Apple blocks game streaming services unless individual games are approved
bbc.com
bbc.com
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24084373
There finally needs to be regulation on this. No banning of end user services as long as they're legal, I don't want a phone maker controlling what I do on the internet. It's ridiculous. Microsoft in the 90s doesn't even compare to this, it's on an entirely different level. If competition regulation would actually still exist we'd tear apple a new one.
I was with you up until this moment.
Doesn't this just shift the power to a less accountable authority in the state?
What about content that isn't legal but which is, you know, not child abuse or similar? Does that deserve a platform also? I think that being able to view content on a phone regardless of its approval by the state is essential to a free society.
And, as always, the question is: legal where?
Healthier is for people to find and enact workarounds to this censorship, and to cause Apple to be unable to profitably proceed.
Crony capitalist companies break competition to rig the economy. That is what Apple is doing by working to collect rents from other people's work.
Computers didn't use to be like this. Apple has land grabbed their way here and is now clamping down harder than ever before. If we don't revolt, we're going to wind up in a terrible place where Apple and Google make all the movies and games and we rent everything and own nothing.
Call your representative and ask them to put an end to this.
Demand open computing. You own the computer, you get to run whatever software you want.
(Side note: iPhones are the only computers a large segment of Americans own!)
So phone and app store could be naturally cut like for android ecosystem.
I can think of a few possible reasons:
1. Chrome (as in the browser) came out after the first iPhone was released (2007), and around the same time of Android's first release (2008). Chrome OS didn't come out until 2011. Android's app ecosystem started developing before Google had all that much influence on web standards, and likely before they realized that it would be a good idea to have that influence, or even knew that Chrome (the browser) would become as popular as it ended up being. I'll also note that Chrome OS wasn't anywhere near as successful as Google hoped it would be; while that doesn't invalidate Chrome OS's app model, it doesn't validate it either.
2. Android has done a decent amount of copying of iOS features (I say this without judgment or malice; I've been a generally happy Android user continuously since 2010 and have no axe to grind). Not having native app development on Android could have been seen as a possible market disadvantage when compared against Apple.
3. Google may have actually desired more Apple-like control over what runs on Android, or at least wanted to allow for the possibility that they'd want it in the future. That's harder when you base your app platform on web standards.
Really it's just code for "let me, a web developer, target Chrome only, so I can just tell Safari users to install Chrome."
Browsers can of course be non-conformant on other interesting issues. Imagine if a browser came out that allowed the Unity Web Player to work. Instantly, people wouldn’t need to use the App Store to purchase games. Instead, they could just use the browser.
For the 2nd, it sounds like there needs to be a way for the web platform to evolve for things that require engine modification. I wonder if the web will break down into smaller standard components and new browsers can be built from those.
With regard to your second paragraph, I believe you have made a category error between "the App Store" and "the browser." The browser is not a store.
And if you want to remove them, that’s just arguing that a business model is at issue not a specific business. After all Epic is selling ports of the same game across multiple platforms any paying each of them a cut of games sold in other stores. If Apple just takes the same cut and allows more App Stores on their platform, or is that ok or is this just a question of money?
Regulating big tech and keeping all tech under government's thumb are not at odds, so it makes me lean towards incompetence as the more likely culprit.
I predict there will be some government intervention but it'll be clumsy and counter-productive for at least another decade or two.
Put enough fear into the population and they'll accept anything any authority presents as a solution. That's the danger of relying on democracy. You depend on the public to do the right thing and the public is easily manipulated.
What do you suggest? Give up? You have condemned democracy itself.
All of them can access web content, facilitate payments, do shopping and run applications.
The reason it's important is because it would be the end of the gaming console model if they were forced to accept anything onto their app stores. Which would have pretty broad implications.
I do agree the lines can be blurry and poorly defined.
How so?
Which is not possible if you going to force them to do things like have alternative app stores or to allow any content to be used.
I recently (6 years ago?) decided to purchase thousands of dollars of music on Google Play Music and look where that got me.
I can (and do) still play my Gamecube games.
You can’t have such an arbitrary definition.
I think people with this notion either work at Apple, love their iPhone, or have lots of AAPL.
Please see what their behavior is doing to the rest of us. Fixing it is more important than any personal stake you have in this.
For what it’s worth I’ve never worked at Apple, down’t own any AAPL (unless you count indexes), and have bought Android phones off and on. So I’d focus less on acusing everyone who disagrees with you of alterior motives.
