"Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community."

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If other comments are mistaken, the thing to do is respectfully provide correct information, so we all learn. Putting others down, posing superciliously, and so on only adds noise and evokes worse from others.

https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor...

1) How come you get to decide how Google chooses to make money?

2) Shouldn’t matter. Their platform, their choice (and if you disagree because they’re a monopoly, you can’t just not pay them without consequences, the court has to handle those things). You could also say that all the money they’ve spent to make Android a de facto world standard that can benefit you as a developer is what you’re paying for.

Without apps android wouldn't have become a standard. Look what happened to Windows Mobile. So Google owes the developers the current status of Androids.

Android is there because they were quick to move ( first movers advantage).

Windows phone tried plenty to sway developers, so it's that would have worked. It would have been the money incentives Microsoft did, since it was part of it's marketing.

Not because they actually swayed developers.

> 1) How come you get to decide how Google chooses to make money?

Because app developers have no choice but to accept Google's rules if they want anyone using their app. Do you really want to give Google unlimited, unilateral power over a whole business sector here?

Not at all! But I don’t think I should get to decide it for them, except through the regular democratic process and then being dragged to court.

But that's exactly what we're talking about and going towards! No one is saying they're king and I say so so it must be. We're having a discussion so that these thing can move towards court!

Google is actually reviewing. hosting, promoting and distributing your app, I wouldn’t say that’s nothing.

The distribution costs may be minute in the case of this developers app if it’s only downloaded a few thousand times a month, but they exist. And in the case of something like Spotify it’s likely Petabytes a month of bandwidth.

Google isn't doing that out of the goodness of their heart though, having a robust app ecosystem is essential and they're doing it for their own benefit. I think there's a strong case that it's a big part of the reason iOS and Android ended up winning against the fairly large number of competing phone operating systems.

So while it's true that there is a financial cost to Google for hosting your app, there's also a financial gain in the sense that the presence of your app contributes to the popularity/viability of their platform.

I don’t know how the “goodness of their heart” is relevant, but I think you’ve just arrived at the concept of a business: revenue, expenses and profit.

The point is that the issue is often framed as "ungrateful developers" taking advantage of the infrastructure Google provides when in reality developers making use of Google's infrastructure provides value to Google in itself.

Aren't apps like Spotify and Netflix the ones where you don't pay through the app but bypass the store? That is, the ones that cost the most don't pay much to Google and Apple but the small developers who can't fight back and rely on the money have no choice.

Apparently these apps have to integrate their billing systems with Google Play by September.

https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2020/09/listening-...

Wait and see

Theft and breach of contract are different crimes, sure.

But I don't think that distinction makes much difference.

Theft is a crime.

Breach of contract is not one. It's not even a tort. An EULA has no legal value, despite what Google would love you to believe.

"Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith."

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HN's third favorite pastime: extrapolating comments and putting words in other poster's mouths.

Please stop posting in the flamewar style to HN. It's not what this site is for.

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