News - South Korea bans non-removable smartphone bloatware

[HEXUS]

With a few exceptions including some Wi-Fi and NFC connectivity apps and an app store.

Read more.

[Jonj1611]

Wish that would happen here.

[Numenor]

Never mind the operators - I want to be able to uninstall all the manufacturer (and Google!) stuff I don't use.

Yes, I know I can root the phone and install a different ROM, but other than the bloatware I like it the way it is.

[Noxvayl]

Agreed. Good move by South Korea, I hope it is popular enough for the rest of the world to adopt.

I wonder if anyone has looked at the performance difference between standard Android and the bloated Android on most smartphones, would be interesting to see what performance hit there is if any.

[Saracen]

I agree too .... except that I don't want NFC on a phone either, so I'd like to be able to remove drivers/apps for that. Better yet, buy a version of a phone without the hardware.

[shaithis]

North Korea doing something the rest of the world should follow! Never thought I'd say that

[Smikis]

North Korea doing something the rest of the world should follow! Never thought I'd say that

South.... you know the tech giant not crazy military people..

[Badbonji]

North Korea doing something the rest of the world should follow! Never thought I'd say that

This is South Korea, not North.

[zdn1042]

I'm hoping manufacturers' would apply this worldwide.

[wasabi]

Good move. Suspect they all start doing what MS did with IE and claim it is part of the OS. And other shenanigans.

[watercooled]

Good move. Suspect they all start doing what MS did with IE and claim it is part of the OS. And other shenanigans.

They'd have a hard time convincing anyone of that when there's a stock version of Android to compare to.

[AGTDenton]

North Korea doing something the rest of the world should follow! Never thought I'd say that

Turn your compass round

Its a shame Smartphones are copying 1990's home computing ideology. Just wait for the AOL sd cards to come out.
The only advantage of bloatware on home computers was that you could uninstall it, just back then no one knew how nor did they identify all bloatware.

[crossy]

Never mind the operators - I want to be able to uninstall all the manufacturer (and Google!) stuff I don't use.

Yes, I know I can root the phone and install a different ROM, but other than the bloatware I like it the way it is.

Same here - okay with the Google stuff, but some of the Samsung bundled extras I could well do without (seem to get an update for ChatOn and/or Samsung Push Services every week).

That said, given that my phone's rooted anyway (because I use Titanium Backup) maybe I should just stop being lazy and dump that junk (same as I did with my Sony phone).

[iworrall]

They'd have a hard time convincing anyone of that when there's a stock version of Android to compare to.

Sadly, Android 4.4.2 includes a HP printer driver installed by Google as bloatware.
Nice if you have a HP printer, but absolutely unforgivable if you don't, because even if you disable it, Android will automatically download and store all updates for it just in case you want to use it at a later date.

[watercooled]

True, and I don't get on with a load of the crap the comes even with stock Android which can't be removed, like the social media rubbish, etc. At least they can generally be disabled though.

[crossy]

True, and I don't get on with a load of the crap the comes even with stock Android which can't be removed, like the social media rubbish, etc. At least they can generally be disabled though.

So for your out-of-box "experience" you want:

• Phone dialler
• Text messaging
• App store
• And nothing else?

I think I'd be happy with that. After all, if you've got the app store then you can (easily?) add the other things that you feel you might want ... most obvious being web browser of course (since we're talking about smartphones).

Listening to some of the (US-based) podcasts and I get the distinct impression that the UK telecos aren't nearly as bad as their US-based compatriots. There's been a lot of negative comment about the amount of non-removable cruft that gets stuffed on a "new" phone.