I am not following these claims carefully, but I have seen tons of copies of Lawnchair in the Playstore.
Another recent event that comes to my mind is the Simple apps, which AFAIK they always were open source? But that didn’t matter until it got sold and then Fossify was the non shit version of it (the positive side of open source).
We have seen time and again, especially on Android, that whenever a moderately-popular app goes open-source, it is immediately picked up by unscrupulous developers. They download the source, add obnoxious ads […]. tracking code […]. Finally, they publish it to the Play Store
This is a pretty bad argument, especially when you’re specifically talking about Android. Android APKs are extremely easy to just download from closed-source, decompile them, and add new things or overwrite existing things.
The argument makes more sense for things that are harder to decompile and recompile
No readily-compilable project is still a worthwhile barrier. So I don’t think it’s a bad argument.
If it’s about open-source licenses, it typically allows that kind of repackaging. Which is not the case for closed-source/proprietary.
It’s the same argument FUTO and Louis Rossman have to make their apps source-available. If you ask me, it’s a cheap excuse. They could as well enforce their trademark or have Google remove it.
This way it’s just another closed source app that doesn’t grant the users any additional freedoms.
The “ThEy’Re GoInG tO taKe MAh COde!!” argument always comes off in the same manner elitist pricks do. Looking at their page, they’ve got a Tipping Calculator, and an App Store rehash. Nothing novel or exciting, so what exactly do they have in their codebase they’re worried about others seeing/using?
open source licenses are only as useful as your ability to enforce them in court
That’s a pretty stupid reason. Even closed sourced application such as whatsapp have a lot of counterfeit on the internet. APK that promises features to its user, but then sneakily scan and upload their stuff to a remote server. This is a usual occurrences.
Vapid argument: You can always check it yourself. That is the benefit of open source: you can inspect the source code and see if it’s malicious or not. You would usually know if an open source project is malevolent or not; if you still have some dubiety, you can always deploy it yourselves.
