At least with google it works reasonably well (even outside the US) without having to install another layer of poop in my phone. Was surprised to see my bank name showing up on an incoming call.

Ignoring the fact that EA is involved and will probably screw customers one way or another, what part of "game engine footage" did you miss?

Nice troll, citing a *google* app needing a *google* account.

Can't tell about the Nexus 7, but on the Nexus 4 and 5 I've been going back and forth between the "stock" bootloader (from different Android versions) and more exotic ones. I very much doubt that they actually lock the user out of that.

Stop joking, this is coming to us really soon. MS-locked bootloader, that is.

Seeing that google sells phones on Google Play, don't give a crap about what carrier you have, and these phones works, I'd say your sarcasm is seriously misplaced.

If you believe that there only exist phones with carrier-specific/altered OS, you're the perfect client for them. All the crap they keep doing to phones (locking them on specific networks, adding crapware, removing legitimate options/tools) is totally irrelevant regarding the ability to use a mobile phone...

Let's look at the Nexus5. Google produce a firmware, google put said firmware on their servers, the phone connect to these servers, and get the update. At what point exactly is the carrier doing anything, beside *maybe* providing the data connection (supposing you're not on wifi when the phone checks his updates)?
Same thing for phones from other manufacturer; Samsung handle updates of their devices, LG does the same, etc.
Carrier are only concerned when they sell severly modified version of the OS, where they take pride to redirect the update lookup to their servers, and only provide updates really late (if at all).

Quite the contrary. Google provides OTA updates progressively, probably to limit the impact of large unknown bugs. A friend got a notification way before me about his Nexus 5 getting an update. Still, if you want to update before you get the notification, you're free to do it with the exact same image provided online. The latency here is voluntary, and don't have much to do with carrier.
And about AOSP; even if everyone where using it, Google couldn't do squat about updating every devices at once *especially* because the kernel is the only thing that have to be device specific. Sure, the fact that some manufacturer likes to add their own UI and crap is also an issue, but you can't just put AOSP on any phone, you have to have a working kernel for it.

Dear UK politicians,
Please stop screwing our internet. If you don't like it, just make your own, it's easy and the infrastructure exist.
Thanks, the real world.
In all seriousness, if they want to create a "curated" internet, sanctioned by the state, they can. No need to bother the sane people around with their craziness.

To filter 18+, questions from the end of the 90s is enough. That's how you know you got old.

A more appropriate terminology is "hide". There is zero improvement in the gov' capacity to actually block such websites from the source (which would at least have a chance to be effective). Instead, they just mess with the DNS to "prevent access" to a list of websites containing gods know what. I wouldn't know such blockage exist without news outlet since I'm not using my ISP's DNS.
And there's not much uproar about these "weapons" (the media call the recent laws "arsenal") being targeted at everyone, very marginally hitting actual terrorists (and not, in any way, hindering their capacity to communicate and recruit). Way to go France.

Geez, improving their software's security by taking advantage of better kernel support, Google really are deadbeat stupid. Better drop the sandboxing idea, have everything in the same process, preferably run as root. We'll be all safe with this old, not up-to-date version of openssl with brand new SSL3.0 support.

The actual replies are worse than the slashdot summary; when someone asked for TSYNC support, the answer was "sounds like another good reason not to use Google Spyware". The followup are in the same vein about Flash.
Now one can have his opinion and think that Chrome/Flash are evil incarnates and must be wiped out from our universe, that doesn't change the fact that Flash still exist, is still in use by an awful lot of websites, and Chrome is the only way to get this content under Linux. Telling people "nah, not gonna have it, kthxbai" is probably more hurting than anything.

The head tracking, being sort of cut from outside visual noises, and the overall immersion? Stereoscopy is a very little aspect of a VR headset.

I hope too. Even with the best intention in the world, doing this would only have negative consequences (and not the expected one).

• Filtered content would still exist and grow happily with at most the small annoyance of hiding it slightly. Or simpler yet use a vpn that even a grandma could set up nowadays and proxy to an unfiltered ISP.
• People responsible for "drawing the line" of what is forbidden will go haywire. Any situation where the lines are fuzzy need dedicated examination and reaction, not a handful of guys saying "hey, block me this just 'cause".

But I'll admit I might be a bit optimistic trying to use logic and basic thinking about what will be a political discussion.

For desktop users.
Most "not power" user simply want their computer to access "the internet" and don't care much about anything in between. NetworkManager does just that: plug the ethernet, you get a working connection. Input a wifi password in a simple, straighforward input dialog, and it works.
I don't know if it was designed explicitely for this usage, but it work wonderfully there. In other scenarios... not so good. On a dev system, or a server, you'll want to remove it. Bet let's not forget the desktop users :)

The proposition to have multiple init system in Debian was promptly rejected with arguments ranging from infeasible to "who is going to make all these packages compatible with sysv init" (although they were compatible a few month ago).
I don't think doing it anyway in Debian was a good choice in that ambience.