On a more serious note, this is why Google and Apple need regulation. The fact that they can dictate business modes to others - whether or not they’re within their legal rights - should worry everyone.
Edit: Not the author in case there was any confusion.
I agree that some regulation is necessary, especially since these are near monopolies, but at least on Android you're still using expensive infrastructure Google provides to you and your users for free. I don't think its unfair for them to demand to not make money using what they provide for free.
The choice between the Google store and F-Droid are presented very differently, and I doubt most users are even aware of there being a choice.
Google does not restrict one from sideloading another app store of choice. One can install FDroid, Humble Bundle, Epic Store, etc... So whether or not one is aware of a choice doesn't mean you can use the hypothetical of "no option to choose on first boot" as a loophole for violating the TOS of a different service.
What I'd like to see is the solution Microsoft was forced to implement w/r to giving users a choice about browsers.
It's fine for me but I don't think the average consumer would ever tolerate it.
I wouldn't turn on automatic updates anyway but I'd love to be able to select multiple items and give a single confirmation to update.
Like, i get that the market sucks for people who care about this stuff, but i avoid Google because their practices bother me. Are their store practices any different then? Should i not simply avoid purchasing their phones (and phones based on their OS) if i dislike it?
I think there's a huge difference between, say, residential ISPs where you can not realistically find a better ISP - vs phones. There are _lots_ of phones, many of them without any storefronts at all, problem solved. You're not forced to buy Google phones, so what is the regulation needed here?
I'm generally very pro-regulation/government, but this feels so optional that i don't get what the expected outcome is. No more closed ecosystems? Playstation has to allow arbitrary storefronts in their system?
edit: Another way to look at this is that the storefront isn't the problem. You're using their infra, they have a right to make you pay. However when they don't allow you to install your own apps outside of their storefront, that is the real problem. Of course you need to pay for hosting, why do you expect it free? But your phone is your own, so you should be able to avoid their hosting entirely, should you choose.
I think Playstations are different from smartphones / ISPs. You can live a normal life without a console, but you really can't without a smartphone or internet access. This technology is no longer optional.
The argument of Google not having the right to dictate terms of their infra seems completely unfounded to me. Why aren't we arguing for a more open Phone? Google demanding money for their own infra is not the issue.
Blackberry now produces Android phones and the Windows phone is defunct. That just leaves the myriad of fly-by-night Kickstarter phones that wouldn't be able to run these apps in the first place.
And again, i already said i think you should have a right to run what you want on your phone. But most of the comments here seem to want to dictate what Google does with its own infra. That they don't get a choice in this.
Furthermore, there is plenty of precedence for this solution, as this is pretty much exactly the approach government took when Microsoft demanded IE be the primary/main browser on Windows.
I'm fully on your side with them being near monopolies and them being overly expensive. But there's no arguing that they have expenses and they need to make money.
How did you think F droid managed to run for free if it cost that much to host apps?
Somehow you said you were fully on his side about monopolies but claimed Google the was the one being exploited. This doesn't make much sense.
And, as said in a sister comment, I'm fully on your side of 30% being to much. But that does not mean that I think they should get nothing.
This is supposed to be analogous to publishing an app and asking for donations?
>Being a criminal does not exclude you from being a victim.
This is not a criminal dispute nor analagous to a criminal dispute in any way, shape or form.
If two parties "economically exploit each other equivalently", there is no exploitation.
[0] Whereas the "fair share" is not necessarily 30%, but >0%.
Hell, look at PC gaming where there are no restrictions. You have Steam (same 30% cut) and... Epic?
Given the scams out there users are already reluctant to enter their CC details, so a natural trust network effect would weed out everyone else except the biggest players.
Why do we give Google/Apple the right to decide on donations? They developed the infrastructure? They have benefited from this. Why isn’t this being looked at similar to the patent system where innovators receive the benefits for early days work instead of a long-forever-their-right to dictate how the rest of us work?
You can’t even deploy native apps in any official capacity on iOS without Apple taking their cut. Did you know that the IAP for a youtube premium subscription is more expensive than if purchased directly from Google? So, not only is everyone forced to pay more because Apple wants their cut, but they aren’t even allowed to give information as to why this is the case.
_Really_ competitive and we’re all benefiting from this type of behaviour, I’m sure. /s
I just don’t see “they built the infrastructure so they should benefit” as being the end-all justification for why we should accept this.
I guess in support of it:
1. Why build it if they don’t stand to benefit. 2. Building it and having it be the only source of applications (case of Apple) centralizes application source. Better than needing to jump through 3 stores for your apps.
