I thought we should restart the brand discussion with something more popular to give this community relaunch a bit more oomph. So, Samsung it is.
I've never really used a Samsung phone much before, despite them being so popular in the States. Have friends who used them, they usually look nice and high quality, and the Galaxy S Active are the only high-end phones I know that doesn't shatter when you look at them wrong without a case, so, props to Samsung.
There are may reasons I don't like Samsung phones: Hardware fuse disabling Knox on bootloader unlock, Exynos vs Snapdragon models, the mandatory Bixby button, the Galaxy Note 7 that really blew up. To me, Samsung phones are trying so hard to go against what makes Android good, which is the customizability to do whatever you wanted. Android is everything; Samsung is just Samsung.
Personally, I think Samsung is only worth buying at the very high end for the Galaxy S series. I've heard that A series have gotten better, but there always seems to be better choices from Moto/Pixel/Chinese brands on Amazon that it's not worth considering their low tier offering.
What should we do next week? I'm thinking Microsoft, just to make fun of them for the very idea of making a Surface Duo 2.
I mean, on the one hand I've had two Samsung phones last me the past decade (and the older one still fires up when I want to use it). But on the other hand, I've decided I'll never buy a Samsung phone again. Their great hardware is marred by the Samsung software experience. The ad experience hasn't been bad actually, probably because I'm on a flagship model.
But I hate the button they force to be associated with their feature that I don't want. Every single time I've hit that button was either by accident or experimenting with how it works. Even though I have set up one of the alternative presses to launch an app of my choice, I never think of the button other than when I accidentally hit it and need to swear at it and Samsung.