So consoles get slightly more expensive, or other revenue streams are created. Steam, Origin, Epic, UPlay and GOG all compete on the desktop while earning plenty, even though people can download games directly from the publisher today. Why can't the same model be applied to consoles which have always been basically pre-built mini computers anyway?
If you say that all these devices are computers then why have arbitrary treatment of desktops, phones and consoles?
Smartphones are logical successors to PCs as general purpose computing devices. A lot of people just have them as their device for photo editing, emails, gaming, spreadsheet editing, web browsing etc.
PCs had open software and hardware access, I think it is reasonable for us to want their logical successors to atleast have open software access.
There is trillions of dollars of ecosystem which PC had which has largely extended/moved to smartphones. Everyone should get a chance to compete on fair and equal terms in this ecosystem.
I definitely enjoy sending emails and shooting movies on my Nintendo.
Speaking of which, should I get Shovel Knight on Nintendo Switch, Wii U, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Microsoft Windows, macOS, Linux, or Nintendo 3DS? I have lots of these, and I'm not sure which inexpensive device is the best for playing Shovel Knight.
Cancel that. I'm not sure I like all of that choice. Which of my seven affordable iPhones from a wide variety of vendors should I download and install it to? Can I redeem my Steam credit?
Fuck Apple. Their behavior makes them a blemish upon our industry.
Thanks! Just got to finish the level of Doom first.
My car’s 17-inch touchscreen-based web browser happily runs turbotax.
Which implications precisely? Because consoles not being sold at a loss seem like a positive outcome.
Apple would be broken up into Mobile devices, Desktops, Software, MacOSX, and Internet services. MacOSX would have to be ported to the PC then with no owning the hardware the same with iOS.
I also have an iPad. I know I lose some software access (e.g. Facebook streaming games) but I also gain software, like Slay the Spire and FTL and Bastion. These games are iOS exclusive in part because iOS effectively prevents piracy, which is another way of saying that users cannot run whatever software they want.
I'm quite happy having some general-purpose computers, and also some purpose-built app-console devices. Why must every device be general purpose?
FTL and Bastion aren't iOS exclusive. Here are links to pages where you can find their Linux versions. Out of curiosity, where did you get the idea that they were iOS exclusive?
Edit: I hadn't previously heard of it, but googling reveals that Slay the Spire is also available on Steam. The steam page says it has a Linux version. That means that all of your examples of iOS exclusives could actually run on a Linux box, maybe even a raspi. ;)
I will counter with the claim that no major, artistically significant games of the past decade have been iOS exclusives. I might even go so far as to suggest that there are no leading iOS-only productivity apps (by leading, I mean better than what you can get elsewhere to the point where there's a major platform advantage, a status conferred to applications like Photoshop and Microsoft Office which used to be Windows-only). That's a claim that you might be able to refute, but I can't think of any at the moment.
https://lutris.net/games/ftl-faster-than-light/ https://lutris.net/games/bastion/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/646570/Slay_the_Spire/
To refine my point, many successful games come to iOS because it is a controlled environment, with negligible piracy. The games come to Android later or not at all, because it is more of a wild west.
As for productivity, iOS has an undeniable platform advantage, and by that I mean tablets. Apple focuses on the iPad but Android tablets are kind of a joke. Here's androidpolice agreeing: https://www.androidpolice.com/2020/04/21/do-yourself-a-favor...
How does that make sense when all of those games were originally developed for the PC platform, which has rampant piracy, even above that of Android?
If you are developing a Nintendo Switch game, you can focus on building a better game, instead of anti-piracy techniques, or futzing with hardware incompatibilities. That's iOS too.
Or you could simply focus on the legit PC market instead of worrying about people who will likely never be your customers.
It's okay, have your iDevice. But that choice supports a company that makes the world less equitable for others. To deny that is to deny economics and the power of monopoly.
We need to educate our lawmakers about this situation so that they can make a decision that most Americans are unequipped to understand.
You're ok with this now, and may never change your opinion on that, but you are being harmed by this in the long run, as is the entire market for these sorts of devices. An entire generation is being brought up on devices that they're not allowed to tinker with -- and don't know that anything different is even possible -- and that will have negative long-term ramifications, though we may not be sure exactly what those are yet.
Nobody is forced into buying an iPhone.
Customers willingly opt-in to these platforms.
Why should trillion-dollar megacorps that run our lives with little competition or escape be allowed such freedom?
Allowing over a billion users the freedom to install and use software on their smartphone (a critical computing device and the only one for many) without corporate approval can indeed control externalities, protect the dispossessed and even save lives.
If people don't like the phones, they don't have to engage with the ecosystem at all. Many diehard anti-Apple (or anti-smartphone-in-general) people do just this today.
