Comment by nolist_policy
15 hours ago
Very nice, here are the 11 Android features that must be made accessible to third party's: https://digital-markets-act.ec.europa.eu/developer-portal/in...
My favorites:
> 6. Structured on-device integration
> AI services will be able to easily interact with other apps installed on the device and perform tasks on behalf of the user within those apps, for tasks that the apps and the user have chosen to make available to AI services. These tasks include “send a message”, “create a note”, “schedule a meeting”. This includes access to certain Google apps (i.e.Gmail, Calendar, Drive, Docs, Maps, YouTube, Messages and Phone) that Alphabet will make available through operating system-level integration channels.
> [...]
> For instance, Android implements structured on-device integration through App Functions, which developers can enable for their apps, and which can be accessed by AI services without being reserved anymore for Google services, such as Google Assistant or Gemini.
> 7. Screen automation
> AI services will be able to automate multi-step tasks within apps, on behalf of the user upon their consent. They will do so by imitating user behaviour in a separate virtual window, which makes it possible for the assistant to complete the task in the background, while the user can do something else. [...]
> Android implements screen automation via Computer Control, which can automatically access apps, and which is currently reserved for Google’s services, such as Gemini.
> 9. System-level on-device models
> AI services will be able to call on existing on-device models (“ODMs”), including the Gemini Nano ODMs, that are part of the DMA designated operating system, already preinstalled on Android devices and already made accessible to third parties. As a result of the measures, third-party AI services will have guarantees of equal access (for example, in terms of performance) to ODMs, as Google’s services. [...]
> 10. On-device model implementation
> Third parties will be able to install, run and use on-device models (ODMs) under the same hardware‑resource and background‑execution conditions that Google’s own models enjoy, and will allow their ODMs to be shared centrally with other apps. [...]
Strange page, it keeps repeating that there are 11 features and then lists four or five, thrice over, and all can be summarised as "device access for competitors' AI voice assistants and dependencies thereof". Then there's some FAQ about the timeline and such. At the very bottom is a link to what seems to be the legal details but ends you up on a search page. Unfolding the only result, there is a link to the 'decision text', which of course you can't just read as text but need to get as a PDF download so the lines can't be broken up and the text is super hard to read using, say, an android phone or screen reader. This format ought to die already.
Anyway, the actual decision text: https://ec.europa.eu/competition/digital_markets_act/cases/2...
Edit: reading that document, I understand now why that press release, as well as the submission above, doesn't get further than a handful noteworthy properties and that even those partially seem like dependencies of each other: that's all it is. It's all about running code on a device activated by a hotword and the access such that it can actually be used (access to the NPU, ability to run in the background, ability to start phone calls, access to sensors, ability to display things on the screen...)