5 ms·

This is insane. This jeopardizes every email, xmpp, matrix, etc; basically any 3rd party application.

by pmlnr 6y ago

ignoramous 6y ago
History repeats over and over again: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3597025 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3597025 For all the chaos, the Internet continues to be surprisingly consistent with one set of rules for BigTech and friends and another set of rules for the rest.
- api 6y ago
  It’s largely based on who has more lawyers. Google would never suspend Twitter because they would be instantly sued... like within 24 hours... and by a top tier law firm.
kreeben 6y ago
All web browsers that are not Chrome, beware. You're next.
- pmlnr 6y ago
  Those might be the exceptions, at least for now. Ever since Firefox's crusade against IE the majority of people seem to still know there are different ~programs~ apps to access the internet with. As long as Chrome is not the default in the overwhelming amount of the operating systems, this might even stay like this, which is why I'm extremely unhappy that Android ships with Chrome these days and not with a thin gui on top of the system webview, like it used to. EDIT: this ties in to the conversation I had on different platform recently, that it's getting arduous to make people understand that an app is not necessarily the same as the system behind it. Choosing an email client used to be a thing (Thunderbird, The Bat!, Outlook Express, mutt, etc; to name some across contrasting needs) not even too long ago. I despise that we came to a world where even the tech moderation fails to understand an app != protocol.
  - ainar-g 6y ago
    > As long as Chrome is not the default in the overwhelming amount of the operating systems, this might even stay like this, which is why I'm extremely unhappy that Android ships with Chrome these days and not with a thin gui on top of the system webview, like it used to. That is also why I was rather sad when Microsoft announced that they won't develop their own browser engines any more. I disliked IE as much as anybody else, but what I did like was the competition. With Edge switching to Blink, essentially becoming yet another partially-degooged Chrome, part of that competition is gone.
    - ttt0 6y ago
      > With Edge switching to Blink, essentially becoming yet another partially-degooged Chrome Now it sends half of your data to Google and the other half to Microsoft. That's an improvement, they decentralized spyware.
      - ptero 6y ago
        Its 75% each way. And they will for many years work to reduce spying by lowering this percentage, to 50% in the asymptotic case.
  - LocalH 6y ago
    I would posit that Google has a vested interest in blurring the lines between apps and the protocols that drive them
- znpy 6y ago
  I wonder why this hasn't been escalated to an anti-trust case yet.
  - waheoo 6y ago
    Because every time a libertarian raises the issue they get called a racist trumping alt right nazi. Y'all made your bed. True libertarians checked out a long time ago. We can either die for your sins against free speech or we can watch them come for you. I know what I chose.
    - geofft 6y ago
      Let me get this straight - you're saying "true libertarians" are people who decide to stop caring about advancing libertarian causes because someone else exercised their right of free speech, and now cheer for the loss of liberty of people they don't like?
      - waheoo 6y ago
        No, I'm saying true libertarians have been getting ostracised by polite society for years now. I'm a massively left leaning libertarian, if it weren't for its consistently proven failures in practice I would be a commy. But here I am, over the years of commenting online I've been labeled a trump supporter, a Republican, alt right, white, male privileged, white privileged, racist, pseudo intellectual, biggoted, transphobic, and a Nazi.
        XorNot 6y ago
        Aren't libertarians all about the absolute sanctity of private property over all other concerns? How is a pro-business ideology remotely justifying government intervention in the practice and moderation decisions of a private company? Wouldn't the rectification involve the government specifically dictating their business behaviour?
        LocalH 6y ago
qwertox 6y ago
> This jeopardizes every email, xmpp, matrix, etc; basically any 3rd party application. Except of course Google's own applications. Gmail, Hangouts/Meet/whatever-it-currently-is, Chrome. Luckily it's not possible to display illegal content with Google's own apps /s I remember when my nephew got groomed on Google Plus, I was way to naive to think that this would not be occurring in Google's walled gardens. But in there, it turned out to be quasi-public.
- Aerroon 6y ago
  >Luckily it's not possible to display illegal content with Google's own apps /s Perhaps one day they will make this argument to justify having to spy on everything you do with their software.
- arduanika 6y ago
  > my nephew got groomed on Google Plus That is genuinely horrifying and I'm so sorry for him and your family.
- devoutsalsa 6y ago
  Don’t worry. Google will kill it’s own chat apps. Sad but true.
- sneak 6y ago
  The app in question wasn't suspended for illegal content, it was suspended for profanity.
  - pmlnr 6y ago
    That's ridiculous on it's own. I mean... got out on the street and listen to how people talk.
veeti 6y ago
Being suspended for user generated content has been a rite of passage for third party reddit clients. It's crazy how this happens again, again and again. https://old.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/96l0at/sync_for_reddit_suspended_from_google_play_xpost/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/96l0at/sync_for_re... https://old.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/6dwv1f/boost_for_reddit_has_been_suspended_from_google/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/6dwv1f/boost_for_r... https://old.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/5fqrr8/now_for_reddit_is_suspended_from_google_play/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/5fqrr8/now_for_red...
- pmlnr 6y ago
  There is a significant difference there though: reddit is still a single, central entity. Matrix, XMPP, email, (and activitypub based systems, ssbc, and anything federated) could be connecting to one's own server. It could be a machine in my basement.
  - Erlangen 6y ago
    I don't see the difference. "Sync for reddit" a custom client for reddit. It was suspended for "hate speech". Then why isn't the official reddit app not suspended?
    - pmlnr 6y ago
      > I don't see the difference. ? 1. I install synapse (a matrix server) on my own machine. I install Element on my own phone. I connect one to another, and via the server to other servers. 2. I install a client that connects to reddit. Same reddit as everyone else. Same reddit as the reddit website. There is a rather significant difference, isn't there? EDIT addressing the 'hate speech' part, you are correct. If one reddit client is banned, all should be banned. But that is not true for communication apps, like Element.
ksec 6y ago
I pointed this out not long ago. When will it comes to Email? How is mailing list any different? And what about Chrome or Web Browser? Or they going to have built in Filter for website? Although without the reach of Google Search Engine having a filter or not makes no difference anyway. But it is great they are doing it, the more the better. People were extremely supportive on HN not long ago about banning speeches they dont like on Internet. Hopefully they finally learned something here. They opened the Pandora Box and there is nothing anyone could do until the Pendulum swing to its limit before swinging back.
pmlnr 6y ago
Update: from what I read, the reasoning can probably only effects systems where history is stored - slack, matrix, to name two. IRC most probably not, XMPP only if configured. Email: unlikely, it's a very different system.

