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0 pointsmysteria8mo ago0 comments

> If someone told us in the 1950s a TV manufacturer was exerting pressure on our forms of information distribution and was choosing which voices get a seat at the table, we'd rightly call that archaic and wonder why people would accept a technology provider as a market-shaping force. But today we accept it nonetheless.

A smartphone from Google or Apple is also pretty much required for certain government apps, banking/financial services, and so forth. I wouldn't call it a stretch to say that in the future it would be mandatory to have these duopoly controlled devices on your person at all times, like how you need to carry an ID card.

Many of those apps don't work on rooted phones or custom ROMs without workarounds and doing so is a TOS violation in many cases as well. Also imagine what it would be like if your Google or Apple account got banned by accident with no human support to sort it out.

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pjc508mo ago

South Korea managed to tie their government ID system to ActiveX for many years: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_compatibility_issues_in_So...

Entire country was stuck on IE6 for far too long.

The UK e-visa system worries me for similar reasons: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/online-immigration-status-evisa

andrepd8mo ago

That's an excellent point. I use Android LineageOS with no google apps. The amount of bullshit that I, a literal computer science PhD, have to put up with to somewhat avoid the more pernicious parts of the monopoly, is insane. Critical and even mandatory parts of my life (banking, government services) require me to engage with google in one way or another.

Non-technical people have absolutely no hope.

mysteriaOP8mo ago

I actually put up with Lineage for many years before it got so bad that I had to switch to an iPhone. Before 2020 many apps still worked fine with it. All my computers are Linux and I self host everything, but I just couldn't risk an account lockout or a broken bank app.

Honestly I wish there was a legal requirement for those services to provide full access via a relatively open platform (like a web site), not a mobile app.

hamilyon28mo ago

Apple and Google censorship of apps not getting nearly as much attention and publicity as it deserves.

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