You also have this freedom if you don't like Apple products.
I, for example, have just purchased my last iPhone.
Plenty of corporations and corporate actions are regulated even when the consumer has choice. Because choice alone is not the issue, and that's usually with options that have far more than 2 ecosystems.
Regulation is necessary.
I don't understand why some are wary of government regulations, but have no qualms about being controlled by major corporations where you don't even have a vote.
Today, I never use iMessage. I'm not logged in to it on any devices. A big part of this was Apple backdooring the end-to-end cryptography (with full plaintext message history and key escrow via iCloud Backup, which is not e2e encrypted, and on by default for all users) which makes it way less secure.
Turns out that iMessage is optional. All of the other forms of communication that existed before and after it are still available to you as options. There's no law or any requirement anywhere that you use it.
"Lock-in" is colloquial: you're free to leave at any time. I was, and I did. Anyone can.
Just don't use their services. Just because you feel powerless in making individual choices doesn't mean advocating for the use of force against the company is moral.
I mean what they're offering, at least in theory, is pretty neat, pretty compelling. Play Xbox Series whatever games, but on your iPhone or iPad. Apple just says No.
Well, if Apple wants to reject the value that these enterprising mofos is trying to bring to their platforms, who is the government to tell them that they can't shoot themselves in the foot? If it causes a few people to switch to Android such as Mike over at Penny Arcade, and maybe discover that they don't need an Apple-branded phone after all, that's Apple's loss. There's been no shortage of compelling Apps and services to be had in the App Store, no shortage of money to be made there if you have something that people 1. want and 2. are willing to pay for. Companies like Uber, Lyft, Doordash, Facebook, even Google have been making bank in the last 10 years off the back of iPhone users, built up a good portion of their business around iPhone and iPad users. Apple can keep the good times flowing through their platform, tighten up on the squeeze and get out of their own way, or they can lose out on opportunities that are literally sitting right in front of them, practically begging for Apple to pick them.
The people that care, that really care, are either going to switch to Android, or purchase an extra device just for this, or iPhone users are going to not give that much of a damn and just live life as they always have: without being able to stream games. Life is tough like that.
Markets always sort crap like this out in the long run though. Give it a few years, we'll come back to this and see if it actually matters.
I don't think we are stuck though. Both major mobiles would love to have a way to make this work from both a product and business standpoint. The platform just needs to evolve to support them properly and we aren't there yet.
For Apple, I could see a path where upon pairing your existing Xbox console with Apple, it unlocks an Xbox branded app store across your devices. Apple would be fed meta-data for that entire store so they would have some levers of control over the experience. The key thing here would be no onboarding flow to the xbox store. You are a clear xbox platform user and you want to extend that experience onto your Apple devices through a pairing flow originating on your purchased xbox. Same could work for any hardware console.
From a quick glance it looks behind Firefox and Chrome on HTML/CSS/JS feature support.
https://caniuse.com/?compare=firefox+84,chrome+89,safari+14&...
And then there's Safari's broken autocomplete:
The reason non-WebM stream services might work on Safari is because said service engineers implemented alternatives to it.
There is wisdom sometimes in saying "no."
There's also no wisdom in Safari preventing users from viewing a widespread royalty free media format. It simply causes frustration which is evidenced by the many frustrated customers in results for "safari stream not working "webm"" search.
There's of course a balance to be maintained; if we single-source our streaming video codecs, that will dampen innovation in that space. But I'd hope there's a less wasteful middle ground than the place we're at now.
Technology license cost is not the only consideration that goes into business decisions. Consider the whole end to end process of making, distributing and consuming video, and all the parties and technology providers involved, not to mention installed bases, cost of switching, etc.
Except this rule doesn't prohibit anybody from putting anything on the internet. TFA is only about putting a streaming service on the App Store. Not to say that's not problematic, but Apple's not holding the web back in any way with this rule.
Yeah, not with this rule. They are holding the web back by refusing to run 3rd party browsers or modernize their one.
Open Web on mobile is being held hostage on iOS side.
At least on Android I was asked to choose my default browser and other browsers are allowed to have their engines.
Look at GDPR, it’s resulted in a tidal wave of horrible pop ups across the entire web that create the worst user experience ever. Apple probably loves this, it makes their Apple News product look amazing because in comparison it’s so slick and smooth, but it’s not at all web-like since you can’t link to articles. So the open web takes a massive hit.
Same with content filters, only the big guys can afford to have them, so they gain a massive advantage. There doesn’t appear to be a way to make good regulation, so why bother at all?
