8 ms·

I tried to search for Friendster in the App Store and didn’t see it among the first few results. Instead, App Store was returning a sponsored ad followed by nor

I tried to search for Friendster in the App Store and didn’t see it among the first few results. Instead, App Store was returning a sponsored ad followed by normal results for all other kinds of similar annd less similar apps. Instagram, Snapchat, Yubo (never heard of), Monopoly Go (mobile game related to the board game Monopoly), BeFriend (never heard of), Tinder, Friendly Social Browser (never heard of), Facebook, and at that point I stopped scrolling the results. For a moment I thought maybe the app was US exclusive or something and not available in my region. But following the link from the post worked fine and I could install it. I literally searched Friendster and the app is named Friendster but App Store gave me all kinds of other crap in the search result instead. Weird. Anyway, installed the app finally thanks to the link. https://apps.apple.com/us/app/friendster/id6760240416 https://apps.apple.com/us/app/friendster/id6760240416

mikestew 6mo ago
Odd, Friendster was the first non-sponsored result for me in the U.S. store.
aprilnya 6mo ago
When a new app is released, it takes a few days for it to get into search, for some reason. Pretty much every single time a new app releases I see a comment like this. Nothing malicious you just have to wait a bit.
- paulddraper 6mo ago
  Agreed. You can search apps by their exact name, identifier, anything, and App Store will not find them for day+.
  - tantalor 6mo ago
    Bookmarking this for the next time somebody claims Apple makes great software.
    - hnav 6mo ago
      nobody has ever claimed that apple makes great cloud software, but all of their walled garden gate-keeping aside, they’re still the last bastion of mainstream local-first computing
      - TheDong 6mo ago
        Yeah, sure. How do I sync my iCloud photos to my local NAS on linux? A: use a third-party app, they don't build their own. How do I build an app for my iPhone locally and run it without ever connecting to their servers? I can do that for my phone running linux or for my phone running android, but on iOS I have to get signed by their servers to run code I wrote. Linux respects my freedom to have my data exist locally, to build and run open source apps, and to modify the code on the devices I run. Apple does not. They don't let me use their ecosystem from Linux, they do not let me patch the iOS kernel and run a modified version on the devices I run, I can't even access the source code for the macOS kernel. Apple's filesystem abstraction and lack of something like android "intents" also makes it wildly difficult to do "local-first" computing where files are shared between apps cleanly.
        pintxo 6mo ago
        You missed the "mainstream" qualifier from the parent. I am afraid nothing you described here could be considered mainstream, although I'd like to see these things becoming mainstream.
        zakki 6mo ago
        I can see there are a lot of T&C for their claim on "Apple makes great software."
        paulddraper 6mo ago
        Is the claim in the thread with us?
    - 6mo ago
- TheDong 6mo ago
  > Nothing malicious The first result is a sponsored result, and even after Friendster is indexed, if they don't pay apple's extortion-rate, the first result will still be for some other social media app. Ads in the app store are malicious. There are people who have searched "Ledger bitcoin wallet", clicked the first link (a malicious app who paid apple enough money to be 'sponsored' for that search), and had all their money stolen.
  - hiccuphippo 6mo ago
    Well they are domain squatters so they known how this extortion business works.
- mapt 6mo ago
  I think it's a warranted attitude to take a failure to implement plaintext search as part of your text search algorithm as enemy action. Yesterday I ended up at Bing for some reason and typed in the unique name of the site I was looking for and it didn't even come up in the first page; All their competitors did, as well as a couple random SEO farms. This is enshittification to the point of unusability, for an application space that we solved in the mid 90's. My workplace does this to our customers too, where you get worse-than-plaintext-search effectiveness, and I guess it must be profitable enough conning the customer to waste our time as well, as we use the same interface for a lot of customer questions.
  - mghackerlady 6mo ago
    We need a FOSS nonprofit search engine that works like 2000s google
    - mapt 6mo ago
      Arguably we need half a dozen operating on adjacent principles, to fight against engine-specific SEO exploits. "SEO is a $100 billion industry" = your opponents have a 12 figure war budget.
      - awesome_dude 6mo ago
        This is what killed search more than anything else - people actively working to get their results higher than they would have been under "normal" conditions.
mschuster91 6mo ago
> I literally searched Friendster and the app is named Friendster but App Store gave me all kinds of other crap in the search result instead. Weird. App Store search is fucked. Hilariously, Apple is at least non-discriminatory - try searching for any Apple app, and they will also be (at best) in the second slot after "sponsored" crap.
- chneu 6mo ago
  The android app store is no better. Anytime one searches, 3/4 of the results are sponsored apps/ads. It's so annoying.
Rekindle8090 6mo ago
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mikestew 6mo ago

