Modi government to set up app store alternative to Google Play, Apple App Store

https://www.deccanherald.com/specials/aatmanirbhar-bharat-modi-govt-to-set-up-app-store-alternative-to-google-play-apple-app-store-895755.html?&ampcf=1

by superasn • 6 years ago

450 320 6 years ago

deccanherald.com

superasn• 6 years ago

Here is a more readable link for the same:

https://outline.com/4CbwN4

zapdrive• 6 years ago

Ok maybe the Indian govt can force Android phone manufacturers to pre install it's app store, how is this going to play out on iPhones? Are we going to see a ban on iPhones in India?

switch11• 6 years ago

Let's look at some background

1) The issue is that Google is attacking competitors using the App Store as a weapon

Google Pay is one of the biggest payment apps in India

It attacked PayTm, another very big payment app, by making its app disappear

2) So lots of Indian companies are using it as an opportunity to do BOTH

A) Point out Google attacking competitors

B) Google taking 30% cut is unsustainable

Now, in INdia Android has 95% market share

So Apple gets a free pass by virtue of being so tiny in India

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hawkoy2• 6 years ago

Attacked Paytm?

They have fantasy cricket now which is definitely gambling and my dad is getting spammed with messages that look exactly like scams. I am glad they removed it even if just for a few hours. They didn't comply after being requested to multiple times.

Justifying it as cashback can be used for almost anything in the way they have done.

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ape42• 6 years ago

No 30% is a big deal... "The government's existing Mobile Seva App Store is expected to be refurbished to create the Indian App Store and all the applications in it, will not be charged for gatekeeping."

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higerordermap3• 6 years ago

This is annoying as shit. Lot of people use Google Pay or Amazon Pay because they are good.

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harpratap• 6 years ago

Apple has a history of complying with government requests. They opened up NFC stack when UK requested it. Added SMS spam reporting integration with TRAI in India. And all the changes they do for complying with PRC

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wtmt2• 6 years ago

The spam integration wasn’t done in the way TRAI was pushing Apple to. On Android, the DND (Do Not Disturb) app could get permissions to the call log and SMS, but this wasn’t possible on iOS. Apple pushed back on that requirement for privacy reasons and instead developed a way for the reporting to be done by the user and the information passed to the DND app to compose (not send) an SMS. No compromises were made to grant any permissions. To this day, the SMS permissions doesn’t exist on iOS.

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powerapple4• 6 years ago

I would love to see India government push for an open iPhone, giving people an option to have their app store if they choose to, and leave people want to stick with Apple AppStore the same as now.

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donedanadone• 6 years ago

"reportedly planning"

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tchalla• 6 years ago

Also, talks within the government indicate that it may ask Google and Apple to pre-install Indian App Store in all phones sold in India in near future. This particular request is likely to face counter from the American companies.

Sigh!

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bostonpete• 6 years ago

Other than the Pixel line I don't know why we'd expect Google to block this. There's already alternative app stores preloaded on many Android phones. To my mind this will be a fight against Apple

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srtjstjsj3• 6 years ago

The pixel line is the only line Google preinstalls anything on. Either the journalist or the negotiator doesn't understand Android or is pushing harder than they need to, or they see sideloading (bad UX) as not sufficient as an antitrust measure.

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rvz• 6 years ago

What's wrong with Getjar for Android? [0] Although I think it needs a redesign but at least it has no Google control and it is independent.

iOS on the other hand is slightly difficult to sideload apps compared to Android. Not too optimistic about an alternative App Store on iOS.

[0] https://www.getjar.com/

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untog• 6 years ago

it is independent

From the perspective of the Indian government that is exactly what is wrong with Getjar.

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srtjstjsj3• 6 years ago

GetJar isn't controlled by the Indian government, so it's not useful for the Indian government.

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risyachka3• 6 years ago

I had a hard time finding an app between that crazy amount of ads.

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tomjuggler• 6 years ago

From all the blank spaces in my browser I imagine there must be a lot of ads.. ;)

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risyachka3• 6 years ago

It will be a special kind of joy for small developers to publish their apps on a billion stores each with its own regulations.

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the-dude• 6 years ago

There is a SaaS for that.

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echopom• 6 years ago

That's a bit exaggerated I think , you would get just "One Side Store" Per country or Region.

That would be such a big victory.

Personally I would not complain about the bureaucratic overhead.

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judge2020• 6 years ago

There are 193 countries (footnote[0]), so that might mean 193 app stores, but then some countries might delegate the power to require their own app store to their own regions/"states".

0: https://youtu.be/4AivEQmfPpk

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elondaits• 6 years ago

It'd create a new middle layer of distributors to handle the bureaucracy... like with music and streaming.

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risyachka3• 6 years ago

You are used to Apple-style bureaucracy. It won't be even close. If 10 countries roll out their stores - most of them probably won't even be in English for a long time. Custom SDKs will add a lot of overhead on the development side. And app review madness will be like never before.

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ape42• 6 years ago

I seem to recall a standard XML file for describing apps in stores a couple years ago.

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pojntfx• 6 years ago

... or they could just create a PWA and publish it on the free and open web and have the app be available globally in 40s w/o any regulations or artificial restrictions.

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maneesh• 6 years ago

Except the ability to send push notifications, which is paramount to retention and revenue

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adventured• 6 years ago

There is no 'free and open web,' that's long in the past now, to the extent it ever existed (for about 10-15 years in a limited form).

Which countries partake in this supposed free and open web? None.

There are dozens of separately regulated prominent webs now and that's going to get a lot worse this decade. We're never going back, nations are not going to give up the control they're assuming, it will splinter further and further; complexity will grow, accessing foreign markets will become more onerous. It'll gradually fully mirror the physical world, where if you want to travel to another nation, or do business in another nation (access their market), you will have to comply with all of their myriad of local regulations (which will continue to grow rapidly in number and complexity).

Nations will fence off their citizens online, and you will have to comply to access them. We're already seeing this directional shift in many nations, it will spread comprehensively.

Turkey's web is not regulated the same as India's web which is not regulated the same as China's web which is not regulated the same as the EU's web which is not regulated the same as Brazil's web which is not regulated the same as Australia's web which is not regulated the same as the US web which is not regulated the same as Britain's web and so on.

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IshKebab4• 6 years ago

PWAs are not as good as real apps though.

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bsaul• 6 years ago

i guess there's a right number. I love the idea of having an alternate solution to reach your market whenever you don't want to comply with apple or google guidelines for some reason

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dgellow2• 6 years ago

You mean that us, developers, will have to choose the right fit between multiple options, in a competitive ecosystem?

