However, ethical questions aside, and from a purely legal conformation standpoint, if the phone validates the user is over 18 and passes only that info as a token to whatever application or website requests it, then it's a good implementation. It means elimination of multiple validation requirements, minimal transfer of data to third parties, fewer sources holding personal data, etc. Whether it works that way remains to be seen.
I had a similar Ubuntu experience in the Windows XP years too (2006ish?).
Everything had a barrier. WiFi drivers always seemed to be a problem, but if I wanted to do anything non-standard it was an exercise in frustration. At one point I owned a Sony digital camcorder that I wanted to get video files from. Eventually, following hours of forum research I learned I had to recompile the kernel to do it, which did actually get me there. To this day I have no idea what a kernel is, and I have no desire to. I remember thinking how wildly complex it was to do something that worked so easily in Windows.
Entirely off topic and potentially triggering anecdote when accounting for Linux’s general prevalence here, but that wasn’t what turned me back to Windows from Ubuntu 20 years ago, it was actually something that most would could consider a positive for Linux. It was the fact that it was so customisable. I had weird multiple desktops that were mapped to a rotatable cube, I spent ages configuring translucent live performance stats on the desktop, hours updating icons and themes etc, whatever I saw on forums that looked cool and wanted to replicate.
Then one day I acknowledged I just wasn’t ever actually using the computer. I literally spent more time modifying and customising stuff than I did actually doing anything. I realised I was never satisfied with the current config and just kept tweaking.
It’s probably not surprising to hear I’ve since been fully into the almost entirely un-customisable Apple ecosystem for a while now. While it’s taken my money, it’s given me back my time!
Absolutely wild that there was a time when Microsoft had three generally well regarded consumer products in Windows 7, the Xbox 360 and Windows Phone 7 all at the same time, compared to where they are now in all of those product spaces.
Windows was Windows, but 7 was largely consistent and didn’t need to be fought with like its successors.
The 360 was the go-to console for developers and gamers, despite the RROD issues, which I’d even give them credit for for handling (eventually) after lots of us got 2 free games and a free controller from them following the debacle.
Windows Phone 7 had a superb interface, great hardware and genuinely stood out.
Now they have nothing and are hated more than ever.
That was part of Microsoft's pitch - they wanted it to be the central device. I was in the minority that thought it was a great idea at the time, but then I'd been running a dedicated Windows Media Center PC under the TV for years until that point, so to me it was a shinier upgrade.
That and the one thing I thought was awesome - split screen TV so I could play a game and have a live football match or something on part of the screen. That was amazing at the time, I was gutted when they killed it off to get more resources for games.
My kids were like 3 and 5 when Kinect was released and they bloody loved it. Also Dance Central was superb for drunken adults.
Plus if Alien Isolation wasn’t scary enough already, a Kinect would dial it up a notch.
Definitely limited appeal and the tracking wasn’t great on the 360 version, but for those first two scenarios (younger kids and late night dancing) it was a superb party game.
Some of the comments on this and similar threads are wild. A dedicated major contributor to the fediverse as a whole, working almost entirely alone, who is solely responsible for bringing many of us to it that were looking to escape the social media capitalist hellscape via Pixelfed, creates another alternative with Loops and publishes some detail regarding how it works, and a bunch of keyboard-warrior nerds try to take it apart.
So many people contribute entirely fuck-all to fediverse platforms beyond the odd bit of content, myself included, and it always amazes me how quickly they want to tell him he's doing it wrong. So many opinions for one person producing so much, from so many people producing nothing.
In the 2010s I had a Windows Phone which I thought was amazing. I bought the original Surface Pro too, because at the time I thought it was incredible. A full operating system in a tablet form factor that was incredibly fast and touch screen.
In the IT office I worked in, we had a dartboard. It was great for just stepping away from your desk if a problem had stumped you, throwing a few darts to take a break, and inevitably the answer would come to you. It was our rubber duck.
Trouble was, all of us were terrible at the basic maths involved with darts matches. So I thought, what if we mounted the Surface to the wall, and could just tap where the dart had hit, and get scores instantly.
So I wrote this darts score-keeping app that worked on everything from Windows Phones to tablets, and even an Xbox at one point, thanks to the way Microsoft had implemented their cross-device app deployment.
We used it every day in the office. I think in 10 years it’s sold about 3 copies.
Yeah, no doubt.