
Google Play Store: Browsing with Firefox is no longer supported on Android - gphilip
When I try to open play.google.com from Firefox on my Android device I get:<p><pre><code>  This browser is no longer supported.

  Please use the Google Play Store app to access Google Play.
</code></pre>
My Firefox version is 35.0, which is the latest version for Android. So it looks like the walls are going up around that particular garden as well.
======
oblio
This is a dangerous slope.

And I'm sad seeing many of the arguments here - a wild guess is that they've
been made by people who weren't here (or have forgotten) the Microsoft/IE
story.

Soon it will become: "Why would they invest resources? Firefox is a niche
browser, the return on investment is not justified". After all, Firefox's
market share is dwindling.

I really hope we're not slowly being boiled like the proverbial frog, by
Google.

~~~
drzaiusapelord
Weren't we all applauding some startup that had a douche-bagy "We dont support
IE" message on their site and everyone here was so excited about it. Now that
the bell is tolling for Firefox, its a different story, eh?

There's been this largely ridiculous "revenge of the geeks" after the IE6
days. Now we've fed so much fuel into that fire, that casually telling people
to use different browsers is the norm. I'm not saying I told you so, but.. I
told you so.

Instead of focusing on your customers' needs, we just ran with what's popular.
That's always going to be a losing strategy.

~~~
kenbellows
There is potentially a critical difference here. The "We don't support IE"
mini-movement was a reaction to Microsoft's refusal to use the web standards
that every other major browser supported. In this case, it appears to me
(admittedly without research) that Google's motivations must be different, and
two possibilities spring to mind: (1) Google doesn't like the competition from
Firefox or (2) the Play store uses non-standard features not supported by
Firefox's overwhelmingly standards compliant browser. If either of these is
the case, we've got a very different situation, potentially one in which
Google has begun to play the part of Microsoft, implementing and using their
own non-standard features, even if it's in a less intrusive and less
inconvenient way.

~~~
tuxone
(3) Firefox for Android misses true Intent Filters support, which causes
annoying experience for the average user.

~~~
makomk
Might have to try it then. Google Chrome for Android's handling of intents is
really annoying. Sometimes I have to tell it to open a link in the browser
rather than the associated app three or more times, as it redirects between
different pages or domains and prompts again for each one.

------
josteink
Hi Google.

Remember those non-evil days where you said you cared about web-standards and
actually acted according to those claims?

Those days were great. Feel free to get back to those.

~~~
fastball
What are they supposed to do if they want to implement features which are not
supported by Firefox?

~~~
william20111
follow standards maybe?

~~~
lmm
That approach is what got us XHTML 2.0 and a "lost decade" for web technology.
The things Google adopts (vp8, dart, spdy) are things it releases and
publishes as open standards, and therefore significantly more standard and
open than e.g. javascript, or even the <img> tag, were when first introduced.

~~~
pyre
> are things it releases and publishes as open standards

Publishing working code (even as Open Source) and possibly a white paper does
_not_ make something a 'standard.' It may be 'open' but not a 'standard.'

~~~
Karunamon
And yet it also completely disproves the argument of anyone claiming that
Google is trying to make another ActiveX.

The idea that nobody can do anything cool on the web unless all browsers
support it seems like a great way to encourage stagnation.

~~~
anon1385
>The idea that nobody can do anything cool on the web unless all browsers
support it seems like a great way to encourage stagnation.

But that's the entire point of open web standards. If you don't like using a
runtime that is the lowest common denominator across all platforms then why
are you using the web in the first place?

I really don't understand people who claim to support the web and web
standards but then moan about vendor X or Y not implementing this or that.
That's the single biggest defining feature of open web standards; things don't
happen unless everybody agrees. If you don't like it that individual vendors
have veto power over things then you don't like open web standards. If you
don't like technology that moves slowly and by consensus then you don't like
open web standards. These are the costs of creating a platform that is defined
by open standards.

~~~
lmm
Arguing definitions is a waste of time. How about this: I like published
formats that become standards as and when they gain multiple implementations.
If you try to standardize first and then implement, you get CSS2 (or, my first
example, XHTML2). The web features we use are there because one vendor or
another implemented them, experimentally (again I refer you to javascript, or
the <img> tag), and they became standards some time after that. For non-web
examples consider something like python - at first, the implementation was the
spec; as it matured and things like jython and pypy began to be important, the
spec took on more of an independent existence.

This is the model that works, and google is trying to continue it. Best of
luck to them.

~~~
pcwalton
> How about this: I like published formats that become standards as and when
> they gain multiple implementations.

That is how the standards process generally works these days.

> The web features we use are there because one vendor or another implemented
> them, experimentally (again I refer you to javascript, or the <img> tag),
> and they became standards some time after that.

That was a long time ago, when there were few browsers and the Web was much
smaller. Nowadays, whenever a browser ships anything, content immediately
starts relying on it, and it becomes frozen for all time. None of your other
examples have billions of pieces of content; the probability that some content
starts relying on the random corner cases of whatever you ship is almost
certain. That is one of the most important reasons the standards process
exists: to allow multiple vendors a seat at the table in order to create
something that makes sense, as opposed to sitting down, writing a pile of
code, having content depend on the random bugs and corner cases in your
implementation, and forcing all other vendors to reverse engineer your code.
(Being open source does _not_ make reverse engineering free, and doesn't even
make it that much easier: the HTML5 parsing algorithm was reverse engineered
from IE6 without looking at the source code.)

