Won’t work for things like neobanks (revolut, n26, trade republic, sumeria)

Ya know, fair enough there ngl, I forgot about those and it definitely makes a difference if you’re reliant on an app.

Also many banks have a disastrous web interface in my country, and card 2FA is sometimes only done on the app for internet payments

Yeah, not much can be done about bad web design. I found that me during a period abroad, it was a worthwhile compromise, but sometimes it can be brutal to deal with.

I know not having the app makes me unable to get Burger King offers, or use the Yuka app, both of which I really need

Gotcha, but in that case, it’s effectively them bribing privacy concessions from you. That’s part of the payment trade-off there.

I don’t really disagree with your points here; it highlights the importance of threat modelling. On a country-by-country basis, things may be far easier or harder. For example, when I was in Japan, I used fewer privacy-questionable apps due to less cultural and technological impetus than I have in the States. The differences you’re having issues with are likely heavily based on both infrastructure and value differences between much of the comm and you. I frankly make many privacy compromises compared to others here myself, but that is less do to the alternative being backwards but more so due to it being ever so slightly more inconvenient.

If you do install it, which you probably will unless you’re okay with living 10 years in the past and losing time, then you’re pretty much back to square one

Non-sandboxed play services have vastly more permissions and access to device information; it’s a step back from not having it, but utterly disengenuous to call it back to square one. It has far more privileged permission, and as you admit yourself, we don’t know what is in its code, so we don’t know what it is potentially doing with that permission.

where? Criticizing something specific inherently implies there is a better alternative, or you wouldn’t be focused specifically on apple. I’m saying android is not and AOSP is not viable due to being an outdated user experience and supporting much much less apps and features, as well as not really being used without play services

Your whole comment is hinging pretty hard on the AOSP point, as that’s almost definitely the alternative the user was referring to.

no bank apps? no google maps? no fast food or taxi app? no ‘mainstream’ social media? that’s your only phone?

The only ones there that are anywhere close to essential are banking and Google Maps. Maps has alternatives that I’ve seen people use as well, such as Organic Maps. More importantly is most of these can be done in a single app, a web browser.

I’ve done both app and phone browser banking, and they’re pretty interchangeable, just set up site shortcuts on your home screen instead. Similar to fast food, I don’t use taxis. Social media is the main offender here but most mainstream social media sucks dick.

Why do you need these things as apps?

That would mean the vast majority of software can always be considered in testing. I report bugs for games I play, heck many sub-communities function around them. I report bugs for the professional software I use, and even for Windows, my OS, and Android, things I had to pay for. So all software is just tested and never used under that definition.

I don’t know what you mean that I want to be thought of as special, I’m in IT, not software development, and I don’t contribute to code so these “special” people wouldn’t include me.

Edit: Also, most paid products do the same thing so you should be paid for those as well. You get function from FOSS software and thus it is a used product. If it isn’t functioning you swap to a better one, maybe a paid one, or circumvent the functionality. The thing is with FOSS the feedback is part can be code suggestions. I personally don’t do it as all the FOSS software I use I tend to be happy enough with it. However, if something is truly that mission critical for you to use the software, you can contribute. I have friends who have done so. Also just about every software I use takes feedback and suggestions. What makes FOSS special is the ability to contribute when the suggestions you want to see are not the priority. I have had an MS Teams bug I’ve been dealing with for several users for going on a year now and MS has told me to kick rocks, I don’t have much more to do from there. For FOSS, I could try to directly implement the solution, or fork the project to meet my needs. There are dozens of projects that have come into existence because of this principle and it is one of the core parts of FOSS software. I wasn’t being smug, I was being very genuine in that you are a user benefiting from the software. Obviously, if someone wants their FOSS software as widely adopted as possible they will cater to their users. Many FOSS products don’t operate on that principle though, particularly smaller ones that are for needs the developer had and everything else is secondary. In those cases, often someone else will come along and fork it and create their own version. It’s one of the benefits of FOSS. Again, the reason I said you were a user is because if you were a tester the primary reason you would be testing is for payment or compensation. If the primary goal is to utilize the function of what it gives you even if it has problems or UI/UX issues you are a user. If you want to be a tester, I have seen some FOSS products search for them in the past so you likely could try to make a buck in your free time for them.

Not testing, using.