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Is this google starting to test the waters when it comes to arbitrarily kicking out software they personally don't like? (open source, decentralized, privacy or

Is this google starting to test the waters when it comes to arbitrarily kicking out software they personally don't like? (open source, decentralized, privacy oriented etc.) I might of course be exaggerating a bit here, keep that in mind. - Element and Matrix are growing but still not equipped to fight back at large against this, so it is unlikely to create too much negative press - If Google starts to catch too much critique for this decision they can put it back and always blame $error I believe Element will be back soon, the problem I see here is that it will be framed as an "honest mistake" and then become forgotten until they pull another stunt like this. Even if these removals are temporary, they can still hurt growth. Let's assume a bit more malice: Couldn't Google just monitor and analyze metrics of an undesirable app (downloads, usage, hype), pick a critical point in its growth then "accidentaly" remove it for a few days, causing damage that isn't immediately apparent, but nonetheless long lasting?

COGlory 6y ago
I don't think this is the case. But in my opinion, the fact that we have no way of knowing and have to rely on Google not to do that is the real issue.
neonate 6y ago
I think the situation is probably more interesting than deliberate anticompetitive evil. I bet that there was indeed some policy violation, and some minor bureaucrat is reasonably applying the policy, but in a way that misses the big-picture impact of doing so, for example threads of outrage high on Hacker News. The policies back them into being a monopolistic heavy whether they mean to or not, because they're so big that they basically have to rule the world and there's no mechanism for outsiders to have a say. The real problem is that the policies are not adapting to rapidly changing conditions (i.e. yet another takedown, howls of outrage, calls for regulation), and the big tech companies have become too sclerotic to cope with that. Worse (for them), they're vulnerable to being gamed. Once people figure out that saying "Jehovah" triggers the policy, some will keep saying "Jehovah Jehovah Jehovah" just to fuck with them and grow the popular outrage.
- bdefore 6y ago
  Very well put. Sympathetic. Yet still culpable even if they can't scale Google scale right?
- clusterfish 6y ago
  > The policies back them into being a monopolistic heavy whether they mean to or not That only happens because they deliberately put themselves in a position of market power. If they didn't have such crazy amounts of power nobody would care about their "policies" misfiring. None of this is accidental in the big picture, we're well past any window of plausible deniability with Google. They can't perpetually claim incompetence.
  - neonate 6y ago
    I'm not sure what the complaint is there. They grew their business, which is what every business tries to do, nothing unique to Google about that. The interesting question is are they finally becoming a victim of their success. It seems obvious to me that the big tech companies have grown past the size where public interest / public square questions start to kick in, which is why the "it's a private company, they can do what they want on their own platform, no free speech issues to see here" argument is so weak. It's also not at all in the long-term political interests of the people who've recently adopted it as a mantra, just for a temporary advantage over their adversaries. Not smart, guys.
    - clusterfish 6y ago
      The complaint is, we don't need to allow big tech so much power. Utilities are heavily regulated to prevent monopolistic abuse. Big tech is showing similar "natural monopoly" tendencies and so needs to be reigned in with regulation because free markets are failing here.
colllectorof 6y ago
>Is this google starting to test the waters when it comes to arbitrarily kicking out software they personally don't like? (open source, decentralized, privacy oriented etc.) Absolutely. They've done similar things with similar apps. You just have to pay some attention to see the pattern. Let's take video for example. They Kicked LBRY client off Play store not so long ago. (It eventually got reinstated.) They permanently banned BitChute app. Not app-related, but currently Rumble is suing Google for manipulating video search results in favor of YouTube. Look up the details, they are quite interesting. Meanwhile, Google has an agreement with all Android hardware providers that forces them to pre-install YouTube and make it non-removable.
- colllectorof 6y ago
  And then you occasionally see more subtle stuff like this: "Since Android 8.0 Oreo, Google doesn't allow apps to run in the background anymore, requiring all apps which were previously keeping background connection to exclusively use its Firebase push messaging service." https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS/blob/master/Notifications.md https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS/blob/mas...
  - walrus01 6y ago
    how is this handled for SIP softphones that can run persistently in the background, in a direct SIP or SIP-over-TLS connection to a server? for instance: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.linphone&hl=en_CA&gl=US https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.linphone&h... that's just a random example I thought of since I use it, but I can also think of a lot of other Android apps that I'm fairly sure aren't using any client-server communications mediated through google firebase, yet they continue to function while backgrounded on android 10 and 11.
    - Un1corn 6y ago
      I'm not sure how Linphone is doing it but all the apps I used that required to run in the background were required to show a notification at all time. This is a terrible UX, my notification center is useless because I always have those apps in there (KDEConnect and Syncthing for example)
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
thoweri234234 6y ago
They kicked out Paytm in India because they were offering "lottery" prizes in the same way that their Google-competitor Gpay was.
cma 6y ago
Seems like the first step to kicking out competing web browsers, if the browsers don't moderate what you browse.
- ttt0 6y ago
  And email clients.
- ekianjo 6y ago
  "Don't Be Evil" - Looks like the roots of Google are far behind them now.
  - etiam 6y ago
    Don't be evil - Google 2004 We have a new policy - Google 2012
  - cma 6y ago
    Unless 30% of your traffic is AMP, your browser gets a demerit.
imhoguy 6y ago
> Even if these removals are temporary, they can still hurt growth. I don't think so. A lot of people were not aware of Matrix even, it's geek tech. Now, just watch how this Streisand effect unfolds over the weekend.
- nip180 6y ago
  This is a critical growth period for smaller platforms.
foxhop 6y ago
Yes, I'm convinced the YouTube algos did this to my channel during summer 2020. Their algos wait in silence until triggered. Big tech platform who participate in anti-competitive practices (Google, Amazon, Apple, Facebook) know the optimal time to pull the plug to flatten the curve and prevent competition from going exponential.
whichquestion 6y ago
Would there be a way to demonstrate that this hurt your growth and could you seek damages for this, despite the terms of service? And if this is actually a pattern with the Google Play Store, couldn’t someone design an elaborate set of traps to demonstrate this in Court?
- zamadatix 6y ago
  Say you demonstrate it in a fullproof way, what are you seeking damages for? A store kicking your product out according to the agreement? I.e. the thing you need to show in court isnt that Google stopped selling your app in its store because it didn't like it rather that it's a monopolistic marketplace or the terms are somehow invalid or so on. These are much higher bars, especially with 3rd party stores and side loading being available and used on the platform. It's considered a battle to prove these things in the Apple ecosystem I can't imagine trying to prove them in Play first.
22c 6y ago
>Is this google starting to test the waters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trial_balloon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trial_balloon

