Why do we need app stores in the first place?!? No app stores => no vetting, let users download whatever apps they choose, and deal with the consequences.
Agreed. The store are unnecessary and sold under the guise of "protecting" the user, when it's really about controlling user use, keeping them ignorant and spying on them.
Google does not care if your data is leaked by an app offered by some nebulously defined verified developer that phones home without reason, or that you develop a problem with online gambling or predatory micro transactions, etc. Blows my mind that we have come this far in the fight for user rights, ownership and accountability and still the majority is going to just trust Google because they're Google. No corporation is your friend. Let the users operate the device they paid for* as they see fit, learning to accept the responsibility for for all the success and failures that come with it and we will suddenly start seeing much, much smarter users.
Mostly it's about milking app sales with the app store fees. Apple for instance get's about 15-20% of it's gross profit from app store fees. For Google it has been estimated that play store fees make up about 13% of their Google services profit.
I think initiatives like this are a form of "marketing" to show that "hey, app stores are important because we protect the users. We shouldn't be regulated away."
App stores are riddled not only with spyware and malware, but also with harmful content like gambling apps targeted at kids. And they claim some moral high ground as an excuse to ever more pervasive spying and control? Fuck me, Stallman was right all along.
It's a tricky balance-act to secure their ecosystem.
The more measures they take to secure it while allowing the user to decide whether to participate, the more drastic this opt-out user-decision becomes.
In order to now preserve that "open ecosystem", they would have to provide the user an option to disable Google Services entirely, which would turns the device almost into a separate product
All this is unlikely to happen just for the sake of "pleasing the community", I believe we need a general legally binding definition of what functions the user owns if (and when) a device is stripped of any services on top.
If my car loses functions once it loses connection to the manufacturer, this bare set should be communicated as the purchased value ("in exchange for your money"), separately from any on-top "in exchange for your data" business-model
The problem is phones became too important. They get trusted more than desktops for things like banking and ID verification.
Feeling like the optimum solution is to just have two devices. Your phone that has all of your banking, ID, etc. and another device that’s completely open, can install whatever you want on, but doesn’t matter too much if it gets hacked.
If this is a reasonable direction, it could still be achieved on the same device. There would be sufficient security architecture available to completely isolate those two areas.
But I feel the issue is less about malware gathering your banking, ID etc, but malware holding your data hostage, using your (social) network for nefarious purposes or tricking you into something you don't want to do.
And for all those cases, having that "other" device doesn't help.
And get judged for their reactions, as is proper procedure.
Why am I reading today articles that present an apocalypse without clearly specifying if there is a "way out OS flag" (allow installation of unverified APK)?
Why do we need app stores in the first place?!? No app stores => no vetting, let users download whatever apps they choose, and deal with the consequences.
Agreed. The store are unnecessary and sold under the guise of "protecting" the user, when it's really about controlling user use, keeping them ignorant and spying on them.
Google does not care if your data is leaked by an app offered by some nebulously defined verified developer that phones home without reason, or that you develop a problem with online gambling or predatory micro transactions, etc. Blows my mind that we have come this far in the fight for user rights, ownership and accountability and still the majority is going to just trust Google because they're Google. No corporation is your friend. Let the users operate the device they paid for* as they see fit, learning to accept the responsibility for for all the success and failures that come with it and we will suddenly start seeing much, much smarter users.
Mostly it's about milking app sales with the app store fees. Apple for instance get's about 15-20% of it's gross profit from app store fees. For Google it has been estimated that play store fees make up about 13% of their Google services profit.
I think initiatives like this are a form of "marketing" to show that "hey, app stores are important because we protect the users. We shouldn't be regulated away."
App stores are riddled not only with spyware and malware, but also with harmful content like gambling apps targeted at kids. And they claim some moral high ground as an excuse to ever more pervasive spying and control? Fuck me, Stallman was right all along.
Yeah on the play store, nothing wrong with enforcing standards there, but enforcing a monopoly on it changes that.
It's a tricky balance-act to secure their ecosystem.
The more measures they take to secure it while allowing the user to decide whether to participate, the more drastic this opt-out user-decision becomes.
In order to now preserve that "open ecosystem", they would have to provide the user an option to disable Google Services entirely, which would turns the device almost into a separate product
All this is unlikely to happen just for the sake of "pleasing the community", I believe we need a general legally binding definition of what functions the user owns if (and when) a device is stripped of any services on top.
If my car loses functions once it loses connection to the manufacturer, this bare set should be communicated as the purchased value ("in exchange for your money"), separately from any on-top "in exchange for your data" business-model
The problem is phones became too important. They get trusted more than desktops for things like banking and ID verification.
Feeling like the optimum solution is to just have two devices. Your phone that has all of your banking, ID, etc. and another device that’s completely open, can install whatever you want on, but doesn’t matter too much if it gets hacked.
If this is a reasonable direction, it could still be achieved on the same device. There would be sufficient security architecture available to completely isolate those two areas.
But I feel the issue is less about malware gathering your banking, ID etc, but malware holding your data hostage, using your (social) network for nefarious purposes or tricking you into something you don't want to do.
And for all those cases, having that "other" device doesn't help.
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> they got so much
And get judged for their reactions, as is proper procedure.
Why am I reading today articles that present an apocalypse without clearly specifying if there is a "way out OS flag" (allow installation of unverified APK)?
> we will be confirming who the developer is, not reviewing the content of their app or where it came from.
What is the point of that? Then app content is the problem.
Ideally if they setup manual review then it would resolve some issues.
It's so that when someone installs a fake banking app and gets their money taken they can point the authorities to the right person to arrest.