That’s exactly what I want!

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abc-xyz• 6 years ago

Have you tried publishing apps for the App/Play Store? Last time I made a game with Unity then I had to export it to different platforms and for some of them, such as iOS, then I had to make additional code modifications with xcode to get e.g. ads to work properly. I’d easily end up spending a day on making sure each store listing looked good (required files in different formats, and tons of settings to setup).

I also struggle to think of a scenario in which you wouldn’t want your app published on all app stores (unless you for moral reasons wouldn’t want your app on Chinese-owned stores or something like that).

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hehetrthrthrjn• 6 years ago

OMG the horror of having a billion other choices when you're arbitrarily banned from one.

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ffdjjjffjj• 6 years ago

That’s not the problem, it’s having to manage a bunch of sets of credentials, and the logistics of pushing updates through multiple stores. Both are obviously solvable problems but definitely annoying barriers to someone who really just wants to make their app.

Or more realistically, it means developers will have to start paying for a middle man saas thing that distributes apps in all the stores and aggregates reviews etc.

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return15• 6 years ago

This but unironically

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tonyedgecombe• 6 years ago

India wants more Apple manufacturing and Apple wants to sell India more phones. My guess is this won't happen.

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HighChaparral• 6 years ago

Right. India is the obvious destination for Apple if/when they decide to get out of their reliance on China.

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mantap• 6 years ago

Is it? Indian and Chinese culture is very different. Apple benefits greatly from China's unquenchable thirst for luxury goods in general, not just phones but clothing, cars, etc. Signalling wealth through conspicuous consumption is important in China. I don't see that same characteristic in Indian culture; of course there is a market for luxury goods but it's not the same.

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montyminds12• 6 years ago

I wonder how's that going to go

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aero-glide• 6 years ago

Those who want open source apps on their phones should checkout f-droid

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dannyw3• 6 years ago

F-droid is a political app store.

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approxim8ion2• 6 years ago

There are no app-stores that are apolitical, that I know of at least. If they are opinionated in setting up barriers of entry for applications, it is a political decision. Even F-Droid choosing to be open-source only, is a political decision.

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amitheonlyone2• 6 years ago

What is their aim by having an alternate app store? Maybe make the manufacturers install it by default as a system app with all the permissions enabled by default? It'd be pretty easy to have a control over what people are seeing or using if so. It's just guess work but I wouldn't be surprised if this is the idea.

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0xmohit• 6 years ago

It might be because of the following:

"Narendra Modi ‘wants state apps installed’ on new phones"

Source: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/narendra-modi-wants-state...

India is said to be considering a plan to make it mandatory for almost all new mobile phones to have government software pre-installed, raising the prospect of the state being able to closely monitor citizens.

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surendrajat2• 6 years ago

It will never be easy to control what people use in India. Also if I won't have to pay $25 just to publish my free app to users, I will be much happier. And if I decide to monetize it, I will again perfer to pay Indian govt a cut than others. Google already knows what I think and what I am doing and it fulfills govt requests too, with precise details so it's better that India govt sees it directly. At least I know how I can stop that easily.

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amitheonlyone2• 6 years ago

You really don't have to control though. Information itself is enough in the most part. As you said, Google already knows, but it has it's own procedure in fulfilling government requests. With the information directly in the hands of the government, that barrier is gone.

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notsureaboutpg2• 6 years ago

I don't understand this logic at all. It's so much more dangerous for a nation state with an army and the ability to disappear dissidents to know so much about you rather than a multinational company...

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sbmthakur4• 6 years ago

What is their aim by having an alternate app store?

It's mentioned in the article that apps won't be charged for gatekeeping.

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Fluid_Mechanics• 6 years ago

Taking preemptive action to derail their economic recovery.

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baybal2• 6 years ago

India has a following issue with Android ecosystem, almost everything not owned by Google, is owned by some Chinese co.

GetJar - sold to Chinese

PayTM - Chinese shareholder

Flipcart - Chinese shareholder

Zomato, swiggy, + 10+ others online delivery/logistics apps. Some used to be reskins of Chinese apps. Some only have Indian C-levels.

20 something messengers - all except FB, and Twiter are Chinese

...

I believe they quickly realised that to ban Chinese apps, they have to ban a lion share of apps in daily use, and here this app store comes.

---

P.S. As I understand, a huge amount of Android phones in the third world doesn't have Google App store pre-installed, as manufacturers don't bother to go through arduous Google certification for low end phones, or provide OTA updates. This is why things like GetJar are still a thing there.

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actuator7• 6 years ago

As far as I recall, Walmart bought Flipkart. I haven't seen it mentioned much in the business press related to Walmart after acquisition though.

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sbmthakur4• 6 years ago

How does having Chinese shareholders(in minority) make an app Chinese?

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zepto13• 6 years ago

If access to the Chinese market is a significant portion of revenue, then these (large) minority shareholders ultimately control the company.

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sathishmanohar• 6 years ago

Finally! I can call my uncle and get my app featured. Awesome.

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phatfish3• 6 years ago

If your uncle works at the right level in Google or Apple I expect this works already.

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villgax2• 6 years ago

Good luck with Apple

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phaer• 6 years ago

While I personally dislike to see an App Store coming from the Modi government, I wonder if there's at least some virtue to the idea of publicly funded App Stores e.g. in the European Union.

Of course there's a risk of easier distribution of state-sponsored Malware and censorship - somewhat similar to state-level DPI - but there could be an advantage in enforcing local laws.

As it stands, software distribution to european mobile clients seems to be restricted by:

  * U.S. laws and regulations
  * Policies by Google or Apple
  * European laws and regulations

Independent App Stores could probably help with at least the first, if not the second point one as well. At least from a governments perspective.
For Free Software Users, https://f-droid.org/en/ is course preferable. Seems to be registered in the UK according to https://f-droid.org/en/about/

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deadalus• 6 years ago

F-Droid previously banned Gab for being a “free speech zone” that will “tolerate all opinions”

https://reclaimthenet.org/f-droid-bans-gab-app/

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yorwba• 6 years ago

F-Droid's press release actually explains their decision not to ban Fedilab even though it allows accessing Gab and they don't like it. https://f-droid.org/en/2019/07/16/statement.html

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return15• 6 years ago

There is, of course. Government build ports, airports, customs etc. This is part of digital infrastructure (until the day comes that stores are no longer needed).