This is insane. This jeopardizes every email, xmpp, matrix, etc; basically any 3rd party application.

by pmlnr 6y ago

This is insane. This jeopardizes every email, xmpp, matrix, etc; basically any 3rd party application.

History repeats over and over again: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3597025 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3597025 For all the chaos, the Internet continues to be surprisingly consistent with one set of rules for BigTech and friends and another set of rules for the rest.

api 6y ago
It’s largely based on who has more lawyers. Google would never suspend Twitter because they would be instantly sued... like within 24 hours... and by a top tier law firm.

kreeben 6y ago

All web browsers that are not Chrome, beware. You're next.

pmlnr 6y ago
Those might be the exceptions, at least for now. Ever since Firefox's crusade against IE the majority of people seem to still know there are different ~programs~ apps to access the internet with. As long as Chrome is not the default in the overwhelming amount of the operating systems, this might even stay like this, which is why I'm extremely unhappy that Android ships with Chrome these days and not with a thin gui on top of the system webview, like it used to. EDIT: this ties in to the conversation I had on different platform recently, that it's getting arduous to make people understand that an app is not necessarily the same as the system behind it. Choosing an email client used to be a thing (Thunderbird, The Bat!, Outlook Express, mutt, etc; to name some across contrasting needs) not even too long ago. I despise that we came to a world where even the tech moderation fails to understand an app != protocol.
- ainar-g 6y ago
  > As long as Chrome is not the default in the overwhelming amount of the operating systems, this might even stay like this, which is why I'm extremely unhappy that Android ships with Chrome these days and not with a thin gui on top of the system webview, like it used to. That is also why I was rather sad when Microsoft announced that they won't develop their own browser engines any more. I disliked IE as much as anybody else, but what I did like was the competition. With Edge switching to Blink, essentially becoming yet another partially-degooged Chrome, part of that competition is gone.
  - ttt0 6y ago
    > With Edge switching to Blink, essentially becoming yet another partially-degooged Chrome Now it sends half of your data to Google and the other half to Microsoft. That's an improvement, they decentralized spyware.
    - ptero 6y ago
      Its 75% each way. And they will for many years work to reduce spying by lowering this percentage, to 50% in the asymptotic case.
- LocalH 6y ago
  I would posit that Google has a vested interest in blurring the lines between apps and the protocols that drive them
znpy 6y ago
I wonder why this hasn't been escalated to an anti-trust case yet.
- waheoo 6y ago
  Because every time a libertarian raises the issue they get called a racist trumping alt right nazi. Y'all made your bed. True libertarians checked out a long time ago. We can either die for your sins against free speech or we can watch them come for you. I know what I chose.
  - geofft 6y ago
    Let me get this straight - you're saying "true libertarians" are people who decide to stop caring about advancing libertarian causes because someone else exercised their right of free speech, and now cheer for the loss of liberty of people they don't like?
    - waheoo 6y ago
      No, I'm saying true libertarians have been getting ostracised by polite society for years now. I'm a massively left leaning libertarian, if it weren't for its consistently proven failures in practice I would be a commy. But here I am, over the years of commenting online I've been labeled a trump supporter, a Republican, alt right, white, male privileged, white privileged, racist, pseudo intellectual, biggoted, transphobic, and a Nazi.
      - XorNot 6y ago
        Aren't libertarians all about the absolute sanctity of private property over all other concerns? How is a pro-business ideology remotely justifying government intervention in the practice and moderation decisions of a private company? Wouldn't the rectification involve the government specifically dictating their business behaviour?
        LocalH 6y ago

