Let Google know what you think about their proposed restrictions on sideloading Android apps. - Android developer verification requirements [Feedback Form]
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Source of feedback form:
https://developer.android.com/developer-verification (bottom of page)
This is just a way to capture negative feedback in a way that leaves you feeling like you did something while impacting none of their business which they can then ignore and throw away with no issues. Make noise on social media, not feedback forms. Make them hurt.
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That's why keywords are important. For instance I added the fact that if they continue in this course I will seek to de-Google my phones.
Like I said in another comment, unless they get tens of millions of actual unique-not-spam responses they will not even consider reconsidering. People aren’t going to de-google in any great numbers from this, because most of the people this will affect are already de-googled.
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Public pushback on stuff like this does work on occasion. It even worked on Apple when they proposed upload filters for CSAM.
Google's intent in the short term probably is just about malware, but in the long term it gives them, and governments which can pressure them the ability to ban any app from nearly all Android devices. Once deployed, there's a near 100% chance of such a mechanism being used for evil.
The malware argument falls like a house of cards when you just dig a bit nd see that Play Store is full of indiscutible malware like flashlight "apps".
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Source of feedback form:
https://developer.android.com/developer-verification (bottom of page)
Just today apple showed how stupid is this policy as they revoked the publisher certificate for a torrent app, proving that the end goal is not locking malware but stuff that they don't like
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Source of feedback form:
https://developer.android.com/developer-verification (bottom of page)
What a disappointing week. I was looking to replace my five year old iPhone with an android phone and now I'm just stumped. Pixel 10 looked pretty good but then this sudden verification requirement news hit. Both platform are now equally crap. The hell with both of these shitty companies. Maybe I'll go full retro and get a dumb phone instead.
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Linux is not on the rise lol.
People are locked in to iOS and Android. There is no appreciable number of people who would switch to another ecosystem and lose all their apps, purchases, etc.
More importantly, just like what killed Windows phone, developers won’t support a third platform, nor will customers move to a platform that doesn’t have the big apps that they need - many, if not most, of which are from Google themselves.
Linux has doubled its market share in the last couple years and is on an exponential growth curve right now. Valve's push for Proton and Steam Deck has changed a lot.
Also, if Linux-based, non-Android phones or tablets became fully functional and feature complete, there would absolutely be a good number of people who would switch. I'd be one of them.
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Source of feedback form:
https://developer.android.com/developer-verification (bottom of page)
You will own nothing, and be angry. But you can't do diddly squat about it. Now open wide and BOHICA.
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What a disappointing week. I was looking to replace my five year old iPhone with an android phone and now I'm just stumped. Pixel 10 looked pretty good but then this sudden verification requirement news hit. Both platform are now equally crap. The hell with both of these shitty companies. Maybe I'll go full retro and get a dumb phone instead.
Get a pixel secondhand and put an android fork on it. Its what I will likely do because I am sick of Google in my life and dont want to pay through the nose for a glossy shit that doesnt even have a file manager from apple.
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Source of feedback form:
https://developer.android.com/developer-verification (bottom of page)
Some poignant questions for these new platform requirements:
- How do you anticipate this being used against journalists and advocacy groups?
- What research and statistical quantification will be done to evaluate the amount of harm these restrictions can inflict?
- What precautions or safeguards will users have against malicious state actors or capitulating corporations?
- How can developers protect themselves from liable damages due to service interruptions caused by third party verification?
- Do you foresee legal restrictions in rollout due to national security concerns from differing nation states?
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Linux has doubled its market share in the last couple years and is on an exponential growth curve right now. Valve's push for Proton and Steam Deck has changed a lot.
Also, if Linux-based, non-Android phones or tablets became fully functional and feature complete, there would absolutely be a good number of people who would switch. I'd be one of them.
Doubling your market share is easy when your market share is so low. It’s not on an “exponential growth curve” lol. The steam deck changes nothing for Linux as most people playing them don’t give a shit about Linux.
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Apple method is terrible too and had to be forced by the EU to allow sideloading so tried to make it as restrictive as possible within the rules. And don't think they bothered to support it outside the EU. So Apple is not the one to use as a defense of restrictions to installation of software om Android.
And I fear malware more from Google Play than F-droid with how they just allow anything and millions of installs give people a false sense of security until it's later revealed it was a malware app. So no I don't buy this security bullshit.
It's about control and data harvesting.
