be truly independent from megacorps?

Sending messages with BBM?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBM_(software)

Here you go: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Librem_5

Blackberry is dead. Ibjust wantlinux on phones to gwt to passable level on modern hardware. I can take it from there.

How can you not need maps? That’s crazy to me

minorities are the loudest.

truth is its quite difficult to function today without a smartphone.

banks, uber, food etc etc

edit: remember iphone mini? so "many" asked for it and apple finally made it. it was a flop.

I think the iPhone mini sold 5-10 million units per year. I don't view that as a flop, and I don't think it merits sarcasm around how "many" people wanted it.

People often use this a argument against small phones like this wouldn't be amazing for any company outside apple or Samsung

If small phones were a widely popular thing then there would be a company making them successfully or it would’ve been greater than 5% of iPhone sales. An individual company with zero brand power or presence wouldn’t have any decent sales. This is not even considering that the value proposition would be way worse than just buying a slightly bigger and significantly better phone with more R&D put behind it.

The reality is 90% or more of people don’t care about that or even think about it, this sentiment only exists in online tech enthusiast spaces. If you’re in HN you’re as non-representative of the average consumer as one can get.

5% of iPhone sales is an enormous amount of revenue. Billions right?

Bring back OS licensing, Apple!

I think you should always include the iPhone SE in those numbers. It had similar dimensions, was cheaper and even more minimal. If it weren't for the SE, I would have picked a Mini right away.

Banks for what?

Uber can be done totally headless, without a screen?

Food? Get outta here.