Comment by lucb1e | Hacker News Reader

Comment by lucb1e | Hacker News Reader

There's more Play news, unfortunately...

Two days ago, I updated Stellarium Mobile. On launch, it now requires that you are logged into the Play Store. No more anonymous Android usage.

I emailed the developer with what I saw in adb logcat, they came back yesterday with this:

> I see your point. The new google verification code requires a google play account it seems. It works with some third party stores, but you need a google account..

> This is probably going to be the case for most apps in the future because Google is pushing for this feature to be enabled by default for all Google Play apps at submission time..

so that's the end of being able to grab apks via Aurora (an alternative, open source client for the play store), at least if the app has any sort of billing function which is not uncommon even for open source apps (think donations). Maybe this is Google's response to the requirement to feeling threatened by needing to give up the app repository monopoly?

My LG-C1 does this nonsense. It requires me to have an LG account to download 90% the apps I want (except the big dog streaming services of course) like Plex or GeForce Now. Interestingly enough it allows YouTube but not YouTube kids.

I’ve so far held out and am considering just getting some sort of Nvidia shield-like device (heard they sadly went down the drain over the last few years) to handle all my apps.

So basically LG is asking me to 1) have an account for internet which is separate from 2) my account for my TV which is separate from 3) the myriad of other apps I want to use and require logging in. But of course they leave out the big players that would (rightfully) call this burdensome on the consumer as they make sure access to their content is as streamlined as possible. So Disney/Netflix/Amazon/YouTube/Hulu get around this but everyone else doesn’t.

And execs are wondering why account sharing is so common and piracy is on the rise.

Aurora still works, you just can't use the search, you enable the search tab and it directs to google play in browser , then you hit a button to send the direct link back to app

Not really.

Aurora lets you download and install the apk, but when you then open Stellarium Mobile, then either:

- if you don't have the Play Store enabled, it will throw a stack trace about not being able to reach the licensing server, which manifests in the UI as a pop-up message telling you to reinstall the app (lol) or suck it up, and when you dismiss it, the app closes.

- if you do, then it will open up the Play Store specifically and require you sign in there. Whether it will work then, since Google doesn't know that you have this app installed (since you used Aurora), I don't know. If you don't and you just hit back or something, the app closes.

The developer of Stellarium Mobile says this is going to be the new standard for all apps. A friend that makes an Android game says he heard that he needs to update the in-app purchases SDK before November 2023, so presumably that's when all apps go dark that have any sort of plus/pro/premium version or donation functionality

So you're technically right of course, aurora still works, but if the apps that you can fetch from there don't work, then can I really tell people that they can use aurora instead of the play store?

I don’t follow. Can’t you bill things without signing into Google? How would they even enforce that?

The app needs to check whether I bought the Plus edition via Google in-app purchases (IAPs) because that's what the developer uses to accept payments. I did not¹ so there is nothing to be billed, but it does the license check of course.

As I understand the developer's response, my being kicked into the Play Store and being told to sign in, with no way of using the app until I've done so, is apparently Google's new requirement for using Google's IAP mechanism at all

¹ I'd love to pay for my use, but rather by something like liberapay or just IBAN transfer, so the developer gets 100% of the money and I don't have to give banking information to Google. With my email to the developer, I also asked for an IBAN in case they can accept payment in that way, as I now had to pirate the apk to use it while signed out of Google, but haven't gotten a response to that yet.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com