Punkt. Unveils Mc03 Smartphone
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The Punkt MC03 smartphone has sparked heated debate with its €700 price tag and €10/month subscription for a locked-down OS, prompting one commenter to quip, "It's almost like we're being punked." While some users appreciate the device's improved openness compared to previous models, others see it as a step backward, with one observer likening it to "pretending to own a device as a service." The discussion reveals a deep-seated tension between those who value device ownership and those who see the benefits of paying for OS updates, with some commenters even sharing alternative, DIY approaches to achieving device freedom. As the conversation unfolds, it becomes clear that the Punkt MC03 has tapped into a broader discussion about the true meaning of device ownership in the modern tech landscape.
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Read the primary article or dive into the live Hacker News thread when you're ready.
Really put off by this though:
> If you don’t pay for a product, you are the product. With MC03, you pay to retain your data rather than paying with it.
So you have to pay >$100/year to maintain access to your device? Why do I need to pay to retain data that is on my own device?
I'm building a portable pbx on a raspberry pi with some power banks I stick in a backpack and a dual sim 5g unlimited internet hotspot, and switch over to starlink 5g when that happens. I'll throw a media server in there (pirate everything), and use a small portable wireless streaming touchscreen. There are all sorts of useful UI and linux tools that can make it a far better experience than android or phones. If I need a camera, I'll buy a camera. I've got earbuds and bluetooth for peripherals.
2026 is the year I leave "phones" behind - not playing the subscription device game anymore. I left Windows last year. I'll get better service, real control, and no enshittification treadmill.
It's too bad it takes an inordinate amount of tech savvy to break out - Linux is well beyond good enough for grandma or the average user at this point. There's no reason beyond exploitation for profit for the kafkaesque intrusion into people's lives and data. If you've got the capability, break out.
This product is not breaking free. Same walls, different garden.
Part of the premium we pay for an iPhone or a Mac is to finance the development of iOS/MacOS. We get the updates for "free" but we actually already paid them when we paid the device.
Meanwhile, here it's clear: you pay the device, and then you pay for the OS.
The opposite being the product like with Microsoft/Google.
Or relying on the goodwill of other people (FOSS).
If I take the example of Kagi, I saw how much impact as a customer I have/had on the product. Meanwhile Microsoft/Google/Apple don't care. And on FOSS I could _just_ do the things myself, but I'm not an OS dev and I already spend some time on other FOSS projects (I'm writing this message on an Linux computer). Donations are great but they are not reliable/predictable and they don't give you more power to influence the product.
Regarding your question "Why do I need to pay to retain data that is on my own device?", according to their FAQ: "Without an active subscription, certain core services and privacy features will be limited. To keep your MC03 fully functional, secure, and up to date, an active subscription is required." https://www.punkt.ch/products/mc03-premium-secure-smartphone
So the phone won't brick itself and you won't lose access to your data.
But the company itself give me a bad feeling, like Proton, trying to surf the hype and doing lots of virtue signaling.
>[...]
>The opposite being the product like with Microsoft/Google.
But Microsoft does offer that, it's called ESU for windows. The problem I suspect is that the cost of maintaining security patches is fixed, and nobody (relatively speaking) wants to pay for it, so other companies like Apple doesn't even bother.
Windows is paid for by OEMs. It doesn’t cost much (and it’s free for some classes of devices) but Microsoft still gets paid for it.
Don’t forget they also get paid for a lot of Windows-adjacent services. 365 subscriptions, Bing users clicking on ads, and the whole business ecosystem of Azure, Entra ID, Microsoft Exchange/Outlook 365, etc.
From consumer App Store pricing expectations to the notion that FOSS be offered at no cost, expecting everything to be free has damaged small software for decades.
There is no other way to support software. You have to pay for it.
Even with this, it still won't be able to compete with the big guys and their enormous ad funnels. But it's better than forcing them to be anemic and sustain themselves with nothing at all.
We have to pay to maintain the things we want.
I paid when i bought it. And i am expecting to work as intended. I do not need another one every second week ( feature updates) but i expect that they fix it when it is defective ( security updates). Yes, i know, this is not cool, JPEG standard changes regularly and today the scrollbar is obsolete, that's why we need "updates".
