5 ms·

It can and will most probably turn to indefinite time depending on the answer to the question "will we have a viable alternative to jump ship before that happen

by devsda 2mo ago

It can and will most probably turn to indefinite time depending on the answer to the question "will we have a viable alternative to jump ship before that happens ?". We don't need anything to completely capture the market, it has to be just enough to make Google hesitate or make it hard for Google to do it for legal reasons. Like how Firefox is ideally supposed to be for Chrome.

microtonal 2mo ago
Many alternative AOSP-based systems work fine today and do not have the new Android Developer Verifier (wow, already rolled out to 500M+ devices [1], though still dormant). To be honest, it is quite scary that Google is able to remotely roll out an app like that to all GMS Android phones. Of course, we all knew that, but it highlights again that Google can remotely take away functionality that you had before, brick your phone, etc. [1] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.android.verifier https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.and...
- izacus 2mo ago
  Wait till you hear that your OEM can remotely rollout full OS updates with full access to all your data and drivers... carrying Google software and most of it Google code.
  - microtonal 2mo ago
    Snarks do not lead to productive discussions. You also know that there is has always been an implicit social contract between users and vendors. The vendor rolls out updates as part of the service attached to the device (typically included in the purchase price) and that the vendor does not abuse the update mechanism to make things worse for the user. If vendors use updates to restrict functionality that the user had before, puts existing features behind paywalls, etc. people are rightfully outraged, because it breaks the social contract. It's just that the repeated offenses have made us insensitive. Imagine Debian rolling out some mechanism that only allows you to install software outside their repos with a 24 hour delay. It would destroy Debian.
    - 59percentmore 2mo ago
      >implicit social contract Sounds worthless (in court).
      - sunaookami 2mo ago
        And that's how you get a low-trust society.
        59percentmore 2mo ago
        Well, no. The low-trust society comes (partly) from corporations betraying the trust of consumers, not consumers recognizing that the corporations saying, "Trust us," are probably bullshitting them. The initial assertion that there has "always" been a social contract is inaccurate.
- RobotToaster 2mo ago
  We used to call programs like this, that allow someone to remotely break your system, a Trojan horse...
  - bpavuk 2mo ago
    and now people install Remote Access Trojans just to let GPT and Claude think and work for them, granting them shell and a11y access. really? after seeing that, nothing surprises me
    - TeMPOraL 2mo ago
      Yes, really. The obvious answer that security maximallists deny even exists is, who is doing it and why. In LLM case, users are doing it themselves to allow a way of computing they want and find useful, in spite of platform locks designed to deny users just that.
      - bpavuk 2mo ago
        I mean, go tell Anthropic to prompt Claude to make it adopt Landlock in Claude Code instead of regex-based filtering. actually adopt it, not how Codex did, but with controls on the level of some third-party harnesses and Pi plugins.
- classified 2mo ago
  > brick your phone, etc. Apple can do the same for iPhones. In terms of dark shit they can do there's no difference anymore.
- ajross 2mo ago
  > To be honest, it is quite scary that Google is able to remotely roll out an app like that to all GMS Android phones. Are any commercial mobile phone vendors not able to do such a thing? Do remember that this giant kerfuffle is all over the seeming preparation for the apparent removal of a developer feature that iPhones have never had at all.
atif089 2mo ago
Google is working on a new recaptcha strategy to counter that. Essentially any non Google flavor of Android OS will fail recaptcha validation
stein1946 2mo ago
> will we have a viable alternative to jump ship before that happens ? Here is a better question: "Is the EU going to stop this?"
- sunaookami 2mo ago
  No because the EUDI Wallet needs Google Play Services. People need to come to the realization that the EU has no interest in regulating the freedom of devices because the EU itself is benefitting from the closed-down ecosystem.
- ChocolateGod 2mo ago
  Why would the EU stop it?
birdsongs 2mo ago
I get the analogy but it's a false one. Google covers about 90% of Mozilla's funding. Firefox only survives because of Google, and that's so they don't hit antitrust problems. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Foundation#Financing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Foundation#Financing
- devsda 2mo ago
  > Firefox only survives because of Google, and that's so they don't hit antitrust problems. Yes, that is what I meant. They should be hesitant to lockdown completely and (grudgingly even) allow alternative options and/or workarounds due to legal concerns like anti-trust. Firefox was existing before Chrome, but in this case we either need a different OS or need an android based option like Graphene/3rd party stores gain enough marketshare to trigger anti-competitive laws.
fsflover 2mo ago
> "will we have a viable alternative to jump ship before that happens ?" GNU/Linux phones already exist. Sent from my Librem 5.

