KickMeElmo@sopuli.xyz
on 03 Sep 04:14
nextcollapse
On the one hand I support this wholeheartedly. On the other, this may be the fuel finally needed to push a Linux phone or two more mainstream. I’m conflicted.
At this stage, it helps when more devs are motivated to switch over and build/improve stuff to cover the things they want to do with a phone. And there’s relatively many devs among those who use F-Droid.
I’m not technically affected by Google doing l this just yet, because I don’t use the Play Services, but with that move coming after they encroached on Custom ROMs twice, I can tell that I need an exit plan. And there’s nothing quite for motivation than slowly being backed into a corner.
chottomatte@lemdro.id
on 03 Sep 04:33
nextcollapse
Honestly? even if we succeed in this , Google will simply fuck things up in something else, the only real solution is that it completely looses people acceptnace , and that’s the hardest part because the majority don’t think about changing things if it’s comfortable enough
Kinda, or any action that pulls the rug enough so that Google makes concessions because it can’t use its privileges as a corporation , but it’s hard to see this happening now
mctoasterson@reddthat.com
on 03 Sep 05:09
nextcollapse
The only way to apply any pressure is to make them lose marketshare.
You’re literally going to need a large consortium of “public interest technologists” (Something like Futo plus Graphene on steroids) to get together and bankroll the manufacture of new hardware that supports something similar to the Google Titan M2, plus unlockable and relockable bootloader. As I understand that will be no small feat because of the engineering required, and because all device vendors are competing for fab and production line space with all the other established device manufacturers.
Then you need robust degoogled OS options, likely based on AOSP, that can pair with that hardware.
The number of available unlocked phones is shrinking and even the new ones are running old hardware.
I want something with a recent processor, a good camera, GPS, Tailscale, 18 hours of battery life a good enough browser to get to my bank and edit photos and a watch that gets a few days of run on a charge and i’d like to have enough admin access to code turning on and off radios and services based on location and relatively good security.
Linux is not up for this yet, postmarket is moving quickly, but it’s still way behind
Hallium+ubuntu touch is fragile if you change the image.
Graphine and Lineage have security third and a questionable future if android upstream goes to shit.
Arcane2077@sh.itjust.works
on 03 Sep 06:31
nextcollapse
The best thing would be to stop using google services but many (most?) banking apps refuse to run on phones without Google’s blessing. It’s fucked up and should be illegal
That would be the best thing, but that’s a really tall order.
The only product capable of handling what they’re doing is Apple and they’re just as locked down, if not more.
The Linux phones aren’t really there yet, and the Halium-based models are unpleasantly locked down as well.
The mobile market is really stagnant. We need some fairly recent hardware with open software on it, but even if the market was ready to buy, the software is nowhere near ready to fill the need and the hardware is becoming less available by the day.
shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip
on 03 Sep 09:54
nextcollapse
Don’t use banking apps. Use banking websites. And if your bank does not allow you to do everything on the website, change banks. I did.
I have never heard of anyone not “dealing with it”.
Most probably they are just asked to go in person to some physical office with a passport or something.
In that case, no thank you.
can’t, without 2fa from the banking app on my phone.
shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip
on 04 Sep 12:56
collapse
Do you actually have to open the banking app? Or is it one of those TOTP codes? Because if it’s a TOTP code, you can use any password manager, including keypass xc on Linux.
anarchoilluminati@hexbear.net
on 03 Sep 07:55
nextcollapse
Didn’t even hear about this. Would this impact other OS’s, like Graphene or Lineage?
shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip
on 03 Sep 09:53
collapse
As long as you don’t install Google Play services on them, no it would not.
lukecooperatus@lemmy.ml
on 03 Sep 10:59
nextcollapse
In the short term, perhaps. If someday Google decides to stop publishing open source updates to Android, though…
Eventually all the ROM teams would have to either massively ramp up their development responsibilities to cover every aspect of an aging Android codebase, or shut down as users leave because their project is dangerously outdated. Or probably both, because even if they tried to take over development, what ROM team is going to have the resources for that on a long term basis?
shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip
on 03 Sep 12:01
collapse
Something makes me think if that happens that LineageOS will become a system in its own right and the community will step up and do the work required to keep it properly up to date.
