Slashdot Mirror
Google Play Shows Warning To Anyone Searching For Fortnite APKs (betanews.com)
Mark Wilson quotes a report from BetaNews: The arrival of Fortnite on Android has not only been eagerly awaited, but also steeped in controversy. In addition to making the game a Samsung exclusive (for a few days, anyway), Epic Games decided to bypass Google Play and host APK downloads on its own servers. But this isn't going to stop people looking for Fortnite in the Play Store. Google is well aware of this, and that there is the potential for fake, scam apps to appear, tricking users into downloading something malicious. As such, the company is taking action, and is showing a warning to anyone who searches for Fortnite in Google Play. Conduct a search for Fortnite in Google's app store and you'll be greeted by a message that reads "Fortnite Battle Royale by Epic Games, Inc is not available on Google Play." Searchers are also advised that Fortnite rival PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds (PUBG) is available to download.
I can see why they would never in a million years do such a thing, but they could just provide a link to The site where Epic has put the installer.
The real answer is that a lot of what goes on at Google is done by algorithms that are uncaring about things such as this. Eventually enough of a stink is made or someone higher up sees the bad press and human intervention is made. Ask anyone who has ever had to deal without Google support and they will tell you that this kind of thing is par for the course and has been for years. The human intervention always comes off as hamfisted because the person making the decision has little idea of what is actually going on and no one can really fill them in since an algorithm has been steering the ship up to this point. Maybe the algorithm gets tweaked a little bit in response, but probably not.
For doing the right thing here. And I mean not locking down the Play Store, allowing 3rd party sources. Google could easily (ab)use its dominant position in the smartphone OS market to force Epic to go through its Play Store and forfeit 30% of their revenues. But they didn't. Thank you for not being Apple.