streamer, gamer, developer, vr escapist
Your Phone Is About To Stop Being Yours
Starting in 2027, a silent update, nonconsensually pushed by Google, will block every Android app whose developer hasn't registered with Google, signed their contract, paid up, and handed over government ID. Every app and every device, worldwide, with no opt-out. Make a stand now before Android becomes an illegal monopoly according to the FTC antitrust Laws.
Lockdown Starts In
Hey, I'm aiming to be the first Vtuber to be fully crowdfunded by my audience, which the funds will go to the channel on Twitch, as well as the equipment! Help support the cause by subscribing to my twitch, or by subscribing to my Patreon, or by visiting my throne page to help crowdfund the equipment for the cause!
streamer, gamer, developer, vr escapist
M y G o a l
The vtubing space has it's ups and downs, and it does happen now and then. Before I started my goal I asked the question, did anybody attempt the goal I started? And fun fact, nobody hasn't done this before. So I started to start the goal, to get to be the first person to be a vtuber who's setup is fully crowdfunded by the community. There has been little reach about this on my end, and that's something I myself must bear starting out.This is where you come in. With this goal in mind I intend to have my equipment fully crowdfunded by good supporters alike. Since I setup my site for this purpose, nobody had tried this before.Now, it's time to make it happen. What will you do next?
streamer, gamer, developer, vr escapist
Lockdown Starts In
Your Phone Is About To Stop Being Yours
In August 2025, Google announced a new requirement: starting in 2027, every Android app developer must register centrally with Google before their software can be installed on any device. Not just Play Store apps: all apps. This includes apps shared between friends, distributed through F-Droid, built by hobbyists for personal use. Independent developers, church and community groups, and hobbyists alike will all be frozen out of being able to develop and distribute their software.
Registration requires:
- Paying a fee to Google
- Agreeing to Google's Terms and Conditions
- Surrendering your government-issued identification
- Providing evidence of your private signing key
- Listing all current and all future application identifiers
If a developer does not comply, their apps get silently blocked on every Android device worldwide.
Who This Hurts
YOUYou bought an Android phone because Google told you it was open. You could install what you wanted, and that was the deal.Google is now rewriting that deal, retroactively, on hardware you already own. After the update lands, you can only run software that Google has pre-approved. On your phone: your property, that you paid for.Independent developers
A teenager's first app, a volunteer's privacy tool, or a company's confidential internal beta. It doesn't matter. In 2027, none of these can be installed without Google's blessing.F-Droid, home to thousands of free and open-source Android apps, has called this an "existential" threat. Cory Doctorow calls it "Darth Android".Governments & civil society
Google has a documented track record of complying when authoritarian regimes demand app removals. With this program, the software that runs your country's institutions will exist at the pleasure of a single unaccountable foreign corporation.The EFF calls app gatekeeping "an ever-expanding pathway to internet censorship."
Google's "Escape Hatch" is a Trap Door
Google says "power users" can "still install" unverified apps. Here's what that actually looks like:
1. Delve into System Settings, find About Phone
2.Tap the build number seven times to enable Developer Mode
3. Dismiss scare screens about coercion
4. Enter your PIN
5. Restart the device
6. Wait 24 hours
7. Come back, dismiss more scare screens
8. Pick "allow temporarily" (7 days) or "allow indefinitely"
9. Confirm, again, that you understand "the risks"
Nine steps. A mandatory 24-hour cooling-off period. For installing software on a device you own.Worse: this flow runs entirely through Google Play Services, not the Android OS. Google can change it, tighten it, or kill it at any time, with no OS update required and no consent needed. And as of today, it hasn't shipped in any beta, preview, or canary build. It exists only as a blog post and some mockups.
This is bigger than Android
If Google can retroactively lock down billions of devices that were sold as open platforms, every hardware manufacturer on the planet is watching.The principle being established: the company that made your device gets to decide, after you've bought it, what software you're allowed to run. In software, this is called a "rug pull"; but at least you could always install competing software. In hardware, it is a fait accompli that strips you of your agency and renders you powerless to the whims of a single unaccountable gatekeeper and convicted monopolist.Android's openness was never just a feature. It was the promise that distinguished it from iPhone. Millions chose Android for exactly that reason. Google is now revoking that promise unilaterally, on devices already in people's pockets, because they've decided they have enough market dominance and regulatory capture to get away with it.Ars Technica: "Google's Apple envy threatens to dismantle Android's open legacy."
Fight back
Everyone
- Install F-Droid on every Android device you own. Alternative stores only survive if people actually use them.
- Contact your regulators. Regulators worldwide are genuinely concerned about monopolies and the centralization of power in the tech sector, and want to hear directly from individuals who are affected and concerned.
- Link to keepandroidopen.org everywhere.
- Push back on astroturfers. The "well, actually..." crowd is out in force. Don't let them set the narrative.
- Sign the change.org petition and join the over 100,000 signatories who have made their voices heard.
Read and share our open letter
- Read and share F-Droid's open letter
- Tell Google what you think of this through their own developer verification survey (for all the good that will do).
Developers
DO NOT SIGN UP. Don't join the program by signing up for the Android Developer Console and agreeing to their irrevocable Terms and Conditions. Don't verify your identity. Don't play ball.Google's plan only works if developers comply. Don't.- Talk other developers and organizations out of signing up.
- Add the FreeDroidWarn library to your apps to warn users.
- Run a website? Add F-Droid's countdown banner.