The reasoning for this is obvious, money. As Nothing itself mentioned, pre-installing apps helps to offset the cost of the hardware, effectively subsidizing the device. Funny enough, Nothing published a video with CEO Carl Pei discussing this practice in regards to Samsung just a month ago, presumably as Nothing was itself working on a deal with Meta to pre-install these apps.
Nothing has said that this practice will only happen on devices that aren’t considered “flagship.”
Beyond pre-installed apps, Nothing Phone (3a) Lite also ships with “Lock Glimpse” enabled by default, a feature that hijacks the lock screen with automatically changing wallpapers that include a link to open an online article related to the wallpaper. The articles are powered by “Vilykke,” cannot be shared, and seem to have no online presence outside of these links. The articles are completely random, too, and seem to exist almost solely to drive ad impressions.
Enshittification begins..
@KevPham thats exactly why I will never buy NothingPhone (or in fact any other bloated phone)
Sad. Nothing were never going to compete with the Chinese OEMs on spec:price, but the one advantage they had was a relatively clean, bloat free OS. Run a Nothing phone through Universal Android Debloater (or Shizuku + Canta) once, replace some stuff with Fossify equivalents, harden it a bit with Rethink Firewall, and you’d basically have as clean an Android install as possible (still not great but better than most) without rooting.
But then the enshittification started. First they announced they’d become an “AI first” company. Then they introduced that Essential Space nonsense, with a dedicated button for it placed in a spot that would ensure maximum accidental presses, sending stuff captured to some random server somewhere. Now their users are getting Zuckerfucked.
Good job, Nothing. You are now no different from every other Temu phone company.
Probably because Carl Pei suffers from “startup bro” syndrome. Being “AI-First” may win over investors but for consumers it just means a decent widget customization feature or ChatGPT implementation. Bloatware is just meant to cover the losses of the Nothing Phone 3’s poor sales