You know, I chose the Samsung Nexus S for the main reason that it runs Android 2.3.4. Yes, the promise of open source and having the “freedom” to do as I wish with it.

Of course, it comes ready with a slick Gmail app just waiting for you to plug in your Gmail credentials and access your mail and all that. But it doesn’t end there! You can create multiple Gmail profiles so that you can access all of your other Gmail accounts, if you have any.

So I configured the Gmail app with my test account first with the intention of removing it afterwards. But you know what? You can’t remove the first account. Ever.

Sure, you can create a second accounts and remove  it by going into Settings, Account and then choosing Remove Account. But the first one? Sorry but you’ll have to reset the phone to its factory defaults, which is total bullshit. Even if you re-associate all of your contacts with a different Gmail account, the first account remains the default account and can’t be deleted. It’s a small annoyance, but not very in line with Freedom as defined by the GNU Project.

The Samsung Nexus S is still a great phone, but Android has a few limitations.

Anyway, speaking of freedom, here’s the FSF‘s Richard Stallman taking the idea of freedom too far by being way too relaxed in public!