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iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

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Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#671
post #558

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Defenders of Apple's policies always say you can just use other tech if you don't agree with them. The same principle applies here. If an app requires you to use a third party app store and you don't like it then choose another app. If you feel compelled to use a product with policies you don't agree with then now you understand how many of us feel about iOS.

But there's no push, you can literally ignore Apple's existence and use none of their products and you'll have no care in the world. Apple's network effect is basically zero. There's always one Android user in the friend group that spoils iMessage and FaceTime so we have to use something else anyway. If you mean you feel compelled to sell in their store which requires a laptop, a business relationship with Apple, and…

No business with a mobile component can afford to ignore iOS.

And a lot of apps launch early on iOS or have better features on iOS or never even launch at all on Android. Less so these days but it's still a thing. I was just in Japan and you can use an iPhone to pay for mass transit but not a non Japanese Android phone, just as one recent example.

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#672
post #143

I think the central question here is: .) whether you buy a phone as a piece of hardware and then own that hardware - which gives you certain rights regarding the usage of that owned hardware or .) whether you are just paying some sort of admission fee to a tightly controlled service, and are basically "lent" a piece of hardware that you have no ownership rights over. All the other stuff about walled gardens, monopoli…

Of course you own the hardware; you have the right to do whatever you want to it. If you want to use iPhones for target practice, have at it. You don't have the right to insist the manufacturer make it easy for you: your imagination about the uses to which the hardware could be put doesn't oblige the seller.

>You don't have the right to insist the manufacturer make it easy for you

I do, and it's easy, look: I believe Apple should let me install DOOM on the bootloader and make it easy for me to do so. If I had time to waste, I'd send emails every day, go protest in front of their HQ until I get what I want.

Apple's allowed to not do anything about it, and I'm allowed to lobby my legislators to force Apple to do so. Because Apple's wishes are not law, not in any functioning country that I know of.

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#673

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they want it, download the app then. Allow others to not download it and use a PWA if they'd like. Actually I believe you're wrong: if people actually preferred Apple's way of doing it, Apple would have no reason to restrict other ways. They restrict it because people prefer the other way, and that would harm Apple's profits.

They continue to restrict it because look at how much trash was (is?) on the Android store; they restricted it even more in the early days because of the torrent of low effort fart / gag apps.

I don't think that they care about not having useless apps. They care about the apps looking "integrated" in their system, right? I am an Android user and an Android developer, and I must admit that iOS apps usually look more consistent (in terms of UX).

And that's one of the values of Apple: this vertical integration that makes the overall thing look more polished (and probably easier to use to some extent).

Of course, they are happy to keep the restriction because they can take 30% commission on the paid apps, I'm not saying they are perfect and that there is nothing to improve. But I am not completely convinced that forcing them to lower their standards of integration (by allowing any kind of apps) is necessarily beneficial for the users.

After all, why do developers want PWAs? Probably mostly because it is cheaper for them, not because it's better for their users, right?

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#674
post #485

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple's ban of all browsers but Safari turned out to be the main barrier preventing progressive web apps from being viable, deepening the duopoly power of themselves and Google, because Apple refuses to implement basic browser standards that are necessary for PWAs. And then when they do implement similar browser standards, they don't follow any web standards, they instead make their own proprietary bespoke web standa…

For years Google been stamping "standards" one after another even though other browser vendors were against many of them and they end up being Chrome-only. No matter what Apple itself does Safari being major non-Chromium browser helps Firefox a lot just by existing and having huge marketshare.

It's a three player world now, and Google wants a better web, Apple doesn't want a better web, and Mozilla is somewhere in-between, but increasingly playing the "privacy above all else" card too.

In June 2020, Apple declared a bunch of APIs they will not implement (https://www.zdnet.com/article/apple-declined-to-implement-16...), in a big press blitz trying to make it look like they were some noble hero. Web MIDI (incredible fun), Web USB (very useful for Arduino using folk for example, who have excellent web-based tools), Magnetometer/Ambient Light/Battery/Proximity sensors, WebHID, Device Memory, and that's just the half. A week latter Mozilla put out a similar PR using the exact same Fear Uncertainty and Doubt (FUD) to try to make themselves look good, to declare themselves virtuous non-implementors.

Sure, I agree, not every site should have access to these sensors/capabilities. There are privacy risks of turning them on. But they're also excellent capabilities, that really help users do interesting things. Making users use less-secure less-sandboxed native apps is a downgrade. There should be some security regimes where these web techs can be permitted.

For a while Mozilla wasn't even reviewing a sizable chunk of web standards (tracked via the excellent https://mozilla.github.io/standards-positions/), just declaring them unsafe & leaving the convo. They've at least started going back to old Request for Positions & reviewing a good number of them, even if they don't intend to implement. And there's a good number of standards they have about-faced on, have accepted as real asks. In general, I'm encouraged in seeing a much more interested & engaged & progressive Mozilla emerge quite recently, within the past year or so.