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villgax2• 6 years ago

What business does the govt have with private app stores.

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ziggystardust• 6 years ago

IT cell must have learned how to inject apps with RATs.

an app store would allow them to inject RAT into every app thus giving them the ability to spy on every indian device

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pedro_hab3• 6 years ago

Yes! If there are issues with Apple and Google they could create laws to fix it.

If the idea was to help citizens, laws or regulations to stop said practices would be better, not that I agree with it.

But thats not the idea, they see Google's power and they want in.

Can you imagine thinking a government having all your data is better than a corporation?

People have forgotten the governments were the perpetrators of the worst thing in human history.

No corporation has rounded up people to be shot like governments did.

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tssva3• 6 years ago

Corporations did just that in the specific part of the world under discussion here. I suggest you look into the East India Trading Company, Dutch East India and French East India companies.

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diego_moita• 6 years ago

I welcome this.

It will be messy, it will open oportunities to corruption, lobbying, crappy user experiences, unsafe apps, government abuse, nationalism, ... it is really a Pandora box.

But mess can be a fertile ground for competition and innovation when excessive regulation blocks it.

Today's app stores are just feature development labs for Apple & Google. There is no chance that anyone will be able to create a big business within any app store and keep Apple or Google out. Just ask big players as Steam, Facebook and Microsoft how they feel about Google's and Apple's stores.

If you're in the apps development business then you're just looking for golden opportunities for Apple/Google and being very badly payed for that.

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iamshs• 6 years ago

The sources said, "Android has 97% market share in India so we should intervene and handhold Indian startups. Making it mandatory for Android phones to be pre-instaled with our apps in under consideration". [1]

Indian Government being arbiter of the app ecosystem on a phone and pre installing apps? Ominous vibes. Good luck with your desire for competition and innovation.

[1] https://www.timesnownews.com/business-economy/industry/artic...

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return15• 6 years ago

So they are competing on same terms as google, in practice. Thats good

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paxys3• 6 years ago

I'd like to think the Indian government will have the interests of its own citizens at heart better than Google or Apple. India has a long and not very pleasant history with foreign corporations.

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actuator7• 6 years ago

I am just puzzled about one bit of this, why the hue and cry few days back about this. Don't Android App stores like the Amazon one already exist? What's stopping these devs to even distribute the apps themselves?

iOS is a different matter but Android has always allowed this. Not sure if they exist in India, but I have seen Android phones come with non Google App Store as well.

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nradov• 6 years ago

Yes alternative Android app stores already exist. For example Samsung devices have their own proprietary app store pre-loaded.

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raghavtoshniwal2• 6 years ago

Yeah alternate app stores exist but when something like this is driven from a nation stare, the Indian govt will most likely mandate inclusion of their AppStore on Android and iOS. Once it is loaded on by default, you suddenly gain 800 million strong distribution channel. It would be a no-brainer for devs to put their app on the strore. The same case could not have been made for Amazon's and Samsung's store.

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devdas5• 6 years ago

This enables tax revenues for the Indian government.

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Bodhisattya• 6 years ago

I would say that the government is not the right institution to take this up. They should support secondary app stores, or legislate to force Apple and Google to make their stores more developer friendly. Getting involved in this business, goes against their own narrative. On one hand, we are privatizing state owned companies and on the other, we are taking up vanity projects which the tax payer has to fund. Do check up on our new government building, that no one apart from the powers that be asked for. Also, this announcement very much coincided with an attempt from some of the major apps in introducing a form of sports betting (see IPL), which was thwarted by the very same Google and Apple, in line with the laws of our country. All over, it seems like American tech. giants are more pro-indian-consumer than our own government, which is tremendously dissappointing in and of itself.

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sschueller• 6 years ago

3rd party app stores that are not pre installed by the manufacturer are crippled and provide a bad user experience. Auto updates is also not possible.

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dheera• 6 years ago

The thing is, why would anyone voluntarily use a censored/restricted app store?

For Apple hell yes, maybe their government app store will be less anal than Apple is with their own app store, and e.g. allow other payment channels and allow embedding other rendering engines than Safari.

For Google though ... why wouldn't one just use the Google store instead? It's pretty open, and if their government's motive is to just create a subset of the Play store that doesn't have Chinese apps, why the hell would anyone use it?

And if the government is forcing the entire population to use its app store -- do they have the authority to do that? I thought India was a democracy with free speech.

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arebhaibhai2• 6 years ago

> It's pretty open

I disagree. It's the quite opposite. So many popular apps don't even get a notice before getting banned, let alone small indie developers trying to get some users.

> why the hell would anyone use it?

Not sure about others but I definetly don't want a US company to put nose in everything I do online. Plus I don't want to give a 30% cut for a regional app that I can publish on some local platform for local users. And I would rather deal with low quality apps than popular apps disappearing every now and then just because Google doesn't like them.

> do they have the authority to do that?

Yes but it's not practical in country like India to enforce it. Free speech and what govt can regulate about internet are different things as far I've seen.

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JumpCrisscross• 6 years ago

I thought India was a democracy with free speech

The First Amendment is radically unprecedented and unique, in its text, judicial upholding and cultural backing.

While India technically has freedoms of speech, in practice it is heavily regulated [1].

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_expression_in_Ind...

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hexbinencoded• 6 years ago

You're confused. India has a populist, nationalist authoritarian who will stop at nothing to remodel the country somewhere between China and Nazi Germany.

The Indian government can block all other app stores, require app developers and mobile OSes install spyware SDKs and turn over data about their users, and ban encryption. Then, the "subversives," academics, and journalists can be rounded-up.

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Mupuff• 6 years ago

But big businesses have been created so it's not entirely true.

Do you have any good examples where you think innovation has been stifled on the play store? (Apple's app store aside)

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cblconfederate2• 6 years ago

big businesses have been created so it's not entirely true.

examples?

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kelnos7• 6 years ago

I welcome the idea that Apple should be required to allow third-party app stores, but the only end game I see with a government app store is a legally-mandated requirement to have that app store installed on all citizens'/residents' phones. At that point the phones just become extensions of the state's intelligence apparatus, and that's a net negative for everyone's privacy.

Apple should certainly allow alternative app stores, and Google should make it easier and safer for customers to install alternative app stores, but I never want to see governments get into that market.

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actuator7• 6 years ago

Anyone aware about the merit of the gambling claims that the apps were indulging in, as mentioned by the article.

While I don't like censorship of any form, if that violates Play Store or AppStore's TOS, the violating app would get removed.