If you buy a Pixel and flash GrapheneOS, you’re getting a better secured phone, better phone hardware, and for less money if you shop smart.
The only reason you’d buy this product over that solution is that you literally don’t know any better.
If they want to monetize their OS they should just do what every other phone manufacturer does and sell optional but integrated services.
There’s no need to push them as mandatory because a lot of people will end up with them anyway (e.g., iCloud+ and Google One).
That's their MP02, different product line, which is pretty much just talk and text plus Signal ("Pigeon" on the MP02): https://www.punkt.ch/products/mp02-4g-minimalist-phone
I recommend the MP02, with one caveat: don't buy it right now. Because there have historically been problems with Pigeon, you really ought to use Signal for Desktop at the same time as Pigeon, in case Pigeon starts having problems. But as of now you can't you can't connect the two (though Signal for Desktop keeps working fine if you already have them synced).
I've found the call quality and reliability on the MP02 to be great after a year of use.
[Edited to add: MP02 doesn't require a subscription.]
I still have some ancient (pre-smartphone) phones lying around, they work just fine and do the same thing. To be fair they don’t come with Signal but then again that doesn’t seem to work well. Only real argument would be the battery - but the last time I tested one of my old burner phones the battery still lasted for about 5 days (crazy right…)
the biggest leap forward in smart phones to me was personally in-hand GPS navigation. that was a game changer. I really _don't_ need to be even opening internet browsers for anything. T9 phone with a week of battery life, the ability to play some mp3's and GPS navigation and.. sigh I guess some way for me to issue MFA for okta/entraid/whatever since that's so ubiquitous with workplace security now... and I'd be set.
it's wild how advanced the likes of hardware companies were over a decade ago at making miniature hardware. the last generation ipod nano (7th I think?) was this tiny touch screen device and when I hold it in my hand today it feels ... actually magic. seriously it feels mind blowing, state of the art with how small and responsive it is. like that kind of miniaturization doesn't seem to exist anymore & it's something only the hardware giants at scale seemed to be able to do since they had supply chain connections and R&D warchests to blow on designing custom components. A lot of these dumb phones rely on generalist components I think and they aren't bankrolled with bajillions of dollars to get new R&D going and tooling online to really put an impressive device together, I just never see it in these "disconnect but stay just connected enough" dumb-phones that are trying to offer an exit from the noise of modern smart phones.
i'd absolutely cherish something that had the form of the nokia xpress music 5310 https://news.softpedia.com/images/extra/MOBILE/large/Nokia_5... with gps navigation, the ability to play music, and workplace MFA capability.
that's it, i've thought about it and i seriously don't need anything else. yeah whatsapp and spotify are super ubiquitous these days but they're literally not required to get in touch with me. and for spotify, i finally did do that whole "nerd mods an ipod 15 years later thing" and it taught me something that i needed to know about myself: ADHD + spotify = bad. my last decades playlists are a mess, i listen to music _less_ because it's just an onslaught of new stuff and access to everything. something about having a collection of music i actually took time to curate into playlists..i know what's in there i know what i can listen to. it's somewhere between meditative (which is good for me) and very intentional. acquiring new music is now also very intentional, getting it onto my device is intentional. its slower, less convenient, and somehow it makes me enjoy the music experience a lot more. im listening to more music now in a way that I haven't since I was sitting on a schoolbus next to my crush and sharing a headphone with her.
all in all I've seen a few of these "dumb phones, no distraction" device manufs now like punkt here start off with a cool design and eventually just cave and fold to some full screen touch design. to me that just nixes a lot of checkboxes for me: more screen = undoubtedly more distractions and ways to be connected, i miss buttons, i just... don't want a big phone. ever. i want to be intentional about my connectivity, and that means if i need the internet i need to just go hop on my computer. if im itching to know something and im standing in an elevator on a subway, i actually don't want to be able to pull my phone out and have the immediacy of an answer. i want to stay bored in my head, work on the skill of "this is important i hope i come back to it lets index that thought and come back to it later", and just learn to live with being in my own head without the constant need to have an answer or scratch a dopamine itch immediately. there's something ive completely lost over the years, basically that ability to imagine spiderman swinging from the powerlines when i was a kid looking out the window of my parents car. whatever _that_ is, i think that came with a lot of core benefits for my brain activity that generally allowed me to have a more meaningful and happier life.
