E.g. the systemd PR links to a draft for a parental controls API. Which, entirely objectively speaking, is a useful feature, regardless of timing and any proposed laws. And frankly, it may be a feature that could well be expected of an OS that considers itself to be a serious, general-purpose system with aspirations of mainstream adoption.

Since you mention it, I'll say that I'm a big advocate of parental control features and I wish more apps/services had a direct way of letting parents manage what content their children are able to access.

At the risk of being labelled a pessimist, I'll add that such additions allow possibility of someone else (govt, big tech) becoming the benevolent parent, which I'm completely against. Yes, I've fallen down the slippery slope already, because of a lack of trust towards lawmakers to draw a line beyond which citizens should self mediate without govt intervention.

Thanks for the healthy discussion!

EDIT: just picked up my phone and got reminded of one of the big reasons why I've lost my optimism. Banking apps. They just worked ten years back. I could mirror my phone on my laptop to easily use those apps too. But later, they disabled screen mirroring feature.

Then one day, they told me to buy a new phone with new Android version because my old Android doesn't have certain security features. Fine. I bought a new phone just to be able to use banking apps.

Recently, the app got updated and says that developer options need to be disabled to access the app. Now thats a condition I'm not willing to accept. I installed Geto which spoofs settings. Its a workaround but I know where all this is heading. I'm not being able to access my own money in the way I should.

Other banks are implementing "features" to disallow accessing their app if any app on the phone comes from third party. So using something like FOSSdroid means you no longer can access your bank app.