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Android co-creator's phone company Essential to close

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Essential, the phone company launched by Android co-founder Andy Rubin, has announced its closure.

After releasing only one major product (the Essential Phone) and a few accessories, Essential Products will be shutting down.

 

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The closure of the company means the Essential Phone will no longer receive any software security updates.

However, the company has shared its software on coding site Github so developers can "keep hacking" the device.

Essential's cross-platform email software, Newton Mail, will be discontinued in April.

It's nice that they're releasing their software on Github; but given the device wasn't that successful anyway, it doesn't really help that many people.

 

Personally I'm not too surprised at this given how badly the Essential Phone went and how little we've heard from them as a company since.

 

Source: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-51482380

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That wasnt surprising. I mean take a look at Cyanogen, they only did software and lasted a year or so.

mY sYsTeM iS Not pErfoRmInG aS gOOd As I sAW oN yOuTuBe. WhA t IS a GoOd FaN CuRVe??!!? wHat aRe tEh GoOd OvERclok SeTTinGS FoR My CaRd??  HoW CaN I foRcE my GpU to uSe 1o0%? BuT WiLL i HaVE Bo0tllEnEcKs? RyZEN dOeS NoT peRfORm BetTer wItH HiGhER sPEED RaM!!dId i WiN teH SiLiCON LotTerrYyOu ShoUlD dEsHrOuD uR GPUmy SYstEm iS UNDerPerforMiNg iN WarzONEcan mY Pc Run WiNdOwS 11 ?woUld BaKInG MY GRaPHics card fIX it? MultimETeR TeSTiNG!! aMd'S GpU DrIvErS aRe as goOD aS NviDia's YOU SHoUlD oVERCloCk yOUR ramS To 5000C18

 

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I'm posting from an Essential Phone right now, loved it at release and still do, the screen real estate game for its time was real. 

Shame it didn't work out, very clean OS with no extra software, elegant design and very fast hardware. 

 

Guess I'll play around with their open source now. 

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I think they mentioned this long ago.

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10 hours ago, Levent said:

That wasnt surprising. I mean take a look at Cyanogen, they only did software and lasted a year or so.

Cyanogen was around for a long time, but it was always an enthusiast thing. There's only one phone range that ever came pre-installed with it... and that was Wileyfox. Their phones were actually really good and the privacy settings were way ahead of anything else.  I actually owned one for a few years... Sadly the company also suffered from a lack of sales outside of the more knowledgeable of the UK's tech community.

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Shame though, I liked the the ceramic approach and aside notch, overall ne of the best looking phones, very sleek. 

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On 2/12/2020 at 2:05 PM, Levent said:

That wasnt surprising. I mean take a look at Cyanogen, they only did software and lasted a year or so.

I never really understood that teams reasoning in doing that, What was their business plan?

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I really liked the Essential phone - altough I wasn't able to find it in germany when I was looking for a new phone. Maybe actually making it available to consumers would have helped... you know not having to close?

75% of what I say is sarcastic

 

So is the rest probably

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The phone market is a really hard market to survive in, even big companies with good backing go under all the time.  The bread and butter is in mass sales and you don't get those from being unlocked or opensource, you get that from being a big brand name with market presence.  

Grammar and spelling is not indicative of intelligence/knowledge.  Not having the same opinion does not always mean lack of understanding.  

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11 minutes ago, mr moose said:

The phone market is a really hard market to survive in, even big companies with good backing go under all the time.  The bread and butter is in mass sales and you don't get those from being unlocked or opensource, you get that from being a big brand name with market presence.  

Or the only profit in Mobile Phones is Apple with a little to Samsung. The Chinese firms are all propped up by their other telecom aspects & the State. Somewhere, from beyond the grave, Steve Jobs is going "Ecosystems, bitches!". He turned out to be quite correct about that.

