I just got my pre-order of the Jolla Phone confirmed. I was super stoked on having a European Linux Based phone.
However Motorola announced collaboration with Graphene during this period.
I am really torn, I love Motorolas and have used them for the last five years. Also Graphene seems a bit more open source and secure ad I’ve always said I would switch the instant they launched on a non-google phone.
Does anyone here have input on this, or maybe suggestions for a certain comm where this question would find better ground? (I didn’t want to ask os specific comms as that would be unbecoming)
That’s not correct. GrepheneOS is based on AOSP and not Googles version of the software. Graphene have full control over everything that they add or remove in their version as it is open source. They don’t need to worry really about how google restricts apps etc. But the app developers may have to create a non google compliant version or refuse to. But the same may apply to SailfishOS. As mentioned here, they will now likely be building their own device trees, but the Motorola partnership may actually help with that.
Saying that, this is a Buy European community, and Jolla is the only European independent smartphone available, so they could never be regulated by restrictions that may apply to devices built outside Europe. That’s not to say that (for example) US big tech lobbying in the EU couldn’t affect them, and remove any privacy. But not something that we need to worry about right now.
AOSP is made by Google. If Google decides to make something like app permissions worse again, that goes to AOSP, and is an extra burden for forks to deal with. Graphene already has to maintain a parallel system for storage permissions.
Control is limited by resources and compatibility. Google decides what goes in AOSP, so they could just design some changes that are difficult to revert or fix without breaking apps.