Odd, Friendster was the first non-sponsored result for me in the U.S. store.

aprilnya 6mo ago

When a new app is released, it takes a few days for it to get into search, for some reason. Pretty much every single time a new app releases I see a comment like this. Nothing malicious you just have to wait a bit.

paulddraper 6mo ago
Agreed. You can search apps by their exact name, identifier, anything, and App Store will not find them for day+.
- tantalor 6mo ago
  Bookmarking this for the next time somebody claims Apple makes great software.
  - hnav 6mo ago
    nobody has ever claimed that apple makes great cloud software, but all of their walled garden gate-keeping aside, they’re still the last bastion of mainstream local-first computing
    - TheDong 6mo ago
      Yeah, sure. How do I sync my iCloud photos to my local NAS on linux? A: use a third-party app, they don't build their own. How do I build an app for my iPhone locally and run it without ever connecting to their servers? I can do that for my phone running linux or for my phone running android, but on iOS I have to get signed by their servers to run code I wrote. Linux respects my freedom to have my data exist locally, to build and run open source apps, and to modify the code on the devices I run. Apple does not. They don't let me use their ecosystem from Linux, they do not let me patch the iOS kernel and run a modified version on the devices I run, I can't even access the source code for the macOS kernel. Apple's filesystem abstraction and lack of something like android "intents" also makes it wildly difficult to do "local-first" computing where files are shared between apps cleanly.
      - pintxo 6mo ago
        You missed the "mainstream" qualifier from the parent. I am afraid nothing you described here could be considered mainstream, although I'd like to see these things becoming mainstream.
        zakki 6mo ago
        I can see there are a lot of T&C for their claim on "Apple makes great software."
        paulddraper 6mo ago
        Is the claim in the thread with us?
  - 6mo ago
TheDong 6mo ago
> Nothing malicious The first result is a sponsored result, and even after Friendster is indexed, if they don't pay apple's extortion-rate, the first result will still be for some other social media app. Ads in the app store are malicious. There are people who have searched "Ledger bitcoin wallet", clicked the first link (a malicious app who paid apple enough money to be 'sponsored' for that search), and had all their money stolen.
- hiccuphippo 6mo ago
  Well they are domain squatters so they known how this extortion business works.
mapt 6mo ago
I think it's a warranted attitude to take a failure to implement plaintext search as part of your text search algorithm as enemy action. Yesterday I ended up at Bing for some reason and typed in the unique name of the site I was looking for and it didn't even come up in the first page; All their competitors did, as well as a couple random SEO farms. This is enshittification to the point of unusability, for an application space that we solved in the mid 90's. My workplace does this to our customers too, where you get worse-than-plaintext-search effectiveness, and I guess it must be profitable enough conning the customer to waste our time as well, as we use the same interface for a lot of customer questions.
- mghackerlady 6mo ago
  We need a FOSS nonprofit search engine that works like 2000s google
  - mapt 6mo ago
    Arguably we need half a dozen operating on adjacent principles, to fight against engine-specific SEO exploits. "SEO is a $100 billion industry" = your opponents have a 12 figure war budget.
    - awesome_dude 6mo ago
      This is what killed search more than anything else - people actively working to get their results higher than they would have been under "normal" conditions.

mschuster91 6mo ago

> I literally searched Friendster and the app is named Friendster but App Store gave me all kinds of other crap in the search result instead. Weird. App Store search is fucked. Hilariously, Apple is at least non-discriminatory - try searching for any Apple app, and they will also be (at best) in the second slot after "sponsored" crap.

chneu 6mo ago
The android app store is no better. Anytime one searches, 3/4 of the results are sponsored apps/ads. It's so annoying.

Rekindle8090 6mo ago

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