You see, Trump thinks he is sitting on an asset that every one wants, the American consumer. But, there are 340 million people in the US.
If you draw a circle around India, coastal China, and Singapore, that includes half of the world's population. 4 billion people. I did a deep dive on the world cellular phone market, and found that the US as a market is an after thought. Phones are designed for Asia/Indian consumers, the same people who build them.
US, less than 20% of most markets.
Name an American cellular phone company... Motorola? A division of Lenova, the Chinese computer company. The US office and brand name is just marketing for Lenovo rebranded phones. And I am still considering getting the best one I can afford, because they offer a good value/ cost ratio.
Those phones were designed for the SE Asian consumer. People who need value vs cost. Just like me, a poor American. Me and the world market are in sync. Good thing I am looking at an older phone, no new tarrifs.
@Urban_Hermit It's really weird reading "Best Android Phone" articles from US media. a) they think US$500 is mid-range, b) they don't have any cheap phones, c) they're missing so many brands!
My family all have Motorolas. And for the paranoid, I note that I'd much rather have the Chinese government spying on me than the USA government, not least because the Chinese aren't a member of the Five Eyes.
@thomasbeagle I mean, honestly, Microsoft systematically spies on every business in the world through their operating system, which has evolved to the point that owning a Windows computer makes you virtually a node on Microsoft's network. They meant it when they redefined themself as a 'Cloud' company. They are selling network services, over their network. It is hard to actually disable windows from calling home daily.
They don't even pretend anymore.
Hmm, isn't that exactly why those American consumers are a powerful lure, even if they are a small fraction of the world's population? They are a large fraction of the rich markets, where you can sell 500 dollar phones.
It's not just phones though. In nominal currency, the US accounts for around 35% of the world's consumption.
@thomasbeagle
That's something I don't understand from paranoid US users. I'd rather have a foreign government collecting my data than my own government. The foreign government can't do anything to me with that data, my government can do a lot.
By the same token, between foreign governments, I'm choosing China over the US any time.
@Urban_Hermit
That was one of the main reasons GM not only stopped making the EV1 but took back and destroyed every single one…because they didn’t break down or need as many replacement parts, and they didn’t think that would be profitable enough.
Everyone who had them, loved them. Fought for them. We could have sleek fully electric cars for years before the shittier hybrids and uglier EVs came out.
Who Killed The Electric Car documentary is about this.
@Urban_Hermit Nevertheless, the US market still accounts for about half of total smart phone revenues. You can't say the US market is an after thought if it's half of revenues. That said, Apple has an outsized percentage of sales revenue in the USA.
As far as I know, there is no market where people are demanding what I'd want from a smart phone. And I doubt anyone would provide it anyway. Shuttleworth at least had an idea at one point of an GNU/Linux phone but I never trusted him either.
@Urban_Hermit So, for the foreseeable future, there will be no smart phones for me. Nothing but vendor lock in, and crude hardware hacks to run unstable hackish software on "rooted" phones, for whatever little that's worth.
For me, all Android and all iOS software sucks. I can't think of a single bit of software on any of them that I can bear at all.
@isaackuo sorry man, outdated statistic. I double checked before responding. Asian revenues seem to be nearly double the US and European revenues combined, from one of 3 sources I checked.
And Americans have doubled the length of time they hold onto phones before replacing them since 2020.
@Urban_Hermit Yeah, it's been too long since I looked.
I tried to look up 2024 numbers and they still do not match up with what you say. What I saw seems to be that 2024 revenues were only about as much as US and European revenues combined.
https://www.maximizemarketresearch.com/market-report/global-smartphone-market/43099/
https://www.precedenceresearch.com/smartphones-market
@cstross @Urban_Hermit Obviously you're not alone. I remember it seemed like everyone was excited about mobile apps some years ago.
But still ... was that really the case, or were most people not really into many different apps? I feel like maybe what seems like "normal" mobile phone users might be more accurately considered "power users".
My guess, maybe, is that most people spent most of their time on 1-3 social media apps, outside of the pack in apps.
@cstross @Urban_Hermit Obviously I'm not a "power user" of mobile phones, given my dislike of using them, but I do consider myself a "power user" of computers.
But in my case, that doesn't really mean all that many different software packages. Most of my "power use" is in the form of my own scripting and automation/integration programming.
clairvie
Urban Hermit
Thomas Beagle
Kevin Davy
Richard K 
Marius
mark zero
Nacho
Jo - pièce de résistance
fdr
Stage name Jay Peach
Isaac Ji Kuo
Charlie Stross
ferricoxide
Havyhh2