More details in [0].
[0] https://www.slashgear.com/android-app-bundles-are-replacing-...
Interesting coincidence.
I don't think devs were really creating enough APK's on the various device dimensions to do this efficiently themselves.
They make it sound like you can't distribute your code using other platforms but you can (so far) based on what I've seen (using .apk)
But smaller app sizes (and the other benefits) are not anti-consumer features.
Android cannot afford being a walled garden like Apple and I don't see them limiting installations. As long as they get users into putting data into Google services, they'll let both OEMs and users customize anything in the platform.
I install all my apps with aurora to cut down on data collected about me by Google. I don't log in with a Google account at all.
For F-droid it's a lesser problem because they require open source software anyway and make reproducible builds to APK themselves. The problem is just that it's really hard to live with only F-droid apps :(