Being able to be alone with our thoughts and let our mind wander and not having to pull out our phone is a good skill to practise.
But a phone with a map and gps is quite useful.
> They have a fork of an old version of GrapheneOS merged with LineageOS. They heavily marketed it as being based on GrapheneOS, but it's a very outdated version. Their devices don't have remotely comparable privacy, security, usability or app compatibility to official GrapheneOS.
Claim not found in article. If it was so heavily marketed, that would be in the announcement since they're mentioning other partners (Threema, Proton, the extra app store it ships...), and definitely on the product page (no mention of /graph.*/ there either)
> They repeatedly said they forked it from GrapheneOS in their media interviews and marketing. They didn't keep following along with our improvements and have shifted away from presenting it that way, partly because we requested it.
And that also matches what is claimed here, they used to market based on this, they don't anymore.
or how being locked in to a black box vpn instills a sense of having gained reliable true privacy?
Do they actually host anything at all? All I could find was their F-Droid repository with six (6) applications: https://store.aphy.app/fdroid/repo/. The rest must come from elsewhere (F-Droid's main archive?), but they don't indicate if they actually use the rent you pay to fund the third parties they depend on.
For comparison, the F-Droid archive consists of 4061 applications reviewed, built, and hosted by the F-Droid team for free.
stopped reading there
Now a company offers it and every 2nd comment has the vibe of 'Why would someone pay a subscription for their "own" phone'. I guess that means the former vibe is not something most people actually want?
Charge a subscription or sell the phone but don't seek rent for something you claim to have already sold.
It seems like the best approach would be to just include the cost of updates in the price of the phone, which I guess is what every other phone maker does.
I understand that maintenance still isn't free in that case, but it seems like they went out of their way to make more maintenance work for themselves, and then they asked their customers to pay for it. As a potential customer, I would've rather it just come with standard GOS rather than paying yearly for a fork that probably isn't as secure.
> You can cancel at any time. Without an active subscription, certain core services and privacy features will be limited. To keep your MC03 fully functional, secure, and up to date, an active subscription is required.
Out of curiosity (I'm definitely NOT going to buy a Phone-as-a-Service), what exactly happens when you cancel your subscription? Does the smartphone brick itself? Does it let you flash a sane operating system that doesn't treat you as a cash cow?
This phone requires a subscription in perpetuity, on top of the full purchase price.
This was in Canada however.
I don't have a cell phone subscription either. I use prepaid which actually is cheaper.
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/PETI-CM-580731...
I have the previous model, the MC02. I reviewed it here:
https://www.theregister.com/2024/08/05/mc02_swiss_private_ph...
The sub is for the email account. Cancel the sub, that email stops working. You can still use any other email account and client you wish.
This may no longer be the case -- but that's what I'd expect.
Most phones have them.
I haven't yet found a manufacturer that publishes sufficient detail such that I can fill out all relevant columns from their official spec page. They're never detailed enough so I can only applaud including more details. There will always be fields that aren't relevant to different subgroups of the audience...
Wow, so it basically measures the material that it's near to! That's cool. I know that microwaves are well-adsorbed by water (such as in bodies), is that how this works, does it piggyback on the 2.4 GHz antenna? Can I read this sensor's output via some Android API or a device file (with root perhaps)?
This really nerfs the whole dumbphone movement for Europeans, which should be a key market.
I went on holiday with someone a few weeks ago who is toughing it out with a no-Whatsapp dumbphone. He missed the train home because he got locked out of the holiday cottage and couldn't get in touch with anyone.
Each person adding their friend to the Whatsapp group is 9 actions
So in practice, only the second one happens. He had one other person's number, but that particular person didn't check their phone.
Most whatsapp groups ended up being muted by almost anyone because they are an annoyance so they are hardly the place where you would ask for help anyway because virtually nobody would get notified.
WhatsApp is undoubtedly big in Europe: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1005178/share-population...
