[guru4consulting]

I consider HN users to be smarter and rational than average internet crowd. Surprised to see folks here comparing the Google Apple store to other business models like Starbucks, Donut shops, Restaurants? does not make sense to me. Consumers have a choice to switch all other businesses but not the mobile app stores. I can live without Starbucks or Netflix if I want to, or switch to different providers if needed. But there's no such an option in mobile app store world. My banks, wearable devices, even many government services provide their apps via Apple/Android app stores and I'm forced to use only these app stores.. ignoring mobile and just using browsers is not practical. At this point, the app stores are monopolies and consumers are the ones who are impacted. Let Apple/Google give a top notch app store and claim it to be more secure, reliable, trust worthy (they are not today).. but let them also give other options to consumers if they want to take the risk and download apps from another app store if they want to.

And these are already trillion dollar companies. Why do some people support them to grow even more bigger and more powerful? It's a nightmare to see power getting accumulated into few hands. It's high time they are regulated. Don't treat them with kid gloves. They are not your typical mom & pop stores.

[ryao]

The average person needs safeguards to prevent them from being tricked into installing malware by seemingly trustworthy black hats. They should not be given devices that lack safeguards. That means having a gatekeeper that curates things. Be it Apple or Google, a gate keeper is a necessity for security.

Even for non-average people, gatekeepers like Gentoo's or Debian's package maintainer(s) do a great deal of good.

[scrozart]

The idea that only these 2 companies can provide a platform for secure apps is patently absurd. What's stopping another company other than these companies' stranglehold? If you want to say resources, I guarantee I'm not alone in a desire to use smaller vendors if they had a good track record of hosting secure apps.

I lean WAY left and still agree the free market would have solved this ages ago.

[kdfjgbdfkjgb]

These 2 companies having a stranglehold is the free market. Antitrust legislation is what would allow other companies to compete with these 2, and antitrust legislation doesn't exist in a free market.

[Kinrany]

Free markets only ever exist because of regulation.

[andrei_says_]

My friend’s 11 year old plays games on his iPhone, downloaded from the Apple App Store.

I spent a few minutes looking over his shoulder.

A bit of gameplay followed by increasing amounts of gambling for power ups and constant reminders to buy power ups. This should be absolutely illegal.

Dark patterns upon dark patterns manipulating the kid to squeeze his parents for real money, by habituating gambling habits and normalizing a horrible experience.

Apple will never address these issues because these games make them truckloads of money.

[Gorbzel]

Shouldn’t your friend be monitoring his kid’s usage? Why is everything always some government/capitalist entity’s responsibility?

[andrei_says_]

Gambling is closer to smoking than regular gaming.

All the boy’s friends play the game and similar games. It’s an uphill battle and an extraordinary pressure on the parents to control each game that gets played and micromanage to that extend - to the detriment of their relationship with the child, because fighting these intentionally instilled addictive patterns will create upset in the child and tension in the relationship. The game devs pay psychologists to create the addiction at scale which the parents just cannot compete with.

In reality parents have finite amounts of energy and a finite numbers of battles to fight. Eat your food, go to school, do your homework, keep your phone charged and call me when you need me to pick you up. That kind of thing.

Having week longs drama forbidding a game that everyone else plays is just not on the map.

[johnnyanmac]

I agree with you in spirit, but I also can't help but think that most other internet denizens won't be satisfied with just banning the loobox aspects. most of the AAA games industry already moved past that and into battlepasses or flooding a store with direct purchase cosmetics.

It's more the nickle and diming people hate, not the actual gambling. And I don't know if we can or should regulate that.

[andrei_says_]

The gambling patterns are related to taking additional action to getting the rewards - like spinning a wheel, choosing to take an additional step risking the current reward for the chance to win another one. That’s gambling, intentionally constructed to be addictive. It changes habits, normalizes addiction and is harmful.

[Guvante]

You could say the same about the post above it.

Why is it different?

Having safer defaults is fine, but why is there no way for alternatives to exist? (30% of all revenue is why BTW)

[nitwit005]

The monopoly isn't necessary for that though. It can just present you with choices of app store during phone setup. It's not like some Amazon app store is going to be automatically less secure.

[Nathanba]

Those safeguards should be on a technical level and with the human gatekeepers being swappable for whoever you trust most. Which is what different app stores effectively do: different human rating, moderation and trust descriptions.

[gitaarik]

Yes, that is why the government needs to make better regulations so people are safeguarded against Google / Apple malware.

[guru4consulting]

yeah, agree that gatekeepers are needed. But why only Apple and Google should be the gatekeepers? why not others? why not crowd curated, open sourced gatekeeping for at least the nerdy folks? And we all know that the current gatekeeping is subpar quality.

[martin82]

The free market would have created many trustworthy gatekeepers itself.

And given how much scammy shit there is on the two major AppStores, I would say that it is clear as day and night that Apple and Google utterly suck as "gatekeepers".

[beenBoutIT]

Exactly - the fundamental problem is that it takes an above average person to understand this. Tech is something that most lawmakers, judges, attorneys and jurors don't get and asking them to regulate it is a mistake.

They'll open up the floodgates and average people will end up dealing with fake Epic apps. A decade from now maybe that same courtroom would better appreciate the value of a trusted gatekeeper.

[InsomniacL]

Apple/Google can be the GateKeepers of App Stores.

Look at the PKI industry, they have a greater need for integrity but there's still a healthy market of certificate suppliers.