Don't like it? Don't buy it.
VNC is used for machine you already own, so that’s why it’s allowed.
They regulate the store, not the web.
Replace websites with apps and open web with PCs and you get the usual defence many people on HN make about Apple's practices in App Store.
Terms of use, or laws don't have to be written in perfect logical consistency. The important thing is intent.
The intent is not to block things that resemble running an application remotely. The intent here is controlling everything that could possibly be sold/distributed as something resembling an application or game.
I see these kinds of comments a lot, where someone describes a rule or law, break it down to it's core components and declare it's illogical.
Generally laws are not enforced exactly by how they are written, but by their original intent. This is also why legal precedent and testing laws in court is so important.
I call bullshit, I think it's mostly just bad laws that become ridiculous when 'broken down'. If you want to convince me otherwise, demonstrate your claim using laws against murder (unambiguously good laws.)
There is no unambiguously good law because of the simple fact nothing is unambiguously good. Given billions of people and many years some ambiguous scenario is going to come up even around the most "obviously good/bad" things.
Treve was saying that anything becomes ridiculous when inspected closely enough. Even the core components.
You are saying that the extension to corner cases becomes ridiculous.
The extension can be ridiculous without the original core being ridiculous.
So you're saying a correct thing, but it's not relevant to the conversation that existed before your comment.
E.g. "murder is always illegal" is not true and a bad law/take on the concept. Expanding the law to include "murder is always illegal except when... <other laws>" is only unambiguous if <other laws> are unambiguous. I don't think I need to take it further to explain justifiable homicide isn't unambiguously black and white or always possible to rule on without looking at intent of the various laws and what happened.
Bringing that back to the original thing this is true of any concept or law, including reviewing some remote apps and not others based on what they are for not that they are remote. I'm not saying I agree the way Apple regulates these is good I'm just saying I agree the fact some remote apps are regulated and others aren't isn't proof alone the regulation is contradictory.
Sure! And if you look at the overall concept, it does not become meaningless. To get to meaninglessness requires you separate the two.
"Unambiguous" is a much much higher bar that we don't need to worry about. Something can be 5% ambiguous but still very meaningful.
> Bringing that back to the original thing this is true of any concept or law, including reviewing some remote apps and not others based on what they are for not that they are remote. I'm not saying I agree the way Apple regulates these is good I'm just saying I agree the fact some remote apps are regulated and others aren't isn't proof alone the regulation is contradictory.
It's not proof by itself, but if you can show that there's no good reason for the distinction then it's a strong mark against Apple.
I'm pretty sure you cannot do as I requested.
edit: maybe we want to define murder as killing someone who does not want to be killed. I would ask what you have to say about the "trolley problem". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolley_problem
If you just boil it down to the actual question
You can pick one of:
1 random person dies, or
5 random people die.
Which one do you choose?
The correct answer is obvious. The question is more interesting with more context.
I think that’s pretty much untrue. Laws are enforced exactly as written. Where the judges come in is the interpretation of what was written. If that’s in line with the intent then that’s great, but I very much doubt that’s always the case.
I don’t fully agree with Apple’s decision but I do understand it and recognise that it’s an awkward intersection between selling software and access to software that’s running elsewhere.
“We worked with the Safari team to ensure that some of the things that weren't there are there, and that allowed us to kind of get to where we are today,” Luna head of engineering and technology George Tsipolitis said.
https://www.engadget.com/luna-amazon-cloud-gaming-interview-...
1: https://hacks.mozilla.org/2020/04/twitter-direct-message-cac...
2: If you have Firefox, browse about:compat to see Firefox's workarounds to websites which relies on Chrome-specific behavior.
3: Firefox implementing a wholesale change that maps "-webkit"-prefixed CSS properties (usually implemented by Chrome even, so Google should used "-blink" (the name of their HTML/CSS engine) since "-webkit" is for Safari's changes) to the standard and/or "-moz" equivalents for websites who are using it.
I can kind of see it both ways. I appreciate that Chromium browsers may have little extras you can tap into as it'll make for neat features (Project Stream and I imagine later Stadia is because of that sort of thing), but it does break browser compatibility so it runs the risk of replicating that "works in IE" experience from way back when.
The IE I don't specifically miss though was needing to support older releases of it at work, personally. But I could see disliking the "what do you mean it doesn't work in Safari/Firefox/etc.?" discussions that may happen.
IIRC all of them start as flags, and there are tons of them available, most disabled by default. Most move up to stable and enabled by default after some time and testing and feedback though.
