Your Android Is A Little Safer With Google's Changes

Ok, fair enough, Android is pretty popular.  It's 68% of the Chinese Market for whatever that's worth.  Since people tend to do what their friends like, it may just get better since that means more people writing apps for the platform.

You know, that whole social aspect of life right?   Facebook?  Blogging?  Asking that nice teenager down the block what he uses to do things on his computer, once he crawls out of Mom's Basement that is.

The problem is that Android has always been more open to viruses because the whole software experience has been less rigid.  Apple forces a developer to submit their software so it can be deeply analyzed.  Google hasn't required that yet.

What they have done is to lay out new guidelines that say basically if we don't think you're playing to the rules, we'll pull your software.  No Rude stuff, No Hate speech, no spammy apps, no illegal apps.  

I guess that Chic-Fil-A App should go...

It doesn't say that they are forcing the backyard programmer to hand over the source of their work.  That's that code review thing that Apple does on their iPhone and iPad.  But it does say that they're watching what goes up on the "Google Play Store" now. 

Who knew they weren't?

Well for you and I, the safest way to get a new app is to wait for it to be a bit older and make sure it has a lot of positive reviews.  Make sure your virus protection is up to date.  Have fun...

If you want to read their guidelines, and they read like guidelines to me instead of hard and fast rules, click on this link. They do seem to do a good job of writing things people can actually read instead of something intractable.  Some of the technical documents that I have read in the past to do my web development work have been amazingly clear even when my mind wasn't focused on the task.

Now if I could find a decent free web alarm clock, it would be easier for me to wake up at 5:59AM.  A little BBC World Service News with the Pips at the start of the hour while I prepare to step over the dog on the way to the bathroom...