But.. against it..
1. I just want someone to be able to buy me a coffee. Why does Apple need any part of this and why do I need to jump through discretion hoops in the black of night to make it happen?
My 2c.
But two wrongs don't make a right. Yes, they take advantage of their position in pricing and yes, they have benefited a lot from offering their infrastructure for free. But that does not make it okay to use the infrastructure they provide for your personal gain just because they are "bad".
We also need to differentiate between Google and Apple here, as the case is totally different. Google simply has a large market share on Android; iOS, on the other hand, has (nearly) no option of alternate stores and the App Store is not free. That's why I mostly talk about Google here; with Apple, it's an entirely different story.
Theoretically, no. Pragmatically, yes.
Pretending Google is just like everybody else is like pretending racism doesn't exist. It's not helpful. Google doesn't play by the same rules as others and we shouldn't pretend that they do. At this point, anything that harms Google is probably good for the consumer.
The app store is also using him to enrich their ecosystem. They allow free apps for a reason even if it does cost them a miniscule amount of money to host them. It draws people to the platform.
The only reason they're willing to sacrifice kicking him off is because they think that they can wring a small amount of extra cash out of him which they can feed to their shareholders.
And he is using the stores to deliver his app, which he is payed for by his donators and Patreon supporters, to them. And I'd argue that his benefit from having the reach of the store is far greater than the stores benefit of having another game there. So it's not like he's not profiting from that relationship as well.
If I wield a vast amount of economic power and you do not, you are therefore obligated to bow to my whims...?
It's not like he's profiting a lot, anyway. This is more akin to a beggar having to fork over 30% of their earnings to a Walmart coz theyre standing outside it. After all, technically the beggar "profits" from doing that.
If he'd complained that 30% is too large of a share, I would be fully on his side. This is unreasonable and I've made that point in the past. But the general principle of getting a share is very reasonable and, just because Google could afford to give him money, they have no moral obligations to do so and change the rules for him because they're so "rich".
It's only profit if you discount the value of his labor to zero.
Google is demanding that every time somebody wants to gift him a cup of coffee to say thank you for giving away something of value for free that they get a cash payment.
This isn't about Google just being rich, it's about Google using their power to extract profit from charity simply because they are economically more powerful.
Imagine if you go to IKEA store and they look into your bag to refuse everyone that has an android to accept only iphone users? Just because they can!
Or if walmart will check your sms or your facebook profile when you enter to refuse persons that support Trump. And Costco, the same with persons supporting Biden.
If there are competent employees that are not finding good jobs because they are not on GH/LI, then that is a market opportunity for people to start hiring people who explicitly don't have those things.
The idea being that since it was "economically irrational" to discriminate on the basis of skin color, the "free market" could therefore take care of it, therefore legislation was unnecessary.
Actually yes they are because they control approximately 100% of distribution.
- publish for free, and doesn’t allow you put donations links
- pay monthly cost for publishing, and be able to put link for donations
Choose one
- Advocate for developer friendly policies and work with the dev community to weaken Google and Apple's stronghold over distribution.
It's funny to see people defending Google here, unless you work for Google it's not in your interest (as a consumer or developer) to do so.
Google has a monopoly and as such has all the power. How can there be consent when one party can dictate whatever they want.
No, this is why devs need to read the TOS, realize Google/Apple are not platforms they want to support, and work to create/support platforms that are developer-friendly (e.g. F-Droid/itch.io, as highlighted here).
Or they are the platforms they want to support (because, for instance, they're where the people are), in which case they're just trying to both have and eat their cake, like Epic on the Apple store.
It wouldn't be the consumers, but these companies. There's a thing called regulatory capture (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_capture).
Try to introduce such regulation, and what would happen is that the regulations themselves would be even manipulated or even drafted by the big players in the market.
Why is that so bad? Because it means the regulations will be harsh to everyone else who tries to join that given market.
This happens all the time in other industries. We don't need this in computing, please.
Regulations can also have thresholds so they don't crush small upstarts, yet do provide necessary controls for larger companies.
The number of customers who patronize only Walmart for any given class of goods, and never use Amazon, Target, Costco, Dollar Tree, etc. is negligible. If Walmart won't carry your stuff, you can sell to the same customers through many other stores.
The number of customers who patronize only Google Play for mobile apps is a pretty good approximation for the number of Android users. There is no plausible alternative to sell to those customers. Amazon is a serious alternative to Walmart; Aptoide is not a serious alternative to Google Play.