Another honest question:
Why wouldn't the EU force Android to allow sideloading apps just as they've done with apple?
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Get a pixel secondhand and put an android fork on it. Its what I will likely do because I am sick of Google in my life and dont want to pay through the nose for a glossy shit that doesnt even have a file manager from apple.
iOS/iPad OS has had a file manager for years? It's not great, and heavily restricted, but it for sure exists.
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Another honest question:
Why wouldn't the EU force Android to allow sideloading apps just as they've done with apple?
We just hope they do force Android to allow sideloading. However, I wouldn't expect them to do so, given their latest decisions...
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Source of feedback form:
https://developer.android.com/developer-verification (bottom of page)
What has happened with mobile platforms has proven that the fact that we ended up with PC platforms that allow us the freedom to largely do whatever we want with them was more an outlier than the norm.
Apple and Google have gone out of their way at every step with their new platforms over the last 20 years to make sure that process does not repeat itself. Even the stuff that seems more open like Android technically supporting arbitrary app installs from anywhere and the Linux container in ChromeOS still allows the platform holder to step in and stop you from doing something with those tools should they desire using mechanisms that the OS depends on to be useful.
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Source of feedback form:
https://developer.android.com/developer-verification (bottom of page)
I did my part!
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iOS/iPad OS has had a file manager for years? It's not great, and heavily restricted, but it for sure exists.
In what way is it restricted? I dont do much but being able to explore to find my files is necessary.
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iOS/iPad OS has had a file manager for years? It's not great, and heavily restricted, but it for sure exists.
It’s not great, and heavily restricted, but it for sure exists
That's kind of the point though. Apple's file manager portrays a "flat" filesystem, where all of your data is laid out neatly on the table - so to speak - and the actual locations of those directories within the system are buried inside vague and protected locations "for security". Android file managers embrace a more traditional Unix-like filesystem hierarchy.
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Doubling your market share is easy when your market share is so low. It’s not on an “exponential growth curve” lol. The steam deck changes nothing for Linux as most people playing them don’t give a shit about Linux.
Linux gaming users are in the tens of millions of people. It's not like this is some super tiny community. There are more Linux gamers than macOS gamers by around double.
About two years ago Linux gaming market share was hovering below 2%. Now it's over 4%.
Yeah.....it's smaller than Windows by A LOT, but it's continuing to grow every single month on the Steam Hardware Survey. With Proton, SteamOS/Bazzite, and the Deck Verified program, Linux gaming has gone from "this sucks" to "this works unless there is kernel anti-cheat".
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What a disappointing week. I was looking to replace my five year old iPhone with an android phone and now I'm just stumped. Pixel 10 looked pretty good but then this sudden verification requirement news hit. Both platform are now equally crap. The hell with both of these shitty companies. Maybe I'll go full retro and get a dumb phone instead.
I am really hoping that PostmarketOS will become more viable.
I've been trying to get rid of all American service provider (dropped netflix, duolingo); smartphones are more difficult though because they need to work.
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Linux gaming users are in the tens of millions of people. It's not like this is some super tiny community. There are more Linux gamers than macOS gamers by around double.
About two years ago Linux gaming market share was hovering below 2%. Now it's over 4%.
Yeah.....it's smaller than Windows by A LOT, but it's continuing to grow every single month on the Steam Hardware Survey. With Proton, SteamOS/Bazzite, and the Deck Verified program, Linux gaming has gone from "this sucks" to "this works unless there is kernel anti-cheat".
Linux gaming users are in the tens of millions of people. It’s not like this is some super tiny community. There are more Linux gamers than macOS gamers by around double.
Nope, not in the tens of millions:
People using Linux computers at home, including for gaming, is a super tiny "community". Also not close to double Mac, and even if it was - Mac isn't a real gaming platform, so the fact that it's not even double Mac is evidence of how little people care about linux for gaming.
About two years ago Linux gaming market share was hovering below 2%. Now it’s over 4%.
Not on steam it's not.
Yeah…it’s smaller than Windows by A LOT, but it’s continuing to grow every single month on the Steam Hardware Survey.
Purely because of the steam deck, and windows is growing too - not everyone uses steam on windows, whereas it's really the only option for Linux.
Linux gaming has gone from “this sucks” to “this works unless there is kernel anti-cheat”.
And unfortunately for Linux, without this it will never take off because the overwhelmingly most played games all have kernel level anti-cheat.