by devsda 2mo ago

microtonal 2mo ago

Many alternative AOSP-based systems work fine today and do not have the new Android Developer Verifier (wow, already rolled out to 500M+ devices [1], though still dormant). To be honest, it is quite scary that Google is able to remotely roll out an app like that to all GMS Android phones. Of course, we all knew that, but it highlights again that Google can remotely take away functionality that you had before, brick your phone, etc. [1] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.android.verifier https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.and...

izacus 2mo ago
Wait till you hear that your OEM can remotely rollout full OS updates with full access to all your data and drivers... carrying Google software and most of it Google code.
- microtonal 2mo ago
  Snarks do not lead to productive discussions. You also know that there is has always been an implicit social contract between users and vendors. The vendor rolls out updates as part of the service attached to the device (typically included in the purchase price) and that the vendor does not abuse the update mechanism to make things worse for the user. If vendors use updates to restrict functionality that the user had before, puts existing features behind paywalls, etc. people are rightfully outraged, because it breaks the social contract. It's just that the repeated offenses have made us insensitive. Imagine Debian rolling out some mechanism that only allows you to install software outside their repos with a 24 hour delay. It would destroy Debian.
  - 59percentmore 2mo ago
    >implicit social contract Sounds worthless (in court).
    - sunaookami 2mo ago
      And that's how you get a low-trust society.
      - 59percentmore 2mo ago
        Well, no. The low-trust society comes (partly) from corporations betraying the trust of consumers, not consumers recognizing that the corporations saying, "Trust us," are probably bullshitting them. The initial assertion that there has "always" been a social contract is inaccurate.
RobotToaster 2mo ago
We used to call programs like this, that allow someone to remotely break your system, a Trojan horse...
- bpavuk 2mo ago
  and now people install Remote Access Trojans just to let GPT and Claude think and work for them, granting them shell and a11y access. really? after seeing that, nothing surprises me
  - TeMPOraL 2mo ago
    Yes, really. The obvious answer that security maximallists deny even exists is, who is doing it and why. In LLM case, users are doing it themselves to allow a way of computing they want and find useful, in spite of platform locks designed to deny users just that.
    - bpavuk 2mo ago
      I mean, go tell Anthropic to prompt Claude to make it adopt Landlock in Claude Code instead of regex-based filtering. actually adopt it, not how Codex did, but with controls on the level of some third-party harnesses and Pi plugins.
classified 2mo ago
> brick your phone, etc. Apple can do the same for iPhones. In terms of dark shit they can do there's no difference anymore.
ajross 2mo ago
> To be honest, it is quite scary that Google is able to remotely roll out an app like that to all GMS Android phones. Are any commercial mobile phone vendors not able to do such a thing? Do remember that this giant kerfuffle is all over the seeming preparation for the apparent removal of a developer feature that iPhones have never had at all.

atif089 2mo ago

Google is working on a new recaptcha strategy to counter that. Essentially any non Google flavor of Android OS will fail recaptcha validation

stein1946 2mo ago

> will we have a viable alternative to jump ship before that happens ? Here is a better question: "Is the EU going to stop this?"

sunaookami 2mo ago
No because the EUDI Wallet needs Google Play Services. People need to come to the realization that the EU has no interest in regulating the freedom of devices because the EU itself is benefitting from the closed-down ecosystem.
ChocolateGod 2mo ago
Why would the EU stop it?

birdsongs 2mo ago

I get the analogy but it's a false one. Google covers about 90% of Mozilla's funding. Firefox only survives because of Google, and that's so they don't hit antitrust problems. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Foundation#Financing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Foundation#Financing

devsda 2mo ago
> Firefox only survives because of Google, and that's so they don't hit antitrust problems. Yes, that is what I meant. They should be hesitant to lockdown completely and (grudgingly even) allow alternative options and/or workarounds due to legal concerns like anti-trust. Firefox was existing before Chrome, but in this case we either need a different OS or need an android based option like Graphene/3rd party stores gain enough marketshare to trigger anti-competitive laws.

fsflover 2mo ago

> "will we have a viable alternative to jump ship before that happens ?" GNU/Linux phones already exist. Sent from my Librem 5.