I too have been Graphene'd up for years. I'm slowly working on ditching the last few bits of Google, just about the only thing left is an old gmail that's tied to a bunch of accounts, which I might keep around as a forwarding thing for a little while yet.

What's the hardware? Pixel?

I'm assuming, then, though, that you do have a computer, in order to receive emails and such. Too much in society is attached to having other stuff: mailing address, email, phone number, two factor authentication, running privacy violating software on Windows, etc...

If you've been doing it since the 80s, have there been eras that have really challenged your desire or whatever to not have a mobile phone?

Do you think life would be much easier if you did have a mobile phone?

Why do you not have a mobile phone?

Do you think other or younger people should follow your lead?

I'm so curious about your story. I've thought about it many times, and as much as I think the technology is super cool and amazing, I also really wish it wasn't all but legally required to participate in so many aspects of society. It makes me wonder where you're from and where you live and if you're American or not.

Tell us what you come up with? If apple and android are out, it's gonna be sailfish or graphene on a thinning hw profile, right?

So with apple locking hard way before android, now what are you proudly signall-uh, running, with neither of them as options?

[Angry ISO-8601 noises]

That's Canada's standard.

Landlines are all VOIP now unfortunately

Took too long for this comment to show up. It seems that too few people know this, which suits Google just fine, I assume.

It must be stated: Google is malicious! The language used here and elsewhere conceals the fact that: a) Google is a for-profit company with no morals (they work with militaries and surveillance-agencies to kill); b) they operate in a monopolistic manner; c) they're eroding control of your personal-property.

This is just another move by Google to consolidate control over the AOSP. It doesn't matter that this convoluted sequence can temporarily 'bypass' Google's wishes--in fact I would state this is clearly worse. Removing the ability to install non-Google-endorsed software on your own private-property could be illegal. This is perhaps the only thing they could do to prevent lawsuits, only they've made it so asininely convoluted that only 0.01% will actually complete the process that it should be illegal monopolistic behaviour. American courts have absolutely failed everyone by allowing this rampant malicious behaviour to be the norm in American-software.

Google's Android already created friction for installing software outside their ecosystem. There is no justification for this behaviour. It cannot be defended. Stop following their market-speak. This is belligerent and malicious behaviour!

To put a finer point on this: Google is charging a recurring fee to anyone who wants to distribute software to phones--Android-phones. If you have a need to distribute software to your organisation's mobile-computers you now need to pay a recurring fee to Google, or... jump on one foot, spin around, touch the ground and hope Google doesn't bully you further. Oh, and you have to do this dance personally for all 438 mobile-computers you manage. The absurdity of the situation is appalling! The fact you have users defending--and that is what these sort of responses are doing: defending one of the most profitable companies in existence--"oh, just do the dance now so it won't inconvenience you later".

The "escape hatch" is down that corridor, to the left, left, right, left, left, up, right & behind the book-case; take the stairs up, down five flights; depart at Washington D.C. and on arrival you'll see a button. Press it. It might not do anything.

--Google

Fyi mine was under "apps from unverified developers" in developer options.

Mine was also named "Apps from unverified developers". However, I'm not sure it actually got applied when I did it just now. Pressing on that quickly flashed something on the screen, but it disappeared before I could see what it was. I didn't get to flip a toggle nor enter the PIN. Pressing "Apps from unverified developers" again doesn't do anything now (not even the quick flash from the first time).

Appreciate any help!

EDIT: I restarted my phone just in case it did work, and checked again, the option is just gone. I'm unsure if this means something went wrong, or if it means it did work, and I'm currently in the 24 hour cooldown period.

The package (com.google.android.verifier) will be introduced on devices running Android 8 or higher, granting Google the ability to block the installation of unverified apps.