Apple’s fight against iPhone sideloading was pointless at best, harmful at worst
9to5mac.com
9to5mac.com
I totally understand and empathize with the “it’s the user’s device, they should be able to do what they want with it” argument. I just have also appreciated the professional fringe benefits of the walled garden.
I do wish there was some way all the cool apps could run free while the ones we put up with are locked down and restricted even harder. Absolutely no one should install a side loadable version of the Facebook app.
"Well I charge $x per store for testing.
I do have one android app that has to be distributed on a separate app store in china but that's out of our hands and has to be passed off to a third party to accomplish anyway.
Ok, but there is a huge difference between iOS and Android. All my clients want it on Android and iOS but they only really care about iOS. iOS is normally the last platform that approves apps (web being immediate/no approval and Play being faster on average) and without fail my clients pretend there is no app until it's released on iOS. I'll even tell them "Go to hxxp://yoursite.com, it's pretty much exactly what you will see in the app" and they almost never even check the web, I know this because once the iOS app is release /then/ I hear "Can we change X? Let's move Y to X! I don't like the color here....".
All that to say: multiple app stores on iOS /will/ be something I hear about whereas I bet I could forget to release on updates on Play and no one (clients themselves at least) would notice.
The downside is that you don't protect those who enable sideloading and see the warnings when installing Facebook sideload and tap through anyway.
Having to call into Apple to confirm maybe?
Sideloading does require several clicks though. First you download the APK, then you "open" the file in the installer. Then you have to allow "installation from unkown sources," then allow for the app that you downloaded it with (for me that's usually firefox, but for most it's probably Chrome), then you can install it.
But if a sideloaded app can do significantly more harm than just visiting a malicious website (which a scammer can already direct a victim to do), maybe the OS is providing too dangerous (or coarsely-controllable) permissions via its APIs?
People will be forced to choose between clicking through an explanation & accepting risks they don't understand, and participating in society.
Over the long term I'm not sure there's a good solution other than legislation arriving at some "acceptable" level of tracking, given how crucial expanding tracking is to social media companies.
And who would be able to resist? There's even a little shield icon!
Only very recently have they started cracking down on third-party in-app payments and subscriptions, and otherwise I think they have basically approved everything that's not either outright malware or illegal, significantly including third-party browsers, VMs and emulators and other things that Apple bans by policy.
They could let you have your phone in either mode, but refuse to allow "hybrid" App Store + Sideloading configurations.
There's no cost to wiping the phone. It doesnt require you to drive to an apple store and have them do it.
This also isnt a phone part. It's not "you cant have a new battery until you wipe your phone."
This is the same message Apple should deliver to every senator and judge: “developers are more productive on things that matter - this is the consumer surplus”
The computer landscape in 2007 punted the problem of viruses and inability back on the user. I think Apple's goals when they finally did an app store were to (1) ensure iOs-specific native software (vs crappy ports), (2) prevent viruses and malware, and (3) keep the phone as stable as possible.
I think you could argue that there were other ways to approach those goals, but I think it's harder to argue that preventing side-loading was entirely pointless.
They had a "sweet solution" for 3rd-party apps! *drumroll* webpages!
More often, that argument seems to be used in bad faith. By that, I mean it comes across as a think of the children fallacy. It's developers wanting their own way ("why should I have to pay..."), and as you highlight, wanting to do things with other peoples devices that they really shouldn't.
The inconvenience is small but real.
But I don't think that this criticism of Apple's model requires alternate app stores (which I have seen first hand can be confusing for some users from the pre digital age). Just a side loading method.
I get the idea behind unifying the browsing experience, but blocking V8 and SpiderMonkey isn't doing the end user any favours. In fact, because Safari is tied to the OS and isn't part of a separate app like on Android, if you find a vulnerability in your browser you have to report it to Apple and wait for an iOS security release cycle. On all other platforms you just push out the patch and your users are secured in a day or two.
It matters because first-party (Apple) vulnerabilities can be fixed and rolled out with iOS updates.
JIT vulnerabilities in third-party apps would leave those vulnerabilities up to the third-party developers to patch.
And that is before we even consider the fact that Apple has shown itself resilient against pressure to introduce back doors in iOS. If third-parties were allowed to write their own JITs you can safely assume that those third-party developers will be pressured to implement intentional vulnerabilities in their apps. And some will fold to pressure.
I am happy that Apple does this.
