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Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

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Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#161

Post by GrinningFool »

zmmmmm wrote: post #156

It seems really dumb of Google not to just go with the flow here and let the AppOps feature exist. Whack a giant disclaimer on it that it will break stuff, disable Play Store comments and ratings, let the users use it, and collect the giant PR dividend for looking like you care about privacy. They can do all that and lose virtually nothing because such a tiny percentage of people will ever use this feature that it wi…

I'd love it if enabling a feature like just caused the selected data points to be returned, but completely bogus (invalid phone number, empty address list, north pole location, etc). It would work for almost everything except network access, and would ensure that it didn't break apps in a bad way.

The all-or-nothing data privacy model of android makes me a bit crazy now that I'm using it on a regular basis for my tablet. That's one thing BlackBerry got right - you can grant or deny individual permissions to applications, and generally could safely assume that application developers knew this and handled security access exceptions when trying to access protected data.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#162

Post by Tyrannosaurs »

DerpDerpDerp wrote: post #138
Tyrannosaurs wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Re. proper keyboards - the market says otherwise. There have been plenty of Android phones with hard keyboards but they've not sold in sufficient quantities to make it attractive. If there was a market for it, people would be making them, if you disagree with that they what are you doing on here, your fortune awaits... Also worth seeing kids who've never used a physical keyboard to any great extent. I've seen them do…

> If there was a market for it, people would be making them, if you disagree with that they what are you doing on here, your fortune awaits... This is incredibly disingenuous because of the high barrier to entry on cellphone manufacturing.

It's an offhand line but the point stands - people who have the resources to overcome the barrier have tried and the phones don't sell in great numbers.

Once they get used to a good soft key board like you get on the iPhone or most Android phones people either don't want (or don't feel they need I suspect) physical keyboards.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#163

Post by ChuckMcM »

thecodeore wrote: post #39
CalRobert wrote: post #24

I'm probably going to turn in to that old guy with tin foil who can't play any games because nobody supports his choice of platform, but I really miss when computers were devices you could buy and then put your choice of OS on. Phones are pretty much just little ARM computers, why the hell don't I just install Ubuntu, Firefox OS, Android, WinPhone, Symbian, whatever? I could format a microSD card to boot from and go…

Because while the ARM processor is probably supported, most of the other sensors, camera, cell radios, etc have proprietary binary drivers that are not. Just read the problems Replicant, the true FOSS android, has had getting all components to work correctly.

It will be interesting if we can get more people to flip their HW over to the 'open' side of things.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#164

Post by Tyrannosaurs »

tomrod wrote: post #120
Tyrannosaurs wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Re. proper keyboards - the market says otherwise. There have been plenty of Android phones with hard keyboards but they've not sold in sufficient quantities to make it attractive. If there was a market for it, people would be making them, if you disagree with that they what are you doing on here, your fortune awaits... Also worth seeing kids who've never used a physical keyboard to any great extent. I've seen them do…

User preferences != the market. They are half the market. What this really says is that virtual keyboards have practically no cost, and so utilizing them instead of physical keyboards saves more in marginal (and perhaps per-unit) cost than the revenue from lost customers that require a physical keyboard.

All you're describing is an extension of the user preference - the willing to pay for their preference. Generally speaking if people aren't willing to make a sacrifice for the preference (in the form of money), how strong a preference is it?

After all I can get a physical keyboard on the $5 electronic address book. Even understanding that that's a very cheap keyboard (though that also includes margins for retailer, manufacturer and all the other costs), you're telling me that that the cost of a physical keyboard is going to be a deal breaker on a $300+ smartphone?

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#165

Post by wmf »

DerpDerpDerp wrote: post #138
Tyrannosaurs wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Re. proper keyboards - the market says otherwise. There have been plenty of Android phones with hard keyboards but they've not sold in sufficient quantities to make it attractive. If there was a market for it, people would be making them, if you disagree with that they what are you doing on here, your fortune awaits... Also worth seeing kids who've never used a physical keyboard to any great extent. I've seen them do…

> If there was a market for it, people would be making them, if you disagree with that they what are you doing on here, your fortune awaits... This is incredibly disingenuous because of the high barrier to entry on cellphone manufacturing.