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vijaybritto• 6 years ago

lol would get removed? This is a fascist govt. They'll ban Google and Apple stores in a whim.

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cardy31• 6 years ago

India is a democracy...

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yalogin• 6 years ago

It feels like this is just a China firewall in the making.

They will strictly block everything they don’t like. I have a bad feeling about it

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freewizard• 6 years ago

China would be a good example to predict what would happen. Since it bans Google, there are 11 Android app stores has >1% market share [1], most are from tech giants(e.g. Tencent), mobile operator(e.g. China Mobile) and phone manufacturers(e.g. Huawei). When Apple opens the gate for 3p App Store, it's safe to bet another 5~10 stores.

Maybe not every country will have as many app stores as China, but still that's gonna be a nightmare for developers (especially small developers) to manage.

Push notification might be another nightmare to watch out for consumers. When China bans Google service, app developers have freedom to implement push themselves or via a 3rd party vendor. And I guess if forced to open, Apple won't support non AppStore push either, hence consumers may end up with Facebook/Google/Epic/Tencent/YouNameWho have their push services running and connected on their phones with a burning battery.

[1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/1058612/china-android-ap...

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pkphilip2• 6 years ago

I am glad that this will force a hard stop on Google's and Apple's monopoly on App stores and force them to be more competitive. India is too big a market for Google to walk away from - especially after they had to walk away from China.

However, it is entirely like that the Modi govt is probably trying to find a way to backdoor all phones in India through this. So thats bad.

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abrbhat• 6 years ago

It seems most people are arguing that the only alternative to 2 app stores is a large number of app stores. But what if the alternative is no app stores? Anyone can install whatever software they want on their device from wherever they want it. Just like it works for desktops. The need for app stores is an artificially created need (by the marketing brilliance of Jobs).

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bhaavan• 6 years ago

I would argue that an App Store, on mobile has helped avoid virus, and malware on phones, unlike how Windows was able to contain it. Having a trusted App Store by a company, who understands security, and has a financial backing to commit to a secure system, is beneficial all the way down.

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542458• 6 years ago

Yeah, an App Store is in no way an artificial need. There’s a reason fortnite is on the Google Play store even when they had the option of only installing through other methods.

For non-savvy users it mostly solves the “evaluating installer maliciousness” problem. For all users it enhances convenience (unified method for installing and uninstalling software) and software discovery. It is not a perfect solution to any of the above problems, but IMO it’s very good.

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paxys3• 6 years ago

The credit for that mostly goes to the sandboxed nature of the OS itself rather than app store review.

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wawhal• 6 years ago

by a company who understands security and has a financial backing to commit to a secure system

Not sure if this stands true for the current Indian government.

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onelovetwo• 6 years ago

I think you might not be aware of how many vulnerabilities iOS has had over the years and still has. Its not the security heaven you and Apple are making it out to be. https://9to5mac.com/2020/05/14/zerodium-has-too-many-ios-exp...

And believe it or not a Store does not have much to do with covering your ass when it comes to malware. There is the same security check on mac regardless where the application comes from (its done at the OS level) The only thing the App Store does is verify the developer because they have to be resisted with Apple (and makes sure Apple gets that 30 cut). Mac already does that btw (you actually cant download an app from an unknown developer by default) unless you choose to in the settings.

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tssva3• 6 years ago

"Anyone can install whatever software they want on their device from wherever they want it."

This is the current situation on Android. It is similar to macOS or Windows. It comes with a store but users are free to install apps from whatever source they like.

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Abishek_Muthian3• 6 years ago

But what if the alternative is no app stores? Anyone can install whatever software they want on their device from wherever they want it

There was already an open, accessible, free app store called - 'Internet Browser' upon which Internet was built. These companies undermined it in collusion with the duopolies to hoard more data from their customers and are now crying wolf.

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michaelkariv3• 6 years ago

Do you mean web apps? Today they are powerful, but in 2008 browsers based web apps could not have access to a lot of things native apps could, I think, so native was inevitable, hence the AppStore.

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indymike2• 6 years ago

The real problem with app stores is that selling your software direct to the user is a solved problem. In many casees the e-commerce platform you use to sell your own software is better than the app stores for the seller (and in many cases the buyer). There really isn't much value until you start bundling the developer tools and libraries. Most of those libraries are derivative or are open source. So developers are trading no real (sorry but Apple's $100 is de minimus) up front costs for a percentage fee paid by the customer at each sale. This is probably optimal for small teams and solo devs...

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freezeshock• 6 years ago

I don't think Apple allows other app stores on their platform.

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Abishek_Muthian3• 6 years ago

Playstore(Google) and Appstore(Apple) are major soft power assets of U.S. Govt. we've seen the former exercised effectively against Huawei, crippling its International smartphone sales.

Considering U.S. - India trade agreement has been elusive for a long time due to differences from fruits to solar cells, India would definitely not add App(Play) store to the list; especially now due to the situation with China.

Although there's nothing stopping anyone from creating 3rd party app store for Android, the lobby wants Govt. to be involved for forcing handset manufacturers to pre-burn this new app store. It's certainly possible, as made in India Samsung M-series phones already has all major Indian apps, they might even provide privilege escalation like Fdroid to make install/update seamless. What they are going to replace Google Play Services with would be interesting to see.

Of course it's not going to happen with Apple unless anti-trust issues in US/EU forces Apple to open its platform for 3rd party app stores.

Coming back to Huawei, Playstore denial didn't have impact on its sales in China as Playstore was never there and China has hundreds of local app stores for android (although silicon denial will have an impact there). Similarly, having local Indian app stores does make strategic sense.

But as a consumer I'm worried about the privacy, security implications of a local app store without common International rules and scrutiny; Especially since I have personally seen what some of these leading apps can do with user privacy and security[1].

[1] https://abishekmuthian.com/paytm-says-to-me-that-its-pos-fea...

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threatofrain• 6 years ago

Just about every single app nowadays vacuums data, so as strange it sounds, I'm back to having Apple replace just about everything, even if Apple's version is inferior.

Oh, I need to use a simple todo app. I guess it needs access to my contacts because there's a legitimate feature for that. It also needs access to my calendar because there's a legitimate feature for that. Of course it needs location for location based todos.

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akritrime2• 6 years ago

I am not sure how I feel about the government being directly involved in creating the app store. On one hand, I believe the government should take measures to nurture the local startups and app, to give them a fair chance at growing. On the other hand, I don't think an app store created and managed by the government will have the right incentive to be competitive against foreign players and may just end up spiraling into a hot bureaucratic mess, with more and more hoops to jump through just to get an app on that platform.