I don’t understand why anyone has an issue with it.
If you don’t like what Apple is doing, then don’t buy Apple products.
Why should those of us who agree with Apple, and buy Apple products because we agree with them, suffer as a consequence of other people not agreeing with Apple?
> Nitro dramatically improves JavaScript performance in web-oriented applications like Chrome/Facebook/Twitter /AlienBlue/Dolphin/Mercury, typically making it 4x to 5x faster.
They changed this in iOS 8, but not many people really noticed even with the slower devices from back then (at least I don't think they noticed that it had been slower)
https://9to5mac.com/2014/06/03/ios-8-webkit-changes-finally-...
It's clearly because Apple wants control
It was also back when websites relied less on JS.
For every improvement that gets added to browsers, in executing JS faster, web developers will take that extra perf and spend it to do more. The result of that is that only the heavily optimised browsers will be able to deliver the experience that the people expect.
A browser without JIT today, would be a no-go. It would be noticeably slower, and it would drain the battery faster.
Of course, the proper solution would be to allow 3rd party apps to use JIT, but allowing 3rd party engines without JIT would definitely be better than nothing
The App Store rules from before sideloading exists will still apply after sideloading exists. Nothing has changed, other than the fact that people could choose to bypass the App Store, and in practice every major app still wants to be on the App Store for maximum convenience.
To wit, sideloading has existed on Android for ages, and nearly all apps still want to be on the Play Store.
People should be allowed to do what they want with their own devices. If you own an iPhone, you deserve to be able to install whatever software you want on your iPhone, end of story.
The facts are
1 the apps of the big bad tech companies are still on the google Store
2 the stores abused their power and pushed big apps out, not to protect the users, but because they might not be puritan enough, or that some legal but not correct speech was happening on that app.
And in that case, I can download, sign, package, and load the app on my phone myself.
I cringe every time I check the "allow packages from unknown sources" option on an Android device.
I don't, because I trust F-Droid apps more than random Play Store apps, but that switch only restricts the former.
I highly applaud the recent Play store change now where it explicitly tells you what data can be accessed, how it will be used, if shared with third party, etc. It's helped me avoid some unknowns.
What about some sort of master switch you could flip that would filter out apps based on behavior? Like the default could be something like "App Store rules" but you could override and allow seeing/installing apps that do other things?
Eh, that wouldn't help with the people who want to use Tik Tok. If Tik Tok can tell them to "enable deep spying" to install the app, they probably will. Although, it would penalize them somewhat and it would make it clear to users what they're doing, so maybe it would help? Hard problem for sure.
Deferred deep linking is also broken. Of course, nobody likes tracking, but referral links also don't work anymore. You used to be able to send someone a single link to install the app and redeem a voucher/discount/special, now you always have to say "install the app, open it (!), then go back here and click this link".
I soooooo hope that this will improve with competition - at least point 1). And my biggest hope is that Apple will fix it in their store because of competition.
And even for apps that I trust 100%, including stuff I personally write, there is exposure to zero days if you do stuff like display images or web content. I'd like the extra safety net of sandboxing.
Perhaps relaxing the no-JIT restriction, though. I think I'd be ok with them relaxing that in side-load. It might be fine in normal apps too, since we have lockdown mode to disable it across the board (including MobileSafari) if extra security against zero-days is needed.
So the walled garden didn't work that well right?
Read the comments on the article itself, it is just full of "i dont want to do this".. so great, don't sideload apps (no one is forcing them to), but why are they so keen on preventing others from doing it as well?
because it's going to make unscrupulous companies like google/fb/etc all force you to go through their app clients to install their sideloaded apps, without any of the scrutiny and control the apple store has provided historically. that's not really a world I want to live in. While yes, I can just uninstall those apps, some are nearly intrinsic to a mobile experience, like the youtube app.
2) Android is far, far less lucrative per-user than iOS.
Maybe sideloading on iOS will work out like Android has. Maybe not.
I'm also not really sure how OS level protections would prevent an app from sending out data it shouldn't. Apple is acting as a regulator here because no one else is.
It might be that nothing changes if sideloading is made much easier, or other browser engines allowed, or whatever. But, that's not guaranteed.
Since I like the current situation—at least, better than the alternative of having no one push back on things like spyware-loving megacorps—I'm not in favor of risking changes to it.
