alt Hacker NewsThis is the conspiratorial version.
The more likely explanation is that when every app can bundle their own browser engine, we will not see a competition explosion. Instead, Electron apps will come to mobile, with every app shipping its own browser stack.
You can’t tell me Gecko, which has already failed on desktop, will suddenly be popular on mobile. You can easily tell me every app shipping their own Chromium would be very popular with developers.
Replies
This is true, however I think an App Store rule that to ship a browser engine, you have to be a browser, defined as having a browser that is maintained on MacOS, Linux, and/or Windows and which can be made the default browser on those platforms. Or even simpler, it has to present web browsing to the user as the primary function and not secondary to accessing content/shopping/gaming.
Seems either approach would rule out your Slack, Amazon app, etc. from shipping their own outdated 900MB Chromiums but allow Chrome, Firefox, K-Meleon, whatever.
a browser is essentially an app store with no 30% cut for Apple. If you can ship a browser, you don't need to pay the Apple tax
Every app shipping its own Chromium isn't currently forbidden, as I understand it. They're just not allowed to use their own engines for webviews.
>This is the conspiratorial version.
Everything that's inconvenient for your preferred narrative can just be dismissed as conspiratorial thinking, makes the world so much easier - doesnt it? I've compiled some of the evidences that makes clear how one of the Gatekeepers (Apple) has a tremendous conflict of interest, which manifested itself in systematic sabotaging of PWAs over the years: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45534316
Firefox is really good now on android. It's my go to browser now for everything. It just needed full addon support but when that was finally there it was great.