Idk why more people don’t do what I do. I call it notification hygiene, or maybe attention hygiene. If an app has a legitimate reason for notifying me, like it’s a messaging app and a human being has messaged me, then the app gets to notify me, otherwise it does not. The first time an app shows me a notification that is useless to me it gets deleted from my phone if I’m not using it anymore. On the spot. Drop everything I’m doing and delete the app. If I am still using the app I disable notifications for it. I get almost no notifications that aren’t people messaging me.

It's not only notifications, it's permissions (that the app won't work until you accept) to track your location, exfiltrate your contact list, and so forth. It's an invasion of privacy. It should not be required to, e.g., order food at a restaurant or configure your headphones.

> one twist: notifications

I’d argue the second twist is data collection, which for an app can be much more invasive than what a web client leaks depending on permissions.

I wish Android would let me filter notifications and add rules to them.

I know that you can switch off certain types of notifications, but thats only if the developer has added those in. For example Revolut uses one notification type and sends payment notifications and marketing through that same channel. So, I just don't use Revolut but it would be good if Android could let me set up keywords to block notifications.

What's worse is when you're forced to use the app.

In my apartment complex we're forced to use an app for laundry (no cash, no card). The fucking app doesn't even sort the rooms (I'm actually impressed. I didn't know you could do any programming without knowing what sort is. Like not even one line of code...). It also has a 30 second load time because it redraws everything during the startup when it tries to connect to the network. Luckily their API got exposed, in May... and someone made all the machines free.

They also wrapped up their sales notification with the one that tells you the laundry is done. So you disable both. Not an issue though because the latter never even worked anyways.

But it's like when people send spam through the same email you send necessary information. Universities pull this shit all the time. Guess what? It all is spam now. And these people wonder why they emails get blocked.

Or when you go to a restaurant and they make you use their app. I'm autistic enough to try hard not to use them but often I give up because people I'm with get upset I'm taking so long (but I'm not the one at fault. It's like yelling at a cashier when corporate increases price on an item. Wrong target, but I get it). I think this is why they get away with it though. Because blame is often targeted at what is right in front of you, and they're often small. But a lot of small things add up. 1 shitty app can be ignored, but a hundred is overwhelming. And I swear, it gets worse every day

This is a big gripe of mine with iOS. There is no way for you to filter notifications by contents (e.g. if Wallet says "weekly spending" dismiss the notification [Apple Wallet has two options for notifications: on or off, there is no way to disable weekly spending notifications that I've been able to find]). Android doesn't have it either, but Android allows third party apps to do it. I'm strongly considering switching to Android for this reason alone.

The real elephant in the room is all the apps that are basically packaged web browsers but also want all sorts of absurd permission privileges so it can harvest user data to sell.

It's becoming obvious operating systems needs to give us more options to control our devices - i.e. firewall, caller and notification filters, etc.

The weird thing is that companies will pay for entirely separate engineering, product and marketing departments for their apps which duplicate their web apps in every way (or usually a bit less), not to mention being under the thumb of the app stores - all for the sake of notifications.

I'm no bean-counter, but that seems very odd to me.

Uber is the worst about this. I make a point of disabling notification permissions any time I’m not actively hailing a car.

Every time I see an app do this, I go to the App Store and give a one-star rating with a comment that this is why (app is using notifications for spam). I feel like using that method is more likely to be seen by the right people than complaining another way.

I just have my phone and laptop on do not disturb 247. Works great. I have one chat app open and people who really need to reach me send a message there. Been doing that for 10+ years; it's excellent.

Take look at this app (I know, one mora app to install :) )

https://www.minimalistphone.com

>Unless you explicitly disable it via settings, it will try to get a small chunk of your attention every now and then.

It's been opt in on iOS and Android for years

I don't understand why you'd have notifications enabled for any app that you don't need them from?

No, really it's identification and tracking on a mass scale.

>Unless you explicitly disable it via settings,

You don't?

I disable notifs like the fucking plague.

Notifs? Yeah, because it's not a question of if; that shit is dead on arrival.

You can criticize something and be a part of it.

Not downloaded that app, but does it deliver exactly the same features as the web app but just look a bit different? If so, I wonder whether anyone working in the respective web and app departments sometimes wonders why their company maintains two separate apps that do the same thing. I know I did.

Edit: Oh, offline mode. Towering profits?

Would you rather have a publication that gags its journalists from criticizing its business practices?