My ideal situation would be that a lot of what Apple prevents on their platform were illegal everywhere so it'd hardly matter, but the US, at least, does not seem to be heading that direction anytime soon.
So, that's why. It risks changing the current situation such that I would find it worse, overall, and I'd prefer not to risk that.
If alternative app stores were allowed, I’d probably download a GNU iOS store. But that’s about it, and it just isn’t worth it.
Indeed. This is called "being an monopoly" and "using anti-competitive practices to control a market, in violation of anti monopoly laws".
Yes, anti competitive practices work.
Yes, being a monopoly works.
And yes, it has produced some good things like Apple's focus on privacy.
But it has also produced other very not good things, like the 30% Apple tax.
But, it is at least comforting that people are now saying the quiet part out loud, which is "yep, Apple had anti competitive market power the whole time, I just like monopolies".
It's... been the entire argument, the whole time, for the "please don't change it" side. I'm not even aware of another angle on it. It's never been "quiet".
> I just like monopolies
I like my life being better than it might otherwise be. In this case, yes, that means I'd rather this monopoly stick around at least a while longer. I'm entirely not a fan of black-and-white positions on most issues. Monopolies generally suck. In this case, however, one particular monopoly seems to be giving me significant benefits I might not otherwise have. Now, if I could trade Apple's monopoly for a harsh crackdown on monopolies across the whole economy, that'd be easily worth it—yes, please. Just to "liberate" iOS devices, though? Nah, I'd rather they leave it alone.
Well, it gets conveniently ignored anytime someone would bring up problems with said monopoly.
For example, the 30% Apple fee is a consequence of their anti-competitive market power.
And yet, if you start complaining about that, the response will be to pretend like the anti-competitive market power doesn't exist, and that you should just "go publish on a different app store" if you don't want to pay that monopolistic fee.
You can't have it both ways here. You cannot say that you like their monopoly power, and then pretend like it doesn't exist when the same exact market power allows Apple to extra 30% of the money from the app store market.
> Now, if I could trade Apple's monopoly....... Just to "liberate" iOS devices, though? Nah, I'd rather they leave it alone.
Well then you should blame Apple for the situation we are in now.
People wouldn't be forced to regulate Apple, if they hadn't been abusing their market power for a decade.
If Apple had instead chosen to lower their app store fee, to 5%, then we could have gotten the best of all worlds, which is a focus on privacy, and no monopolistic fees.
Its too late for that now. If only Apple hadn't fought these efforts so much, they could have given everyone a worthwhile compromise.
Two very bad consequences for me if sideloading were easy:
1. There would be no safe product to recommend to my aging parents who would be vulnerable to social engineering.
2. A company with a popular produce like Facebook could go outside the store, which would normalize side-loading, thus rendering argument like ‘people who want safety can stick to the store’ moot.
The arguments about not wanting to control what other people do are moot. If you want a platform with side-loading, buy android.
I haven't heart of social engineering involving https://github.com/altstoreio/AltStore but maybe you know something I don't. Either way, installing apps onto iOS devices over the network exists today.
Life is too complex and there is too much going on and too much to figure out and too many demands on my time, I just want to pick up a device, use it for what i need and then put it away. I don't want to spend hours tinkering to get every little thing the way i want it, i'm happy to outsource that to someone that knows what they are doing and in return I get a device that just works.
Now we are going to end up with a bunch of app stores, which is horrible and annoying to manage on a phone, side loading apps, apps requiring certain app stores so you have to download that app store just to get it and then apps that don't meet the standards that Apple have set.
If you don't like that, you could have bought an Android, but I was happy with it, I want my devices to get out of my way.
And then suddenly I lose all the protections afforded to me by the Apple Store, such as easy cancellations of subscriptions, easy refunds of apps that don't work, a layer of protection against malware, and so forth. It also just makes my phone that much harder to use, as finding and installing apps becomes that much harder.
If everybody gets sideloading, that absolutely will impact me directly, and negatively. Does that make sense?
Bingo. Chiefly worried about Facebook and my folks. As well as compliance deciding everyones' personal phones need antivirus spyware.
That said, I think Apple has the playbook with SIP on Macs: make it scary to disable and clearly in power user territory.
> corporate compliance
I've never enrolled any of my personal devices in any sort of corporate network, and I never will. Just say no.
If you actually try saying no, you'll find that it's actually easy.
And you become the pain-in-the-ass of every friend group and professional circle. No one likes dealing with annoying people like this.
