Recently Google decided that in the future for an app to be installable on an Android device, the developer of this app needs to be ID’d and registered at Google. They claim this is in order to “to better protect users”. However, I think, this is a move to get more control over the Android ecosystem, and the data they can collect with it. If anyone who wants to develop an app for Android devices has to be registered with Google, this puts all the power of who to allow distributing an app to Google.
Furthermore F-Droid shows, that safe app stores can exist without registration, neither of users nor of developers. There is zero malware or spyware on the F-Droid store. What there is on F-Droid is thousands of beautiful, useful and, most importantly, safe apps. And this entire ecosystem is at risk, because Google wants to gain more control over its users and over the Android operating system.
Jesus that post is bleak. It’s basically “Please write your political representative to do something or we’re forced to close up shop”. Since all our political representatives are walking around with massive hard-ons at the idea of surveilling us, it’s basically a poorly veiled good bye note.
Honest question: what else can they do anyway? They cannot fight this war alone.
They really can’t, I’m not blaming them. Maybe they could pivot ressources to contribute to sailfish or postmarket in some form. Android is pretty much dead for people who want to own their devices at this point.