[allenbrunson]

Here's my own personal perspective.

I am very thoroughly in Apple's camp. I have owned several iPhones, an iPad, and more Macs than I can count. This is what I use personally, and what I program for.

Although I don't use Android myself, I'm glad it exists. It keeps Apple on their toes. I don't think Apple will make much of a dent in the Android ecosystem, despite the fact that Steve Jobs apparently wanted to.

But now it's turning out that Google faces some of the same issues as Apple, doesn't it? The Android ecosystem is generally more open than iOS, but now we see that it has its limits.

Personally, I think Google is doing the right thing here. If this secondary phone OS really does contain a lot of Android frameworks, as they claim, then I think Google is right to be upset about this.

Interesting to see what the fan base's general reaction is going to be to this.

[lucian1900]

Alibaba pirated google apps and put them on their appstore. That's different.

Android can be forked just fine.

[tedivm]

The pirated app thing was brought up after the fact, and really has nothing to do with the original issue- that google is strong arming a company to prevent a competing OS from being released.

Besides, claiming that Alibabi supports piracy because there are pirated apps in their store is the same as saying Google supports malware because their stores have sold infected apps.

[will_work4tears]

That's not what I got. My understanding of the situation was that Google is saying Alibaba can't claim to be Android compatible if they are not. Alibaba is saying they are claiming no such thing, but their marketplace seems to not reflect that claim.

They aren't trying to prevent a competing OS at all.

[lucian1900]

But since Alibaba themselves put the pirated google apps on their store, I'd say that's quite a different situation than Google Play having malware.

[allenbrunson]

sure, it can be forked. Not even Google is disputing that. They're just saying that, if you want to fork it, you don't get to be in Google's "handset alliance" anymore.

[Xuzz]

The Google Play store has plenty of pirated apps on it all the time, which you often have to DMCA Google for any chance of getting taken down. I don't think that's a big difference here.

[bookwormAT]

"The Android ecosystem is generally more open than iOS, but now we see that it has its limits."

No, this is not about Android. Acer joined a "don't fork Android" club, and now Google told them that if they support a fork they have to leave the club.

Android remains completly free and open source.