COGlory 6y ago

I don't think this is the case. But in my opinion, the fact that we have no way of knowing and have to rely on Google not to do that is the real issue.

neonate 6y ago

I think the situation is probably more interesting than deliberate anticompetitive evil. I bet that there was indeed some policy violation, and some minor bureaucrat is reasonably applying the policy, but in a way that misses the big-picture impact of doing so, for example threads of outrage high on Hacker News. The policies back them into being a monopolistic heavy whether they mean to or not, because they're so big that they basically have to rule the world and there's no mechanism for outsiders to have a say. The real problem is that the policies are not adapting to rapidly changing conditions (i.e. yet another takedown, howls of outrage, calls for regulation), and the big tech companies have become too sclerotic to cope with that. Worse (for them), they're vulnerable to being gamed. Once people figure out that saying "Jehovah" triggers the policy, some will keep saying "Jehovah Jehovah Jehovah" just to fuck with them and grow the popular outrage.

bdefore 6y ago
Very well put. Sympathetic. Yet still culpable even if they can't scale Google scale right?
clusterfish 6y ago
> The policies back them into being a monopolistic heavy whether they mean to or not That only happens because they deliberately put themselves in a position of market power. If they didn't have such crazy amounts of power nobody would care about their "policies" misfiring. None of this is accidental in the big picture, we're well past any window of plausible deniability with Google. They can't perpetually claim incompetence.
- neonate 6y ago
  I'm not sure what the complaint is there. They grew their business, which is what every business tries to do, nothing unique to Google about that. The interesting question is are they finally becoming a victim of their success. It seems obvious to me that the big tech companies have grown past the size where public interest / public square questions start to kick in, which is why the "it's a private company, they can do what they want on their own platform, no free speech issues to see here" argument is so weak. It's also not at all in the long-term political interests of the people who've recently adopted it as a mantra, just for a temporary advantage over their adversaries. Not smart, guys.
  - clusterfish 6y ago
    The complaint is, we don't need to allow big tech so much power. Utilities are heavily regulated to prevent monopolistic abuse. Big tech is showing similar "natural monopoly" tendencies and so needs to be reigned in with regulation because free markets are failing here.

