Seems like a good use case for the FDroid Nearby feature, host apps on your phone and let other people download them. Make the whole thing FOSS and all of a sudden it's a lot harder to block.
Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store
761–770 of 931 posts
Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store
#762This is why Apple will always be a second-class citizen to Android. If I have a good reason, I can toggle a setting and install APKs built by anyone. If I have a good reason, I can wipe my phone and unlock the bootloader to literally replace and de-Google the entire OS. When I buy a phone, it's a hardware product I'm buying. Just like when you buy a PC/laptop, what you run on it is your business, not the manufacturer…
That's probably also the reason why GNU and FSF should get new momentum. In the 90s/00s there was good reason to get away from Windows because it was really unstable - and Apple being expensive and niche. Now both are kind of viable options for most things but the freedom to use whatever application one wants to use is definitely becoming more important.
Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store
#763This is why Apple will always be a second-class citizen to Android. If I have a good reason, I can toggle a setting and install APKs built by anyone. If I have a good reason, I can wipe my phone and unlock the bootloader to literally replace and de-Google the entire OS. When I buy a phone, it's a hardware product I'm buying. Just like when you buy a PC/laptop, what you run on it is your business, not the manufacturer…
Why does it have to be Android? It's another commercial closed-source OS and therefore the business interests controlling it will at some point conflict with a user's definition of freedom. There are FOSS alternatives easily found by searching.
Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store
#764This is why Apple will always be a second-class citizen to Android. If I have a good reason, I can toggle a setting and install APKs built by anyone. If I have a good reason, I can wipe my phone and unlock the bootloader to literally replace and de-Google the entire OS. When I buy a phone, it's a hardware product I'm buying. Just like when you buy a PC/laptop, what you run on it is your business, not the manufacturer…
"This is why Apple will always be a second-class citizen to Android." Android wouldn't allow an app to be installed on official phones if Google didn't want so, and unofficial ones are built in China anyway plus often already ridden with spyware. The only workaround would be a 100% FOSS phone where the user is king and decides what would run or not. Pine64.org devs, are you listening?
> The only workaround would be a 100% FOSS phone where the user is king and decides what would run or not.
This is why we need to support efforts to create and maintain such platforms. Even taking a moment to spread the word is helpful here.
Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store
#765Earlier quoted context omitted.
It is certainly conceivable that people could make a different choice next time they decide to buy a phone. Others that feel more strongly could switch right away.
Maybe, if it were convenient to switch. But I've given up on believing in boycotts. E.g. People kept buying video games, no matter how shitty the business practice. Preoders, Lootboxes, Season Passes, Pay2Skip... all seemed to have made a ton of cash.
As a technique, the boycott is tried and true, but its efficacy is ultimately dependent on how many people actually care about the issue.
Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store
#766"On January 24th, Apple Computer will introduce Macintosh. And you'll see why 1984 won't be like '1984.'" -Apple, 1983 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1984_(advertisement)
Oh how times have changed!!
Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store
#767As someone who has appreciated the privacy stance Apple has had and the privacy assisting steps it has taken for a long time (long before iPhone), I believe Apple is coming out to be completely hypocritical and anti-privacy/anti-freedom on this app. I cannot believe that Tim Cook and other senior executives haven't examined this deeper and taken a bold stance to let the app stay! Shame on you, Apple! Even John Gruber…
Agreed! If Apple caves in to Chinese pressure on this, what else will they do? Does Xi Jinping's brutal authoritarian regime now effectively make decisions for Apple abroad, since they can always threaten to cut Apple out of the lucrative mainland market?
Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store
#768Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store
#769This is why Apple will always be a second-class citizen to Android. If I have a good reason, I can toggle a setting and install APKs built by anyone. If I have a good reason, I can wipe my phone and unlock the bootloader to literally replace and de-Google the entire OS. When I buy a phone, it's a hardware product I'm buying. Just like when you buy a PC/laptop, what you run on it is your business, not the manufacturer…
> If I have a good reason, I can toggle a setting and install APKs built by anyone. If I have a good reason, I can wipe my phone and unlock the bootloader to literally replace and de-Google the entire OS.
This is not possible for many (and I suspect the majority of) android phones.
Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store
#770Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's funny: "Apple will always be a second-class citizen to Android" You don't hear about 14 million iPhones being infected by malware[0], do you? Or malware stealing users' bank credentials[1]? Heck, there are people whose brand new phone comes pre-loaded with malware[2]. Oh, this one was just posted five hours ago -- applications on the Google Play store load with trojans and spyware[3]. I can keep going, but the…
This argument reminds me of the gun control argument. People in favour of "more guns" are fully aware that more guns means a more dangerous society. But they consider the freedom to choose whether to own guns more important than living in a statistically safer society. Whereas, people in favour of "gun control" consider the safety of society overall to be much more important than the freedom to own devices designed t…
Apart from the fact that an Android that has side-loaded malware probably(1) won't shoot five innocent bystanders, I think this is a good analogy.
(1) Probably. It's an open source OS, so no telling categorically what hardware it's driving ;)