So then we will have three mobile operating systems, iOS, Android, and LineageOS. iOS will be made by Apple, Android will be made by Google, and LineageOS will be made by the open source community. Don’t get me wrong, I assume development will become slower, but I don’t think it will stop entirely.
Sir_Kevin@lemmy.dbzer0.com
on 03 Sep 15:53
nextcollapse
This would be the best outcome. I don’t even care if the OS gets “outdated”. If it’s good enough and runs F-Droid I’ve got everything I need.
That would be awesome to see. OEM bootloaders (and their fuses) and dealing with the proprietary drivers/blobs are the things that really need to be tackled with resources to be on as many devices as possible. I doubt those companies will want to play nice depending on whatever Google demands to be allowed Google Play Services. It is so hard to actually break into the OS market for mobile at all, but it is dedication that LineageOS has had that has kept it alive and updating. I hope that all the custom ROMs and the Linux Mobile OSes help each other out to the benefit of everyone on all levels of phone/tablet tiers.
magguzu@midwest.social
on 03 Sep 16:21
nextcollapse
Their next likely move will be to require all apps to pass integrity check, which means, unless developers are specifically crafting non-integ apps for f-droid, there will be less apps available for non-google play services devices.
FriendOfDeSoto@startrek.website
on 03 Sep 09:22
nextcollapse
Not defending Google but I have a but (no typo - although I’m the proud owner of a double t version as well. But I digress.)
Google is not getting rid of sideloading. They are implementing a registration process for devs and then do a check if they have the info on record before allowing an app to be installed. It is possible for you to download an APK from wantsomalware dot com and install it as long as the developer registered with Google - as all the malware dipshits will manage to do on burner accounts, which will not curb the spread of malware, which is their stated aim. Technically, your bank could distribute its app on its website as long as they registered with the Goog. But it will render abandoned projects uninstallable and that’s the rub.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t like this either. Twisting their words though isn’t helping either.
Corey Doctorow pointed out that it is mad that we call it sideloading. Installing an APK is the same, whether it’s coming from Play, F-droid, or the dark web. There should not be this distinction. Lobby your politicians on this matter. G will not GAF about this petition - it’s PR for the cause at best. Only the tag team of legislature and judiciary can set this right.
I think your definitions don’t quite match common use. When people think about sideloading, they think about installing apps from a third-party source that are not approved by the primary vendor. That’s precisely what Google is going to block.
You also mentioned that the rub would be that abandoned projects will be uninstallable. That’s true, but that’s vastly understating the problem. The real problem is not that abandoned projects will be rejected, because they would phase out due to version upgrades within a few years anyway. The real problem is that programs that would take power or money away from Google are guaranteed to be rejected or delayed for bullshit reasons. And even if they are initially accepted, Google can always pull a Darth Vader and reject them later, as soon as they feel threatened. And all of that shouldn’t be happening at all on an open source operating system on a cell phone that we purchased when we’re controlling it ourselves.
This is also an imperialistic move. What happens if someone from Iran or Palestine tries to create an account on Google’s server? Will they be blocked as a terrorist? I think maybe they will. So then the only software that’s allowed to run on Android phones is going to be software that’s approved by Google, which is subject to pressure from the United States government. But we don’t even have to go that far to find the badness. If a marginalized group has a software developer who wishes to remain anonymous that creates a perfectly good program that will help out that marginalized group, by Google’s new rules they won’t be able to distribute it.
That’s the real rub. All of that. Google’s strong desire to gain as much control over its own applications as Apple has on the iPhone. This is a massive grab for money and power, and we should never think of it as some minor thing that might mildly inconvenience abandoned projects.