No u.
Oh? So are you saying that monopoly power is a real thing, and that a company like Apple can extract a 30% monopoly fee, because of this network effect?
The problem with this argument is that Apple fans on one hand have been smugly commenting for a decade, "go but an Android" or "just don't publish on the iPhone" .
And now, they are turning around and suddenly discovering what market power is.
If Apple had merely reduced their 30% fee to 5% from the beginning, we wouldn't be in the situation.
But thems the breaks. Now every Apple fans will have to hear the same exact argument, that they used against others, for a decade, thrown back in their face.
I had problems with that only once. I guess it depends on people you are around with. But most people have different groups of friends on different apps already so it's usually no big deal.
Given that iphone owners are more wealthy I expect this to happen much more often when sideloading is allowed on iphones since there's more money to be made. It's gonna get bad imo.
Certainly, Play Store doesn't feel as restrictive as the App Store, so that's probably a factor. But I doubt popular apps will drop Apple's store, because it will significantly reduce the number of people willing and able to install their apps.
They claimed that they expected Apple's rule changes a while back to cost them $10 billion dollars in 2022 alone.
Things may work out as the have with Android sideloading, but they may not. Incentives definitely differ between the two. It's also not clear to me that if sideloading is forced via regulation, it'll look like it does on Android—both operating systems may be forced to make it easier than it currently is on Android.
And, to be honest, who is Apple to dictate what Facebook's users can and cannot pay their Facebook subscription with? If people are fine with Facebook's cyber stalking, let them install the stupid app. You can still use the web version from Safari with all of the ad blocking addons you can find. Apple isn't the government and they don't have power of attorney, so I know what basis they have to say what apps you can and cannot sideload onto your phone.
Even still, I doubt Facebook will leave the app store because of this. They may provide some kind of "Facebook Plus" that you need to sideload, but the app store has too many eyes on it because it comes preinstalled.
The nightmare scenario, for the "please don't change it" side, is that one of a handful of big players does this but also uses it to push an entire alternative store. Facebook and Epic are the most likely to try. Maybe Google, outside chance Microsoft tries. I doubt any would bother to just push sideloading an app, without using it to make a play to become the second of an app store duopoly on the platform. Basically the same strategy Steam used to gain market share—"here's our new game that everyone wants... oh, by the way, to use it you have to install our store".
I mean, Epic's been burning stacks of Benjamins for at least a couple years giving away tons of games (most of it not even cheap shovelware!) to buy marketshare for their desktop app store—it's not implausible they'd give away a lot of free games or other software to get iOS users to install their store, to make a play for the #2 (or #1!) app store position on the platform. And Facebook could probably get people to install theirs by just adding some visual bling to users' posts when they use the version from Facebook's store—might not even have to give them actual extra features to make it happen.
Maybe none of that happens, sure, but it might. If these changes brought by regulations end up making sideloading easier than it currently is on Android, on both platforms, I'd say it's a certainty that something like that'll go down, at least on iOS (more money to be made there; store's more restrictive) and maybe on Android, too.
I can see Epic starting a mobile game store. And, honestly, I don't see a problem with that. Apple is using Apple Arcade as one of their many "stay with us and you get all of this stuff" services, so why not? Perhaps Microsoft will join the fight and take Game Pass to mobile phones. May the best app store win.
Apple clearly has the upper hand no matter how this plays out. They'll actually have to compete, which means they may need to fix the review situation and loosen some of their policies to allow for things users want rather than make their users comply with what they want. They can stick to their "no video game streaming, no emulators, no links to your website" policy if they want to, but that'll only work as long as their users agree with them.
This point keeps being made in these threads on here, and the response I’ve seen made, which I agree with, is that this clearly isn’t the case when you look at Android. Sideloading already exists and it is far from a common way to distribute applications.
From a business perspective, it really doesn’t make sense to force users to pull from outside the App Store, because you’re basically going to destroy your business. Most users are not all that technical and the moment you require them to fool around with apks or whatever other format, you’re going to lose a huge percentage of them.
The problem with using Android as a counterexample is that Apple iOS is more restrictive (e.g. privacy settings) than Android.
E.g. Facebook admitted they lost billions in revenue because of the Apple iOS ad tracking permissions change. That might be an example of Facebook forcing users to "sideload" Facebook+Whatsapp+Instagram to get around the privacy restrictions. In contrast, the Android platform didn't financially hurt them like that so there's less incentive to ask Android users to sideload Facebook apps.
