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That passage doesn't make sense. Android already allows other app stores, just not entirely without friction. It's iOS which doesn't allow them.
by cubefox 2y ago
That passage doesn't make sense. Android already allows other app stores, just not entirely without friction. It's iOS which doesn't allow them.
- ocdtrekkie 2y agoSort of but not in any practical reality. Besides the scare screens to make any alternatives look like malware, Google has actively paid developers to not compete with the Play Store and launched secret codenamed projects to undermine individual third party stores. Google has even tasked security teams with finding exploits in competing solutions to try to destroy the reputation of anyone who could launch an effective competing store.
- talldayo 2y agoThat doesn't seem like abuse of monopoly positioning, though. It's dirty, but bug-hunting for your adversaries and responding to the proliferation of competitors is entirely normal and accessible. Google's biggest "scare screen" is the developer menu which rightfully warns you of the danger associated with third-party packaging. The only other mandatory menu is the one that asks for user consent to install a package, which is not scary so much as mandatory to prevent obvious exploit chains. Google's approach to sideloading is borderline inscrutable, and I say that as someone that will gladly sell them out for their abuse of the advertising market. This lawsuit exists to grant faux parity for the Apple lobbyists due in their government mandated reaming. As long as the AOSP exists, it is literally impossible for Google to abuse Android as an anticompetitive environment for other companies. OEMs control Android as much as Google does. The same cannot be said for Microsoft or Apple.
- BadHumans 2y agoGoogle's sin was paying other people off which Apple doesn't do because the option to create a competing store doesn't exist.