Mastodawn

#Google trips over its own words, when they sell you #Android it's the best computing device in the world that does everything. After you bought it Google doesn't let you do anything *you* want to.

#Sideload is a made-up term. Putting software on your computer is simply called “installing”, regardless of whether that computer is in your pocket or on your desk.

What Do You Talk About When You Talk About Sideloading?

What does Google?

Here's #FDroid: https://f-droid.org/2025/10/28/sideloading.html

What We Talk About When We Talk About Sideloading | F-Droid - Free and Open Source Android App Repository

We recently published a blog post with our reaction to the new Google Developer Program and how it impacts your freedom to use the devices that you own in th...

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Samuel Hautamäki Oct 28

@fdroidorg Sideloading is a cool term though fr

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Matija Nalis

@samuel
#Sideloading is a term - it is when you use another computer on the SIDE of your mobile device, connect them via cable (that is why it has to be on the SIDE) and use that other computer to remotely install the app on the mobile device, without mobile device having a choice. You know, like with "adb sideload" command.

Using your web browser or app store of your choice on your mobile device to install apps is just regular "installing apps".

In other words, #Google is intentionally misusing the term, trying to redefine #sideloading to mean "using your phone in any way that prevents Google from collecting and selling your personal data, or having user having any ownership rights on their device".

I would suggest #EU to bill Google 10€ for false advertising for each time they've thus misused the word "sideloading", multiplied by number of all Android phones ever sold, multiplied by number of days this continues