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gowld 2 days ago

> Millions chose Android for exactly that reason.

Millions? Are you sure?

Even so, Android has billions of users who want secure app management by default.

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JoshTriplett 2 days ago | parent [-]

Don't buy the FUD claiming this is about "secure app management".

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akramachamarei 2 days ago | parent [-]

Just to play devils advocate, the petition is a bit of FUD too, no? I ask as an F-droid user and downloader of unofficial apks. Speaking purely from my own experience, all the side-loaded apps I care about are fungible; I could get them or similar quality equivalents from GPS. With the exception of a 4chan reader, that hasn't been hosted there and likely won't be. I don't mind the 1 day wait too much.

I understand political dissidents and those living under authoritarians may have much more concrete Fs and Ds but for me (us?) it's mostly U.

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JoshTriplett 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

> I don't mind the 1 day wait too much.

I do. It's my device. And I've been in the position of having to buy a replacement phone in a pinch; having to wait an extra day before having a usable replacement is not acceptable.

In terms of apps I might not be able to get from the Play store:

- Signal, depending on what country I'm in in the future and whether they've tried to restrict things they can't backdoor.

- Vanilla Music, which remains the best music player I've used. (I wish there were an Android version of Quod Libet.)

- A fully capable version of Termux. (the Play store currently has a less capable version that's maintained separately, which could go away if someone decides to stop putting up with it).

- Syncthing-Fork, which has at times been undermaintained in the Play store.

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akramachamarei 2 days ago | parent [-]

I'm gonna try out Vanilla Music now. FWIW I use Musicolet from GPS and it's quite nice. I hope to learn whether and how our criteria intersect by exploring Vanilla....

Update: out of the box it seems to be reading tags strangely. Maybe I could fix this studying the settings more, but I'd say you have an upgrade opportunity switching off Vanilla. Signal is hard to replace though.

	▲	JoshTriplett a day ago \| parent [-]
		Honestly, the only thing I want out of Vanilla is the filesystem view. The only modes I ever use with a music player are to browse files as I organized them into folders, queue them up, and play the queue on repeat and/or shuffle.

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Cider9986 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The problem is the slipper slope. If we let Google get away with this, it will only get worse.

Just see the Play Integrity API making the user experience more difficult on more secure devices like GOS with mo security benefit.

>Play Integrity permits a device with years of missing security patches. It isn't a legitimate security feature. It checks for a device in compliance with Google's Android business model, not security.

(https://xcancel.com/GrapheneOS/status/2036610983888588818#m)

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lucb1e 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

> all the side-loaded apps I care about are fungible; I could get them or similar quality equivalents from GPS

You're missing out then!

	▲	akramachamarei a day ago \| parent [-]
		I am very open to first hand recommendations :)