Google Launches Private Android App Stores 86
Trailrunner7 writes "Malicious apps have emerged as perhaps the most serious threat to mobile devices at the moment, and the major players, such as Apple and Google, have tried several different methods of preventing them from getting into their app stores and into the hands of users. Now, Google is taking one more step with the launch of a new service called the Private Channel for Google Apps, which gives enterprises and other organizations the ability to create private app stores and control the apps their users can download. Private Channel is essentially a way for organizations to stand up their own miniature app stores inside of Google Play--the main app store for Android devices--and publish apps to it. That gives these organizations the ability to point their users directly to the apps they want users to download for their Android devices. The new service will include some of the security features built into Google Play, most notably the anti-malware system and the ability to authenticate users."
Re:Watch out Google, Facebook might sue! (Score:5, Interesting)
How? This is not related at all to desktops.
I'm seeing it happen already.
There are plenty of SMEs in Asia using tiny Android PC-on-a-stick computers as basic office desktops. Clipped to the back of a HDMI screen and plugged into a USB hub along with a mouse & keyboard, they're cheap, low overhead and easy to use.
EFF / FSF Channel? (Score:5, Interesting)
Might be cool if the EFF or FSF put up a channel. EFF could identify apps that don't spy on you. FSF could list apps that offer their source code under a F/LOSS license. Either one could also create an "Approved by EFF" (or FSF) logo program to generate revenue to fund the channel administration.
Malicious apps have emerged as perhaps the most serious threat to mobile devices at the moment
It is true that I am much more likely to install software I believe I can trust,. For me, the EFF and FSF are organizations that I would trust to make the call, not a corporation like Google, Apple, MS, or Amazon. But Google does make it easy to get the software onto my rooted and rom'd Galaxy, and pay the programmers for their work.
It may not have mass market appeal, but it doesn't have to. It only needs to appeal to the hundreds of thousands of technophiles who know about the EFF and FSF; that's enough to make a successful channel. There'd be some decent revenue there, and it would raise the public image of the EFF and FSF as defenders of digital liberty.
Obviously there are EULA, DRM, and walled garden questions that must be contemplated, but there seems to be enough upside to at least go through the thought process and see if it can be reconciled.
It was bound to happen (Score:2, Interesting)