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Originally published at: Google Cracks Down on Sideloading Apps from Unverified Developers

Android’s openness has always been one of the main reasons for its popularity. For years, you could sideload almost anything on an Android device—including apps that never went near the Play Store. That freedom is now facing a major change. Google has announced it will soon require all developers, not just those in the Play…

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From the first article….After verifying their identities, developers will have to register the package name and signing keys of their apps.
Google won’t check the content or functionality of the apps, though.

so it’ll be- - we know who you are so play nice ?? that’s sure to work !!

and from the second article–

we will be confirming who the developer is, not reviewing the content of their app or where it came from

ooh, scary….

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I do wonder if this is simply another cash grab? I don’t see anywhere where it tells us if those developers, who charge for their apps, will have to pay Google for the priviledge of being “Certified” or give a percentage of their income to Google. Maybe a couple of years out for the North American market from what it looks like.

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Hey Miki, shouldn’t “Google Will Block…” be a new thread?

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Tx @elginherd appreciate the assist. Be well my friend and have a buffer free day.

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Are you talking about TV or interference from my wife?

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If Google follows through on this, anything with Android TV or GoogleTV o/s will be useless to anyone who wants access to open source apps, including those for streaming. Even though they are more work to set up, I have always preferred stock android devices over android tv and google tv. No restrictions and customization options are limitless.

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Can you say what stock devices are? Thanks

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They’re try to force everyone to pay to watch tv is the end result! I’ve never paid for TV and I’m not starting now! I have thousands of DVDs so I’ll just stop watching tv and be done with it! These jack offs are money hungry!

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This will tell you what stock Android is.

Here

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What’s important to point out here is the following.

What Devices Are Actually Affected

Google says only apps with verified identities will be installable on “certified Android devices.” This refers to virtually every Android-based device that has Google services installed.

However, this doesn’t affect all streaming boxes. Devices like BuzzTV, Formuler, Ugoos, and other Android boxes that don’t use Google’s certified builds should continue working as they always have. These boxes typically run non-Google versions of Android without Play Store integration.

Custom ROMs or devices sold without Google Play services will also remain unaffected. The catch is that most mainstream Android TV and Google TV hardware runs certified builds, so these workarounds won’t help most users.

So, if this does turn into a problem more than likely we will still be able to use the non-certified devices such as BuzzTV, Formuler, Ugoos, etc.

Not ideal as we all love the Onn boxes.

I think the devs of these apps will get creative and find a way around this ID verification process.

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It will just affect those piracy apps that the developer doesn’t want to register as a certified Android developer which has a $25 fee to register.
Official Iptv player apps, Kodi, Stremio etc won’t be affected.

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@slapbad Please watch your language in your message posts. The “jack offs” remark wasn’t needed here. Maybe some folks are not familiar with that saying, but, those of us who do do not appreciate it. Thank you.

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Google’s management is beyond clueless! They want to be like Apple and that will blow up in their face.

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Like Apple, Google is a multi Trillion $ company and I doubt this move will impact them heavily that they would even notice. Apple are way more stringent with their devices and App Store and they are still amongst the top 5 richest companies in the world along with Alphabet(Google)

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Just spitballing here but Kodi should still work also isn’t Apple TV box a possible fall back?

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Beats me as I don’t use Kodi. There are better ways to stream.

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There is no real way of knowing the extent this will affect users, but I don’t think some of the developers will “put their name” on some of their apps. For those that won’t, the choice will be the noncertified boxes. I prefer those anyway.

The other thing is what else does Google have planned? I can see them going the Amazon route and trying to lock out third party launchers to force viewing ads etc.

Apple TV has already become a competitor since they have good IPTV apps and streaming apps that use Stremio plugins. They don’t have the quantity of apps, but what they do have work well and the box is blazing fast.

Time will tell but as long as you are willing to put in a little work there will always be alternatives.

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So, in planning ahead, since these brands of boxes seem to be the best options available currently. In diving into the threads that are available, here on the Insider, it appears that the only brand that has taken steps to answer and help the owners has been Buzz TV. I had found a thread where a buzz TV representative was actually actively assisting some issues that owners were complaining about. I’ve seen that @sim_bill has been really happy with he Ugoos box, but I thought, probably mistaken, that several have had unresolved issues with several Ugoos boxes. Am I just being paranoid?

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Kodi should always work as it’s just essentially a media player and Devs will never be associated with the third party add-ons that promote piracy. Also don’t go asking for help with these add-ons on Kodi community forum as you will not receive any help lol. The best place to get help with these type of add-ons is on the subreddit Addons4kodi as some of the actual developers are active on their and some of the 181,000 members are pretty helpful too.

As for Kodi on Apple Tv it doesn’t support HDR or DV if those are important to you.

For me Kodi is hard to beat for streaming because it just works and the community and the main devs are very active

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