So even a mega giant like Facebook has to follow Apple's rules because there is no sideloading to bypass them. A somewhat analogous situation in 2019 happened when Facebook violated Apple's app store policy and spied on teenagers by abusing their Apple developer account: https://www.google.com/search?q=apple+revokes+facebook+certi...
>Most users are not all that technical and the moment you require them to fool around with apks
I think some conversations about "sideloading" are muddy because casual conversation around it mentally includes alternative app stores rather than end users literally downloading raw ".app" bundle files
Apple can clearly make the OS secure/privacy friendly if they want to. The only layer of security that you may lose is the dubious “review” process, which clearly doesn’t do anything considering the amount of scam apps on the store.
Your sentences above are a prime example of a technology mindset being so familiar with the underlying technology that it actually handicaps the analysis of how people might use the tech in ways you don't expect.
The way the sideloaded app gets around the os-level restriction is that they would force users to give permission to the ad-tracking. Otherwise, the sideloaded app has crippled functionality.
That scenario can't happen on Apple's offical App Store because their policies don't allow apps to have crippled functionality when users opt-out of ad tracking.
The theme is that the side-loaded apps can exercise way more freedom with clever psychological dark patterns that bypasses os-level settings.
E.g. see related example from Twitter: https://www.techgoing.com/twitter-ads-may-track-users-in-vio...
There is a simple solution for Apple: disable ad tracking on iOS. The DMA doesn't require gatekeepers permit ad tracking. It only requires gatekeepers provide the same functionality they provide themselves. Apple is still perfectly able to provide a safe and secure OS under the legislation.
But it's also been apparent that relying on code auditing wasn't going to be sustainable long term. The real answer is for Apple to beef up their sandboxing to prevent things like cross app tracking, coercing permissions from users, etc - independent of the app store review process or policies.
This is what the Libre Android distributions (eg GrapheneOS, CalyxOS) have been (slowly) converging on.
Why not? It seemed to be going fine. As the number of apps increases, so does get money the App Store receives. I don't see anything inherently unsustainable in it at all.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/11/technology/bad-digital-ad...
Obviously, things like phone book access can be solved for sideloaded apps just as well as for App Store ones – just like Android has been doing for many years.
No, at most you'll pay more for the same app your coworker sideloaded. The price for apple protection, +30% on everything.
Most people didn't extract pictures from their phone before apple cloud (or w/e their service is called) appeared. I know because i was the tech support for my family for those 5 years. How would they sideload?
I originally thought I would never load a different App Store but now I might. If an App Store came out that was highly curated (ie no casino games, no subscription scams, no advertising against competitors), that listed exactly what the in-app purchases are before buying, and removed developers who get a lot of complaints in the store, I would be interested. Apple hasn’t been a good steward of the App Store.
I'm fine with it. Apple has been intentionally hindering WebKit development for years to hobble web apps and maintain their App Store dominance. They'll finally be forced to compete again.
Couldn't have said it better. The only things I could see myself sideloading are indeed the Kindle app (I like being able to single-click buy books without having to switch to Safari), a full browser, and possibly some retro computer, calculator, and console emulators.
All of these are (or at least have been, before I switched) been possible on Android via official apps from the Play Store.
Android has always supported sideloading, yet in almost 10 years of using Android, I've never had to sideload any commercial app.
Anecdotally, Amazon has tried to push their app store for a while by incentivizing installs with free games and the like, but none of these weren't also available on the official Play Store. Nowadays, it's all free-to-play anyway, but that's a different topic.
But they want their Facebook. Or SnapChat, or Insta, or TikTok, or whatever.
Once other app stores are allowed, there's nothing stopping Meta (for example) from revoking their existing apps, and requiring the use of the Facebook App Installer for access to Facebook. They've paid people in the past to use their Onavo VPN app to bypass Apple's privacy controls, so this would be unsurprising.
Of course, that's just an example; replace with the next SnapChat, TikTok, whatever. If that's the thing that teens want, and the way to get it is to click a bunch of "Yes I agree" dialogs, they'll happily do it. And now suddenly some developer has access to all your family financials through your teen.
If your solution is "well, people shouldn't do that then", you might not understand teens. (Or grandparents. Or regular people.)
