As I see it, no one here claims, that the FP1 or FP2 worked flawless. There are way to many problems mentioned here in this forum. And you will find more than one thread like “leaving a movement” or “I wanted to love it, but…” So the voices on this forum are not just in favor of …
But this forum is meant to help people and that of course needs a positive attitude.
Besides, I had very little trouble with my phone and the thing I always tell is this:
Faiprhone is a small company that has set out to change the industry.
On their way they have done a lot, e.g. with regard to sourcing of raw materials and workers rights and wages.
At the same time they wore working to make the phone fair to the customers as well, by making it repairable and giving the opportunity to change the OS. Name me one other phone, that came with a google-free OS plus a community that made /e/ and ubuntu-touch and sailfish possible for the phone.
I did not use any of those different OS, but that’s something really special about this phone.
Taking on all those tasks at the same time might have been too much, but one can the the steps they have taken and the progress they made.
Us useres of the first two models have been kind of beta-testers of the FP concept phones.
Especially the FP2 has taken the modularity to the max (with the display just clipped on) thus finding out, that this was - in general - a step too far. Connections were not strong enough, the phone as such was not rigid/sturdy enough, bending easyly and obviously too much. Due to these design features the wear and tear on some of the modules could be too much, depending on the kind of useage.
E.g. taking apart the phone and reassembling it quite often, for showing off or carrying the phone in the backpocket of your jeans can be too much stress for some parts of the phone like - especially - the display and it’s contacts.
The FP3 is the next step, keeping the modularity, but avoiding all the problems of the FP2. The display is fixed with 13 screws; and, as I understood, they started with much less screws and added one at a time, until the phone was sturdy enough. And that (in my opinion) Fairphone themselves expect the FP3 to be finally a good enough phone for the mass market, is shown by the way they presented this new phone and by offering it via many resellers as well.
So, yes, us early adaptors payed a price for helping to get the FP3 done.
Everyone who bought the phone, not taking into consideration, that FP is a new and tiny company doing their first phones, was maybe driven to be “fair” but a bit naive as well, when expecting to get a phone like all the others.
Finally:
When it comes to environmental friendly, I don’t know, how the FP2 in the end will be ranking. We will never know, how many parts are going waste during the production of phones by one of the large manufacturers for example. And there are so much more factors to be considered, that to me only one thing is for sure. As FP themselves say: the fairest and environmentally best phone is the one you have. Keeping it for as long as possible is what counts.
but as we love the concept and are heavily active on the forum, you can guess we want to support the idea and defend the project of a fair(er) phone. And if you notice, we are a lot to have had more or less troubles with it, myself included (a lot with my FP2). But I don’t think we should drop this great concept right away if so…