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whimsicalism4• 6 years ago

may just end up spiraling into a hot bureaucratic mess

Many publicly traded corporations are not that much different. I am confident that an app-store is not that hard of a task relative to the revenue Google et al are extracting from mit.

If the govt can run a postal service competitively, then I don't see why what is basically a glorified file hosting service + reviews would be impossible.

If anything, I think we need more of these "public options" to compete with walled-garden "platform"/market-making tech companies like Google's play store, Venmo, Uber, etc.

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akritrime2• 6 years ago

If you want to register a company in India, its a convoluted maze of red tapes. While there have been a lot of improvements, the experience still leaves a lot to be desired (anecdotally). And while the govt postal service is exemplary, its hardly the norm. Yeah it is a glorified hosting service with reviews and I am not worried about the technical capability of the government, I am worried that the 'babu' culture of India will make this simple thing needlessly complicated.

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krisgenre• 6 years ago

How will the Indian govt. enforce an alternative app store? Will Apple bow down?

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KuriousCat2• 6 years ago

What are the efforts at other important levels? Silicon? Operating systems? Next generation architectures? Where is the leverage without being independent at the hardware level? Look what has happened to BSNL with 4G...

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KuriousCat2• 6 years ago

What are the efforts at other important levels? Silicon? Operating systems? Next gen architectures? Where is the leverage without independence in those?

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lstroud• 6 years ago

LOL. We don’t need 30%. We’ll pay for it through taxes instead.

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aaron695• 6 years ago

No government on Earth could run an App store.

Unless they mean force sellers to change defaults and dump on f-droid or something it's embarrassing they think they can.

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zeristor• 6 years ago

The article states that the Apple App store has 2% of the market, isn't that too little to bother about?

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bilalhusain3• 6 years ago

Since the title mentions the idea as well as the govt, let me add that while the idea is excellent, the current (Modi) govt is incompetent when it comes to execution, or may be has some other interests. Examples - failed demonetization, poor implementation of Goods and Services Tax (GST), failed Covid-19 lockdown. Most of what the govt does benefits select corporates (eg. rise of Jio). Interestingly, Paytm benefited the most during demonetization (2016) which is mentioned in the article and might have catalyzed the idea. The important part to notice is that demonetization was aimed at wiping out black money, GST was supposed to improve taxation, Covid-19 lockdown was supposed to dampen the long-term effect. However, these steps which were supposed to improve economy turned out to be counter-productive. Due to the poor or misdirected execution, India's economic is tanking down. So, although self-dependence is the stated goal, I am not sure where it will land. Moreover, the authoritarian tendencies don't help either. They are known to blackout journalists, assassinate lawyer, conduct media trials and put anyone speaking against them in jail. They will be a bigger bully than Google/Apple and pose a bigger risk to privacy.

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ahiknsr• 6 years ago

>>They are known to blackout journalists, assassinate lawyer, conduct media trials and put anyone speaking against them in jail.

Can you please share some citation for the assassination part. I don't think the Bar Council of India would be happy if a lawyer is assassinated by government.

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bilalhusain3• 6 years ago

I am talking about Justice Loya [1].

By the way, the govt has been very active in making sure that they have their loyal representatives in bureaucracy as well as in judiciary. Recently, the Supreme Court convicted a prominent lawyer for a tweet criticizing them [2]. It is very easy for them to dismiss cases which might show them in bad light. Media has no independence either. Eg. the case of Punya Prasun Bajpai [3] who's show was blacked out and eventually cancelled because it was critical of Modi.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brijgopal_Harkishan_Loya

[2] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/31/world/asia/india-bhushan-...

[3] https://thewire.in/media/punya-prasun-bajpai-abp-news-narend...

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anaganisk2• 6 years ago

Modi is a pure marketing person representing JIO and PayTM period, he just wants their spyware to be pre-installed. Nothing more, now if you want proof, watch the down votes. He is the kind of PM who doesn't meet journalists, doesn't take questions. And all he does is Marketing. No execution went atleast good till now.

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_throwaway_0093• 6 years ago

I have to explain this comment. Because it will look like politically charged content to outsiders. The following is a rough summary of Indian politics from my perspective:

The current leadership has done some fishy marketing tactics for sure. There are swathes of fake news on whatsapp and Facebook which lure unsuspecting citizens into thinking the current leadership is some kind of savior. The local media is mostly silent and doesn't broadcast any news that might affect the savior image of the leadership. These media outlets cognitively manipulate people by pushing uncertain news; eg: "did coward china leave the Ladakh region after Modi's roar?"

Sorry, my English is not very good. But this news is so manipulative when broadcast in the local language.

This combined with aggressive Hindutva identity politics, most naive people of India think Modi is a savior, while they are systematically looting this country. BJP is one of richest parties in the world and no one asked where all the money from de monetization went. Modi has not even called a press meet so far.

It doesn't help that the opposition party is exploited by Nehru family. INC had a great prime minister PV Narasimha Rao, but he was suppressed in the party itself. He is easily the best PM this cursed country has seen after Late Mr. Shastri.

Doesn't help there is a vocal minority of liberal arts graduates which even openly support terrorist forces in an attempt to rail against BJP. They call themselves left or liberals but they are not left. They openly support all kind of dammage from Muslim fundamentalists, and try to defame the long standing tradition of the country. You can see lot of those people on r/india echo chamber. You will be banned for opposing their viewpoints. The effect? You will be called as leftie/liberal/communist/anti-national for just opposing Modi, among your friend circles who are already likely to be manipulated from the fake news based propaganda.

TL; DR This country sucks.

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pkphilip2• 6 years ago

You made some good points and then started making the same points that the extreme Hindutva trolls make - that the students are supporters of muslim fundamentals merely because they ask questions. What is the "long standing tradition" that you are referring to?

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ra7• 6 years ago

I think you’re more or less accurate about the current political situation in the country. The BJP is no good, opposition is incompetent and the faux left liberals provide enough fodder for the country to remain polarized.

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wtmt2• 6 years ago

This is going to be a big mess. PayTM as a company isn’t known for respecting user privacy. The CEO’s brother was caught in a sting video saying they could sell any user’s information for a price (search online and you’ll find the video). All that these Indian startups care is for them to benefit and control everything. It’s not about equitable treatment. It’s more about regulatory capture and making sure that their apps somehow become pre-installed on devices. As for the government’s apps being pre-installed, one couldn’t ask for worse things. The COVID-19 contact tracing app, Aarogya Setu, needs location and Bluetooth access all the time “to help the user.” You can imagine what a bunch of such apps can do.