qwertox 6y ago

> This jeopardizes every email, xmpp, matrix, etc; basically any 3rd party application. Except of course Google's own applications. Gmail, Hangouts/Meet/whatever-it-currently-is, Chrome. Luckily it's not possible to display illegal content with Google's own apps /s I remember when my nephew got groomed on Google Plus, I was way to naive to think that this would not be occurring in Google's walled gardens. But in there, it turned out to be quasi-public.

Aerroon 6y ago
>Luckily it's not possible to display illegal content with Google's own apps /s Perhaps one day they will make this argument to justify having to spy on everything you do with their software.
arduanika 6y ago
> my nephew got groomed on Google Plus That is genuinely horrifying and I'm so sorry for him and your family.
devoutsalsa 6y ago
Don’t worry. Google will kill it’s own chat apps. Sad but true.
sneak 6y ago
The app in question wasn't suspended for illegal content, it was suspended for profanity.
- pmlnr 6y ago
  That's ridiculous on it's own. I mean... got out on the street and listen to how people talk.

veeti 6y ago

Being suspended for user generated content has been a rite of passage for third party reddit clients. It's crazy how this happens again, again and again. https://old.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/96l0at/sync_for_reddit_suspended_from_google_play_xpost/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/96l0at/sync_for_re... https://old.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/6dwv1f/boost_for_reddit_has_been_suspended_from_google/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/6dwv1f/boost_for_r... https://old.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/5fqrr8/now_for_reddit_is_suspended_from_google_play/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/5fqrr8/now_for_red...

pmlnr 6y ago
There is a significant difference there though: reddit is still a single, central entity. Matrix, XMPP, email, (and activitypub based systems, ssbc, and anything federated) could be connecting to one's own server. It could be a machine in my basement.
- Erlangen 6y ago
  I don't see the difference. "Sync for reddit" a custom client for reddit. It was suspended for "hate speech". Then why isn't the official reddit app not suspended?
  - pmlnr 6y ago
    > I don't see the difference. ? 1. I install synapse (a matrix server) on my own machine. I install Element on my own phone. I connect one to another, and via the server to other servers. 2. I install a client that connects to reddit. Same reddit as everyone else. Same reddit as the reddit website. There is a rather significant difference, isn't there? EDIT addressing the 'hate speech' part, you are correct. If one reddit client is banned, all should be banned. But that is not true for communication apps, like Element.

ksec 6y ago

I pointed this out not long ago. When will it comes to Email? How is mailing list any different? And what about Chrome or Web Browser? Or they going to have built in Filter for website? Although without the reach of Google Search Engine having a filter or not makes no difference anyway. But it is great they are doing it, the more the better. People were extremely supportive on HN not long ago about banning speeches they dont like on Internet. Hopefully they finally learned something here. They opened the Pandora Box and there is nothing anyone could do until the Pendulum swing to its limit before swinging back.

pmlnr 6y ago

Update: from what I read, the reasoning can probably only effects systems where history is stored - slack, matrix, to name two. IRC most probably not, XMPP only if configured. Email: unlikely, it's a very different system.