Ads upon ads upon ads
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A single row of ads would be ok, but having this many plus an ad showing up first, where the search results should be… Oof
No it wouldn’t. Phones aren’t cheap.
They can be. I bought a Galaxy s22 with a broken screen for $150, and my carrier just gave me an $1100 credit for it on a new iphone. I don’t need an iPhone, and I will be selling it to get yet another cheap phone and pocketing the money, but it goes to show just how much phones do not cost to the people producing them
Dam that’s a hilarious life hack lol.
I’m on a 12 Pro with no intentions of upgrading but when I go to I’m gonna try and find a new broken flagship to turn in too lmao.
The Android licence is free and the Play Store infrastructure has to support tens of millions of devices.
I’m not saying this is an acceptable level, but Samsung ain’t putting a dollar toward Google running the store, in fact, they’d much prefer to run and maintain their own.
I guess hoovering up all your data ain’t enough.
They shouldn’t rely on ads to make money back on a phone IMHO.
I don’t think ads showing something related to what I’m looking for are bad in and if themselves. I want to find related content, the problem is that these are often not in any way related to what I’m looking for. It’s just a list of who paid to be listed there.
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Linux is great! It’s such a zen environment.
Apple’s App Store has some ads. In my experience the first search result is always an ad, and every now and then the Today list features an ad. Not sure how much the normal data/results are skewed. It’s a store so you have to expect some kinda marketing tricks to sell you more. They tend to feature popular stuff.
It’s nowhere near as abhorrent as the post here.
I haven’t run into TikTok unless it has been featured or if it is the top result in the popular (free) apps chart. I wouldn’t dare searching for it 😆
i dont even touch the galaxy store unless i absolutely have to, something about it just feels so… off?
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On the App Store, it’s also under the “essentials” section. The “Must-have iPhone apps”. Lmfao. I hate that state of technology in 2023. Burn it all down.
What would you expect the algorithm to be if not to recommend the apps installed and used the most on their platform?
I don’t use TikTok or FB, but it’s hard to blame them for suggesting apps that they have concrete usage data on saying they are the most used.
Just leaving this here: Aurora Store
Aside of the lack of ads, I now depend on Aurora Store for batch app updates because the cocksuckers at Google Play have allowed devs to force app version updates even when you have disabled automatic updates for that specific app.
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IDK… I root all of my devices ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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Isn’t that one of the things the FTC says can’t void warranties? They’ve been going after companies for those lousy warranty void stickers lately.
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Agree, there’s a risk even if you don’t break anything.
What is the difference with F-Droid?
It’s an alternative client to the Play Store. It does not access F-Droid repos.
Others answered you, but aurora also has an F-Droid replacement called Aurora Droid.
Aurora store is basically anonymous access to the official Google Play store.
You can download any app because unlike the Google Play store Aurora doesn’t send your phones hardware ID, so if for example your phone is rooted you can get the Disney Plus app anyway.
Fdroid is an alternate app store. They have different things than the Google Play store. They respect your privacy and will let you download any app that is ever been uploaded to them, Even old versions of an app.
Thanks to Lemmy, my phone went full FOSS. Always go full FOSS.
One word: F-Droid! I’m literally only searching there for Apps first, often I find it. Send them some love, if you can afford it! Wouldn’t know how to watch YouTube anymore without New Pipe and stuff, listening to music via ViMusic, all ad-free. https://f-droid.org/en/
I run /e/OS with a custom app store, App Lounge. It combines F-Droid and the Play Store via Aurora. It even embeds Exodus Privacy Ratings and is simply awesome. You can even log in with your Google account and download paid apps that way. Pretty neat.
Is there an easy way to see which of my installed apps are available through f-droid? Or do I need to search for each one manually.
I’d also like to know that.
i just discover ViMusic thanks to your comment, i love it!! thank you for mentioning it!!!
I discovered ViMusic a while ago but Youtube music keeps cencoring the songs I like so I will probably seitch back to mp3’s soon, cool app tho!
If you do, check out plexamp.