Well, there is maybe one thing. That is their projection of reduced installs. It's not just an issue of clicking "Yes". It's probably also an issue of knowing how to do it in the first place. The first party app store will always be easier.
By strong arming carriers Apple took this revenue to themselves which had the paradoxical effect of opening things up from where they were before. Without this, there’s no doubt you’d be using a Verizon App Store and I’d have AT&T and governments would see no need to take action because there was carrier competition.
Is being able to install whatever you want on your phone, a good thing? Undoubtedly, but we wouldn’t have tasted this opportunity without Apple’s move to take App Sales in house. We also have to be mindful of the devil we don’t know. if you’re OSS you see sideloading as blissfully unchaining your device, but if you’re an Apple competitor you see it as a chance to do everything you were forbidden to.
Certainly, the carriers had stores, but it's not like they had software I wanted to run.
Smart tech users do lose out in the trade off, but it is a trade off.
For the majority of my family the App Store provides a huge amount of safety, as no cost. They have no concept of the protections it provides, but equally will just blindly follow instructions online as well.
My mother was convinced for years her iMac and MacBook were from Microsoft because every doc she opened said "Microsoft Windows" and she knows Microsoft.
Weren't Facebook caught teaching people to use TestFlight to install VPNs to circumvent rules before? This feels like it'll play out similarly to Binance teaching users to install VPNs to circumvent trading controls, for the big official apps, and simultaneously open the floodgates to a ton of spam/phishing/fake apps.
Facebook/TikTok/etc just have to say something like "Here's our fancy new version and feature X is only available when you follow these new install instructions" and it'll happen.
Then it'll normalize it, which is the worst outcome.
"Think of my elderly mother!" is the apple fanboy's version of "think of the children!" No. Get over it. Talk with your mother and explain your concerns. Do you have power of attorney over your mother? If you think she's too mentally feeble to be responsible for herself, then maybe you should think about that instead of advocating for the imposition of these rules on everybody else.
Edit for response:
phone8675309: If scammers can talk your mother into sideloading an application, then they can also talk her into emptying her bank account. Get power of attorney over her, if you care.
And Apple will probably get pretty far with that. People trust Apple a lot more than they trust Facebook.
Once, when you enable the keyboard. And it seems like an entirely sensible warning. It’s a keyboard, by definition it has to have the ability to react to your key presses. Explicitly letting the user know of this risk seems like a good thing.
Perhaps, but if it is like Android, users will get plenty of warning when they try to turn on side loading, and every time they get a chance to sideload.
> Facebook/TikTok/etc just have to say something like "Here's our fancy new version and feature X is only available when you follow these new install instructions" and it'll happen.
10+ years of Android sideloading and this has not happened.
This was done using Facebook's enterprise developer certificate, which allows them to sign apps for internal use - Apple revoked the certificate as it was a violation of ToS to use it externally as they were.
And yes, they already tried it it as a way around controls.
Android's permission and anti-tracking measures have generally been more lenient. I'm sure if sideloading was permitted when the anti tracking measures rolled out on iOS Facebook would have jumped to side loading ASAP.
Sideloaded Facebook can't access your location or camera if you don't tell iOS to give them access (iOS restrictions). On the other hand, there's nothing stopping sideloaded Facebook from refusing to work if you don't let them access those things (no App Store rules).
Something else to consider is the fact that the average user only installs apps from the default store. If Facebook wants installs, that's where they have to be. Also, we don't know many "scary screens" Apple will display when trying to sideload something.
People click through pop-ups without reading them all the time.
Could pop-up a "click OK to send your money to us" button and people would click OK and I'd get calls from family asking where their money went.
Some Android skins show you a big red warning, disable the "install" button for a few seconds, and the cancel button is the one with the bright colour. This, plus not allowing sideloading by default, seems to work well. A simple popup probably wouldn't be as effective.
I foresee that Meta will make a dedicated landing page with a side-load download + easy steps and it will get adopted by a size-able chunk of people (like you say). Once that side-loaded app is on the device, they will have auto-update features built-in and you'll likely never need to manually install it ever again. They'll essentially have complete rooted control over your device and use it to steal any and all information possible.
This is a very real reality and I don't think folks care enough. I'm not even against opening up the app store(s), I just wish we had regulated social media's permissions to our private life more before we opened the flood gates to the garbage they will now attempt to dump onto our devices.
