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Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

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Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#341

Post by WD-42 »

hahn-kev wrote: post #340
itg wrote: post #2

Installing any app I want outside the Play Store was the primary reason I decided to go with Android, despite most of the people I know using iPhones. If I can't do this anymore, I may as well switch and be able to use iMessage and FaceTime with them.

Probably the only real benefit now is Firefox/alt browsers

Firefox with UBO is still a huge win. But Orion browser is making progress. At this point I just don’t see a reason to go android anymore. If I have to be part of a walled garden I may as well choose the nicer one.

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#342

Post by WD-42 »

jolmg wrote: post #327
cons0le wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if banking and messaging apps will work on it in the future

Re: banking, not until adoption of non-Android and non-iOS devices grows. To break this chicken and egg problem, one can get an Android phone and use it exclusively for the banking app, treating it like one of those hardware security keys the banks used to give out in the early 2010s. One used to just leave it at home; maybe take it to work occasionally. Another option is to live like the early 2000s and go to an ATM…

Or use the banks website from a computer? Which banks do not allow this?

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#343

Post by jolmg »

dinkleberg wrote: post #123
miclill wrote: post #114

My hope is that this lets some more people wake up and finally make Linux on the smartphone a reality.

If that ever does happen I really hope they just focus on making a proper phone, not trying to make it a hybrid phone and workstation. When they were working on Ubuntu touch (or whatever their phone version was called), they would show off how cool it was that you could just plug your monitor and input devices into it and boom you’ve got an all in one device. But who wants that? It’s cool. But I’d rather just have a…

> If that ever does happen I really hope they just focus on making a proper phone, not trying to make it a hybrid phone and workstation.

It's not a zero-sum game in that regard. The entire point of Linux phones is to get Linux distros working in phone form-factors. Getting them to work as general-purpose computers is the easier, already finished part. Getting them to work as phones is the harder-part, the new work. Removing the easy, already finished part doesn't make writing the camera drivers, modem-handling software, etc. any easier.

> But I’d rather just have a fully functional phone that happens to be Linux.

Without the "workstation" stuff? That's Android.

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#344

Post by falcor84 »

vivalahn wrote: post #170
jamesnorden wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I may as well switch and be able to use iMessage and FaceTime with them I, too, love vendor lockin.

Another road that leads to BBM it seems. It’s utterly bizarre how BBM could have been the iMessage and WhatsApp and who knows what else. But rich out-of-touch people thinking exclusivity is a perk in a commodities market just shows how business savvy and wealth are in reality disconnected from eachother.

Just to assist perplexed netizens like myself, apparently in addition to being an acronym for Big Beautiful Men, BBM also stands for BlackBerry Messenger [0].

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBM_(software)

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#345

Post by debtta »

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #308
raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes because technically literate users shouldn’t have trusted mainstream companies to not install bundle ware back in the Day? They shouldn’t have trusted Zoom not to install a web server on Macs surreptitiously that caused a vulnerability? They shouldn’t have searched Google for printer drivers not knowing that it was a fake printer driver? They shouldn’t have trusted Facebook when they installed VPN software that t…

Technically illiterate users should leave the default security settings enabled. In the modern day, I actually think this mostly works? Are you aware of instances where normies installed Windows malware because they purposefully disabled Windows Defender? Everyone always talks about the "Dancing Bunnies Problem" but I'm not convinced it's actually a thing.

The default security settings only got to be the way they are after more than a decade of exploited windows xp machines breaking the whole internet.

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#346

Post by greekrich92 »

opan wrote: post #260
estimator7292 wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, we have mandatory Play Store services, so the experience on android is not significantly less locked-in.

LineageOS without gapps (no microg even) works fine. Very few apps require play services. I think everything from F-Droid works.

The market for that is extremely niche and Google is going to make that less and less practical as it closes off AOSP source availability

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#347

Post by londons_explore »

WD-42 wrote: post #342
jolmg wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Re: banking, not until adoption of non-Android and non-iOS devices grows. To break this chicken and egg problem, one can get an Android phone and use it exclusively for the banking app, treating it like one of those hardware security keys the banks used to give out in the early 2010s. One used to just leave it at home; maybe take it to work occasionally. Another option is to live like the early 2000s and go to an ATM…

Or use the banks website from a computer? Which banks do not allow this?

Many banks in Europe are app-only and don't allow you to log in with a web browser.

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#348

Post by monksy »

The funny thing here: They have active spyware and malware on their app store. They go by vague offical sounding names like "Gallery" and "Messages" "Text Messages"

I've reported it and that goes to an google form where the app stays up. I've even gone farenough where I've escalated through internal Google contacts. Nothing is done. It's not sideloading that's the issue.

It's google. This is a hostile behavior to all users of the devices and developers of their platform.

_--

My thoughts on where this might go:

We're getting into an era where there are organizations that are violently hostile to your device and they demand that. These people believe that the device you paid for and the service you paid for is theirs.

I.e. mobile ids from governments, which may introduce client side scanning. More so, theres a hostile push for "age verification" which would lean on the Play integrity chain. Want to find out who does this? Look into Magisck on reddit and the apps people have difficultly using. This is not a case of "someone wants to hack something".. it's all about control.

If you're watching the Root/third party space.. right now there are issues running apps. Some apps scan for "SuperSU" app and will refuse to run. (As in they're not sandboxed)

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#349

Post by scrlk »

vivalahn wrote: post #170
jamesnorden wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I may as well switch and be able to use iMessage and FaceTime with them I, too, love vendor lockin.

Another road that leads to BBM it seems. It’s utterly bizarre how BBM could have been the iMessage and WhatsApp and who knows what else. But rich out-of-touch people thinking exclusivity is a perk in a commodities market just shows how business savvy and wealth are in reality disconnected from eachother.

In 2012, Jim Balsillie (then co-CEO of RIM with Mike Lazaridis) had actually planned this, but the board rejected the idea: https://www.theregister.com/2012/04/13/balsillie_plan_open_b...

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#350

Post by jolmg »

yndoendo wrote: post #43
kypro wrote: post #9

As someone who doesn't really care about apps, if I wanted to move away from Android what phones and OSs are worth considering?

Don't know how the Google's actions with affect AOSP. There are few options depending on location / country with base band frequencies. Murena with e/OS/ [0], Purism with PureOS [1], Volla with Volla OS or Ubuntu Touch [2], and Furei Labs with FuriOS [3]. Those are the companies actually trying to sell a phone versus Pin64 selling a device to tinker with. Alternative is checking personally managed OSes like postmarke…

PinePhone

https://pine64.com/product/pinephone-beta-edition-with-conve...

> versus Pin64 selling a device to tinker with.

PinePhone Pro sure, but PinePhone works AFAIK. Similar specs as Purism's (though weaker cameras), and 4 times cheaper.

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