You can self host a small Plex server on a raspberry pi and store all the music there. Play via plexamp and Plex does all the metadata for you
Use jellyfin instead, its FOSS and amazing.
The eternal debate, Jellyfin vs. Plex 😀
I tried both, i prefer Plex (also because my TV doesn’t have a Jellyfin App and i don’t want to have another mini-PC just to play Jellyfin on my TV)
I hear great things about Jellyfin, but I’m in the Plex camp too. The availability of the Plex app is a big factor. I’m a bit biased in that I bought a lifetime membership years ago so I get all the premium features as well. I believe they still offer deals on plex lifetime membership from time to time. It is really worth it!
Yup, got the 20% off of lifetime a couple months ago.
Didn’t regret it.
To each their own of course, I just want other people to be aware of an alternative to Plex if they haven’t heard about it.
That sounds awesome!
Saved this comment, thank you!
laughs in F-Droid
Luckily I only have F-Droid on mine.
What, no love for the Ad Store?
“Thanks for the F-Droid”
- Dirty Mike and the Boys
F-Droid for the main stuff, Aurora Store when I’m feeling dirty.
it got worse and worse over the last 1-2 years. this days you can’t even open an app description page on desktop anymore. you search for the name…and you can’t click on the app listing. it just gives you the option to install on your phone but not to read the store page. you only get to it by searching on Google for it. and the mobile app is like you said shit too. often you can’t even find an app and get random ads for other shitty apps.
It sounds like you’re browsing the web signed in to your Google account. Sign out and clear cookies, or go Incognito.
what has this to do with signed in our not? google does the same if you’re not logged in
Works well here. I just checked on desktop to be sure they have not broken it now - nope, I can browse apps normally.
maybe it depends on the region then. I’m in germany.
what has this to do with signed in our not? google does the same if you’re not logged in
I mean, it’s Google. What did you expect? Android is free because having it on a ton of cheap phones helps Google collect data and sell ads.
Side-rant:
Apple’s got plenty of problems and anti-consumer behavior, too, don’t get me wrong… but it’s incredible how far they’re able to enforce privacy, down to the hardware level, while still giving devs almost the same level of control over OS features as Android.
Like, look at how ARKit does point cloud sharing vs ARCore. iOS limits sharing scanned AR environments to peer-to-peer local connections, and it’s a totally opaque object. Android meanwhile uploads your scanned room to a Google server, and the privacy terms for that data are the same as the ones for Youtube, search, maps, etc.
It drives me crazy how many FOSS nerds will rail against Facebook’s data collection and chokepoint capitalism, but then go on to praise Android for standing up to that no-good Apple. They hear “I can sideload apps” and they drop all of their recent cynicism about why they’re getting nifty stuff at a hefty discount.
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I mean, FOSS nerds run android de-googled (or more specifically never install google services on a custom ROM).
but it’s incredible how far they’re able to enforce privacy, down to the hardware level, while still giving devs almost the same level of control over OS features as Android.
I don’t give a shit about devs. I want that control for users. Until they allow users to do what they want, they can get fucked.
Privacy through the use of user restrictions is not acceptable either. It’s my god damn phone, don’t you dare tell me what I can’t do on it “for my protection”.
It’s like saying a security firm is the best in the world at keeping clients safe, because they lock those clients in a vault and don’t let them leave.
Privacy for freedom is not a good trade for those enthusiasts your frustrated with. They will accept Google’s shit because the alternative is getting in a fucking cage.
That’s not an Android problem, that’s a Google Play Services problem. You can run Android without all the Google bullshit.
Not to mention that you can at least install third party app stores like f-droid. For me Apple is the epitome of evil giant corporation that is consistently abusing it’s market power and getting a pass from regulatory bodies.
Don’t get me wrong, Google aren’t great either, but if I have to choose between them I would pick Google any day.
I’ll give apple this one thing.
They are really, really good at backup.
I recently had to wipe my dad’s iPhone, I manually backed up his pictures just to make absolutely certain they were all saved but everything else I didn’t even bother.
I logged him back into his apple account and everything immediately started downloading again.
