I'm not sure I can be as pliant as others here. Being less of an activist and more of a user of convenience, if I am making PayPal payments somebody better give me a reason why I'm not just using the same store that came in by default with my phone.
this post was submitted on 11 Aug 2024
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How much convenience do you really gain from using the Play Store instead of F-Droid? And is that convenience worth the developers of your applications receiving a smaller cut of your payment or being charged additional fees by Google? Is it worth contributing to Google's monopoly over the Android app landscape?
Those are all advantages for developers and activists. End users don't care or need to care. As an end user the only reason for keeping two stores in my phone is that one does a thing the other one doesn't, functionally. That's why Samsung can keep putting their dumb store on their phones forever but people just don't engage with it.
Now, unlike the Samsung store when I was on a Samsung phone, F-Droid is something I do use, because there is a clear use case there: Play for all the commercial apps, F-Droid for non-commercial alternatives and a stuff that Google doesn't allow on Play for whatever reason.
If F-Droid wants to make a push for being my only store, they better provide all the functionality, support, variety and convenience Play does, because Play comes pre-installed. If I can't go to F-Droid to be guaranteed to not have to deal with payments or MTX, then it better have every single thing I need. I'm talking every game, every app, every legacy piece of software. It better have the same one-click payment convenience I get from Google Pay. And it better still have a default option to search for completely free apps, or I'll have to go find a F-Droid alternative that does that for when I want to be sure I'm not getting any hidden fees with my app.
I suppose that's true, if you consider anything outside of your personal and immediate financial gain as "activism". I would like to think there are more people out there who actually care about ethical consumerism and contributing to small and independent business.
If F-Droid wants to make a push for being my only store
I didn't read anything in the post that suggests this is their strategy. F-Droid wants to support small developers and challenge Google's monopoly in the app store space. Nowhere does it suggest they are expecting every application on the Play Store to also be available on F-Droid, so I'm not sure why you would assume that their goal here is to completely replace the Play Store. This is about competition, not market domination.
To clarify, I'm making a two step argument: One, I will only install a second store on my phone if that store serves a specific use case I don't get from the first one (which is Play by default, since it comes preinstalled). Two, if F-Droid is going to sacrifice the clear message that it's the place for noncommercial apps, then it must carry the same apps Play does, it needs to carry ALL of them so I can make it my default store.
So I understand what you're saying, my point is that this is not a viable value proposition for me. F-Droid is positioned as the safe place for noncommercial software. If it's no longer going to be that, then it's picking the same fight with Google Play that the Samsung or Amazon stores do, and it's just as likely to lose that fight. The reason it isn't doing that at the moment isn't its moral high ground, it's that it has a clear position that doesn't overlap with Play's: noncommercial software.
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(11 replies)
i am good with the subscription and pay once approaches they mentioned.
the iffy portion is the in-app payment sdk. i hope f-droid will be the one providing those to have it standardized.
in-app ads are kinda okay. i won't use said app, but if f-droid labels apps like those as how it labels apps with non-foss/features-you-may-not-like, it should be okay.
In app ads are very much not ok as they are often targeted and serve no benefit to the user. I have no issue with a donate button popup with a link but we already have Google play for spyware.
i'm fine with it as long as the privacy labels remain front and centre when downloading; especially if they clearly mark which apps are ad supported, subscription based, etc and don't prioritize them over foss/ad free
otoh, i use neo store so it probably won't matter
We need a way to support foundational open source projects like browsers, a open source subscription platform might be the way.
Start off with apps that are already subscription like vpns.
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(6 replies)
I see many issues with that / for them.
But I'm not against experimenting and finding out. We maybe need some free and open monetizing options, maybe also ad platforms. That would give people some more options, instead of relying on Google and Apple all the time.
Please just make it respect user privacy, be FLOSS and categorize the Apps, so it's clear to me what is and what isn't licensed Free Software.
Wow, there is approximately 2 people in these comments that actually read the article.
I can't see this go well for them.
I get the idea. I also get not wanting to restrict devs and hence offering all kinds of payment options. But I cannot see this be visible for them given their target audience.