Same here. Side loading will open the door to a whole new category of malware/adware/crapware.
Yes of course the App Store is not perfect but at least Apple has control over it and can stop things when they are degenerating. I’m not looking forward to a new Facebook VPN that will “enhance my phone,” available through side loading only, that I will of course never install but which my grandma or another unsuspecting entity would…
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So don't sideload apps? For you, the experience will stay the same. Let apple put a warning like android with DANGER, ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT SIDELOAD and problem solved. Ppl that want to stay in apple store will do so, ppl that want sideload will sideload
Meta is already in the regulators' sights. Data harvesting is not something the EU is blind to. Presumably there would be injunctions made against them from so easily pied pipering users into doing that. Not to mention, most users do not want to have to jump through more hoops just to have the same old FB/IG/WhatsApp experience. They'd balk.
Ah yes... so give Meta a couple of years of all gas no brakes with regards to user data while the legislators play catch up.
They have gone for Apple out of pride and short sighted electoral strategy. The answer is to deal with Facebook(Meta) and Google(Alphabet) et cetera first. Pumping money into Gecko development.
This is serving up regular people who use smart phones (which in the west are essentially mandatory) to big data on a silver platter.
What’s your explanation for Japan doing the same to Apple? It’s hardly only the EU who has them (and Google, and the rest of Big Tech) in their crosshairs.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36393809
> regular people who use smart phones
That’s the beauty of it. I’m not convinced that ‘regular people’ are going to have the patience to deal with Meta forcing them to get and manage yet another damn account to use Facebook/Instagram/WhatsApp. Just a terrible hurdle that will cause FB to shed a non-zero number of users, at a time where their DAU has not been hot, never mind their long term growth potential.
Without a compelling reason for them to join (free Oculuses? Oculii?) you can’t expect users to be forced to sign up for yet another account- not to mention most people are aware at the invasiveness of Meta- and remain quiet. Users already have more streaming services than they can handle, they’re not going to have the patience to juggle multiple app store accounts, just to get the same apps they already have!
Forcing users to adopt a new walled garden right away is going to inspire mass consumer backlash right away. And that will cause regulators to weigh in immediately, data gathering operation or no data gathering op.
I just don’t see Meta having the product or marketing stones to pull this off. Their last thing with positive buzz is what, Threads? Something dependent on the failure of another’s platform? And that only lasted for like a week.
Elon is already attempting the next step with X.
There is going to be a race to become the WeChat of the west.
Governments more generally need to deal with tech and the EU is the only one with the heft and the stones to do it. But this piecemeal approach of trying to hit each of these giants like this ends up paralysed by court processes and intervention from the American Government.
Network effects are powerful. And there is a huge incumbency advantage past a certain point.
Meta, Google, Microsoft, and X are the big winners out of this decision.
Competition on storefront take will be slow.
Musk's questionable decisions aside, I don't see how X can succeed being an everything app a la WeChat. (Aren't they also planning to pivot to becoming a video app? What is the vision combining both?) You know what social media app that also supports sending payments, video submissions, had/has its own content channel of shows, even a knock-off of HQ Trivia? Facebook. And who ever used FB in its portal-like form? Besides the Feed, Events, Groups, and Marketplace, who bothers with the everything features? I question that the WeChat model is really applicable for U.S. markets anyway, as it really depends if food delivery, ridesharing, etc. other companies are willing to team up with an everything app platform-maker.
Google is plagued by product execution issues. Any attempt at such an app will just fill a larger plot in the Google Graveyard. Microsoft doesn't even do social- what do they have, LinkedIn? Yammer? The Xbox network? X faces an uncertain future. Funnily enough I think Uber would have been a contender back under Kalanick's reign, but they don't have the same juice they used to.
And you trust governments because?
We, the people.
if all that makes their phones secure is "not allowing sideloading" or "not allowing different browser engines", then that's a pretty shit security