Qui Bono, Brutus?

This could easily be used as a sort of blanket hold-harmless statute, absolving online commerce providers from liability in the event their users violate ToS. That way Facebook et al can't be held liable for libel committed by a user of someone else's nom de plum, pseudonym or legitimately acquired moniker.

In that context it would cut off nuisance lawsuits and cut down on digital second-life ambulance chasers.

With this description of your status, it seems to me that you lack not just an acceptable environment in which to play code monkey but a purpose from which you can derive some satisfaction. I agree with those that would have you avoid confronting, 'the manipulative jerks,' because the fish rots from the head. It sounds like you need to involve yourself in something more meaningful. Something more directly tied to your value system, thereby allowing you to take some satisfaction from the belief that your efforts connect you to the purpose your efforts facilitate.

The Buddhists call this, "right living."

1st of all, the premise that manufacturers sell to users is incorrect. Manufacturers sell to carriers. Carriers market to users. And the carriers don't care what approved phone you buy. Their selection is based on business concerns well outside the user experience.

Penultimately, the only thing the carriers actually care about is the monthly recurring services fees generated by the use of voice, text, data and the revenue share generated by music, video, and app sales. They do impose standards or operation that manufacturers have to meet in order to be considered for branding and sales through the company store, but they don't give a rats ass about usability. And the term reliability is reserved for the description of phones' performance as a network device.

As to the crux of marketing to the consumer, I've been around enough marketing and sales people to understand that most of them hold a low opinion of the consumer. Computer sales and marketing campaigns have rarely if ever provided meaningful or reliable metrics to the end user. Users are inundated with basic specs, processor speed and memory and storage capacity. Winmark and Winstone got some play in the rags that pass for consumer oriented periodicals, but I don't know anyone who considers these publications to provide much more than paid advertising, pretty pictures and hype. I mean, when's the last time any Slashdotterer read Walter Mossberg's column when seriously investigating a purchase decision?

It's not just your heart.

Geriatrician Muriel R. Gillick, in her book "The Denial of Aging, emphasizes the social consequences of faith in an ageless old age: “If we assume that Alzheimer’s disease will be cured and disability abolished in the near term,” she writes, “we will have no incentive to develop long-term-care facilities that focus on enabling residents to lead satisfying lives despite their disabilities.”

Aside from which, currently there is nowhere in the world where society is adequately planning for an economic transition to a generally sustainable model for life that will protect the biosphere, the ecosphere or develop a politisphere capable of allowing 'humanity' to achieve the dubious goal of for average lifespan. The competitive model of economics and politics won't allow for it, and the wealthy who promote the concept that enough gated sanctuaries might survive the turmoil that will occur if mankind continues pushing the envelope to determine the actual carrying capacity of the earth are already delusional or just nihilistic enough to believe that The Tau and the DOW are synonymous.

Whatever New Age drivel was cited in TFA should be ignored because the evidence is clear, a globalized, competitive economically will collapse long before the average lifespan grows by another 10%. And even though your grandparents aren't talking about, assuming they're able, the quality of life beyond 80 exists on a graph defined by a decreasing curvilinear function. If you want to consider your mortality you should really think of it in terms of your legacy, not your longevity.

Of course if you live in a consumer society, that's a bit like encouraging a fish to think about space travel.