With Google, you’ll get your text messages. Your contacts, your pictures, your videos. Maybe your YouTube history and subscriptions but any random app probably uses Google backup services but it might not.
I’ll give Apple another thing
I was on Android for years. Galaxies and Pixels. Around the 2 year mark they were always barely working and with a battery that needed to be topped off several times a day. Slow, hot, poor battery, glitchy. Always
I got a 12 pro at release and it’s rock solid as the day I got it and I have no intentions of upgrading it. I’ve used it since launch with no case and yeah it’s for a few scratches here and there but despite all the drops etc it has no cracks either. It’s a tank. A tank that just keeps fucking working as it should.
I can’t scrobble my music to last.fm on iOS without some janky workaround. The “almost same level of control” part of what you said relies on an assumption that only the set of use cases explicitly determined by Apple as ones that “matter” are worth supporting. That it’s more important to prevent the user from explicitly allowing a scrobbling app permission to read the music player app’s now playing notification than for the device to be able to perform this simple function.
This point of difference doesnt have any meaningful impact on collection of my data. It just stops the device from being able to do the function I want. So that what, I can sleep easier knowing that Apple designed a slick interface to point out data vectors which were already implied to be collected? It used to feel like a smartphone with training wheels, now they’ve just locked up the handlebars so that it’s easier to go straight.
I’m with you on this, I used to avoid using apple products at all costs due to the way they are so anti consumer and lock you in heavily to their ecosystem.
But in terms of security and privacy they aren’t even playing on the same level. Android will never be as privacy or security focused as apple due to the way google runs its business so long term a Linux mobile operating system would be the dream.
Until then I stick with what I can use which is the apple products for now.
Apple does objectively suck for many reasons though.
Also, important to note that what you’re describing as their privacy focus is a deliberate rebranding exercise after a huge ,global failure with icloud and things like police access to their systems/data and public backlash.
They are only here now, in this brief moment, because of necessity and like any of this, it’s typically a pendulum. As soon as they don’t have to do this (which probably sounds a lot like users like you defending their security bonafides publicly on their behalf), they will start to creep away and de-prioritize privacy and security.
Apple makes money by selling expensive devices.
Google makes money by selling ads.
You can figure out the rest of the equation.
I like how like 10 years ago everyone went crazy about the apps. It seemed like you could have an app for everything, and everyone was enthusiastic about it. Nowadays I only open Play Store when I am in the need of specific utility, or to buy some classic RPG/other game ported to Android.
Most of the stuff in the store is just unusable shit.
And we need a store with actual quality apps (with no micro transactions, and being reviewed by people who care about usability), because certainly Google Play is not a good source for them.
Agreed. Mostly everything in the store can also be easily done in a browser too.
And we need a store with actual quality apps (with no micro transactions, and being reviewed by people who care about usability), because certainly Google Play is not a good source for them.
Fdroid apps CAN have microtransactions I believe, and they’re not curated either, but overall, the quality is much better than Play Store and most apps are free and open source.
Alternatively, for games in particular, Apple Arcade is great, but it’s a subscription (cheap if combined with Music, TV and iCloud storage, otherwise several euros per month). The games aren’t allowed to have MTX or ads if they want to be on Arcade. But of course that requires moving to iOS (where the app store is much better than Play Store, BUT you don’t get alternatives like Fdroid on Android.)
I use a huge amount of open source f-droid apps, like my keyboard, my mail app, the one i’m typing on right now, SD maid 2, (Revanced). in my opinion these apps are just better. not only because i can trust them, also because they simply do what i downloaded them for, in the most efficient way possible.
I’ve lost all of my faith in mobile gaming ecosystem ever since I saw that talk of the two guys that created a bot for generating and uploading as many slot machine games to the playstore as possible, just generic pull a lever, see an ad and that’s it, based on a random keyword like “owl slot machine” or “bathtub sloth machine” with pictures pulled from google images, that let the bot run for a few months and then found out that they made literally thousands of dollars of ad money.