Hacker News: No one needs it. No one uses its group features. Man Gesturing No Emoji. Just use a landline instead!
> If that is your friend he surely had your number right and possibly others?
He answered that.
> Most whatsapp groups end up being muted by almost anyone because they are an annoyance so they are hardly the place where you would ask for help anyway because virtually nobody would get notified.
Sure in a group of 10 everyone acts like you and mutes the holiday group for text, voice- and video-calls. Even on the last day with possible increased need for communication. How far can the goalposts be moved?
In my social group I was always the guy that wanted other to use my chat program. Last year I caved and installed WhatsApp. Guess what: I didn't die and it isn't half bad.
Before saying "E2E" please exercise your critical thinking. The OS is controlled by Google, so Google has access to everything in the phone's memory. The app is controlled by Facebook, so Facebook has access to everythig in the app's memory.
I do however have one mitigation: I don't run the whatsapp app on my primary phone. I use a matrix bridge. The app is still installed on another phone which is left at home. Because every month or so you have to enter the pin code (apparently meta thinks us users are retards that will forget it if we don't keep entering it).
On my phone I use the ElementX app then. I did get banned from whatsapp one time which was presumably to do with the bridge (I don't see what else it would be).
Okay, now we’ve established that even your dishonest spin on the relationship between companies that provide the software and communications using the software is extremely unconvincing: that’s a dishonest spin on the relationship between companies that provide the software and communications using the software. Google/Facebook has to mount an active attack, serving you malicious software, in order to get the kind of access you’re talking about, which is risky and something we’re slowly but surely getting better at defending against (attestation, transparency logs).
My experience of not having a Whatsapp account and being in Europe is that I don't miss it.
I'm not in a few group chats with people that won't use Signal but that's it. I've never had an issue contacting any business or any indivdual.
Sure you will get a bit socially disconnected at times but that's about it.
I'd really be an outcast if I didn't use it.
I still have whatsapp but some of my contacts don't even care to check it anyway so they can take 2 weeks to see your messages. How useful is that?
In the end I only really keep it to communicate with my family abroad and my in law's extended family in another continent. My own progeniture as well as my partner have conversation/xmpp setup on their smartphone + a laptop. While I haven't done a whatsapp suicide yet, I told them it was important to have other means of communication in case their phone died, a cloud vendor had issue or their account was suddently banned.
I used to be in a group of parents when my kids were in primary school but it was mostly useless and full of intense mums arguing against each other. I barely looked at it. My dance class supposedly has a whatsapp group but I didn't join it and I heard only a few annoying persons post random memes in it. I went once there only to see nobody there and heard it was cancelled afterwards , no big deal. I'd rather do the trip once for nothing than be spammed all year long with stupid memes.
Same goes for kids sports activities.
Meanwhile at the last work retreat they did everything through Whatsapp and it was so relaxing to be out of the loop.
I just checked with my roommate in the morning to get the planning for the day, and I wandered as I wished.
I missed a lot of impromptu events, sure. I also missed a few official events that changed place at the last minute. I went walking on the beach instead.
And for the events I was expected to be active in, organizers just made sure that I was where I needed to be when I needed to.
So I was able to completely relax and enjoy my stay.
In the end everybody was exhausted while I was refreshed like after actual personal holiday!
Enjoy your Whatsapp!
While WhatsApp is definitely the default messenger in many European countries, SMS and calling still exists and works on every phone. It'll cost you extra because of carrier shenanigans, but it's not like nobody has phone numbers anymore because of WhatsApp.
You may be left out of group chats if you don't share the same group chat app, but not being able to get into contact with anyone shouldn't happen.
Except for the companies that say you should use whatsapp to talk to the support desk. That phone number won't be ringing a physical phone that someone picks up when you call it
Couldn't he use the phone as a phone ? Or was he in Germany ?
???
If you're talking about google delaying the release of android causing pixel 10 builds to get delayed, that's mostly fixed and there are experimental builds now. Moreover pixel 10 was released a few months ago and is already available on the latest android. Meanwhile this phone hasn't even been released and is supposedly (based on other comments) on Android 15, released a year ago.
