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Google’s Play Store gives a worse age rating to Fleksy, a Gboard rival

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Re: Google’s Play Store gives a worse age rating to Fleksy, a Gboard rival

#91

Post by toast0 »

parliament32 wrote: post #13

On a related note, does anyone have recommendations for a Gboard alternative? I've disabled all the "pipe everything I type directly to HQ for analysis" things in Gboard but I'd prefer a non-Google alternative.

I've been using Simple Keyboard, which seems to be what it says on the tin. Not a lot of features, doesn't make my phone sad. (In today's android, 2GB is not enough memory, saving some ram on the keyboard makes my launcher less likely to swap out when it's in the background; I wish I was overreacting)

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=rkr.simplekeyb...

Re: Google’s Play Store gives a worse age rating to Fleksy, a Gboard rival

#92

Post by whack »

levosmetalo wrote: post #5

Didn't install the app, but one look at the screenshot of the Fleksy in Playstore shows "earn coins as you type" feature. It also offers in app purchases, but didn't bother to install to check which. I know many apps use coin system, but in many cases it's just a children manipulation.

This is classic whataboutism. We shouldn't be excusing monopolist behavior because the victim "deserves" to be punished for some wholly unrelated offense.

Re: Google’s Play Store gives a worse age rating to Fleksy, a Gboard rival

#93

Post by ozim »

smilekzs wrote: post #69

Curious: How effective would it be to separate only the app store from Google/Apple, when it comes to this rating problem? Perhaps not even the infrastructure --- I'd imagine even just having an independent group of reviewers / rule enforcers would make the situation much less absurd?

So you maybe want to nationalize app stores? Getting european app store, managed by EU. Then US store managed by US government...

It is also as bad, but on the other hand I think internet infrastructure like app stores and all the other stuff should also be treated like roads in the end.

But government sucks with managing money :/

Re: Google’s Play Store gives a worse age rating to Fleksy, a Gboard rival

#94

Post by CamelCaseName »

__jal wrote: post #40
judge2020 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty standard method to obtain new users, but I don't think Google is unable to advertise their keyboard on their own.

Pretty bullshit method. Any software that wastes my time begging me to market for them gets uninstalled, period. I don't know why anyone puts up with that.

>Any software that wastes my time begging me to market for them gets uninstalled, period.

I hear you. I really hate prompts to post to social media myself, but companies do it because it is hard to get people interested in your product.

I'm passionate about this issue because I faced this problem myself many times when trying to generate reviews for my Amazon products. It is hard, if not impossible, to compete without breaking any rules.

The bottom line is, customer acquisition costs are high. In most free apps, it seems you are losing money until / unless you can reach critical adoption rates that make decrease those acquisition costs below your customer LTV. A single social media post could save the publisher $5-10 in customer acquisition costs.

---

So what can be done to fix this?

One idea is making reviews mandatory. There could be an optional prompt that can only be dismissed after a user has left a review. It could be a requirement to leave a review on a previous app before downloading another.

Any strategy to shape how or when users leave reviews will have the potential to be gamed, and I by no means have the answer.

But I think the solution to the review begging / social proof demands needs to be solved at the app store level.

As it stands, established companies have a massive, massive, advantage over indie publishers.

---

I could talk about this all day, so I'll leave it here, but I'm interested to here others thoughts on this:

How do you balance the need for businesses to generate reviews with customer convenience?

What would you change to fix this problem?

Is there an opportunity for a third party fix this?

---

>I don't know why anyone puts up with that.

Because honestly, it's just a single click to say "no" and users are already invested in that particular app.

Responsible apps should only ask once, but there are countless apps that ask every time.

Re: Google’s Play Store gives a worse age rating to Fleksy, a Gboard rival

#95

Post by eitland »

ysavir wrote: post #65
osrec wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would your ideal open-source smartphone ecosystem be structured? Genuinely interested as I'm looking to explore this as a potential project myself with my team.

* In app library, clear and upfront expectations of what permissions each app uses (as well as an explanation for each permission in the app creator's own words). * In app library, ability to filter apps by permissions required ...... Specifically, I would want to be able to blacklist permission sets. Eg, search for Keyboard apps, but exclude any apps that require access to my contacts. * Ability to pay for apps dire…

This is the one I agree most with so I'll add mine here:

- network connectivity as a separate permission (no reason every app should be allowed network access)

- also, permissions systems everywhere need to get updated for this millennium. Some thoughts:

-- to read my photos is OK as long as they don't have direct network access.

-- but today every app has Internet access by default

-- and just because I trust an app to read my photos doesn't mean I should have to give it permission to delete photos

Re: Google’s Play Store gives a worse age rating to Fleksy, a Gboard rival

#96

Post by yjftsjthsd-h »

Bartweiss wrote: post #52
heavyset_go wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Never attribute stupidity to that which is adequately explained by self-interest. It's extremely convenient that Google had an oopsie that's entirely aligned with their own interests.

I mean, this could be as simple as internal app teams not going through the same form, or not getting re-reviewed automatically because it's assumed they'll speak up if they add anything objectionable. And Fleksy's point about being targeted for their increasing use count wouldn't require intentional targeting either - that could just be an automatic "trigger an extra review when user count grows enough". Which doesn…

Letting your own apps bypass the review process sounds pretty anti-competitive to me...

Re: Google’s Play Store gives a worse age rating to Fleksy, a Gboard rival

#98

Post by MBCook »

techwizrd wrote: post #6
magashna wrote: post #2

Seems malicious on Google's part since middle finger is official unicode

I'm guessing it is more that the different teams do not talk to each other, and Google must not have a good, standard review process. "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."

Oh yeah, because if this was Apple no one would pile on.

At a certain point (and both Google and Apple are big enough) it becomes their fault. You should have good enough policies. It’s been 10 years or so since the app stores launched. This isn’t new stuff anymore. It’s not untrodden territory.

It’s laziness at best, and that shouldn’t keep getting excused.

Re: Google’s Play Store gives a worse age rating to Fleksy, a Gboard rival

#99

Post by cmroanirgo »

eitland wrote: post #95
ysavir wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

* In app library, clear and upfront expectations of what permissions each app uses (as well as an explanation for each permission in the app creator's own words). * In app library, ability to filter apps by permissions required ...... Specifically, I would want to be able to blacklist permission sets. Eg, search for Keyboard apps, but exclude any apps that require access to my contacts. * Ability to pay for apps dire…

This is the one I agree most with so I'll add mine here: - network connectivity as a separate permission (no reason every app should be allowed network access) - also, permissions systems everywhere need to get updated for this millennium. Some thoughts: -- to read my photos is OK as long as they don't have direct network access. -- but today every app has Internet access by default -- and just because I trust an app…

I'd go as far as requiring a statement of intent (soi) from developers requesting network access, describing the frequency and payload content and size. If the code doesn't match the soi then the app is crippled.

Re: Google’s Play Store gives a worse age rating to Fleksy, a Gboard rival

#100

Post by stordoff »

aitchnyu wrote: post #66
netsharc wrote: post #3

I use Gboard, and today it had a strange prompt on the bar above the keyboard: "Do you like typing German?".. I was curious and I pressed it, it lead to a prompt where there was text I could copy paste and I guess post on my social media, about how much I enjoy using Gboard... So you fucking want me to advertise for you, Google? And for what reason? Does someone want their promotion/bonus and for that they have to re…

Windows apparently has the system dialog "how likely are you to recommend Windows 10 to a friend or colleague?" with a score from 1 to 5.

I've seen that in one of the default apps on Windows Phone (fairly sure it was the Photos app - quite recently too).
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