Most commonly we'd see just weird things. Every other browser could handle "render this circle lightly colored, put some text inside it." But random versions of Safari would draw "solid black circle" with illegible text. Update the OS (the only way to update Safari) and the bug goes away. So we wrote work around after work around to make the same code that ran everywhere else run on Safari. And before you ask, all of our devs were on macs, but they weren't running random versions of the os where the bug was present. Or worse, the simulator in xcode wouldn't show the error but it would on a device. At one point over 90% of browser-specific bugs (and almost all customer-reported ones) were due to Safari or Safari mobile, despite making up less than 20% of our traffic.
Plus Apple keeps trying to stop people from running test infrastructure of every permutation of os and hardware. It's a nightmare and we just eventually put up a "safari may not work" warning on all our help docs.
For our team Safari was worse than ie6, because at least there everyone shared workarounds and knew how to handle the MS foolishness.
I should have worded it in a better way, and when someone said "X is the new IE" I should view the context of it. "Chrome is the new IE" is a very valid opinion, but not in all contexts, and so is "Safari is the new IE".
We willingly give Apple money under this premise. I'm not sure why this is surprising.
To the people saying it's obviously a joke: The App Store Review Guidelines have become huge and I wouldn't have been surprised to find something like this in there, although not in these exact words. Actually, I wish the App Store Review Guidelines WOULD state exceptions like the one mentioned. At least that would be transparent.
> Apps may contain or run code that is not embedded in the binary (e.g. HTML5-based games, bots, etc.), as long as code distribution isn’t the main purpose of the app, the code is not offered in a store or store-like interface, and provided that the software (1) is free or purchased using in-app purchase; (2) only uses capabilities available in a standard WebKit view (e.g. it must open and run natively in Safari without modifications or additional software); your app must use WebKit and JavaScript Core to run third-party software and should not attempt to extend or expose native platform APIs to third-party software; (3) is offered by developers that have joined the Apple Developer Program and signed the Apple Developer Program License Agreement; (4) does not provide access to real money gaming, lotteries, or charitable donations; (5) adheres to the terms of these App Review Guidelines (e.g. does not include objectionable content); and (6) does not offer digital goods or services for sale. Upon request, you must provide an index of software and metadata available in your app. It must include Apple Developer Program Team IDs for the providers of the software along with a URL which App Review can use to confirm that the software complies with the requirements above.
From https://www.globaltimes.cn/content/1137321.shtml
> According to a statement the WeChat Team sent to the Global Times, the pulldown menu has been a function that WeChat always has and has always tried to optimize. > But the team stressed that the pulldown menu only provides WeChat users a convenient way to open the Mini Programs that they have used before. The menu does not recommend new Mini Programs to the users, neither does WeChat have a commercial model based on centralized traffic distribution like app stores.
Also changes to their Payment rules, https://www.theverge.com/2018/1/16/16896008/apple-wechat-tip...
If Apple thought they could get away with content policing movies, they surely would.
As a devoted apple product user, these kind of behaviors really worry me. I understand that this is normal behavior for powerful organizations, but apple is making the user experience worse for money. I don't see how that ends well.
Yet the collective can decide at my expense: Netflix gets a free pass via the argument that Netflix's movies are somehow more important than the content I wish to experience.
It's great to see collective bargaining in action, for sure. I don't blame the people, and I don't blame Netflix. I blame Apple.
We are one of billions of people. The fundamental nature of existence is that our sum ability to affect the world around is generally quite small in comparison to the sum of the consequences of others as a whole.
More people use Netflix, ergo Netflix has more leverage in negotiations with Apple. I don’t think that’s a particularly controversial conclusion?
There should be no leverage, and the fact that Netflix uses this privilege without taking a stand for others left behind is also controversial.
How do you deal with it?
Sometimes I wonder how an industry that relies on logical thought ends up with folks who think the extreme opposite.
This isn't normal behavior for powerful organizations. Microsoft isn't stiffing me now, is it? Heck, even Google hasn't gone full retard. Would you like it if your car only allowed you to use gasoline from Shell and no other company, simply because Shell is "big"?
I feel its important to mention that the issue is not quite as clear cut as this, since we have interactive Netflix movies and an ecosystem of web-based apps via Safari, but this seems to be Apple's rationale.
Netflix has plenty of obscene and naughty content that Apple doesn't insist on policing.
An easy violation is nudity, there is an app for Playboy, but there is zero nudity in it. However, I can get the full, uncensored Playboy magazine in the Nook app. I can watch movies with nudity in Netflix or Amazon Video. I can even buy or rent movies FROM APPLE with nudity in the iTunes store, like Eyes Wide Shut, Walk Hard, Boogie Nights (which is about porn!), and Barbarella, all right from my iPad or iPhone.
