by Kerrick | 2025-11-23 02:22:55+00:00
I've been using a featureful dumb phone (Sunbeam F1 Pro, Juniper) for a few weeks now. Before this I've been using an iPhone since iPhone 6s, and before that an Android phone since Nexus 4. My new phone runs BasicOS, an Android remix that removes Google Play, removes all web browsers, and comes with a suite of custom default apps built to nice with physical buttons (T9-style).

My phone has calls, SMS, MMS, email (IMAP), calendar (CDAV), contacts (CDAV), navigation (offline and Waze), note-taking, voice memos, a music player, weather, and voice-to-text via Azure's AI models. The only things I've missed so far are:

- Two-factor authentication via TOTP and HOTP. I loathe SMS-based 2FA, and not every service supports Email-based 2FA. This has been so annoying I've considered jailbreaking it, learning Kotlin and Android development, and releasing an MIT-licensed application for the company to bundle with the phone.

- A way to scan QR codes. It would be fine if I could just extract the text into a Note.

- The ability to record a call without an additional device. I've been dealing with a medical billing kerfuffle and it was much easier to disclose and press record, than to disclose and find another recording device.

- The ability to send and read SMS/MMS messages from my MacBook Pro. It should be possible with the Bluetooth HFP, which many cars use to enable the same thing. Sadly, Tunabelly Software's app "Handsfree 2" was pulled from the market and I could not get Sustainable Softworks' app "Phone Amego" to work. I've considered building a TUI for this purpose.

- At first I missed Audible, but then I learned two important facts. First, I can listen to my Audible books on my Kindle as long as I connect a bluetooth speaker (including Ford SYNC). And second, Audible and iTunes for Windows integrate with each other to allow me to burn Audible books to CDs, 80 minutes at a time.

- I really miss having O'Reilly Learning Platform. I used to listen to audiobooks on there all the time, and now I've got no good solution for it. I've replaced that time with Audible books (which are rarely about software). I still get plenty of software book reading done when I can focus my eyes on it, though.

There have also been some UX problems, which are livable:

- The camera is not extremely high quality. I've taken to borrowing my wife's iPad to take photos of my whiteboard when I need to preserve something before I erase it. It's fine for texting photos to friends, but not for document scanning.

- The music player is good for music, but not great for audiobooks and podcasts. It doesn't remember where you are in the middle of an audio file when you play it again later (which would, admittedly, be weird for music).

But the benefits have been incredible:

- I no longer stay up way too late every night pushing pixels past my peepers. Instead, I stay up way too late only some nights, reading technology books.

- I no longer browse social media, play puzzle games, or browse news headlines every time I'm bored for a few minutes. Instead, I contemplate (what my plans for tomorrow are, a recent problem I failed to solve, what that odd sound is, how pretty the clouds are, etc.).

- I no longer have to put up with Liquid Glass. (I also replaced my Apple Watch with a Casio LWS2200H and downgraded my MacBook Pro to Sequoia.)

- I no longer have to be concerned with anybody but my carrier tracking me.

- I've been less aware of state, national, and world news--which has been a huge boon to my mental health. Conversations with friends and coworkers still keep me apprised of the things that are important enough to need to know. All the other crap just passes me by. Nothing is shoving headline notifications at me, and the easy moments to browse headlines have been replaced by devicelessness.