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> anyone is welcome to fork This is wrong. One of the three major pieces of this case is the allegation that Google has hindered those who wish to fork by pre

by asr 8y ago

> anyone is welcome to fork This is wrong. One of the three major pieces of this case is the allegation that Google has hindered those who wish to fork by preventing them from making phones with any of the major phone OEMs: "In particular, Google ... has prevented manufacturers wishing to pre-install Google apps from selling even a single smart mobile device running on alternative versions of Android that were not approved by Google (so-called 'Android forks')." http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-18-4581_en.htm http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-18-4581_en.htm

Mikeb85 8y ago
They can fork if they don't want to pre-install Google apps. Lots of Chinese phones have alternative app stores.
- asr 8y ago
  No, until now, you were not allowed to fork just because you agreed not to install Google apps on that phone -- you were only allowed to fork if you didn't want to install Google apps on any phone you made. So, for example, Samsung couldn't decide to offer an Android phone without Google unless it was willing to shut down its entire current business. The allegation is that because of this, anyone looking to fork Android had a very hard time finding good OEMs to make their phones. E.g., maybe the Amazon fire phones would have worked if they could have gotten a Tier 1 OEM to make the phones so they could have put out a better product. But nobody would agree to stop making all of their current Android phones to see (I assume; there is no public version of the decision yet so I'm making up the example).
  - dirkgently 8y ago
    AOSP is completely open for anyone to work. It's as simple as that. Nobody is forced to use Google apps. They are free to fork and come up with a way for people to install apps from their own app store.
PuffinBlue 8y ago
Hmm, I wonder if that's somewhat what Fuchsia and the push to ChromeOS might be about. I guess looking forward the writing is on the wall that Samsung will eventually move to its own OS. An the 'anti-fork' attempts will eventually get beaten down by litigation. So really a proprietary OS on your own hardware like Apple would be the way to go. No surprise that Android apps will work on ChromeOS going forward, I'm sure they'd work seamlessly on Fuchsia too (don't they already?). Maybe in a few years this comment will look quite prescient. Or I'll look like a dumbass. I'd say 25/75

by asr 8y ago

Mikeb85 8y ago

They can fork if they don't want to pre-install Google apps. Lots of Chinese phones have alternative app stores.

asr 8y ago
No, until now, you were not allowed to fork just because you agreed not to install Google apps on that phone -- you were only allowed to fork if you didn't want to install Google apps on any phone you made. So, for example, Samsung couldn't decide to offer an Android phone without Google unless it was willing to shut down its entire current business. The allegation is that because of this, anyone looking to fork Android had a very hard time finding good OEMs to make their phones. E.g., maybe the Amazon fire phones would have worked if they could have gotten a Tier 1 OEM to make the phones so they could have put out a better product. But nobody would agree to stop making all of their current Android phones to see (I assume; there is no public version of the decision yet so I'm making up the example).
- dirkgently 8y ago
  AOSP is completely open for anyone to work. It's as simple as that. Nobody is forced to use Google apps. They are free to fork and come up with a way for people to install apps from their own app store.

PuffinBlue 8y ago

Hmm, I wonder if that's somewhat what Fuchsia and the push to ChromeOS might be about. I guess looking forward the writing is on the wall that Samsung will eventually move to its own OS. An the 'anti-fork' attempts will eventually get beaten down by litigation. So really a proprietary OS on your own hardware like Apple would be the way to go. No surprise that Android apps will work on ChromeOS going forward, I'm sure they'd work seamlessly on Fuchsia too (don't they already?). Maybe in a few years this comment will look quite prescient. Or I'll look like a dumbass. I'd say 25/75