Google Confirms Non-ADB APK Installs Will Require Developer Registration
Yeah, but... this isn't that.
You're literally saying "well, anecdotal impressions say this, so I refute this study that says something else".
We don't like that. That's not a thing we like to do.
And for the record, as these things go, the article linked here is pretty good. I've seen more than one worse example of a study being reported in the press today.
They provide a neutral headline that conveys the takeaway of the study, they provide context about companies mentioning AIs on layoffs, they provide a link to the full study and they provide a separate study that yields different, seemingly contradicting results.
I mean, this is as close to best case scenario for reporting on a study as you can get in mainstream press. If nothing else, kudos to The Register, the bar is low but they went for personal best anyway.
Man, the problem with giving up all the wonky fashy social media is that when you're in an echo chamber all the weird misinformation and emotion-driven politics are coming from inside the house. It's been a particularly rough day for politically-adjacent but epistemologically depressing posts today.
I said it because it's... true? Well, in that this is what they announced anyway. Also, relevant to the post I was responding to.
So how is it downplaying anything? It's not downplaying it, it's not exaggerating it, it just... is.
Nobody is arguing with you on this being bad, friend. You just want to be mad at a shill and because you couldn't find one you're doing your bit at the first person that said anything other than "Google sucks" even if it was on an unrelated subject.
Don't do that. That's a bad thing to do.
So the report itself argues there is a need for better data, and it seems fairly level headed, but...
...what's with people being mad about it?
I say this a lot, but there seems to be a lot of weird anti-hype where people want this AI stuff to work better than it does so it can be worse than it is, and I'm often confused by it. The takeaway here is that most jobs don't seem to be behaving that differently so far if you look at the labor market in aggregate. Which is... fine? It's not that unexpected? The AI shills were selling that entire industries would be replaced by AI overnight, and most sensible people didn't think so or argued that the jobs would get replaced with AI wrangler tasks because this thing wouldn't completely automate most tasks in ways that weren't already available.
Which seems to be most of what's going on. AI art is 100% not production-ready out of the gate, AI text seems to be a bit of a wash in terms of saving time for programmers and even in more obvious industries like customer service we already had a bunch of bots and automation in place.
So what's all the anger? Did people want this to be worse? Do they just want to vibe with the economy being bad in a way they can pin on something they already don't like and maybe politics is too heavy now? What's going on there?
I mean, I appreciate the gumption but, honestly? This mentality is probably why Americans can't have decent public services.
No worries, I appreciate that.
FWIW, I don't really care about downvotes either way. I am clearly not here to pander, with my "NUANCED POINT IS NUANCED, YOU NAUGHTY, NAUGHTY CHILDREN" persona.
I mean, convenience is a factor.
And while Steam doesn't typically sign exclusive stuff they are known to use store positioning as a bargaining chip for preferential treatment. You'd think Konami would be above needing that, but who knows.
Anyway, good game, whatever the reason for the delay. Someone who is on the fence about getting it on Steam go get it on GOG instead to make up for them tricking me.
It's come and gone a couple times. There was a period where a bunch of big games did simultaneous launches, then a big period of drought where a few large publishers withdrew entirely from new releases and recently a few isolated AA and AAA releases started popping back up. I wonder if it's driven by how much effort they can put into outreach or something like that.
Yeah, it sucks for Silent Hill especially because a) it's super expensive, at 80 bucks on PC, and b) I was on the fence about getting it at launch and only jumped in a few days ago. I'm just out of the refund window and... hey, I like it so far, but I don't like it 160 bucks' worth.
Whoever is screwing with GOG screwed them out of my purchase and I'm starting to think that not buying anything on Steam at all if I can help it may be the way to go.
Boycotts, yes.
"I was on the fence about buying this and I want to sound engaged on the Internet, may still get it later" voting-with-your-wallet nonsense? No.
Alright, this is great, but also people need to start confirming GOG drops before the Steam launch. I check for GOG launches whenever I buy a game, but just this month there's been a couple of big games that got stealth GOG launches just after their Steam release and it's been extremely frustrating. I don't know if it's a publisher thing to work around pirates waiting for DRM free versions or Steam being dicks about it, but it's infuriating.
Yyyyes?
I mean, as opposed to what? Mainstream Linux phones? The guy is saying that if this goes through he may try dumbphones or Linux phones, I'm saying that degoogled Android may also be able to bypass the problem. How is what I'm saying in conflict with what you responded?
Sorry, I know I'm grumpy, but on this subject it's been super frustrating the degree to which people just respond to isolated stimuli like a dog seeing a ball go by. Like, zero ability or attempt to grasp context or meaning, just see a word, type the thing they wanted to say regardless of whether it fits. It gets grating after a while.
Honestly, even at the time that entire "benefit of the doubt" garbage read like some combination of active collaboration and outright denial. It's nuts that Trump rode it to a second term, honestly. As late as the week of the election people were having haughty conversations about the lack of ties between Project 2025 and the Trump campaign and those morons still elected them again because Harris was too weak on Israel or whatever.
I mean, I'd normally not assume an entire culture is incapable of parsing reality, but there are still supposed American leftists going "they're both the same" on this site right now.
Which reminds me I'm trying to cut off American politics from my media menu as much as possible, so maybe it's time to mute this stuff and move on with my day, because man, what a group of weirdos.
It is absolutely fair to criticise them for the stuff they are actually doing, yes.
That's why I wrote:
I mean, that's all really bad. Why do we need the hyperbolic "Google is killing Open Source" framing? The real thing is bad enough and it doesn't make me show up to argue about it. Plus you could have accurately stated "Google kills anonymous apps, threatening alternate app stores" and that would have been 100% accurate and just as horrifying.
Again, there is no need to slippery slope this crap, because it's bad now. So why even point out how little you trust Google will do the bad thing they said they are doing for 100% real and imagine a worse thing they'll do later, even if it's likely that they will? All it does is invite pedants like me to argue with you, which can then be weaponized by Google to say you're deliberately misrepresenting the issue.
Okay.
At a glance that seems... disproportionate, but alright. This is me telling everybody I'm good with this answer and don't need to ever think about this again.
I know. And I didn't defend Google's ownership of your phone.
See how annoying that is?
The second person is rhetorical there. I'm saying whether you believe that in all caps and bold letters is entirely irrelevant to whether the video title is misrepresenting the issue.
I don't care who you trust, honestly.
I have no patience for slippery slope arguments to justify poor reporting or misinformation.
For what it's worth, I do think there is a slippery slope and it's reasonable to expect things to tighten down the line without regulatory intervention.
But that doesn't matter, because this is bad even if nothing like that happens down the line, and even if Google can't be trusted the coverage is misrepresenting the issue.
Man, I hate the Internet.
Cool.
So title the video like that and don't misrepresent it and I'll be here agreeing with you.
"But I disagree with what Google is doing" is a non sequitur here.
I believe they confirmed uncertified devices will not have these requirements, so technically degoogled Android should still be fine.
You don't get Google services, but then again that's also true of every other alternative.
It's all jumping the gun for now. We'll see where this goes.
So there's nothing new here other than a link to their Q&A video.
And perhaps more importantly a subtle reminder that the Q&A blog post in question includes a link to a Google survey for developers you can freely add feedback to by entering your email.
Following the links instead of reacting to the headline has its perks.
Yeeeah, maybe take your own advice there.
For the record, we're still not disagreeing, technically. In that "All I did is expand on the other negative side effects of this measure that weren't mentioned" is 100% "I couldn't find a shill to argue with, so I had the argument all by my lonesome whether it made sense or not".
It's still bad.