But you don't have to.

That is just about everything. No matter how compelling some product is, if I see something it is app-controlled, I just move on.

Silly things. A heated coffee mug (app-controlled). An air purifier (app-controlled). A home generator (app-controlled). sigh.

At costco the other day, there were gift cards for two movie chains ($50 for $39). One was just "take this card to the register", the other one was an app/website and more mess (and a hard pass)

> "I don't want bluetooth and an app,"

Me neither

> "I want rs485 and a specification”

I want ethernet and a well-documented API. Put the thing in its own network segment which does not connect to the outside world and you get to have an the advantages of a network-connected device without any of the disadvantages. No automatic updates taking away functionality, no chance for bad actors to hijack your devices but still all the possibilities offered by having direct network access.

I agree, I also don't want bluetooth (nor other wireless communication) and an app, I want RS-485 and a specification (that is hopefully not too complicated).

You probably need to hit a share button and then there is usually an option for a link. If not, choosing message or email will throw a link in there. I haven’t used the Instagram app in years, but that’s usually how it goes.

If you don’t have the app installed, and aren’t logged in, there is about a 60/40 chance that the person on the other end will be able to see what is sent. And if it’s a video, they’ll miss the first bit of audio, because it defaults to muted, and it doesn’t let the user replay the video. They employs a lot of aggressive dark patterns to get people to create accounts, login, and use the app.

There is a way to get a link, my wife sends me Instagram links all the time. Unfortunately I don't know how to do it because I don't use Instagram.

Of course you can. I'm doing it for years now.

It’s not whatever it’s bullshit pushed onto those who have the least power to change things, driven by greed for money, attention and data.

You are not alone. I am also in a rural area and have never found a compelling need for an app. I use the phone for making calls and texting. If the phone required even one more millisecond of my time it would go in the hydraulic press. If anything I've gone the other direction. If I can't go into a building and talk face to face with real people then I am not interested in doing business. The exception at the moment is Amazon as local stores do not carry things I need but I have stocked up so I can nix that requirement soon. Even in that case I browse Amazon from a Linux desktop, not the phone. I have never browsed a site from my phone.

Those websites would probably be better of the resources, time, and budget from the app were spent on the website.

> If you need an app for something brief but specific, delete it after you’re done

Amusingly, you've just described a web browser.

And just as maddening is that it goes both ways. So many websites (including technical blogs made by people who post here and should know better!!!) are the width of a damn phone screen, even if you view it on desktop. Lazy website development abounds, sadly.

It's wild to me that such a safe, pro-user-agency, extensible system is hated by so many for delivering rich experiences.

I get that there are plenty of bad webapps too, that performance can be bad. And there's not enough highly visible open source efforts on local first & off-main-thread javascript to form the backbone of knowledge to inform mainstream webdev how to stay fast, responsive, adaptable, yet (I thought we would be so much further along at using these amazing capabilities by now!). But wow, it's still so wild to me that apps are so beloved by some.

PWAs are also wild to me because they are "just" the web but without half the web's superpowers. No extensions, address bar, history, bookmarks, tabs (unless built specifically for it; wildly weird.

Oh man, the idea that they might only drop that after the haircut is done makes me cringe. What’s worked for me when businesses are insistent is saying something like “I only have my work phone and the security policy doesn’t allow me to install apps without contacting IT” That’s not true of course but if you’re going to play dirty so can I

App designers try too hard to be simple (or whatever it is they're trying to do), and the widgets are often useless or not the ones you want. I don't trust app developers to choose sane options, because they're trying to make an 'experience' or something.

My homescreen has more links to webpages than apps, because they can give me info faster than apps/widgets. I don't have to see the news/ads/videos or 'what's new' modal windows like I usually have to with popular apps. (That said, open source apps tend to be far more sensible. F-Droid has got a lot of hidden gems.)

To be fair, it was the users and developers who asked for this when the original iPhone launched. Apple’s plan was to have web apps be the way forward for accessing anything outside of the pre-installed apps.

What is the vision you’re seeing that would be revolutionary from what we have today, with similar hardware?

Counter view: Steve Jobs instincts were about owning everything. Any app should (must) be bought from apple, as a subscription, while holding your data hostage, at their price.

Many services do "make" you use an app if you want to get something done.

For example, I parked in some part of Dallas the other day. I HAD to download an app to pay, there was no other way to pay.