Comment by tolmasky | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tolmasky | Hacker News Reader

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Sure, but why? If the rules clearly said "no chess games", one could say "that ends the discussion of why chess games are denied", or you could further ask "but why are no chess games allowed?". Is it because Google plans on having their own Google-Chess someday and thus is preemptively preventing competition? Is there a technical or regulatory reason chess games aren't allowed?

That's the question (at least for me) here: why are (non-tax-exempt) donations not allowed, beyond the tautological response of "because the rules say so"? I'm not familiar with the regulations around this area, so for all I know there's a great non-Google reason for this and Google just wants to avoid the hassle of conforming to some law. Or maybe donations is a feature they want to eventually support in Google Play and they don't want to have to force a bunch of apps in the future to switch once they add it (which would be a more disappointing reason). Perhaps they're afraid that it would create a loophole where people could get around the 30% cut since psychologically it feels shitty for someone to middle-man a donation, but then if they made donations Google-tax free, everyone would just choose "donation" and they'd have to police this.

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"

And a non-donation in-app payment isn't open for fraud?

If it was a normal in-app payment it would go through Google. Where it could be tracked, identified as fraud, and stopped.

You misspelled "Where it benefits Google, no matter whether it's fraud or not".

I am okay with that. No one is forcing anyone to use the Google service.

You are forced to use either Apple or Android or a Windows PC to acces many services that are essential to modern life. Android would probably be the cheapest option. So if you do not want to use Google services you would have to pay premium. For many people it is not an option.

I am not and I am not using neither Apple, Android (I am using the FOSS version, I guess that does not count as Android in this case) nor Windows and I am not missing anything, and I'm not frugal in this sense (most of my friends consider me a guy living in the future). And I am not paying premiums. I simply prefer web apps over native apps, it's a breeze with PWAs.

All government services where I live require Windows/Android or Apple. For some time I used Android in a VM for tax declaration etc, but the developers first banned the OS build name, so I changed the build name :P But then they found some way to figure out that I was using a VM. My hope is in PWA's, but the problem with PWA's (it's a feature really) is that it's harder to fingerprint and spy on the user. Also meaning it's harder to catch abuse like identity theft. I know there are ongoing work on Web ID standards where you can have a cheap second factor device as key. So it looks promising. But then there are the platforms, what incentive do they have, (more then empowering their users and developers), to actually enable a layer like web browsers that circumvent their monopoly status?

If they repackaged the app, gave it out for free, but changed the donation link how would that violate the license?

I suspect OP was referring to the non-profit status given by the government as “the license,” not the license of the source code.

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 donations or something.

That's totally ok in the world of Free Software. Pick any source code you want, repackage, rebrand it, sell it as you wish and may the Force be with you. People do it all the time.

Just because the license lets you do what you want with the code doesn't mean you’re allowed to commit fraud.

For example, if a person were to repackage someone else's open source project with a link that says, "Donate to support the development of this software" that's still fraud (assuming they keep the donations).

I understand your point but we should not assume criminal intent without some solid evidence.

Back in days I paid for CDs with only open source software because internet was too slow. CDs were definitely priced for decent profit. The beauty of opensource is that we can do this legally.

But this isn't a discussion of assuming criminal intent of a particular actor. This is a discussion of a rule to prevent actions by a hypothetical criminally-inclined actor...and thereby prevent a platform from getting a reputation for that criminal action.

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

The requirement for provable non-profit status is a legal requirement. A new federal law that passed last year makes it so any "online" content distribution network (including Google play) is legally responsible for any crimes committed by someone else listing a product or message on their platform.

Basically, if you include a donation link in your app without proving non-profit status you could be committing fraud, and Google could be held equally responsible to the crimes of the app being hosted. Google also has to report non-tax exempt profits made by any app/content they host in many locations, so only non-profit groups may link to a 3rd party payment system without violating legal statutes in some countries/states.

Thank's for the insightful response. I figured it was google covering their financial butt.

> Basically, if you include a donation link in your app without proving non-profit status you could be committing fraud,

How is it fraud to ask for donations without being a non-profit?

> Google also has to report non-tax exempt profits made by any app/content they host in many locations,

I am not familiar with google's payment model, but is there no way to charge users except through Google for google play apps?

How is it fraud to ask for donations without being a non-profit?

It's higher risk for sure. Non-501c3 donations are the kind of high risk small peanuts you can imagine a behemoth like Google wanting to get away from.

Because it saves google some hassle in policing shady monetary schemes. As soon as money is involved it is a massive hassle. Going outside of established monetary policy opens up a massive hole of shenanigans. Not to mention every app you download would have huge incentive to put up endless patreon/donate buttons that would go outside of googles carefully crafted walled garden, yet they would be held responsible for shady practices.

So they want the app store but as soon as it gets comlex or difficult to manage they kick up their heels and ban apps rather than stepping up to the plate and owning thier problem.

It seems like either (1) Google fears getting in legal trouble, or (2) Google wants to tax the transaction.

Their house, their rules.

A great way to have nobody come to your parties.

Or a good way to avoid having party guests trash your house.

Can't have party guests trash your house if nobody comes to your party!

taps finger on temple

Right, but I’m outside their house, asking others who are standing on the sidewalk with me, why they think they have these rules.

Problem comes when they own 90% of houses

Smartphone app stores are a duopoly, so I don't think Google should have total freedom to decide what they allow and what they don't.

There are at least three, actually, since Amazon also runs their own store which can be installed on any Android device. Samsung has another one specifically for Samsung devices, and there's also F-Droid though that might not count as a "store" since it doesn't handle payments. Anyone else can start their own the same way. Only the Apple devices are restricted to apps from their vendor-specific app store.

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