If you think I’m being hyperbolic, just wait for Reliance Jio to announce its own App Store as the first one. It’ll come with the full force of the government behind it (who in a government wouldn’t love a telecom and network provider that loves slurping all data and is against end to end encryption when it’s done by other competing apps like WhatsApp?)

I feel bad for all the poorer people who already are forced to buy cheap Android phones that don’t get updates and are loaded with crapware and what not. As much as I despise Google for tracking users, I believe Google will look like a saint in front of these companies.

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raghavtoshniwal2• 6 years ago

It would be messy for sure but there is somewhat precedence for it. WeChat operates its own AppStores and is subservient to the CCP. 'Running' your own AppStore is forbidden in the iOS terms of service but when you have the might of a billion people, some rules are okay to be broken.

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simonh• 6 years ago

WeChat mini-programs don't actually run as native code on the phone though. They're much more like web apps running on the WeChat back end, with WecChat acting as a browser to access them. Roblox does a similar thing, with interactive games from third parties running on the Roblox servers in the virtual environment. A third party app store where you install native code apps on the phone, directly accessing phone OS services and consuming local resources is a completely different thing, right?

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singularity2001• 6 years ago

At least we get a choice whether we want our privacy violated by CCP, silicon-NSA complex, or Indian aristocracy

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zepto13• 6 years ago

What choice? All of these are mandatory.

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colejohnson664• 6 years ago

This is going to be a big mess. PayTM as a company isn’t known for respecting user privacy.

Controversial opinion here, but this is part of the reason I like that Apple makes (practically) all purchases run through them. They don’t sell my information, and they have an incentive to not change that.

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higerordermap3• 6 years ago

Yeah, but apple devices are affordable for 0.1% of Indians.

Also, Android is not to be blamed here. The openness is why privacy-minded people can use F-Droid.

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monokh• 6 years ago

On the flip side, they become the central honey pot for every apple user ever. Most of whom sit generally further along the wealthy/important person scale. Incredibly high incentives there for exploit. The high stakes should translate to proportionate attention? One can only hope.

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reader_mode2• 6 years ago

What exactly is the cost of having my store activity sold to someone ?

30% cut is a very real one

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devdas5• 6 years ago

That is a threat to those not subject to US law.

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webmobdev• 6 years ago

but this is part of the reason I like that Apple makes (practically) all purchases run through them.

I vehemently disagree - in the name of "protecting privacy" Apple has been fooling users to believe that only Apple can be trusted with user data, and the biggest lie they sell is that they don't do anything with your data, unlike other corporates. From crippling Safari by allowing full cookies by default, and claiming to block trackers and browser fingerprinting (which a Google study itself has busted), to collecting user data in "anonymised" form Apple has been disingenuously mining its user's data with users given no choice.

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hhjinks• 6 years ago

That's not an argument for Apple forcing everyone else out. You can still choose to just interface with Apple services, even if other app stores or payment services are available.

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kelnos7• 6 years ago

Controversial opinion here, but this is part of the reason I like that Apple makes (practically) all purchases run through them. They don’t sell my information, and they have an incentive to not change that.

I'm sympathetic to this, because I do think it's great that Apple values user privacy. But I think it's unfortunate that the perception is that the only way to get that privacy is to use a heavily locked-down device that the user doesn't actually have control over, and that the entity protecting your privacy has to impose strict restrictions on what you can do with that device.

Obviously Google will never be a good example of a company that protects user data and user privacy; their entire business model depends on the opposite. But that doesn't mean that the concept of a company selling a premium product that protects user privacy by default couldn't also allow users to do whatever they want with their device.

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lukeplato• 6 years ago

I don't see where in the article they say that PayTM would be processing payments. From what I read, it just says that PayTM was in violation of store policy. I think the parent poster was implying that PayTM shouldn't be hosted on the app store because their violations needed to fixed.

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diebeforei485• 6 years ago

Apple also makes it easy to unsubscribe to any app's subscription. You don't have to call some number and wait on hold.

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cocoa19• 6 years ago

Thought experiment. Imagine that MasterCard charged 30% of every purchase at the groceriy store, restaurant, pay gas or shop online.

Or... what if Windows charged software developers 30% of sales of any product. And Microsoft wouldn't let you give away free software, in the name of "privacy" whatever that means for Apple.

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r73ydhdh• 6 years ago

It seems really out of touch to simultaneously acknowledge the struggling poor while also demonizing a practice that allows them to be showered in free services despite their poverty. People have bigger issues than digital privacy and frankly if the American approach is so lucrative then Indian app developers will gravitate towards American practices anyway. Who knows though, maybe the EU will finally come back from their their lunch breaks and show the world an even better (in the real way) monetization model.

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econcon• 6 years ago

Modi couldn't ban alibaba let alone Google play store.

India today has no eBay equivalent or even Alibaba or Taobao equivalent, without these I don't see b2b or even exports growing much.

eBay used to be the only way to find stuff like rare metal, or niche tools and spare parts.

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nine_zeros• 6 years ago

What is stopping the government from simply banning single monopoly app store and forcing Google to allow installation of multiple private app stores?

Why does it have to be a government app store?

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flak48• 6 years ago

Because the saner option has lesser PR value

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sbmthakur4• 6 years ago

How can we be sure that this app store won't charge any charges or commission?

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rishav_sharan• 6 years ago

Far too many optimistic voices here and that scares me. I don't see this app store being about providing alternatives. that's just a talking point.

This app store is all about forcing every android sold in India to have a system installed govt driven app, which will report back to the govt on tons of private information about the device and owner. Information that Indian govt will be too incompetent to keep safe and given its authoritarian nature, should never have access to.

This is an authoritarian nightmare abut to happen. Modi wants India to move in the direction that China chose. And this scares me a lot.

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tomcat27• 6 years ago

authoritarianism is when a ex judicial company has so strong influence over regulations and those adjudicated arbitrarily and in-transparent and the effected party couldn't do a damn thing about it..

while it's not the best solution, there is merit to it.

one of the role of governance could be to help setup an environment for healthy competition. Well it took decades of work at NASA before one private player like space x created momentum outside government.

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bilbo0s3• 6 years ago

I agree with you, the worst is about to happen worldwide.

The Indians clearly want more control. The Chinese obviously are never going to relinquish any control. Even the South Americans and especially the Africans are starting to look at regionally fenced mobile and internet services as a method of both more control over social media and growing their economies. (As well as providing jobs for their youth.)

