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Open-source apps removed from Google Play Store due to donation links

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Re: Open-source apps removed from Google Play Store due to donation links

#561

Post by bonoboTP »

orbital-decay wrote: post #511
bonoboTP wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it is actually an ideology... It's the same as why people don't care about climate change or other far removed things from everyday life. For the normal, everyday non-tech user, they see that all their friends use these apps and nothing has ever happened to them. The FBI didn't come knocking, they weren't fired from their jobs or anything like that. From their point of view, why should they care about repositorie…

Funny that the same could have been said about actual literacy several hundred years ago. Who ever needs to be able to read and write in their everyday life? Why should I care? It's a thing far removed from everyday life, unless you're a trader or a priest or a scholar or some other expert. Today you can't imagine an adult person being unable to read, in most of the world. Except the tech is already there, and you us…

I think a better metaphor is driving. In many countries, like the US, driving is extremely widespread and most adults cannot function in the job market without being able to drive.

However only a minority of them knows how cars work under the hood. Most people understand the pedals and the steering wheel and that's it.

Same in tech. People understand there are screens, there are buttons you can click, text input fields you can type things in with the keyboard, on/off switch, sleep/standby, etc. All the things needed to operate it.

> for example by losing money from a stolen credit card.

I'm in Europe and I don't know anybody who had this happen to them, nor is identity theft a thing here. And this is mostly about phishing and social engineering anyway, not about understanding the tech background of package managers and digital signatures.

Re: Open-source apps removed from Google Play Store due to donation links

#562

Post by raxxorrax »

dessant wrote: post #235

Google Play In-app Billing does not support donations [1], so open source developers should be allowed to link to their own donation pages. Google Play policies do not spell out that linking to donation platforms such as Patreon is forbidden. Disallowing developers from using in-app billing for donations, while also barring them from linking to external donation platforms, puts open source projects in a difficult pos…

I just cannot comprehend how there are thousands of predatory apps on the store and these apps get banned.

Aside from that it should highlight problems with app stores as a model for software distriubtion in general, although I don't have much hope that this will happen in the immediate future.

That there even exists such a rule is ridiculous and unacceptable in my opinion.

Re: Open-source apps removed from Google Play Store due to donation links

#563

Post by pragmatick »

y49 wrote: post #517
greggman2 wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My guess is it's ripe for fraud. Find open source app, put on Google with your donation platform of choice, profit! By requiring government registration my guess is the hope is both that the fraudsters will be caught or dissuaded and if they do make it past the government registration then when the real devs complain Google can say "take it up with the government. They mis-licensed. We just followed their license"

My guess is you missed the point of Free Software. Anyone can use it in any way, including selling for profit. "Free" as in "freedom", you know Recently I created a small homepage with different re-packaged versions of Java: https://jdk.dev All that alternative packages are free of charge but they have extended support from a number of big companies. All these companies funded separately, there's no common place for…

I like that page but really not a fan of the font. It looks... dirty? Like writing with ink on wet paper.

Re: Open-source apps removed from Google Play Store due to donation links

#565

Post by kennydude »

pcr0 wrote: post #74
bubblethink wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>(for the time being) Why do you have that caveat ? You can use f-droid forever.

I'm on an unrooted phone and F-Droid doesn't do auto-updates or even "update all". I have to remember to open F-Droid once in a while to click "Update" and then "Install" for each app, one-by-one. I understand that it's probably Google's fault for not providing APIs/permissions but it's still terrible UX. I only use F-Droid when an app isn't available on the Play Store.

F-Droid isn't a "system app" so it can't even ask for permissions. If it was added as a system app in a custom ROM, then it'd be able to use the undocumented interfaces to install apps.

Re: Open-source apps removed from Google Play Store due to donation links

#566

Post by mimi89999 »

Trellmor wrote: post #423
hanniabu wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm, any idea how Google automatically catches a donation link? I feel like there's so many ways to do it that they must only be catching a handful.

My app also got taken down some months ago. I had a menu entry called Donation that linked to a web page containing a PayPal donation button. I'm guessing they are just looking for the string Donation in your app.

What app was it?

Re: Open-source apps removed from Google Play Store due to donation links

#568

Post by lern_too_spel »

ganeshkrishnan wrote: post #236
lern_too_spel wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All Google phones and Android One devices have unlockable bootloaders.

Unlocking bootloader is not the same as rooting.

Unlocking bootloader makes rooting safely possible.

Re: Open-source apps removed from Google Play Store due to donation links

#569

Post by lern_too_spel »

SamBam wrote: post #198
lern_too_spel wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All Google phones and Android One devices have unlockable bootloaders.

Rooting the Pixel 2 (I haven't tried the other Pixels) is not trivial for the average user, it still involves downloading third-party software and doing stuff on the command line. I had hoped that the pure-Google devices would have just had a switch: "I am now root," but alas it wasn't to be.

> I had hoped that the pure-Google devices would have just had a switch: "I am now root," but alas it wasn't to be.

An unlocked bootloader is strictly more powerful than simply gaining root. You can even install other operating systems. The ability to safely gain root falls out as one of the possible uses of an unlockable bootloader.

Re: Open-source apps removed from Google Play Store due to donation links

#570

Post by kllrnohj »

anoncake wrote: post #524
kllrnohj wrote: post #457

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Whatabout SecuROM"? I don't understand what you're attempting to get at with this. PC DRM back in the day was notorious for rootkit vulnerabilities and even bricking CD/DVD drives (example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootk... ). The point was just at least SafetyNet isn't straight up broken like the wild-west of arbitrary DRM providers of yester-year.

This is whataboutism. Please stop.

I'd suggest you re-read that wikipedia page on logical fallacies a bit closer before attempting to accuse others of "whataboutism."

But clearly there's no value to be had to anyone by continuing to debate with you, so sure I'll stop.

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