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Google will allow only apps from verified developers to be installed on Android

9to5google.com

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Re: Google will allow only apps from verified developers to be installed on Android

#361

Post by askafriend »

donmcronald wrote: post #144
Kim_Bruning wrote: post #140

I never really got into "phone" progrmaming, always waiting for the shenanigans to die down. But somehow the shanigans have gotten worse and for a significant chunk of the world population, the phone is the only computation device they have at all.

I never got into it because I was convinced developers would refuse to give up control over distribution when Apple started doing it. I wish I was right, but here we are.

Developers want a stable, secure platform where they can reach customers that trust the platform and are willing to transact. Everything is downstream of that, including any philosophy around control.

Developers are businesses and the economics need to work. For that, safety and security is much more important than openness.

Re: Google will allow only apps from verified developers to be installed on Android

#364

Post by superkuh »

eadmund wrote: post #357

This is completely, absolutely and totally unacceptable. My phone is my phone, not Google’s. They have absolutely no right to prevent me from running whatever software I wish on that phone. This must not be allowed to stand.

It's actually your telco's phone. They're the one that has the license to run the baseband computer and RF transceiver. The 'pad' computer device is sort of yours. But there's no legal way to have ownership of a cell phone unless you yourself bid for and get the RF spectrum and set up your network in a way that accomplishes the FCC coverage and timing requirements. Then run your own telco for your phone. Basically, impossible.

Smart phones try to limit and firewall the interface between the two but tight integration is required for energy efficiency. So a smart phone, or a cell phone, can never be yours. They aren't good choices for doing computing and this legal reality is becoming more and more obvious with time.

Re: Google will allow only apps from verified developers to be installed on Android

#365

Post by rpdillon »

chenxiaolong wrote: post #31

If this is enforced via Play Protect, then the whole mechanism can likely be disabled with: adb shell settings put global package_verifier_user_consent -1 This does not require root access and prevents Android from invoking Play Protect in the first place. (This is what AOSP's own test suite does, along with other test suites in eg. Unreal Engine, etc.) I personally won't be doing this verification for my open-source…

I really hope this ends up being possible! Play Protect seems to jump up every so often and try to scare me into turning it on. Very annoying. I've wanted to disable Play Protect permanently, but never did the query to learn how, so thank you.

Re: Google will allow only apps from verified developers to be installed on Android

#366

Post by paxcoder »

Kim_Bruning wrote: post #140

I never really got into "phone" progrmaming, always waiting for the shenanigans to die down. But somehow the shanigans have gotten worse and for a significant chunk of the world population, the phone is the only computation device they have at all.

[dead]

Re: Google will allow only apps from verified developers to be installed on Android

#367

Post by Terretta »

cesarb wrote: post #175

The reason I chose the Android ecosystem over the Apple ecosystem, once I found out that the Maemo/Meego ecosystem was a dead end and the Openmoko ecosystem was a non-starter, is that the Android ecosystem allowed me to develop and install my own apps on my own devices whenever I wanted to, without arbitrary limitations like having to periodically plug the phone into my computer to renew some authorization. Additiona…

> without arbitrary limitations like having to periodically plug the phone into my computer to renew some authorization

I find it easier to do a git commit once every 89 days and see my app auto refreshed through Testflight for me and anyone else I care to let use it.

If you look at the build system SaaS pricing or even IDE pricing on Show HNs here, the Xcode cloud build and distribution ecosystem is an absolute steal at $9 a month. Private Testflight (with no review) can be more convenient than that desktop cable.

Re: Google will allow only apps from verified developers to be installed on Android

#368

Post by klabb3 »

rkagerer wrote: post #115

I've grown increasingly hateful towards both my Android and iOS devices over the last decade. The platforms themselves are increasingly user-hostile, and their appstores are crammed full of shitty, privacy-invading, telemetry-hoovering, dopamine-triggering, ad-filled, lipstick-covered apps that are often garbage compared to the pioneering days of mobile. I miss the days of my old Palm Pilot. Is anyone working on fixi…

The crazy thing is this is all under the pretense of preventing malware. And I constantly hear this argument that the app stores protect people, even from developers.

I truly don't get it. Are these people from 2009? Have they seen the apps on the current app stores? If you're lucky your highest rated flashlight app will only have a few Fullscreen ads and a subscription less than $10/mo. The recipe sites from content farms are less bloated and way less scammy.

It's certainly not about preventing scams. It's about preventing competition in the scamming business.

Re: Google will allow only apps from verified developers to be installed on Android

#369

Post by ActorNightly »

rkagerer wrote: post #115

I've grown increasingly hateful towards both my Android and iOS devices over the last decade. The platforms themselves are increasingly user-hostile, and their appstores are crammed full of shitty, privacy-invading, telemetry-hoovering, dopamine-triggering, ad-filled, lipstick-covered apps that are often garbage compared to the pioneering days of mobile. I miss the days of my old Palm Pilot. Is anyone working on fixi…

I mean, just get a rootable phone and roll your own RoM. If you can type stuff in a terminal, its not that hard to do.

You can pretty much disable all google services. Just a fair warning though, the experience is quite degraded.

Re: Google will allow only apps from verified developers to be installed on Android

#370

Post by VariousPrograms »

marcodiego wrote: post #200

How did we let this happen? Oh, yes... Actually I remember: it was a long slow series of accepting small artificial restrictions. I remember people laughing at me at the time. They said it won't matter, they didn't care, that I was paranoid... Now... Here we are.

Unless this is used to block TikTok or ChatGPT users still won’t care and people will still laugh at us for caring, or think wanting privacy or control of your computers is suspicious or ungood.
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