I see Google’s review process for apps on the Play Store is as bad as their review process for extensions on the Chrome Web Store. Every couple of months ago, a new batch of malware is found on CWS, and you almost never see that with Firefox’s add-on marketplace, even when accounting for Firefox-based browsers having a much smaller userbase. And I’ve noticed that when it does happen, Mozilla is much quicker in laying down the banhammer than Google. Hell, Mozilla banned a browser hijacker named FVD Speed Dial, whilw Google has it featured on CWS to this day. ~Cherri
When I was looking for a good ad-blocker a few years back, I remember stumbling upon something like… Nano Defender? I’m not sure what was the name, but it was one of the few succesful anti-adblocks that managed to get past most of adblock killers, and was generally recommended on Reddit.
After a few years, the guy sold the extension to some Indian company that promptly infected it with credential stealing malware, which compromised most of my and my GFs accounts. Ever since that, I just don’t use any extensions apart from ublock and Bitwarden, since it’s just a huge security risk.
But I’m slowly building up the willpower to finally switch to Mulvad Browser + VPN, I really like the approach they took to fingerprinting - just use Tor Browser, don’t need any extensions, and it’s bundled with a VPN - so every other user has exactly the same fingerprint and IP as you, thus making you untrackable even by the most soffisticated methods. (Well, apart from the ones that uses ML to fingerprint you based on your typing and mouse habits…). But I have already gotten used to Librewolf, and it would mean getting rid of Bitwarden extension, and that’s -effort- :(
Wait, what? A shitty Google product? Plagued by ads and spyware? No way!
As others have pointed out here, use Aurora Store or F-Droid.
I’m not exactly sure when it started, but Play Store now has “Limited time events” that further block what I’m actually looking for. I don’t give a damn about some gacha/loot box promotion some soulless pay2win app is advertising, I just want to browse for apps I might like.
Try out Aurora Store. Just started testing it. Looks and works similar to play store but without adds. You
can login withshould not use your main google account.https://f-droid.org/en/packages/com.aurora.store/
/edit/
Pro tip - Avoid using your main account because it might get blocked permanently by Google.
Why?
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Do you know what part of the TOS that is violated? I looked through it and didn’t see anything that seemed to apply.
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Thanks for that, looks pretty nice. Though I’m concerned now trading Google might block your account for using it.
When I’m installing F-Droid I get a security alert about it being developed for a previous android version and that it doesn’t include latest privacy updates. How legit is that? I’m downloading the apk throught their official website https://f-droid.org/
Just be glad you’re on Android and have alternatives to this. Poor Apple users are stuck with whatever Apple decided to do with the app store.
Poor Apple users kinda don’t have to deal with this shit
Can confirm on my own device. Only ad in sight is for two dots itself at the top … I kept scrolling looking for one and didn’t see any.
Lol the ad is also the very same thing you’re searching for
Whats the ad situation on app store, do they aggressively push stuff into your throats there as well?
Not at all from my experience. The App Store generally looks cleaner and more organised.
I hope for your sake that they at least stick to that. The google approach seems to be that they are too big to fail and that they can keep doing what they want, and what they want, apparently is more space for ads!
Unfortunately that seems to be the case with Google products (see YouTube on mobile). Most users might not even care about the excessive ads and Google knows that.
Luckily, there seem to be many alternatives on Android. If Apple was to ad-ify the App Store, you wouldn’t have that many options (outside of jailbreaking and maybe the Altstore).
Google made 80% of its revenue from ads last year. No wonder they’re trying to force ads everywhere they can
That’s soon to change when regulations come in to force apple to allow sideloading.
Google is an advertising company.
I’d take the in-store ads if they enforced consistent behavior for in-app ads. It’s infuriating to have an ad that plays for 30sec or whatever, only to then force you to wait ANOTHER 5-15sec on the title card for the close button to appear. Or, worse yet, have an ad that automatically opens the Play Store unless you can hit the 2px close button.
Afaik it’s not nearly at all like this. Doesn’t change the fact that you have absolutely no alternatives, though. If apple did decide to do this, you couldn’t just sideload the apps yourself.
Yes, Poor Apple Users are stuck with no ads at all! What a Shame
Yeah Apple doesn’t do this to the users whatsoever.