So why can I see nudity if I buy it directly from Apple in a movie, but not an app?
I can download the Twitch app and watch streams of video games, but I can't download an app to let me PLAY the very same games?
There is no difference, it is simply Apple capriciousness.
There are not enough competitors for this to actually be something you can choose. I use and will continue to use iphones because I care about privacy and updates. That doesn't mean I like what is happening with this case.
See PRISM
For instance I have a subscription to a magazine publisher that pushes me any new issues of several magazines as they are published (roughly 10 to 20 every months). And the content of the subscription is not fixed, for a few months some magazines appeared, and other disappeared. Some of the content is gore/mature, while not straight porn.
The catch of course is that the subscription payment goes to Apple, and only Apple (no concurrent web version exists), and additional in-app purchases also go through Apple, no bypassing.
There is also audio subscriptions apps working on the same principles. The one I follow has been there for years.
Basically, as long as Apple gets a decent cut the "browser" nature or fine grain policing content doesn't seem to matter much.
For those interested there is the equivalent for Jump comics and a few others (Pixiv etc.), those must also be available as web only subscriptions.
So this ban is broader than the article suggest.
Steam Link seems to do that just fine: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/steam-link/id1246969117
And Rainway also as you note: https://rainway.com/ios/
I believe what formerly happened with Software patents is currently happening with platforms. Lawrence Lessig (if you haven't read his works, highly recommend) talks a lot about how copyright is used to restrict creativity / culture / innovation. In this talk [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uH4RskpUFiA] he makes the case that:
1. Creativity and innovation always builds on the past
2. The past always tries to control the creativity that builds on it
3. Free societies enable the future by limiting the past
4. Ours is less, and less, a free society
What's fascinating is Apple has gone a step above and beyond here to use their control over a platform to control the innovations built upon it. The end-state is that no one can do to Apple what Apple did to other players (leveraging free software--Unix--and open hardware Schemas to kick off their computing platform). This pattern is one we've seen with other players, and will result in more and more people "defensively" building out platforms (what I suspect Google is doing with Android and FB with Oculus; if Apple's monopoly is allowed to stand it's only reasonable that other companies will need competing personal-computing platforms as a bargaining chip).
Music/Movies are in all countries regulated by well established rules which govern what level of objectionable content is permitted i.e. you will never find porn on Netflix. Apps/Games have similar regulations in some countries but definitely not all. So Apple has opted to "fill in the blanks".
And since movies are over a century old every country has a similar regulatory framework.
Most countries do not have an equivalent for apps/games and so it is ultimately left to Apple to regulate.
We literally have ESRB that's a whole lot less arbitrary than Apple's review system.
Hence my point that there isn't a global regulatory framework for apps/games like there is for music/movies.
Also aren't movie rating systems like the MPA self-regulated? Not required by law. There's already equivalent systems for video games with PEGI and ESRB.
Still a bit flawed though: I thought that there is already a ratings board in America for software?
Every country has regulations for music/movies/TV. US and a handful of other countries have them for games and I am not aware of any for apps.
https://www.esrb.org/ratings/34178/Minecraft%3A+Story+Mode+-...
Meanwhile Netflix's own Bandersnatch is not ESRB rated, and isn't too different as a game. Yet Apple has supported both of these perfectly fine regardless of their lack of proper ratings.
I think the reason is Apple are making a stand here is simply because Xbox and Google have released subscriptions games streaming services after Apple released a subscription gaming service (albeit not streaming) whereas the other exceptions were released before Apple entered its own subscription services into those respective markets.
How are these exceptions to the rule? None of those platforms are the source of the content being provided. That's the primary reason why this distinction exists.
Then what about shopping sites like eBay and Amazon? It’s not multimedia but it’s still an interactive process where you can access adult content.
There comes a point where a company’s position is so nuanced that you have to suspect it’s more to do with financial motivations than a moral stance.
That’s why they are banned unless the individual apps or games are submitted individually.
It’s not really surprising they don’t want other companies running storefronts on iOS.
The ‘consistency’ argument is just not valid.
They have explitly talked about their ‘two plaforms’ approach.
Approved and controlled stuff in the store. Everything else via the web.
>
> That’s why they are banned unless the individual apps or games are submitted individually.
Spotify is a streaming app. Spotify didn't submit and Apple didn't approve every song.