They're not even sure if they'll support the 10a when it comes out.
The "iffy" status reflects temporary development hurdles rather than a shift in Google’s openness to custom operating systems.
(Google delayed releasing the necessary source code to AOSP).
I get that this could indicate that they are dropping support in the future. But it seems to be fine, albeit delayed, for the Pixel 10?
- Google is an American company
- GrapheneOS Pixel support depends on Google's Pixel support (and has been affected by Google's decision to open-source less of their Pixel trees)
- This OS promises to maintain the usable app store + cloud experience
- OS maintenance isn't dependent on a bunch of volunteers/donations
- You can just buy this from an official reseller rather than making your own or having a sketchy website pre-install a custom ROM for you.
I think GrapheneOS has the better developers when it comes to privacy and security, but there are reasons to go for the reliability of a corporate entity you pay for support over hacking together an alternative.
Can someone please release a nice Sidekick like device with physical keyboard that supports Signal.
Discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46467057
I would rather just buy a $20 Bluetooth keyboard if I wanted to do some serious typing on a phone. Or maybe get into Samsung Dex and similar technologies.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crypto_AG
Why? What is so important that they need me to notify about?
Why do websites still do this? It's an immediate red flag that the underlying company have no respect for their customers.
If you have a site that "requires" chrome, you can easily add a user-agent switcher extension to fool whatever JS nonsense that claims to require chrome.
I still have some ancient burner phones but it would be nice to have a recent one that is decent and not too expensive
There is a 4G edition of the Nokia 105 which would be my next option. But I'm thinking maybe if I move to a 4G phone I'd like it to have the ability to create a wifi hotspot, which none of the cheap Nokias can.
But I dunno, I'm slowly kind of getting tired of the burner phone life... It's just getting harder and harder. I spent three months in the US this summer and it was impossible without one there, even the door of this workshop I was visiting needed a fucking app to open the door, so I did buy the cheapest Samsung (my first ever smartphone). I'm now back in Europe and using the burner phone again, I keep the smartphone for the bank app and what not. But... maybe when this new GrapheneOS device comes out this year (they promised a new non-google device with official OEM support) I may bite the bullet... Or maybe one of those ink-display devices...
I used the CAT S22 for a while but it just isn't the same.
If they release a 5G MP03 I might buy one. I don't see the point of a Punkt smartphone.
That happened to me once. Took me days to find my way out.
It’s also slightly upsetting that both Punkt and Apostrophy’s websites refuse to mention “AphyOS” is an Android-based OS, which is 100% relevant for a purchase decision.
Non-starter.
Nope Nope Nope nope Nope Nope Nope
So... FLOSS doesn't mean external contributions but did anybody review this, like security audit, submitting issues, anything? It's the first time I hear about it.
Damn, so close.
I have my iphone 13 mini for 4 years, having a Punkt MC03 for the same amount of time would cost me €1058. Thanks, but no thanks.
Ah yes, more dystopian "You'll own nothing, and rent everything, including your own data" products. That's a hard no, do not pass go from me.
Technology has been enshittified enough, stop being part of the problem, and certainly don't try to pretend you're doing me a favor or protecting my privacy by holding my devices and/or data captive unless I pay an indefinite renters fee.
If they aren't selling the data, then why the hell do they want it? Want to protect my privacy? Sell me the damn device, let me do as I please with it, and let that be the end of the transaction. Keep your damn telemetry, backdoors, dark patterns, bloatware and subscription bullshit off it.
pretty bad signal
based on how they welcome new customers to their site, I can only assume this is the general vibe of the company also. (aggressively pushing crap)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46466171
Being android the trade off between convinience and privacy might be lesser than a purpose built Linux Phone like Librem. Their marketing copy suggests it's not for the same audience as say Librem or Graphene OS phone.
Ofcourse many of their advertised privacy features can be achieved for cheap with any LineageOS/postmarket OS phone with self-hosted Nextcloud.
What made previous Punkt models cool is that they were "dumb+" phones. They did what you needed them to, and nothing else. In exchange, you got a device that fit easily in your pocket.
Now that it's a big touch screen, you've got apps, complexity, and ultimately no differentiator from any other smartphone.