Bloatware is Harmful

August 28, 2024

Bloatware

Nowadays, most phones like Samsung, Huawei and Apple phones ship with bloatware.

Bloatware is software that comes pre-installed when you buy the phone, that may come with previleged permissions that evade your privacy or without allowing you to unninstall them.

I believe that it is morally wrong to force apps onto the user in this manner. The phones have become a very expensive and personal device, so it should allow us full control over it, instead of letting it induce us into using the apps that benefit the business.

The world of Oreo-Fridge

Let's enter the imaginary world of Oreo-Fridge.

In this world, fridges have cameras to track your behaviour to see what you consume everyday. This helps them sell this information to food companies who want to know how to sell you more of your favourite snacks!

Now imagine that everytime you open your fridge at home you always see a pack of Oreos.

You could buy another fridge that comes without Oreos, but every nice fridge in the market that shows up in the fridge store has some sort of unhealthy snack in it.

In this world, fridge companies teamed up with food companies (most of the times they are the same company) so it is in their best interest to force their proprietary snacks to always magically appear on your fridge.

You did not decide to have those snacks there, but in this world, you seem to have no alternative.

The Oreo-Fridge is by far the most popular fridge out there. If you own one, you get such cool and convenient features! It is in fact so convenient that you stop thinking about the fact that you always have an available pack of Oreos in it.

A lot of people want the Oreo-Fridge conveniences, and some people actually need them for their work, so they always have packs of Oreos available to them.

Some people want to lose weight and have a healthier relationship with the fridge, but all the fridge does to help you is hide the Oreos in a little corner. This makes it very hard for those people that want to stop eating unhealthy snacks, because they have their favourite snack always at reach, even if is a little hidden!

We would not like our fridges to act like this in the real world, but we let our phones do it, which, given the intimacy we have with this device nowadays, is perhaps more troubling.

A slightly better world

Having this illegal would perhaps make our world a little better, because:

  • it would stop tech companies from infriging the digital rights of millions
  • it would give users more control over their phones
  • it would allow users to use their right to choice, and their right to privacy, which is swiftly taken away as soon as you have a new phone. (By the way, if you want your privacy back, you may have to spend hours deactivating our amazing features that only cost your personal information!)
  • it would prevent tech companies from monopolising the entire user experience with technology