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35 minutes ago, Taf the Ghost said:

Or the only profit in Mobile Phones is Apple with a little to Samsung. The Chinese firms are all propped up by their other telecom aspects & the State. Somewhere, from beyond the grave, Steve Jobs is going "Ecosystems, bitches!". He turned out to be quite correct about that.

He knew if you can make something insanely popular then lock it down you would succeed, he was in many ways just like warren buffet in that regard. 

Grammar and spelling is not indicative of intelligence/knowledge.  Not having the same opinion does not always mean lack of understanding.  

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2 hours ago, myselfolli said:

I really liked the Essential phone - altough I wasn't able to find it in germany when I was looking for a new phone. Maybe actually making it available to consumers would have helped... you know not having to close?

I ordered mine from the US through Amazon, you could also had bought it through their website. 

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1 hour ago, Taf the Ghost said:

Somewhere, from beyond the grave, Steve Jobs is going "Ecosystems, bitches!".

I think he's saying something more along the lines of "bullshitting people on stage, bitches!" but in a very convincing way.

Don't ask to ask, just ask... please 🤨

sudo chmod -R 000 /*

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20 minutes ago, strajk- said:

I ordered mine from the US through Amazon, you could also had bought it through their website. 

I'm sure it was available at some point, but definitely not from the start and not when I was looking at them. The specifically said that the phone was only available in specific regions at that point.

 

And I'm not gonna pay extra for shipping and import taxes.

75% of what I say is sarcastic

 

So is the rest probably

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40 minutes ago, myselfolli said:

And I'm not gonna pay extra for shipping and import taxes.

Amazon offered free international shipping for it when I ordered it after the first price cut.

And you pay import taxes regardless of buying it at some store in Germany or through Amazon, it's in the price.

The € is also worth more than the $, I did the math and it was cheaper ordering it from the US through Amazon than buying it from anywhere else.

During purchase Amazon already includes the import taxes during checkout, meaning you won't pay extra once it reaches the hands of custom.

 

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On ‎2‎/‎13‎/‎2020 at 1:46 AM, Anomnomnomaly said:

Cyanogen was around for a long time, but it was always an enthusiast thing. There's only one phone range that ever came pre-installed with it... and that was Wileyfox. Their phones were actually really good and the privacy settings were way ahead of anything else.  I actually owned one for a few years... Sadly the company also suffered from a lack of sales outside of the more knowledgeable of the UK's tech community.

Oneplus wants to have a word with you.

 

The Oneplus One came with Cyanogen as the pre-installed base OS. I had one, and it even had "Cyanogen" engraved on the back of the sandstone grey rear panel. Sadly I sold the phone a few years ago or I would take a picture.

 

Late models of the One lost the Cyanogen label, though, and they broke their partnership not long after and Oneplus created OxygenOS instead. 

 

I heard of the Essential phone awhile back but never really looked into it. Was it basically an upstart phone maker like OnePlus was ~5-6 years ago but had their own OS?

 

Edit: Photo from google. Credit to Oneplus.com

unnamed.jpg

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2 hours ago, TigerHawk said:

Oneplus wants to have a word with you.

 

The Oneplus One came with Cyanogen as the pre-installed base OS. I had one, and it even had "Cyanogen" engraved on the back of the sandstone grey rear panel. Sadly I sold the phone a few years ago or I would take a picture.

 

Late models of the One lost the Cyanogen label, though, and they broke their partnership not long after and Oneplus created OxygenOS instead. 

 

I heard of the Essential phone awhile back but never really looked into it. Was it basically an upstart phone maker like OnePlus was ~5-6 years ago but had their own OS?

 

Edit: Photo from google. Credit to Oneplus.com

unnamed.jpg

I'd never heard of that myself, but then again oneplus doesn't seem to be a major brand in my country and I've never actually met anyone who's ever owned one of their phones.

 

But it's good to know there were more.... shame that we've not seen any with the 'lineage' CM offshoot OS.

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