colllectorof 6y ago

>Is this google starting to test the waters when it comes to arbitrarily kicking out software they personally don't like? (open source, decentralized, privacy oriented etc.) Absolutely. They've done similar things with similar apps. You just have to pay some attention to see the pattern. Let's take video for example. They Kicked LBRY client off Play store not so long ago. (It eventually got reinstated.) They permanently banned BitChute app. Not app-related, but currently Rumble is suing Google for manipulating video search results in favor of YouTube. Look up the details, they are quite interesting. Meanwhile, Google has an agreement with all Android hardware providers that forces them to pre-install YouTube and make it non-removable.

colllectorof 6y ago
And then you occasionally see more subtle stuff like this: "Since Android 8.0 Oreo, Google doesn't allow apps to run in the background anymore, requiring all apps which were previously keeping background connection to exclusively use its Firebase push messaging service." https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS/blob/master/Notifications.md https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS/blob/mas...
- walrus01 6y ago
  how is this handled for SIP softphones that can run persistently in the background, in a direct SIP or SIP-over-TLS connection to a server? for instance: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.linphone&hl=en_CA&gl=US https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.linphone&h... that's just a random example I thought of since I use it, but I can also think of a lot of other Android apps that I'm fairly sure aren't using any client-server communications mediated through google firebase, yet they continue to function while backgrounded on android 10 and 11.
  - Un1corn 6y ago
    I'm not sure how Linphone is doing it but all the apps I used that required to run in the background were required to show a notification at all time. This is a terrible UX, my notification center is useless because I always have those apps in there (KDEConnect and Syncthing for example)

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

thoweri234234 6y ago

They kicked out Paytm in India because they were offering "lottery" prizes in the same way that their Google-competitor Gpay was.

cma 6y ago

Seems like the first step to kicking out competing web browsers, if the browsers don't moderate what you browse.

ttt0 6y ago
And email clients.
ekianjo 6y ago
"Don't Be Evil" - Looks like the roots of Google are far behind them now.
- etiam 6y ago
  Don't be evil - Google 2004 We have a new policy - Google 2012
- cma 6y ago
  Unless 30% of your traffic is AMP, your browser gets a demerit.

imhoguy 6y ago

> Even if these removals are temporary, they can still hurt growth. I don't think so. A lot of people were not aware of Matrix even, it's geek tech. Now, just watch how this Streisand effect unfolds over the weekend.

nip180 6y ago
This is a critical growth period for smaller platforms.

foxhop 6y ago

Yes, I'm convinced the YouTube algos did this to my channel during summer 2020. Their algos wait in silence until triggered. Big tech platform who participate in anti-competitive practices (Google, Amazon, Apple, Facebook) know the optimal time to pull the plug to flatten the curve and prevent competition from going exponential.

whichquestion 6y ago

Would there be a way to demonstrate that this hurt your growth and could you seek damages for this, despite the terms of service? And if this is actually a pattern with the Google Play Store, couldn’t someone design an elaborate set of traps to demonstrate this in Court?

zamadatix 6y ago
Say you demonstrate it in a fullproof way, what are you seeking damages for? A store kicking your product out according to the agreement? I.e. the thing you need to show in court isnt that Google stopped selling your app in its store because it didn't like it rather that it's a monopolistic marketplace or the terms are somehow invalid or so on. These are much higher bars, especially with 3rd party stores and side loading being available and used on the platform. It's considered a battle to prove these things in the Apple ecosystem I can't imagine trying to prove them in Play first.

22c 6y ago

>Is this google starting to test the waters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trial_balloon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trial_balloon