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A first look at Europe's alternative iPhone app stores

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Re: A first look at Europe's alternative iPhone app stores

#111

Post by pndy »

uyzstvqs wrote: post #44

AFAIK this is just Apple-approved apps, just through another app and servers. How does this change anything ? Apple still has full control over what apps users can install. There is no side-loading. They still need to approve every app on third party platforms. Or has Apple actually decided to remove app signing? They sure didn't when they announced this change.

They're doing everything to discourage devs who'd want to release apps on their own and make actually difficult to do so. You still need to fit their requirements if you want to play the alternative stores game where apple holds all the cards.

So yes, what they did changes anything, and it's just a smack in the EU face while keeping the status-quo. If they wouldn't maliciously comply and do some weird acrobatics we'd have a fdroid-like stores running right now and options to enable side-loading and some kind of scanning feature like google play protect (which on the other hand, likes to turns itself on).

For the user this is really simple: you're a typical consumer who wants to use appstore and stick to apple-approved software just to be "safe" - that's the default for you. You are poweruser who wants to expand the software library on the device - tap the setting, read the warning, read it again and install whatever you like

Anyway, it seems that the EC has received feedback from devs regarding what apple presented: https://www.macrumors.com/2024/03/20/eu-antitrust-chief-warn... so things may change in the future.

Re: A first look at Europe's alternative iPhone app stores

#112

Post by mathieuh »

styren wrote: post #98
SOLAR_FIELDS wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s a very good case to be made that these kind of laws are selectively used as a tool to oppress minorities and the poor. So while it’s probably not the straightforward Mr. Burns picture you painted, it is absolutely one of many tools in a large toolbox employed in America to continue to maintain the existing power dynamic.

Do you mind making this "very good case" for this legal oppression to a non-American?

Well, to use a quote from Anatole France who put it more pithily:

> In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets and steal loaves of bread.

Re: A first look at Europe's alternative iPhone app stores

#113

Post by shiroiushi »

nickburns wrote: post #105
ben_w wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> intellectually dishonest analogy based on numbers alone, never mind what each is respectively used for Neither should matter. Also, if you think the analogy misleading, please say why rather than calling it dishonest (I need more details than you've given to understand why you don't like it in those ways): this is a sincere comparison, and it's hard to learn from insults. > they all just up and randomly closed shop…

intellectual honesty is a concept the opposite of which i did not refer to with any intent to insult. what i mean is that, on their faces, video game consoles and smartphones are inherently different things. that you can play video games on a smartphone but you can't smartphone on a video game console is relevant. and that nearly everyone in the modern world has one (smartphones), but a relatively small number the ot…

Accusing someone of intellectual dishonestly is a blatant insult.

Re: A first look at Europe's alternative iPhone app stores

#114

Post by cesaref »

guappa wrote: post #104
sureMan wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In general, having lived and worked for extended (10 year + periods) in both the US and Europe. I find Europe have a lot more freedom, generally speaking. In some area's the US is better, and in other area's Europe is, but overall, I would tip the scale to Europe. American "freedom" have always felt to me like just pure marketing, however the same can be said for some European countries. For examples the Netherlands…

I know a woman who had married a dutch and went to live in a farm there. Apparently it was frowned upon for women to wear pants in the village where they lived, and finally she divorced and left (also for other issues I presume, but she cited closed mindedness as a major one). She's in her 40s, not in her 80s.

Over here in Europe your be better off saying trousers, as suggesting it was frowned upon for women to wear pants sounds like quite a free and sexually liberated village to me :)

Re: A first look at Europe's alternative iPhone app stores

#115

Post by Rinzler89 »

jamil7 wrote: post #106
nickpp wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that I don't have to worry if the newfangled clipboard manager my grandma was tricked into installing is sending the passwords she is copy&paste-ing to a server in China is wonderful.

It seems like "think of the grandmas" is the new "think of the children" line.

I wish people using the Grandma argument for security would provide some statistics on how many grandmas got hacked and robbed from side loading android apps before trying to die on that hill for Apple.

Re: A first look at Europe's alternative iPhone app stores

#116

Post by shiroiushi »

guappa wrote: post #103
throwaway2990 wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Apple's total control of all aspects of the iPhone platform is harmful to consumers in a way that is not at all obvious, especially not to the less technologically literate. This would only be true if Android did not exist. But the reality is it’s not harmful at all.