I think the saying was something like freedom dies to thunderous applause.

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phatfish3• 6 years ago

I'm not happy with governments taking such an active role. Ideally they help home-grown alternatives and push out American/Chinese corporations to give them space.

That is probably too little too late at this point though. Google, Facebook, Apple et al. have shown they will not stop until they dominate digital markets worldwide. Aggressive intervention by governments is the only way for them to wrestle back control.

At least with the "Indian Government App Store" there is no smoke and mirrors with regards to who has access to the data. Tech companies hand over whatever governments ask for anyway.

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parasubvert5• 6 years ago

If you read the subtext of the other Epic v. Apple threads, this is the point: government is somehow going to do a better job than Apple or Google.

That or government will mandate the Libertarian Wild West on our phones where anyone can install anything from any store. Mobile operators alone will balk at that.

This is a fever dream from a new generation of publishers and developers that have to learn how this worked in the past: the market evolved, the old platforms withered or became irrelevant. Consent decrees don’t fix things, at best they add a counterweight on the scale. See: Microsoft, still making money hand over fist due to the PC monopoly that no one cares about.

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akira2501• 6 years ago

That or government will mandate the Libertarian Wild West on our phones where anyone can install anything from any store.

It's a little disconcerting to me that you would see allowing me to install whatever software I want on a device I fully own as a "Libertarian wild west."

Mobile operators alone will balk at that.

Why? Don't fixed-location ISPs have the same issue?

the market evolved

I think the concern is it didn't evolve naturally.. it evolved to this configuration due to the whims of a few companies in strong monopoly positions. Believing that we have the best solution available is again, a bit disconcerting.

due to the PC monopoly that no one cares about.

They were sued for this. The government won. Then the next administration basically vacated the actions against them. People care.

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ptx2• 6 years ago

Libertarian Wild West on our phones where anyone can install anything from any store

An important distinction is that while I can install whatever I want on my phone and you can install whatever you want on your phone, removing Apple's monopoly on distribution wouldn't make our phones world-writable to "anyone".

Mobile operators alone will balk at that.

They didn't. We already had multiple app stores for J2ME, Windows CE and Symbian apps before Apple started the trend of locking things down.

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kelnos7• 6 years ago

Mobile operators alone will balk at that.

I don't think that's a consideration anymore. When the iPhone was brand-new, Apple had a ton of trouble negotiating with carriers who were used to controlling what goes on their network. Nowadays, carriers have very little say beyond things like PCTRB certification and a mostly-cursory review of OS-level OTA updates. When it comes to apps (or even app stores), the carriers don't even get notified, let alone get veto powers.

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jariel• 6 years ago

"Apple threads, this is the point: government is somehow going to do a better job than Apple or Google."

No, it's absolutely not.

It's about user and vendor choice.

Nobody is suggesting that the 'US Government' make an alternative app store.

But a lot of people are suggesting that people should be able to buy directly from Epic, Adobe - or whoever.

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akshaybhalotia• 6 years ago

A government that knows what it is doing may do a better job at it.

So let me put in decreasing order of who will do a good job according to what is good for the users:

- government that knows what it is doing

- government

- authoritarian government

- authoritarian government that knows what it is doing

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airocker2• 6 years ago

Privacy and Freedom are the same thing. If you dont have privacy, you cannot do anything as a group or individual that goes against anyone powerful. Freedom can also be thought of as sovereignty. I think if any government including USA has to be sovereign, it has to take privacy of citizens in its own hands. Democratic countries have to devise ways that this data cannot be used to influence elections. Otherwise, Keep in mind Google is no democracy. This data cannot be better off with a corporation because they maintain their database security better.

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Barrin92• 6 years ago

If you dont have privacy, you cannot do anything as a group or individual that goes against anyone powerful. Freedom can also be thought of as sovereignty.

Seems like a pretty one-sided American cowboy version of freedom.

More accurate take I think is that privacy is often a tool of the powerful stopping collective action of citizens. Finance, taxes, and payment compensation are a pretty trivial example. The rich and powerful love their financial privacy, ordinary citizens gain little from it. Wage earners who benefit from their status love that they don't have to share their income with coworkers who may be discriminated against.

I think the opposite is true. It's not privacy but transparency that is required if groups are supposed to be able to take action against the powerful.

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amelius2• 6 years ago

Perhaps this will force Google and Apple to come with alternatives without the downsides you mention?

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dodobirdlord2• 6 years ago

This is the downside to involving regulation in a technological space. Government intervention isn't a technological problem and doesn't admit technological solutions. The government can ban any alternative or workaround you can imagine in specific or in general, and moreover can ban the act itself of working on alternatives and workarounds.

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accurrent2• 6 years ago

Fact of the matter is there's nothing too scary about living in China as long as you are not involved in politics. The scary thing about a BJP lead authoritarian regime is that unlike the CCP, BJP is made of a bunch of idiots. CCP is authoritarian, but they have made sure every Chinese has food on the table, a roof on their head and one can live an honest life in China without having to be corrupt. Crime rates in China are fairly low and one can walk on the street in the middle of the night without living in fear of lynching or raping. This is not true of India. Even doing simple things requires you to have connections or pay bribes.

Additionally, CCP actually thinks through its policies whereas BJP rolls a policy out and then does a 180 degree turn. Just look at the COVID-19 epidemic. China actually managed to end it because it was authoritarian (even if you don't believe the CCP's numbers you cannot deny that they have managed the situation far better than a lot of other governments). BJP had the opportunity to do so but somewhere along the way decided that they could just follow Trump.

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danbolt• 6 years ago

Fact of the matter is there's nothing too scary about living in China as long as you are not involved in politics.

Just curious, who decides what's politics and what isn't in China?

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dodobirdlord2• 6 years ago

The fact that the CCP are competent authoritarians and the BJP are incompetent semi-authoritarians isn't really in dispute. But the claim that there's nothing scary about living in China if you're not "involved in politics" (whatever that means) is completely absurd.