Shadow is a remote game streaming app. Apple allowed them in the App Store when they removed the ability to launch directly into a game. [0] They won't allow Moonlight to do the same. [1]
[0] https://www.theverge.com/2020/8/6/21357771/apple-cloud-gamin...
[1] https://github.com/moonlight-stream/moonlight-ios/issues/417
These are completely unrelated things.
I don't feel the same way any more, and I've been happier with an Android device since.
You still won't get kernel updates when security issues come around because not even the OEM can update that without convincing all the vendors to update their blobs.
- Disable GApps. Note that this can absolutely be done without root [1], as I've done so on my BlackBerry KeyOne and a previous LG G6. This has the additional benefit of a dramatically faster UI on nearly any device.
- Use F-Droid instead of the Google Play Store when possible. If you've disabled GApps like I have, the Aurora Store can be used to fill in the few apps your employer may require.
- Use web versions of apps when possible. mbasic.facebook.com or simply facebook.com is a reasonable alternative to the app, and won't steal you contacts. The former even allows messages to be sent without the app :)
- Use a custom ROM. Note that this will require an unlocked bootloader and either a maintainer for your phone, or to build LineageOS for yourself.
- Minimize permissions you give apps. Don't get thrown when some apps request Location when you don't think they need though: Google has tied Location to Network Access, meaning you must grant Location Access for most apps to see Bluetooth & WiFi networks (which could reasonably be used as a proxy for your location).
- Unless you need it, don't leave Bluetooth on all the time. Retail locations use Bluetooth beacons to ping devices and follow consumers through the store. Bluetooth is reasonably localized, and gives the retailer fascinating data relating to where you went, how long (or if) you lingered in front of junk food, if you had to search for something, where you went first, and possibly payment card information (waiting in line vs walking away after a payment is made at a certain terminal).
[1] https://www.xda-developers.com/disable-system-app-bloatware-...
Use Firefox and signal instead of say chrome. Disable the assistant and be aware of the privacy controls of your google account.
Looking at the DNS requests made so far, it doesn't seem that much worse than an ipad or iphone.
I think it depends on what you are also keeping private from who.
Apple makes sure iOS apps don't ask for anymore permissions than they need. Google doesn't really care. That is the ONLY major difference. If you're mindful of what apps are asking for what permissions, you aren't gaining much from Apple's garden.
If you're going 1:1 on the apps that run on both android and iOS, you'll soon see that there's very little difference.
One more area where iOS is better is security. Your iPhone is basically a paperweight if it's stolen and the thief doesn't know your password. But that's another story.
I don't know what other manufacturers are doing but Google on stock android and on Pixel does mandate asking for permissions. Even Google's own apps ask for them.
If your Pixel is stolen you have remote wipe options and newer Pixels contain Titan M chips that disallow tampering to gain access.
It's less secure and likely more privacy problems trusting a service with Blokada compared with my own pihole.
My own pihole is accessible wherever I want, I know who has the logs for the DNS requests performed by my pihole which is done over DNS over HTTPS.
The DNS requests are made securely through wireguard and just those requests.
There is no extra hop?
Do you have a firewall running on your phone to block or redirect DNS requests? Since hardcoding and bypassing the one in network settings is extremely easy and done by default by even some Google apps. DNS leaking VPN is trivial.
What logs are you talking about? Blokada can use the same upstream DNS as your pihole so the logs are exactly the same if any exists.
Without a firewall and a VPN (both on the phone) you are not secure. With a VPN and a custom DNS service with blocklists you have an identical setup as one who uses Blokada, but without an external service.
No I leave my pihole at home?
>Do you have a firewall running on your phone to block or redirect DNS requests? Since hardcoding and bypassing the one in network settings is extremely easy and done by default by even some Google apps. DNS leaking VPN is trivial.
I assume wireguard's DNS field sets/redirects all DNS traffic through the VPN. If it ignores that setting, then Android's VPN design itself is broken. Switching to blokada won't fix this problem either.
Either way, Android's Firewall/Network aspects don't give me enough control here. But I can see enough hits on my pihole to have some reasonable confidence.
>What logs are you talking about? Blokada can use the same upstream DNS as your pihole so the logs are exactly the same if any exists.
I don't have to trust the owners of blokada aren't keeping logs? Why would I need to trust them when I can use my pihole which I know doesn't keep logs?
You are offering no advantages here compared to using my setup.
>Without a firewall and a VPN (both on the phone) you are not secure.
Well there is no competent firewall on the phone without root. Yes there is a VPN on both and it seems to work.
>With a VPN and a custom DNS service with blocklists you have an identical setup as one who uses Blokada, but without an external service.
