Post #2704053

2026-05-12 14:08 UTC

@Epic_Null@infosec.exchange @quasirealsmiths@beige.party @permafriday@indieweb.social @keepandroidopen@techhub.social @pluralistic@mamot.fr Google is not a singular person. Some people will make bad decisions, some good. The main driver for Google is money. They are doing this to look like they care about grandpas being scammed to look more trustworthy and get more money. If they didn't ban installing outside the store outright, it means there is no reason for them to do it. You slippery slope fallacy can be used against any law, because any law can be a first step to full autocratic government. You need a solid facts to make that argument. This is not the case in this matter, because they can just block those apps like Apple does. To answer your question more directly: No corporation is trustworthy.

Replies (1)

@Epic_Null@infosec.exchange 2026-05-12 14:36

@PhoenixWright@ieji.de @quasirealsmiths@beige.party @permafriday@indieweb.social @keepandroidopen@techhub.social @pluralistic@mamot.fr Alright so we agree that they are not trustworthy! Great! From that, I don't think it's incorrect to watch what they do and what they build instead of listening to what they say. It's also not incorrect to trust an open door to stay open. You slippery slope fallacy can be used against any law, because any law can be a first step to full autocratic government. Actually a good callout! Laws are a dangerous entity in themselves! He who controls the laws has a lot of power, and that could get really nasty. Which is why we built tons of friction into the legal system! (A lot of that friction is failing, and we are sliding into authoritarianism, but let me just talk theory for a bit) You may have noticed that our legal system is broken into many parts. The idea is that no one entity controlls it, and thus all entities provide friction for the others. Jurries can nullify laws they think are unjust. Courts set standards for evidence. Victims can choose not to sue, or to settle outside court. Laws are written by representatives who need to be regularly voted in, and who need to work with each other to do anything. Each law remains on a slope, but extra friction points work to make it much less slippery. So to show a given slope is not slippery, the question we need to ask is "Where is the friction"? Google is part of a duopoly, so there's a lot of missing friction there. We don't enforce anti-trust laws, so no friction there. Most users only use the playstore so no friction there. We have an entire generation that grew up without knowing what it means to truly own a device, so no friction there. Companies are comfortable using DRM in weird places to gain control of customers' devices, so the precident is in Google's favor. No friction there. If this is not a slippery slope, then where does the friction come from?

Open ##2704054