> If you want a modern smartphone experience (I don't mean one from 2005) you only
  > get to choose which option you find 'less bad' between Apple and Google.

This is a market failure, is it not? I would perfectly happy to pay twice what I paid for my Samsung Note 10 to another company that provides me with:

  - A useful stylus
  - A useful contacts suite and dialer that can sync CardDav (I use True Phone).
  - A useful calendar that can sync CalDav (I use Business Calendar 2).
  - Runs an Anki implementation (I use Ankidroid)
  - Can sync text files with a desktop computer (I sync .org and .md files via ADB)
  - Has a voice recorder

However, nobody makes such a phone. And this model of Note is not supported by e.g. LineageOS, though I suppose that I could buy an older Note. The real problem is the stylus, no other phone has one.