FriendOfDeSoto@startrek.website
on 03 Sep 11:37
collapse
I think your definitions don’t quite match common use. When people think about sideloading, they think about installing apps from a third-party source that are not approved by the primary vendor. That’s precisely what Google is going to block.
See the end of my pervious comment. The fact that we call that “sideloading” in common parlance is a magic trick Google has already played on us and we ate it up. Resist.
The way I understand sideloading is installing an app through a way that isn’t Play. So F-droid - as one example - is sideloading because you need to go through the overly dramatic warning messages to enable the install from unknown sources. If all the devs in F-droid’s repository theoretically registered with Google, nothing will change. The only difference is that Google wants to know who made it. They make it harder and shittier and thus limit our choices, yes. But they don’t block everything outright.
The problem arises for apps, whose developer doesn’t want Google and by legal extension the American judiciary to have access to their information. That’s a privacy concern that I find very concerning too. I’m not defending Google’s choices here. I hate it. I also don’t like the inevitable hyperbole going the other way.
ZonenRanslite@feddit.org
on 03 Sep 11:17
nextcollapse
Remember after widespread public outcry, petitions, and developer pushback google still went ahead with Chrome’s Manifest v3 because it made adblockers worse? This won’t accomplish anything.
exactly. Petitioning those who have already demonstrated that they don’t care unless you have leverage is meaningless.
use leverage, in what ways you can. make a habit of it.
irelephant@lemmy.dbzer0.com
on 04 Sep 00:46
nextcollapse
Change.org is where action goes to die.
skuzz@discuss.tchncs.de
on 04 Sep 03:11
nextcollapse
Just stop paying Google money and stop using their ad revenue generating services. Google doesn’t want consumer customers anymore and want gov/mil/corp going forward, one would guess. If you have to use YouTube for some reason, adblock the hell out of it.
List of things they canceled in the last few years alone:
cancel nest cameras
cancel nest smoke alarms
cancel nest secure
make pixel android hardware inferior
make android more closed every year, removing filesystem access, deleting old apps from store, etc. etc.
Chromecast killed
google one VPN killed
google podcasts killed, and that is just a simple app that plays rss fed mp3 files hosted on third party servers!
google music killed
Most of this list is Google slowly exiting the consumer space
The petition us useless. Way too many people just don’t care or even understand what it’s really about.
To me, personally, this is the final nail in the coffin that is android. Welcome Linux phone, and if I can’t find any, fuck the phone altogether.
I don’t need another crapple.
threaded - newest
On the one hand I support this wholeheartedly. On the other, this may be the fuel finally needed to push a Linux phone or two more mainstream. I’m conflicted.
Use of non-play store apps is not mainstream enough for Linux phones to get more than a little bump from this.
At this stage, it helps when more devs are motivated to switch over and build/improve stuff to cover the things they want to do with a phone. And there’s relatively many devs among those who use F-Droid.
I’m not technically affected by Google doing l this just yet, because I don’t use the Play Services, but with that move coming after they encroached on Custom ROMs twice, I can tell that I need an exit plan. And there’s nothing quite for motivation than slowly being backed into a corner.
I hope something good comes of it.
Honestly? even if we succeed in this , Google will simply fuck things up in something else, the only real solution is that it completely looses people acceptnace , and that’s the hardest part because the majority don’t think about changing things if it’s comfortable enough
Like shelving Android completely like so many of their successful products?
Kinda, or any action that pulls the rug enough so that Google makes concessions because it can’t use its privileges as a corporation , but it’s hard to see this happening now
The only way to apply any pressure is to make them lose marketshare.
You’re literally going to need a large consortium of “public interest technologists” (Something like Futo plus Graphene on steroids) to get together and bankroll the manufacture of new hardware that supports something similar to the Google Titan M2, plus unlockable and relockable bootloader. As I understand that will be no small feat because of the engineering required, and because all device vendors are competing for fab and production line space with all the other established device manufacturers.
Then you need robust degoogled OS options, likely based on AOSP, that can pair with that hardware.
Google will not acknowledge any Petition.
