Comment by echelon

7 hours ago

We do not need our hyperscaler minders telling us what content we can and cannot consume.

This ought to be grounds to litigate antitrust. This should not be happening.

We need web-based app installs without scare walls ("downloading from the internet is dangerous"), without hidden settings menus to enable them ("Settings > Apps > Special app access > Install unknown apps"), and without any interference or meddling from the hyperscalers.

Tyranny of defaults = 0.00001% of users will ever fall into these buckets = Google knows exactly the evil shit they're doing. Apple not even allowing it is almost less evil by contrast as they're not pretending.

These devices are too important for two companies to lord over us and tell us what to do.

I hope Lina Khan comes back, and I hope she has some absolute urgency next time. I also hope our pals in the EU and Asia put this shit to rest as well. No citizen of the world should have their devices cucking them like this. This is not what computing is supposed to be. (And let's not discount the fact that competition on these devices is in no way, shape, or form fair anymore. You're taxed to hell and back if you do distribution or outreach on these garrison states.)

These our our devices, Google and Apple. You do not get to control what happens after we buy them. You are both monopolies. You are both allelopathic parasites. Invasive species that have outgrown your ecosystem and invaded all the other ones. Doing damage to everything you touch.

The world needs a cleansing forest fire to restore healthy competition.

17 comments

echelon

Reply
brookst  6 hours ago

I’m generally with you, but I am not prepared to say companies should be forced to host and distribute content they believe reflects badly on them.

That and I don’t see how Google and Apple can both be monopolies in mobile. Is this the “Ford has a monopoly on Mustangs” argument? Never found that persuasive.

Now, reframe as duopoly, and maybe layer in that a platform owner who curates their App Store must allow alternative app stores on equal footing, and I’d be with you.

  • Neikius  1 hour ago

    Well they are big enough to be called infrastructure now. Similar to payment providers. Them removing things essentially removes them from existence for 99 percent.

  • kstenerud  2 hours ago

    Remember the days when you could just run whatever software you wanted on your hardware?

    • perbu  36 minutes ago

      I feel like this is captures the point very well. Google removing this software, means that for 99% of the users on the platform, the choice to play this gets taken away from user.

  • alterom  1 hour ago

    >I’m generally with you, but I am not prepared to say companies should be forced to host and distribute content they believe reflects badly on them.

    There's platforms, and there's Apple and Google.

    You don't need to say "platforms" when you talk about the two companies that control the 99.99999% of the mobile ecosystem.

  • wat10000  6 hours ago

    I don't think companies should be forced to do that in general, but there are some circumstances where I think they should.

    A local printing company should not be forced to print things they don't want. But an ISP should be required to transport everything, with exceptions for legal requirements and legitimate network health measures, or get out of the ISP business.

    App stores feel more like the latter to me. Especially Apple's where there's no way around it for the average user.

    • brookst  6 hours ago

      Agreed on the free speech versus common carrier aspects.

      But I lean the other way with app stores. The companies hire reviewers, the listings appear in the App Store trade dress, it feels more like a museum or magazine than an ISP. But I get how reasonable people can disagree.

      Maybe we need some formal choices: is this a curated App Store that reflects editorial judgment (in which case it must be possible to ship alternatives on equal footing), or is it a common carrier (in which case you can be the only game in town).

      The ambiguity doesn’t help, and of course megacorps love shifting the frames depending on context.

stronglikedan  6 hours ago

nah, companies should be able to put all the content warnings they want on their own products, full stop

  • alterom  43 minutes ago

    They weren't talking about the warning.

    The warning was cited as an explanation as to why that game was delisted.

    The objection was to Google wielding the power of picking and choosing which controversial materials the users are allowed to see.

stavros  7 hours ago

This should already be illegal under the DMA. I don't know how Google is planning to get out of it.