I don't know what to do about web standards. Google takes a lot of flak, but who is there to work with? Edge, a Chromium fork, has some pro-web attitude, and indeed drives some new features for Chromium & participates. But there's largely no one but Google+Edge to deal with left in the web standards implementer world. The other browser vendors are broadly against a lot of features, for reasons of malicious-self-interest. Meanwhile Chrome continues to have one of the most open, progressive, interactive, review-seeking, concensus-desiring, most mature & responsible feature-lifecycle processes the world has ever seen. There is nothing else on the planet that gets shipped with such a high bar, such a socially pro-active, such a well planned & democratic process for how the feature gets developed. It's the gold standard of standards. https://www.chromium.org/blink/launching-features/#launch-pr...

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#675
post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He'd then have to convince everyone else he wants to talk to to use Signal instead of Facebook. That's the hard part.

It’s not as hard as what people think. You just tell your friends that you are not reachable on Facebook anymore and how you can be reached. You don’t have to "convince" anyone. Your real fear is that people will stop reaching you if they don’t want to install another app, send you an SMS, send you an email or to call you on the phone. Well, if your friends stops reaching you because you uninstalled an app, honestly…

It's not about being reachable in a 1-1 chat. It's about being excluded from group chats which are very important for keeping up the group and friendship in general. For example, if I deleted FB Messenger right now I would still get invited to the occasional event but there would be way fewer "yo, I'm at X, is anyone free to hang out?" type messages that I will see, or invitations from acquaintances in big group chats, or the current shitpost of the week that will become part of everyone's lexicon for the next 2 months other than yours, etc. For a lot of people (including me) such communication is a majority of their overall communication with their friends and breaking them does break a big part of their life.

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#676

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course you own the hardware; you have the right to do whatever you want to it. If you want to use iPhones for target practice, have at it. You don't have the right to insist the manufacturer make it easy for you: your imagination about the uses to which the hardware could be put doesn't oblige the seller.

>You don't have the right to insist the manufacturer make it easy for you I do, and it's easy, look: I believe Apple should let me install DOOM on the bootloader and make it easy for me to do so. If I had time to waste, I'd send emails every day, go protest in front of their HQ until I get what I want. Apple's allowed to not do anything about it, and I'm allowed to lobby my legislators to force Apple to do so. Becaus…

Don’t think legislators can force Apple to write software for your phone in the US at least. Maybe in places with fewer free speech protections.

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#677
post #607
post #477

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are (usually) buying a perpetual licence which is revocable, not renting a licence, so the language is correct. Common usage of the word 'buy' also applies here - the term 'rent' would be confusing to a customer and would usually imply it being time-limited (often days).

What does it mean for a perpetual licence to be revocable? To my layman's ear the two terms sound almost contradictory.

It means it is your forever, unless it is taken back, the reasons for which would be described elsewhere in the contract. The language may not be lay language, but neither was the ream of paper it took to buy my house, but people still do that every day.

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#678
post #558

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But there's no push, you can literally ignore Apple's existence and use none of their products and you'll have no care in the world. Apple's network effect is basically zero. There's always one Android user in the friend group that spoils iMessage and FaceTime so we have to use something else anyway. If you mean you feel compelled to sell in their store which requires a laptop, a business relationship with Apple, and…

>Apple's network effect is basically zero. >There's always one Android user in the friend group that spoils iMessage and FaceTime

Yes. That's literally my point. It's really hard for Apple to establish a network effect when any group above a certain size can't use iMessage or FaceTime and have to use a 3rd party app like Discord, Snap, or Messenger.

You can't be the "everyone else is one it" social network when every Apple user uses a 3rd party messenger and video chat app for at least one person. That app ends up being the winner.

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#679
post #485

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For years Google been stamping "standards" one after another even though other browser vendors were against many of them and they end up being Chrome-only. No matter what Apple itself does Safari being major non-Chromium browser helps Firefox a lot just by existing and having huge marketshare.

It's a three player world now, and Google wants a better web, Apple doesn't want a better web, and Mozilla is somewhere in-between, but increasingly playing the "privacy above all else" card too. In June 2020, Apple declared a bunch of APIs they will not implement ( https://www.zdnet.com/article/apple-declined-to-implement-16... ), in a big press blitz trying to make it look like they were some noble hero. Web MIDI (…

> Google wants a better web

Really? I believe that they want to control the web.

Re: iOS 17 app sideloading might only be available in Europe

#680

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That a very American viewpoint. This is why Americans have a gun problem with all the school shootings and random killing going on there. Sometimes it's a good idea to don't let people do something for their own good.

Love how we're equating sideloading to school shootings.

Agree, blanket statements as "never a solution" always bring out the worst in me :-)
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