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Google forced OnePlus to decimate a Fortnite launcher deal, claims Epic Games

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Re: Google forced OnePlus to decimate a Fortnite launcher deal, claims Epic Games

#72
post #37

I think in the last thread a bunch of people were adamant Google wasn't a monopolist because plenty of phones shipped with app stores outside of Play. Seems like Google picks and chooses which of those are okay. It's time to stop lying: Google will absolutely abandon every single rule in the book to ensure they get 30% of Fortnite purchases. It's too lucrative, and Google is too greedy. This has nothing to do with sa…

Their customers are not your right For example,you are not forbidden from developing for some random Linux distro They did not build their trust and ecosystem for free,so you should'nt have access to them for free 30% is not unreasonable,costs can be managed,since you are selling a digital product

You're not quite seeing the point: This is not a developer trying to use their ecosystem for free, not in the OnePlus example: This is a developer saying "Thanks but no thanks, we'll choose a different ecosystem"

And Google inserts itself into the relationship between the business partner for that other ecosystem and bullies them into cancelling the deal.

Off course it's important to keep in mind that as of right now, we have only Epic's highly self-interested interpretation of events, and the truth may be far different. It seems LG for example had a pre-existing contract with Google to not do the sort of thing it was about to do with Epic.

Re: Google forced OnePlus to decimate a Fortnite launcher deal, claims Epic Games

#73
post #62

I think in the last thread a bunch of people were adamant Google wasn't a monopolist because plenty of phones shipped with app stores outside of Play. Seems like Google picks and chooses which of those are okay. It's time to stop lying: Google will absolutely abandon every single rule in the book to ensure they get 30% of Fortnite purchases. It's too lucrative, and Google is too greedy. This has nothing to do with sa…

did any of these alternatives also ship google play side by side with alternative stores? unless a company has a special deal with google, then it's either google or alternatives but not both. i think the only reason there could be a special deal is that google made some concessions when trying to convince a manufacturer to use android. but that would be an older deal.

Samsung can generally fight for special concessions because they're A. One of the largest OEMs and B. Actually have the technical capability, monetary resource, and customer loyalty necessary to fork or replace Android.

Everyone else has really no choice, and Google gives them the my way or the highway approach.

Re: Google forced OnePlus to decimate a Fortnite launcher deal, claims Epic Games

#74

Why hasn't a business approached F-Droid or other App stores to bridge a gap between Play and Android?

Many OEMs ship their own stores (Samsung, Huawei, etc.) which gives them a piece of the pie. Is that what you mean by business?

Approaching F-Droid probably isn't very desirable when the point of the store is to not profit from software.

Re: Google forced OnePlus to decimate a Fortnite launcher deal, claims Epic Games

#75
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How its dream of zero bloatware when Google itself adds tons of Bloatware starting from Play Music, Books, Duo, Drive what not. I am even ok shipping them by default and giving an option to uninstall. Any app which I cant uninstall is Bloatware.

Don't forget that Google embedded Duo into the Google Play Framework so even if you disabled or uninstalled the app, people could still call you via Duo.

You mean Google enabled E2E encrypted calls to every Android device?

That sounds like a good thing. Duo is still pretty much the only E2E encrypted video call app that also works on the web.

Re: Google forced OnePlus to decimate a Fortnite launcher deal, claims Epic Games

#76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Their customers are not your right" When did I become Google's property to trade and bargain with? Because it sounds like i didnt buy the phone, Google bought me.

You're not an Android user, you're an Android used.

It's kind of a shame the Ubuntu phone never really materialized. At one point a while back I put off a much needed upgrade from a nearly dead phone for about 6 months because their phone was supposed to be "any day now".

I think the OS is still kicking around and technically not dead yet, but it's really hard to believe that it would be able to break into the OEM side of things at this point. If Microsoft couldn't buy their way in to it I don't see much hope for a group that wouldn't be paying massive amounts of money to handset manufacturers and carriers to support the development & deployment. Though I'd be happy if it were simply possible to flash it onto most Android handsets with full hardware compatibility.

Re: Google forced OnePlus to decimate a Fortnite launcher deal, claims Epic Games

#77

I don't find it particularly interesting to argue over whether Google and/or Apple or Goople are monopolies/duopolies. I think however it is obvious that something has seriously pathologically gone wrong in the mobile software market and these two companies are behind it. I also don't think that appeals to "is that legal" are all that satisfying -- (Apple's free speech lets them silence whoever they wish, of course)…

> Why do I only have 2 choices?

There’s an extremely high barrier to entry and people don’t have time to learn different operating systems.

Re: Google forced OnePlus to decimate a Fortnite launcher deal, claims Epic Games

#78
post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

did any of these alternatives also ship google play side by side with alternative stores? unless a company has a special deal with google, then it's either google or alternatives but not both. i think the only reason there could be a special deal is that google made some concessions when trying to convince a manufacturer to use android. but that would be an older deal.

Samsung can generally fight for special concessions because they're A. One of the largest OEMs and B. Actually have the technical capability, monetary resource, and customer loyalty necessary to fork or replace Android. Everyone else has really no choice, and Google gives them the my way or the highway approach.

even samsung is limited. they have their alternative OS, but they are not allowed to support android apps on that OS because that would violate their android license which they need on other devices.

other alternative systems have more freedom than samsung because they are not bound by a license from google.

Re: Google forced OnePlus to decimate a Fortnite launcher deal, claims Epic Games

#79

I don't find it particularly interesting to argue over whether Google and/or Apple or Goople are monopolies/duopolies. I think however it is obvious that something has seriously pathologically gone wrong in the mobile software market and these two companies are behind it. I also don't think that appeals to "is that legal" are all that satisfying -- (Apple's free speech lets them silence whoever they wish, of course)…

> Why do I only have 2 choices? There’s an extremely high barrier to entry and people don’t have time to learn different operating systems.

The barrier to entry is not high. There used to be many more options for phone OS.
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