The discussion I stumbled upon, about this SSH app for Android, is really worrying. Will Google really manage to make it impossible to root your phone?
But there’s more to this, it’s more complicated. In the Big Picture, Google has every incentive to make these changes — they lead to more security, and they’re aligned with Google’s corporate goals as well.
- When talking to users, Google will emphasize control over hackers.
- When talking to stockholders, Google will emphasize control over users.
Edit: I disagree with “they lead to more security”. That’s not “security”, let’s not turn words upside-down.
That has to my understanding been Google’s project all along (making Android crappy that is). IIRC they bought Android, which due to utilizing the Linux kernel was GPL software. The solution was therefore to seperate Android from all the tools that make Android work, splitting core functionality away from the now AOSP and over to Google services. By abuse of market position we are now in the position where stuff like Google push services, safety net and etc are now basically forcing people into their ecosystem. It will not get better, as witnessed with the company’s attempts at making email and most sites on the internet dependant on their ecosystem as well.
But they haven’t. Android has been getting better. Just A/B partitioning is so much more convenient (if harder to grok) than it used to be. Project treble helped a ton with being less reliant on vendors. Storage APIs are great compared to what we used to have (again, harder to grok, though). Even power user stuff like rooting and XPosed is far less hacky with systemless root and stuff. For those who want to fully ungoogle, MicroG also works great and does not seem to have been hampered by changes.
To some extent you are of course right in that the underlying technology of Android has improved. What I was referring to was a design strategy aimed at crippling those who might want to present a Google-free Android alternative.
EDIT: I also want to add that MicroG, though a great project, is to my knowledge not Google free and probably never can be.
[Citation Needed]
From their main page:
From their dedicated Google connections page:
I mean, sure you can ask for sources, but maybe take a little less aggressive stance when the information is so readily available. This took me way more time to write than you would have used looking it up yourself.
a) You are right, I was a bit annoyed by this thread and all the upvoted misinformation. Sorry.
b) Though I also don’t find [Citation needed] that aggressive
c) I also understood it differently, as having google blobs, not making connections to google servers.
d) finally, the way I read it you can stop all of those connections, it seems to mostly be “if you make connection to google servers, you will make connections to google servers”. How much use you get if you don’t want to connect to google at all is a different thing.