Poor Motorizon can barely afford to make those Droids... wait, no.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#166

Post by google666s »

kllrnohj wrote: post #160
annoyedgoogler wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you put software into the wild - you have released it. Just because the cycle has sped up, you didn't document it properly, and your QA failed, does not mean you didn't release it. I'm not taking sides here, but you have to call a spade a spade.

> If you put software into the wild - you have released it. Even by that definition Google never released it. You needed a 3rd party app to access the feature, Google's software alone was not enough. Google didn't fail here, they flat out never released it. Or perhaps you could argue that they failed by not releasing it (or something similar), but that's different story.

I would not argue your 2nd point. I did not read that you needed a third party utility to access this.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#167

Post by DerpDerpDerp »

raverbashing wrote: post #151
DerpDerpDerp wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If there was a market for it, people would be making them, if you disagree with that they what are you doing on here, your fortune awaits... This is incredibly disingenuous because of the high barrier to entry on cellphone manufacturing.

You can sell a pluggable device, no need to produce the whole phone

A pluggable device doesn't offer the same experience as having a physically built-in keyboard.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#168

Post by DerpDerpDerp »

Tyrannosaurs wrote: post #162
DerpDerpDerp wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If there was a market for it, people would be making them, if you disagree with that they what are you doing on here, your fortune awaits... This is incredibly disingenuous because of the high barrier to entry on cellphone manufacturing.

It's an offhand line but the point stands - people who have the resources to overcome the barrier have tried and the phones don't sell in great numbers. Once they get used to a good soft key board like you get on the iPhone or most Android phones people either don't want (or don't feel they need I suspect) physical keyboards.

That a large company can make enough money by focusing on one type of phone, thus not splitting their engineering efforts doesn't mean that there wouldn't be a viable niche market, if not for barrier to entry.

I often hear people lament the design of their phone, caused by the preferences of the majority.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#169

Post by kunai »

Tyrannosaurs wrote: post #102
CalRobert wrote: post #24

I'm probably going to turn in to that old guy with tin foil who can't play any games because nobody supports his choice of platform, but I really miss when computers were devices you could buy and then put your choice of OS on. Phones are pretty much just little ARM computers, why the hell don't I just install Ubuntu, Firefox OS, Android, WinPhone, Symbian, whatever? I could format a microSD card to boot from and go…

Re. proper keyboards - the market says otherwise. There have been plenty of Android phones with hard keyboards but they've not sold in sufficient quantities to make it attractive. If there was a market for it, people would be making them, if you disagree with that they what are you doing on here, your fortune awaits... Also worth seeing kids who've never used a physical keyboard to any great extent. I've seen them do…

> There have been plenty of Android phones with hard keyboards but they've not sold in sufficient quantities to make it attractive.

They haven't sold because they've sucked. They had low-quality displays, crappy software, slow SoCs, and barely enough memory to be usable. The only keyboard phone left is BlackBerry, and that's not selling, well, because it's a BlackBerry.

There is a huge market for regular keyboard cellular devices. It's just that nobody's made a half-decent phone along with the keyboard.

If there is a device with a physical keyboard, a tapered, curved design, high quality components, a top-notch display, excellent build quality, the latest versions of Android, and good marketing, and you have a winner on your hands.

It's just that idiotic OEMs like HTC and Samsung would rather follow the fruity status quo than break from the norm. Only BlackBerry seems to have any balls today. Shame they're practically dead in the consumer sector.

Re: Google Removes Vital Privacy Feature From Android, Claims Release Was Accidental

#170

Post by zrgiu_ »

fooqux wrote: post #94
wting wrote: post #14

If you have root you can still enable it with market apps.[0][1] However something like this needs to be integrated tightly like iOS and apps need to be aware they may not receive requested permissions. I still use App Ops in Kit Kat and it silently breaks apps all the time. Apps expect to be able request information (e.g. contact details) and crash or stall when they can't. In that respect, LBE Privacy Guard[2] was…

I think the article is a tad misleading here, and I think your first link is going to add to the confusion. The ability to revoke permissions was built right into the System Settings app, but the ability to access it was hidden from view. Custom roms would usually add a link to it, and apps like AppOps by ColorTiger (your first link) was simply a pointer that would trigger that view to activate (I'm glossing over the…

Color Tiger dev here - actually with our version and root access you can install a recompiled version of AppOps with a few extended features as well - rebranded as AppOps X
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