[johnnyanmac]

TBF Google does have alternative app stores. That's why people who didn't read the article or lawsuit are confused that this lawsuit succeeded but Apple failed. Of course all this fails to take into account why Google actually loss. it was using that monopolistic pressure to push away OEM deals. That's defintiely where the monopoly was being used anti-competitively.

But yea, really would like both mobile OS's to open up more. Apple is especially bad because they can effectively ban stuff of an entire OS if it doesn't follow store policies. no 18+ apps, no emulators, no file explorers (tho these two were loosened overtime), no alternate browsers unless it's a safari skin. Can't imagine Microsoft getting away with this on Windows at any time.

[turtlebits]

Customers don't necessarily want a choice.

Sometimes choice equates to complexity, if it doesn't work for you, don't use the product. Apple is very well known (and probably very successful) for limiting choice, in product lines and features.

IMO Android devices are already open enough - there are alternative app stores and you can sideload apps. Banks not distributing on these channels is not Google's responsibility.

[crowcroft]

Take it a step further – the power grid. I don't want to have to choose which power grid to use, and we shouldn't bother making duplicate power grids. It makes sense they operate as a monopoly. Those companies are heavily regulated though.

[Guvante]

> Those companies are heavily regulated though

Without that regulation it is a very different beast.

Having the government decide the platform cut would very much change the conversation.

[felipelemos]

> Customers don't necessarily want a choice.

I was going to say that it's something for them to decide, but then the conversation was going to be circular.

Nobody should have the right to not have a right.

[berkes]

> Customers don't necessarily want a choice.

But that's not a requirement for something to be a monopoly.

[int_19h]

Customers don't want a choice right up until the moment they need to do something but can't (e.g. install Fortnite).

[theoldgit]

Capitalism without competition isn't capitalism; it's exploitation without competition, innovation is slowly strangled if there is no free market, the wealth in the market accretes upwards to those who control the market; i.e. those businesses which do not have competition

[secf4ult]

It's right and wrong at the same time, you can only say "most of the customers don't want a choice", so we just gonna ignore the minority and let big companies take all the cake?

[guru4consulting]

Let the customers have the choice to decide whether they want choice or not. Historically, more choices have always benefitted the common folks in the end.

[jojobas]

FWIW you don't really need an app store, you could download APKs off vendors/publishers, verify signatures and mind updates (except Apple won't let you, but that's a different story).

You want to use an app store, fine, use an app store and pay some commission on what you buy there, it's not a problem, reaching into any purchase done after the initial download is.

[iforgotpassword]

Where exactly can I download my bank's app as an APK? Except random shady websites...

[turtlebits]

How is this a Google problem? Ask your bank.

[iforgotpassword]

They say I should use the app store.

[ffgjgf1]

So? Google isn’t forcing them to only publish on the Play Store.

[iforgotpassword]

Your point being? Maybe you want to read the comment I was replying to again:

> FWIW you don't really need an app store, you could download APKs off vendors/publishers.

Very evidently I do.

[skeaker]

Hahahaha, yes, let's rely on the famously tech savvy banks to securely distribute their app.

[rowanG077]

They seem to be pretty good considering I can't just hack someones bank account and fill my pockets.

[stjohnswarts]

probably still better than myfreebankapps.ru

[niutech]

APKmirror is not a shady random website. It's well established.

[UtahDave]

Many applications such as banking applications are only available in the official app store.

[jojobas]

Google is not to blame for the fact that your bank won't trust you to verify an apk signature. There's no fundamental need for the OS vendor to oversee app distribution.

[ryao]

Definitely. Blackhats are much better at overseeing application distribution than the OS vendor. :P

In all seriousness, you already have to trust the OS vendor not to be trying to do bad things. Having them oversee software distribution at least does not increase the number of organizations you need to trust. If you have someone else do it, you will be opening the door to black hats that will be clamoring to take that role. Not relying on the OS vendor to do that is how we have scams where the victims installed the malware that harmed them. :/

[abridges6523]

Have you used an AppStore? They’re both full of scammy apps

[salawat]

Trust is a Social/People problem that most techies are uniquely unequipped to scalably solve.

[jzl]

That would be impractical and nearly impossible to do. Name even one other computing platform that works this way.

Oh, wait a minute …

[Oras]

> you don't really need an app store

> except Apple won't let you, but that's a different story

You're saying you can comment, but no one will give you access to the keyboard?

[jojobas]

The whole discussion is about Google, they do let you use whatever store, and also let you compile and deploy your own Android if you're up for the task and your phone manufacturer allows you to boot what you want.

I'd too prefer Apple to be forced by court to open their devices for everything, not holding my breath.

[johnnyanmac]

you may be able to breathe one day on that aspect. Sounds like the EU is putting groundwork to do that exact thing on IOS.

[EchoReflection]

worse, Apple and Google worked together (without the public knowing, of course) "as if they were one company".

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-10-20/apple-goo...

https://www.benzinga.com/news/23/11/35888191/apple-google-wa...

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/25/technology/apple-google-s...

https://www.businessinsider.com/google-apple-deal-default-se...

the sources go on and on, which makes sense, I guess. when two of the world's biggest and most powerful companies have interests that overlap (exclude any OS that isn't Android or iOS) collusion seems like a natural choice.

[niutech]

You don't need to have Android/iOS. You can access webmail, bank accounts, Netflix using web browser on an open source platform like Ubuntu Touch or Sailfish OS. I am using both just fine and both support Android apps.