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> Apple wouldn't allow it on App Store. Do you have a source for this? Offhand, I can't find any source -- not "reputable" source, but any source, period -- th

> Apple wouldn't allow it on App Store. Do you have a source for this? Offhand, I can't find any source -- not "reputable" source, but any source, period -- that confirms there was ever a "Switch to Android" app that Apple blocked from the App Store. The Register's story on "Switch to Android" from April of this year says, "Google, which supports sideloaded apps on Android devices, also wants people to buy an Android phone and, after a year or so of planning, has finally deployed its own iOS app to help that happen." The Register is hardly the kind of publication to softpedal stories to keep Apple (or anyone else) happy, so if this "year or so of planning" was 2015 and they didn't get to actually put it in the store until 2022, it's real hard to believe that wouldn't have been mentioned.

nevir 4y ago
Wouldn't be surprised that the conversation is happening behind the scenes, and Google doesn't want to make a public fuss about it. Happened before with Kindle, for example (that originally had a store built in …which Apple blocked so that they could release in-app purchasing a few months later)
- chipotle_coyote 4y ago
  The Kindle change wasn't behind-the-scenes, though. Apple made a change to their publicly-documented App Store policies that made the Kindle Store against their new rules and the subsequent back and forth between Amazon and Apple was widely reported on. And that's kind of what I'm getting at. It's not that Apple doesn't do petty, vindictive, and greedy things. It's that if Apple had been blocking Google from submitting an app for five years, it's very hard to believe there wouldn't have been an "anonymous leak" from someone on Google's side over it -- this is the sort of story that tech reporters would eat up, and Google would have good reason to want it out there.
nneonneo 4y ago
I wouldn’t be surprised if Google has channel for “pre-reviews” - some mechanism by which they would run proposed apps by Apple so they could avoid wasting developer time on apps that have no chance of being approved.

nevir 4y ago

Wouldn't be surprised that the conversation is happening behind the scenes, and Google doesn't want to make a public fuss about it. Happened before with Kindle, for example (that originally had a store built in …which Apple blocked so that they could release in-app purchasing a few months later)

chipotle_coyote 4y ago
The Kindle change wasn't behind-the-scenes, though. Apple made a change to their publicly-documented App Store policies that made the Kindle Store against their new rules and the subsequent back and forth between Amazon and Apple was widely reported on. And that's kind of what I'm getting at. It's not that Apple doesn't do petty, vindictive, and greedy things. It's that if Apple had been blocking Google from submitting an app for five years, it's very hard to believe there wouldn't have been an "anonymous leak" from someone on Google's side over it -- this is the sort of story that tech reporters would eat up, and Google would have good reason to want it out there.

nneonneo 4y ago

I wouldn’t be surprised if Google has channel for “pre-reviews” - some mechanism by which they would run proposed apps by Apple so they could avoid wasting developer time on apps that have no chance of being approved.