Yes, I have an identical setup that I run myself without trusting some random owner of blokada. It runs externally just fine using my home network.
Disable and remove every Google or pre-installed app you don't want to use. You won't be able to do it for all of them though.
Use something like Blokada to block ads everywhere, including apps. https://blokada.org/index.html
Not going back to Apple until they change their ways.
So hello Sony Xperia 5 II and goodbye IPhone 11.
They just want to milk everything on the app store. I'm so torn on Apple - on the one hand their ecosystem is the most complete and works the best, but on the other hand they try to take a cut from every revenue stream on their platforms, keep a walled garden and often lock out things that are useful to me.
For example iPad pro is an amazing tablet - hardware wise - I would use it as a on the go dev machine - but iOS is so pointlessly locked down I couldn't use it for anything non-trivial. Compare that to an Android device where I can get Linux userland running or Windows tablets. But then Apple couldn't monetise all my apps on the device.
Samsung is the closest you can get to Apple ecosystem but they suck badly - their hardware is acceptable but software is nowhere near close - apps are bad, bixby is horrible, tizen OS is missing basic stuff.
Microsoft could be a player here but they just started experimenting with mobile after a long time, they have no wearable, and the surface line seems promising but always has that one or two flaws that makes it unsatisfying. I'm hoping they can create something in the future, I have no expectations from Samsung - they seem both incompetent and insistent on doing their own thing when it comes to software.
It's quite funny actually, I was planning to join the Apple ecosystem with a new iPhone this year, and then they pull all of these shenanigans.
Netflix now has “interactive” video content (see: Bandersnatch). Isn’t a streaming video game service same as “interactive” video. If so, isn’t Apple almost saying they’d also have to approve every video on the Netflix platform?
Or am I missing something?
“More and more, software is getting integrated into the hardware… Yesterday’s software is today’s hardware. Those two things are merging. And the line between hardware and software is going to get finer and finer and finer. And one of the ways that we’re approaching the problem of trying to remove the barrier is to try to look ahead a few years and try to make some predictions at how the technologies are merging, and at the same time very carefully looking at the kinds of high level tools our customers are going to need and trying to make those two points the same target.“
—Steve Jobs, 1980Really this goes for the majority of iOS apps since native apps can't do a whole lot anyway. This doesn't even need push notifications though, I don't know why anyone would bother putting up with all the crap native apps take just to have to deal with all the crap apple gives you.
EDIT: While that seems super sarcastic. Consider this: Game streaming services are in the end just a gateway app to games, in the same way the browser is a gateway to the internet. Furthermore apple already did hinder "browserish" gateways, like apps which are a gateway to more ergonomically reading word-press blogs or message apps which where gateways to a federated "internet of messaging".
It is their platform and ultimately they have a right to determine what apps they do or do not approve. Whether it's streaming or not is completely irrelevant.
If the client app is only used to access content also owned, curated or managed by the client app vendor, then the client app vendor is on the hook for that content. Audible falls in this category, even though it’s superficially similar to a podcast app, because the app client vendor also owns or curates all the content. Sure there are some odd edge cases, but games streaming services pretty clearly fall into this category, and not the same category as web browsers.
You mean like Amazon's Luna game streaming service, which will run in Safari as Apple worked with them to provide the necessary support in webkit?
let's be honest, Apple dopes it for money not for users, blocking XBOX will not protect anyone , Apple wants a big cut or even better they want to sell their own gaming service in future.
Yes of course this is about money.
The simple and consistent principle Apple applies is “how much negotiating leverage does this app developer have?”
If it’s rating you talk about then again both of them are rated.
Unironically, I think that this could happen soon.
That sounds crazy, but here me out. Pretty recently there was an announcement regarding a streamer service, that would allow people to play Fortnite, from their phone, through a mobile safari
So, in order to block fortnite form being played on an iPhone, Apple would literally have to do what you are suggesting.
Apple has always clearly stated that this is perfectly fine on websites, just not in apps.
Alright, and fortnite is now going to be playable with in web browser purchases, on the safari web browser pretty soon.
So the purchases, without going through Apple, are going to happen on the iPhone, as well as the playing of fortnite on the iPhone.
And Apple would have to prevent certain websites, if they wanted to stop those purchases that go outside of Apple's app system.
So no, they are not going to block websites.
Since 1984. That was the whole point of the Macintosh.
At least Google Stadia makes developers port games to Linux. Geforce Now isn't doing anything like that.
Somebody had to throw cold water on the bubble idea of game streaming.