I highly doubt that sideloaded apps would somehow be granted root by default
Android has sideloading since forever, and this doesn't happen there. The number of users you get by the convenience of being in the main app store for the system is way bigger then from any feature you can do if you are not.
But the biggest question that always gets me is why anyone who considers the Android way fine would want to change Apple? Simply stay with Android and let others be. Changing Apple makes it just another Android-- you can't have your cake and eat it too.
This is also why Google is under pressure as well. This isn't just a "go to Android" situation, this is a "the entire mobile market is entirely anti-competitive due to Apple and Google being in bed with each other" one.
Odd that I don't remember anyone calling Nokia anti-competitive when their platform had the market sewn up and Apple and Google had 0%.
Scammers can already trick your mother into installing their apps. https://altstore.io/ exists and is widely used to install an emulator and some other apps Apple has deemed unworthy of their users' attention. The source is here: https://github.com/altstoreio/AltStore
Can you back that up with data? My family’s phones are full of apps.
The highly tech literate are more picky and have fewer more specific apps.
Backed-up with zero data, based on anecdata from friends.
I can’t wait to see what apps try to do when there are no restrictions.
I suppose some copycat apps send tons of notifications, but you can easily uninstall those. As far as I know, iOS sandboxing is better than Android's, so I don't think there's any greater risk.
I can only agree with this conclusion. And I'm still somewhat surprised Apple would so intransigently do something that makes them look so utterly stupid and bad.
Apple is still going to have the best integrations for their own App Store and even if eg Epic manage to get close (I kind of doubt it even if it's technically possible) all it will do is force Apple to actually compete on eg take % and developer experience. Versus right now they can tell you to go pound sand for no reason when you're releasing a 1-line bug fix revision for your 10 year old app.
It’s a very personal decision, but I like iPhone/iOS because it feels like a device, not like a computer. Android still geeked computer-y the last time I tried it a few years ago. Different strokes.
I like the level of review that apps get and the data shows a much lower prevalence of malware in the iOS ecosystem vs the Android ecosystem. I also like the integration and convenience. I’m mostly happy in my walled garden.
What I don’t like is the political speech suppression. I was appalled when AWS, Google and Apple all canceled Parler. I was not a user of Parler but the arbitrary censorship was shocking.
I am ok with protecting me from malware, but not happy with arbitrary editorial decisions about what speech I can see/participate in.
I agree. It was all the scarier because of how obviously coordinated the attack. It makes me wonder what else they are coordinating. Any move to wrest power from their hands and put it back in the hands of ordinary citizens is a very good move from a moral, legal, economic, and democratic perspective.
Times have changed though, Willy Wonka is gone now, phones are nearly identical in specs across the board, and there aren't that many more marvels to distract with.
It's almost like a talking point that relates this policy to the bad name of Facebook was seen as being effective
Other developers have complained about the fees, the arbitrary rejections and not being able to mention web signup
I think allowing third party browser engines actually has much broader, significant implications here; Apple is already making aggressive investments into Safari in order to keep its edge against Chromium based browsers. Hopefully, PWA will finally become a viable development platform, which may weaken this "app store" economy in a long run.
HOWEVER. This would have been a lot easier if Apple and Google simply reformed their commission models. A take rate of 10% instead of 30% would have prevented this.
Why I can't install Steam on my Xbox or PS5? Since we are here talking about open market, we should not target one company but make it all open.
Those who did sideload were forced to do so by the extraordinarily popular app they wanted to run not being on the Google Play Store at all. Yeah, I'm talking about Fortnite.
Sure there are techies like us who will sideload apps to skip YouTube ads or covertly save Snapchat nudes or sniff wifi packets or whatever, but we're a vanishingly small minority. Most android users didn't even know sideloading was an option and wouldn't care if they did.
It's not zero risk, no arguing that. It's just pretty small, and (IMO) not worth the loss in user choice.
Will 3rd party stores prevent crappy apps from being published?
One reason I never bought an Android is because the Play store is rife with junk, spyware, and malware.
It should be noted TrollStore does also enable this in certain versions of iOS, and jailbreaking enables this in older and newer, up to 15.x on arm64e devices (iPhone 11 and up), and up to 16.4.1, the latest version, on older arm64 devices.
This is the biggest modern PR blunder in some time. Do we not get insane productivity as devs from their platform vs others or not? I say emphatically, yes. That’s all you have to do, repeat over and over until blue.