The only real solution is to install an Alternate Android or Linux Phone OS
The number of available unlocked phones is shrinking and even the new ones are running old hardware.
I want something with a recent processor, a good camera, GPS, Tailscale, 18 hours of battery life a good enough browser to get to my bank and edit photos and a watch that gets a few days of run on a charge and i’d like to have enough admin access to code turning on and off radios and services based on location and relatively good security.
Linux is not up for this yet, postmarket is moving quickly, but it’s still way behind
Hallium+ubuntu touch is fragile if you change the image.
Graphine and Lineage have security third and a questionable future if android upstream goes to shit.
The best thing would be to stop using google services but many (most?) banking apps refuse to run on phones without Google’s blessing. It’s fucked up and should be illegal
That would be the best thing, but that’s a really tall order.
The only product capable of handling what they’re doing is Apple and they’re just as locked down, if not more.
The Linux phones aren’t really there yet, and the Halium-based models are unpleasantly locked down as well.
The mobile market is really stagnant. We need some fairly recent hardware with open software on it, but even if the market was ready to buy, the software is nowhere near ready to fill the need and the hardware is becoming less available by the day.
Don’t use banking apps. Use banking websites. And if your bank does not allow you to do everything on the website, change banks. I did.
I am about to check/do this. Problem is the national ID system, based on apps that work the same way.
How do elderly people deal with it because they are less likely to have smart devices or less likely to understand how to use them properly?
Whatever way they deal with it, you can use as well.
I have never heard of anyone not “dealing with it”. Most probably they are just asked to go in person to some physical office with a passport or something. In that case, no thank you.
can’t, without 2fa from the banking app on my phone.
Do you actually have to open the banking app? Or is it one of those TOTP codes? Because if it’s a TOTP code, you can use any password manager, including keypass xc on Linux.
If they force you to use the app, switch banks.
My banking app works without google :)
Which ones ?
Didn’t even hear about this. Would this impact other OS’s, like Graphene or Lineage?
As long as you don’t install Google Play services on them, no it would not.
In the short term, perhaps. If someday Google decides to stop publishing open source updates to Android, though…
Eventually all the ROM teams would have to either massively ramp up their development responsibilities to cover every aspect of an aging Android codebase, or shut down as users leave because their project is dangerously outdated. Or probably both, because even if they tried to take over development, what ROM team is going to have the resources for that on a long term basis?
Something makes me think if that happens that LineageOS will become a system in its own right and the community will step up and do the work required to keep it properly up to date.
So then we will have three mobile operating systems, iOS, Android, and LineageOS. iOS will be made by Apple, Android will be made by Google, and LineageOS will be made by the open source community. Don’t get me wrong, I assume development will become slower, but I don’t think it will stop entirely.
This would be the best outcome. I don’t even care if the OS gets “outdated”. If it’s good enough and runs F-Droid I’ve got everything I need.
That would be awesome to see. OEM bootloaders (and their fuses) and dealing with the proprietary drivers/blobs are the things that really need to be tackled with resources to be on as many devices as possible. I doubt those companies will want to play nice depending on whatever Google demands to be allowed Google Play Services. It is so hard to actually break into the OS market for mobile at all, but it is dedication that LineageOS has had that has kept it alive and updating. I hope that all the custom ROMs and the Linux Mobile OSes help each other out to the benefit of everyone on all levels of phone/tablet tiers.
Fine, at least for now:
mastodon.social/…/115135404985369728
Their next likely move will be to require all apps to pass integrity check, which means, unless developers are specifically crafting non-integ apps for f-droid, there will be less apps available for non-google play services devices.
Not defending Google but I have a but (no typo - although I’m the proud owner of a double t version as well. But I digress.)
Google is not getting rid of sideloading. They are implementing a registration process for devs and then do a check if they have the info on record before allowing an app to be installed. It is possible for you to download an APK from wantsomalware dot com and install it as long as the developer registered with Google - as all the malware dipshits will manage to do on burner accounts, which will not curb the spread of malware, which is their stated aim. Technically, your bank could distribute its app on its website as long as they registered with the Goog. But it will render abandoned projects uninstallable and that’s the rub.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t like this either. Twisting their words though isn’t helping either.
