Fun Fact: My smartphone is turned off 95% of the time or so. I only turn it on when I have a specific need for a specific function. The overwhelming vast majority of my activities are on desktop systems, using native code or browsers where the invasive permissions of common mobile apps are generally not present. REMEMBER: The reason so many websites push you to use their mobile apps is that the iOS and Android permission environments provide vastly more opportunities for the collection of your personal data.
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@lauren this is innaccurate you have vastly better permission models and security on up to date android and iphones then on desktops this is a missunderstanding of the security and permission models of mobile systems in fact your browser is even better off on your phone due to the permissions and restrictions the phone places on apps in fact your hardware identifier on most phones is blocked from apps on basically all current up to date phones including android since I beleive android 10.
@lauren Since I'm on disability and home most of the time, I'm the same. Only use the phone for calls, and VERY occassional texts. Everything else is on the desktop.
@lauren As an alternative, I run web site versions in DDG or Safari browsers and I skip installing the apps.
@mark_watson When you can. For some situations though, there's no choice.
@lauren Mine is turned on most of the time, but is mostly used for texting, calling, and occasionally looking stuff up. I have a custom app that gets notifications from my servers.
I probably use 20% battery a day, charge to 80% only.
Everything else I do on a PC. Much less annoyance on a PC, and I can get around most pop-ups, ads, etc.
Banking, browser or ATM.
Phone as a platform sucks for anything you can do on a PC.
@lauren Happily a Graphene user as of two weeks ago, but this surely is a more definitive approach, I respect it ♥️
@lauren
One of the rules I try to follow is to never do on a mobile what you can do on a desktop or laptop. If it's easier and more convenient it's also less private and less secure.
@lauren that's only part true, one big reason is that its real estate in their phone desktop, to increase usage.
@lauren Google Android is surveillance as an operating system.
@lauren
In my experience, the reason sites push the smartphone app is that:
1. That's the device most people use
2. A native experience will usually be better and easier to develop than web
3. It's much easier to detect and fight fraudulent and sock puppet users
Are there native apps that data broker? Absolutely! But saying it's "the main reason" is, at best, missing the point.
@StompyRobot Native experiences usually SUCK on small devices, unless, yeah, you have 20/20 vision. It's all about pushing people to BUY BUY BUY on impulse. That's the WHOLE POINT.
@StompyRobot I stand by my assertion. The push to native apps for what could easily be done with a browser (including PWA) is largely about data collection supported by permission structures that almost no users understand, and that are even confusing to many app developers at Apple and Google. The permission structures are horrific and getting worse -- not better -- over time.
I don't disagree that mobile permissions are challenging. However, I'd like to see your source for the assertion that this is why developers choose native development on mobile.
As a developer and executive for over twenty years for several different efforts, I have not once seen or argued "we can harvest data easier" in the top ten list of reasons to push mobile. "Mobile browsers suck and Safari is the worst" is usually the top reason, followed by performance and native access
@StompyRobot Such is often never explicitly stated. But somehow permissions like Fine Location manage to get pushed into the permission lists even when they're not at all necessary. There's always some "tasteful" excuse.
@lauren
Having been in these meetings where we discuss this for many apps, I didn't recognize your characterization.
What is your source of this claim?
@lauren
It might be that Facebook makes that determination -- never worked there. But if so, they are the minority.
The apps I've been involved with didn't even need permissions for normal operation. If they were enabled, it was done reluctantly, for the integrated ads, which had to be shown for users who don't want to pay for their use.
Presumably you're okay with users making that choice? Because it's a very popular choice for some reason I don't understand myself...
@StompyRobot There are built-in permissions you don't even see and have no real choice over. The permissions sets are complex and not intuitive. Note how in Android you now have to give location permission just for a local bluetooth connection. And other permissions can join in to existing ones with no notice to the user. It's a train wreck.
@lauren This is 100% true.
At the same time, web apps that are close enough to feature parity with the equivalent mobile apps are becoming more common and widespread. Doordash on the web - apart from nagging you to use the app - has all the functionality I need to use the service. One of the biggest local taxi companies here (13cabs.com.au) has a genuinely Uber app competitive webapp which means you both don't need to install a privacy risk app, and you also don't have too use Uber - double bonus!
As someone who works at a company that (among other things) develops mobile apps for clients, a lot of clients - particularly our government clients - are starting to ask the question "Can we also do this as a web site that works on phones so that people who don't want to install an app can use it too?" Of course, surveillance capitalism's gonna surveil, We also get a lot of cold emails offering us payments for including some poorly described SDK in popular apps on a per install basis. I have zero doubt that many of our competitors follow that money.
@lauren it always makes me angry to think about this, especially when I remember that the vast majority of apps are really just single-site web browsers under the hood.
@lauren Oh, hopefully you take your battery out of your devices too... cause they seem to work when off now. Oh wait, we can't remove the batteries anymore. Funny, that. /s
@lauren Same. Although it's on more than yours, because I have no landline. But I often forget to turn it on. I've never missed anything important that way. My friends know to email me.
@lauren And yet our banks trust the app environment more that the browser, thanks Microsoft.
If i buy sth on the desktop, the app provides 2FA. if i buy sth with the phone, 2FA is a second "are you sure" popup on the same effing device!
@nettings The reason they do that, and in many cases dispense with user 2FA completely from a mobile device, is that they can generally create a tighter link between account and a device in the mobile app environment than they can in a typical browser desktop environment (or browser on mobile, for that matter). The device itself is considered to be the second factor, essentially.
@nettings Banking apps are something of a special case, especially when they include camera-based check deposit and the like. I won't bend anyone's ears with details here for now.
@lauren
But I read books on my phone. I'm on it several hours a day. Serious reading addiction :)
I used to do the same thing.
Since then I switched to a Linux phone. When I'm told, "You need to use this app," I just shrug and say, "Sorry, it won't run on my phone. Do you have another option?"
My phone also has physical switches for the mic, Bluetooth, Wifi, and cellular connections. I don't even have to turn it off to make it untraceable.
Downside? It has crap battery life and is big and heavy.
Upside? It runs Linux desktop apps and you can connect a keyboard and monitor.