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jlokier• 6 years ago

there's nothing too scary about living in China as long as you are not involved in politics

Does "being an Uyghur" count as involved in politics, as that sounds difficult to avoid if you're stuck with it? The reports of torture, forced sterilisation, detention sound rather scary to me.

every Chinese has food on the table, a roof on their head and one can live an honest life

Maybe I'm misinformed, but what I read tells me "every" is a stretch here. I don't automatically trust Wikipedia on everything. But the fact the USA passed a law with strong bipartisan support makes me treat it a little more seriously.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uyghurs#Persecution_of_Uyghurs...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uyghur_Human_Rights_Policy_Act

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disown• 6 years ago

It's a good start, but doesn't go far enough. India should also temporarily ban google, facebook, microsoft, apple, intel, etc until their local software companies are strong enough to compete. India, like china, is sufficiently large and important enough to create their own tech ecosystem. But given their track record, I really don't have much confidence in india to get it right. Hope I am wrong though as the world needs genuine competition the tech space.

Now maybe the EU should get their act together? The EU was able to create airbus to compete with boeing, why can't they do the same for their own version of microsoft, google, apple, facebook, etc? They are certainly wealthy enough and given their large population, they certainly could produce the talent to drive such an initiative.

If the EU thinks their private sector is going to compete against state-backed corporations like google, facebook, microsoft, apple, intel, etc, then they really have drunk the kool-aid. The EU's private sector can no more create a competitor to these tech giants as it could have created an aerospace company to compete with boeing. These companies are fundamentally "private" state companies.

If india, EU, etc succeed, then perhaps ASEAN, Africa, etc will follow their examples and create their tech ecosystem within their economic bloc.

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jmpman• 6 years ago

So much for Apple moving their manufacturing to India.

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throw93• 6 years ago

I would not trust any state run App Store. In past their “Aarogya Setu” app has been criticized for privacy concerns. Note that the people who complained about Google’s review policy aren’t indie Developers but big Players like PayTM who benefited immensely from demonetization mandate. Clearly violating a policy that’s in place to protect the user and then complaining that your app got taken down is ridiculous. Agree, App Store review process isn’t perfect. There are mistakes in review process which get some apps wrongfully rejected. But I would rather have stricter policies than no/questionable review process. Another point is specific to this govt. The govt and the PM don’t exactly have a great track record when it comes to minorities, which makes such interference more scary.

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blntechie• 6 years ago

Government run app store would just be a wedge to bring Jio app store in.

Reliance will become like one of those chaebol companies in Korea, pervasive in every Indian’s life with little to no other options.

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henvic• 6 years ago

So we should trust a state to have an app store on our phones? Thanks, but no thanks.

I'd rather not even have any state app instead.

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ramshanker• 6 years ago

>>>Also, talks within the government indicate that it may ask Google and Apple to pre-install Indian App Store in all phones sold in India in near future. This particular request is likely to face counter from the American companies. <<<<<<

THIS is the only time, I am more inclined to side with Chinese style of control. Sovereign nation out to decide what is good for their people. India is a chaotic democracy, but a function one. I will rather support my government's way of ensuring "Privacy and Security" than Apple's. We do have equally capable people over here. Slowly but surely, things move in positive direction. No need of dictation by any foreign multi-national.

The way Google banned PayTM for few hours, until they removed some of the features from the App, come-on, Indian Laws are good enough to decide what is legal / correct / etc. etc. This was a very visible case of an American company imposing "Their Policy" on things which only court / government should get to decide.

I am mostly IN with this proposal.

EDIT: I guess I used harsh words, but something definitely needs to be done with the current duopoly.

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uname_amiy• 6 years ago

Considering what the central government said back in 2017[1] >"There is no fundamental right to privacy and even if it is assumed as a fundamental right, it is multifaceted. Every facet can’t be ipso facto considered a fundamental right."

This doesn't sound like a good idea to give the control of an app store to the government. Government will for sure try to track and spy on users and remove any app it doesn't like and quality will be a joke.

[1] https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/right-to-privacy-not-...

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ab_testing• 6 years ago

I have a contrarian view that this is a very good ideas to get rid of the duopoly of Apple and Google App Store. These companies charge 30% of all sales and in a country like India where margins are low, that can be a huge chunk of profits . I also believe that there should be a baseline for what apps can come preinstalled on a new phone - because India is a hotbed for low cost Chinese mobiles that are subsidized by the CCP and in turn send all user data to China.

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ineedasername• 6 years ago

I don't like a government owned & controlled app store any better than the current status quo.

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tebura• 6 years ago

I am happy with this decision. There should be alternative to these stores. Let people decide which store to choose. Looting devs for 30% income is bad decision.

Also recently Google banned few Indian apps. The way I see it, Indian govt wants to make sure, essential apps are in their control, not in private companies'.

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throaway1990• 6 years ago

bad idea. indian companies haven't shown any competence or compassion in this space.

if they force Apple to pre-install appstore on phones? say bye-bye to $10 B manufacturing dream.

Having local controls and slightly stricter rules is good! But these chinese-commie style is bad!

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amelius2• 6 years ago

Why, in the firsts place, is Apple allowed to have a monopoly on something the user already paid for? I think the law should address this question, as clearly the current practice is not in favor of the customer nor the market.

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ilaksh• 6 years ago

I'm sure that this will get buried or ignored as usual, but I find it very strange that no one evens discusses the possibility of using decentralized technologies to create public marketplaces in cases such as this.

This seems to be a good opportunity for cryptocurrency and something like a distributed database or content-oriented networking with indexing. Such as for example Ether and OrbitDB.

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umaobviously• 6 years ago

I feel like india needs to sort out abject poverty, lack of sanitation and rampant discrimination before moving on to government mandated spy apps. This is yet another example of that country’s government giving the impression of a democracy working for the greater good when tens of millions of people suffer. Pretty disgusting.

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fellellor• 6 years ago

Anything the government manages will become a complete shit show. I have no hopes for this.

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hijklmno• 6 years ago

Although government control will lead to more problems down the line, at least, this has opened serious debate about the unfair control Apple and Google has over the App stores.

Third part app stores should be allowed, and in the end, hopefully, the best one will come out as a winner.

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LockAndLol• 6 years ago

Being surveiled by Google, Apple and Facebook (America), and soon in greater effect by the Indian state isn't exactly appealing, but at least it means competition I guess.

Honestly, what alternative exists? Corporations won't be OK with publishing on F-Droid, but is there some kind of opensource store that can be used for commercial apps? If some people put their heads together, maybe they could come up with something opensource that respects privacy, is secure and allows closed-source stuff to be published.

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mensetmanusman• 6 years ago

Interesting.

Suppose Epic wins its case against Apple and judges force alternative app stores, I wonder if that would mean tmobile, at&t, et al. would all then be allowed to install their app store with adware into iPhones...

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Modi government to set up app store alternative to Google Play, Apple App Store

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