Corey Doctorow pointed out that it is mad that we call it sideloading. Installing an APK is the same, whether it’s coming from Play, F-droid, or the dark web. There should not be this distinction. Lobby your politicians on this matter. G will not GAF about this petition - it’s PR for the cause at best. Only the tag team of legislature and judiciary can set this right.
I think your definitions don’t quite match common use. When people think about sideloading, they think about installing apps from a third-party source that are not approved by the primary vendor. That’s precisely what Google is going to block.
You also mentioned that the rub would be that abandoned projects will be uninstallable. That’s true, but that’s vastly understating the problem. The real problem is not that abandoned projects will be rejected, because they would phase out due to version upgrades within a few years anyway. The real problem is that programs that would take power or money away from Google are guaranteed to be rejected or delayed for bullshit reasons. And even if they are initially accepted, Google can always pull a Darth Vader and reject them later, as soon as they feel threatened. And all of that shouldn’t be happening at all on an open source operating system on a cell phone that we purchased when we’re controlling it ourselves.
This is also an imperialistic move. What happens if someone from Iran or Palestine tries to create an account on Google’s server? Will they be blocked as a terrorist? I think maybe they will. So then the only software that’s allowed to run on Android phones is going to be software that’s approved by Google, which is subject to pressure from the United States government. But we don’t even have to go that far to find the badness. If a marginalized group has a software developer who wishes to remain anonymous that creates a perfectly good program that will help out that marginalized group, by Google’s new rules they won’t be able to distribute it.
That’s the real rub. All of that. Google’s strong desire to gain as much control over its own applications as Apple has on the iPhone. This is a massive grab for money and power, and we should never think of it as some minor thing that might mildly inconvenience abandoned projects.
See the end of my pervious comment. The fact that we call that “sideloading” in common parlance is a magic trick Google has already played on us and we ate it up. Resist.
The way I understand sideloading is installing an app through a way that isn’t Play. So F-droid - as one example - is sideloading because you need to go through the overly dramatic warning messages to enable the install from unknown sources. If all the devs in F-droid’s repository theoretically registered with Google, nothing will change. The only difference is that Google wants to know who made it. They make it harder and shittier and thus limit our choices, yes. But they don’t block everything outright.
The problem arises for apps, whose developer doesn’t want Google and by legal extension the American judiciary to have access to their information. That’s a privacy concern that I find very concerning too. I’m not defending Google’s choices here. I hate it. I also don’t like the inevitable hyperbole going the other way.
<img alt="" src="https://feddit.org/pictrs/image/7725579f-24ce-4059-95f0-6dcbe2c87fa6.jpeg">
Remember after widespread public outcry, petitions, and developer pushback google still went ahead with Chrome’s Manifest v3 because it made adblockers worse? This won’t accomplish anything.
Wouldn’t it be better to petition a political power… Such as the EU or the UK parliament?
This is already sorted out by law in the EU. Now they just have to wait for Google to follow up on their intent.
why are you upvoting this inane, useless, poser, impotent bullshit? we is petitioning evil corp to be a smidge less evil what the fuck?
exactly. Petitioning those who have already demonstrated that they don’t care unless you have leverage is meaningless.
use leverage, in what ways you can. make a habit of it.
Change.org is where action goes to die.
Just stop paying Google money and stop using their ad revenue generating services. Google doesn’t want consumer customers anymore and want gov/mil/corp going forward, one would guess. If you have to use YouTube for some reason, adblock the hell out of it.
List of things they canceled in the last few years alone:
Most of this list is Google slowly exiting the consumer space
killedbygoogle.com
The petition us useless. Way too many people just don’t care or even understand what it’s really about. To me, personally, this is the final nail in the coffin that is android. Welcome Linux phone, and if I can’t find any, fuck the phone altogether. I don’t need another crapple.
Do it anyways