Android, the platform where you're free to be victim of a different USA company.

Android has its issues, but if you want to use a different app store on an Android phone, you're free to do so. You can also side-load apps over a USB cable. One is not like the other.

Re: A first look at Europe's alternative iPhone app stores

#117

Post by eps »

emsy wrote: post #70
jocoda wrote: post #26

I have no interest in distributing IOS apps but I would like to be able to install and run my own code on IOS. Right now I can install my own code on my iPhone but if I don't have a Apple developer account Apple will remove apps after a week. And presumably when the account lapses, so does the install. How, if at all, are these Apple restrictions affected? Are we still stuck in the thrall of Apple or do we get more o…

The one week limitation is so mind bogglingly stupid, it’s something only Apple could come up with.

Hostile, not stupid.

Re: A first look at Europe's alternative iPhone app stores

#118

Post by seszett »

shiroiushi wrote: post #107
seszett wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hammers aren't a good example because there's already an established market for interoperable nails, but batteries for tools is a more appropriate comparison I think. They should absolutely get regulated, there is no good reason for Parkside batteries not to be compatible with Bosch tools, or Makita, or Ryobi or whatever else. They all have their slightly different battery interfaces, that don't have technical reason…

Sure, it's bad, but suppose that all the power tool makers except Granny Smith Tools got together and made a standard for batteries, so now you can use Makita batteries on Ryobi tools, etc. The only exception is Granny Smith tools, which have proprietary batteries that cost a fortune, and have encryption chips to prevent making compatible third-party batteries or chargers. The Granny Smith tools cost more than the ot…

> suppose that all the power tool makers except Granny Smith Tools got together and made a standard for batteries, so now you can use Makita batteries on Ryobi tools, etc. The only exception is Granny Smith tools

The problem with that hypothesis is that in reality they just wouldn't do that. Once a fragmented market based on vendor lock-in is established, every manufacturer is afraid to break it because the first that breaks it has the most to lose.

> Is it correct for the government to step and and protect stupid consumers from themselves?

Do consumers have an option for interoperability today? They don't.

> If the government did this for everything that consumers buy, we might as well just have government ownership and operation of all companies

That doesn't follow, plenty of things consumers buy don't have vendor lock-in, and plenty of things that do have vendor lock-in also have available options without lock-in. Other products even have vendor lock-in, without interoperable options, but where lock-in isn't an actual problem (say, blades for electric razors: sure they are not interoperable, but they are a minor expense and have actual technical reasons for not having a standard).

> So at what point should government just let people make bad decisions

At an arbitrary point that is chosen by the regulatory bodies taking into account many of the variables that affect the markets of consumer goods.

Re: A first look at Europe's alternative iPhone app stores

#119

Post by resource_waste »

VagabundoP wrote: post #47

I was hoping for something similar to f-droid for iPads when this all shook out. But alas not to be. The vast majority of Android tablets seem to suck for some reason.

Think of the bright side, at least Android users finally get some competition so Android has to try harder.

For so long Android was the only place to get widgets. Finally iphone has them. Now they are going to have multiple stores!

If they sold iphones with aux ports, they might even convince me. (Probably not, Apple's security record is abysmal and I have an expensive secret on my phone)

Re: A first look at Europe's alternative iPhone app stores

#120

Post by jeroenhd »

uyzstvqs wrote: post #44

AFAIK this is just Apple-approved apps, just through another app and servers. How does this change anything ? Apple still has full control over what apps users can install. There is no side-loading. They still need to approve every app on third party platforms. Or has Apple actually decided to remove app signing? They sure didn't when they announced this change.

Apple has a history of doing bare minimum compliance with regulation they don't like. Regulators have to treat them like a toddler, because that's how they behave when they don't get their way. They don't want competition, they don't want to give developers any kind of freedom, and they especially don't want any competing payment apps on their platform.

Right now, Apple is testing the limits of what they can get away with. A small infraction here, removing a feature there, just seeing what triggers the regulators and what doesn't. Once regulators start investigating them, they'll just change their software to comply and get a minimal fine for the short period that they did get caught violating the law in.

In a few years time, when the first fine is handed out and has been appealed on all levels of the court, we'll see what Apple will actually end up sticking with.

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