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"Why is #Android such a hellscape?" Part 5 - Locked Bootloaders

And another entry in "does this even count as 'open source' if ..." - how much "openness" is #Google's platform if they provide the tools for manufacturers to prevent people from installing better software, and there's no penalty for companies using them?

None.

I bought a second-hand Android phone earlier this year, released in 2015. There's a forest of better, newer Android builds for the phone... but unlocking the bootloader is entirely at the manufacturer's discretion.

I mean, bad luck and bad research from me that I didn't realise it before buying (after already doing an hour of research to decode all the ridiculous version numbers and feature differences)... but turns out I'm in the only region in the world where they just "computer says no" on unlocking.

Google never needed to allow this, regulators didn't either. Vile.