> This is the model that works, and google is trying to continue it. Best of
> luck to them.

It's also what got us quirks mode, the content sniffing algorithm, the
gratuitous complexity of HTML5 parsing, marquee, blink, and the incredibly
underdocumented and hideously complex tables specification. I could go on.

You're portraying CSS2 as a failure, but CSS2 is actually a great example of
something that is _implementable_ by virtue of being standardized. CSS2 only
looks bad because you can go to the standard and look at the complexity, but
automatic table layout (what we had before) is much worse, being defined by a
pile of C++ code that few people in the world know, with corner cases and
weirdnesses a mile long. To this day, table layout is essentially implemented
by reverse engineering Gecko. As someone who has implemented both features, I
much prefer the former.

------
andreastt
For reference, this is being tracked by Mozilla's webcompat group in
[https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1131601](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1131601).

~~~
eginhard
And it was apparently "blocked by mistake and will be fixed very soon":
[http://venturebeat.com/2015/02/10/google-play-no-longer-
supp...](http://venturebeat.com/2015/02/10/google-play-no-longer-supports-
firefox-for-android-did-the-browser-war-just-get-ugly/)

~~~
kapok
Come one, don't be naive...
[https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=668275](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=668275)

The whole point of web standards is to create a - you know - "standard" basis
everybody can build upon. If your webapp doesn't work on a given recent
browser (firefox latest is both recent and decent), you're doing it wrong.

And Google has been doing it wrong for years (since 2011 for Gmail). Not only
is it wrong in the sense that it's poorly developed, but it's also wrong in
any other sense of the word (evil, bad,...).

We're talking about a company that develops a web browser and that, in 2015,
serves barely usable version of their services when the UA doesn't match its
own.

Edit (for the sake of completeness): if you don't spoof the UA of firefox
mobile, you can't use gmail except for painfully reading e-mails.

------
matthewmacleod
Sloppy user-agent matching. This string:

    
    
      (Android) Gecko
    

triggers the message, with both "Android" and "Gecko" being required
components.

I don't see any benefit to this. It's just stupid.

------
jsight
On Android, clicking a link in the browser generally takes you to the default
application for that type of url. If there is no default set, then it will
give you the choice of what to use to go there (possibly including the browser
in the case of a link like this).

Firefox doesn't support that, and would instead take you to the play website,
that really doesn't perform well on a lot of mobile devices. I'm guessing this
factored into their decision to discourage its use.

I don't necessarily agree with this decision, but I think it is an
exaggeration to imply that there is some evil intent here. It's not keeping
you from doing anything that you could do before, and if you are really eager
to get to the site just tap "Request Desktop Site" and it will still load.

~~~
fpgeek
This isn't true. As I mention in a comment below, Firefox gives you two
_nicer_ ways to switch from the web to an app:

1\. The droid in the URL bar once the page has loaded.

2\. The "Open in an app" alternative in a link's long-press menu, which often
tells you which app when the destination is clear.

~~~
tuxone
The point here is that it's not a lack of feature but a lack of user
experience. Android Intent Filters [0] should work like that: the user starts
an action and the system executes the default behavior (or prompt a choice
list). Think about the average user, both ways you described seem poorly user
friendly.

Sure Google solution is crap, right now following a link to a Play Store app
generates this [1], you really need to be a Firefox Power User in order to tap
the droid in the URL bar (on this point Firefox should prompt a tip, at least
the first time).

[0] [http://developer.android.com/guide/components/intents-
filter...](http://developer.android.com/guide/components/intents-filters.html)

[1] [http://i.imgur.com/X43Izy3.png](http://i.imgur.com/X43Izy3.png)

~~~
fluidcruft
Google made the intent system annoying in Lollypop. Previously you could just
touch (well, double touch) the icon of the app you wanted and it would open
using that without setting any preference. Now if that app happens to be the
top-most one you have to squint at the small light-green-on-white buttons as
if a touchscreen were some sort of precision input device.

Honestly, the intent system really sucks for the use case that you mostly want
to set a default app but occasionally want to do something different.
Basically your choice is "be annoyed all the time" or "never have an option
again until you install a new app or go in and delete all the default app's
intent preferences".

Long-press/right-click for rarely used obscure options is pretty standard.

I definitely would not hold up Google's intent design UI in Android as some
sort UI panacea.

~~~
jsight
> I definitely would not hold up Google's intent design UI in Android as some
> sort UI panacea.

Yeah, I completely agree with this. Both Google and the hardware vendors have
tried many different ways to both select and change the default. They are all
terrible, just in different ways.

I had a Samsung phone (T-989) that would open a popup after you selected a
default app informing you of how to change the default later. It would do this
every single time, so picking a default always took at least three taps. It
was by far the worst implementation that I have seen.

The AOSP behavior in Kit Kat is still the best so far, IMO, but it still isn't
friendly at all to non-technical users.

It's a hard problem. If it wasn't someone would have solved it already.

------
dannywoodz
Interestingly, it works if you request the desktop site: they're explicitly
blocking Firefox Mobile.

~~~
zanny
They probably just don't want you accessing the store from a browser on mobile
when you can be using their app.

I don't think this is some malicious betrayal of trust, even if its a stupid
thing to do.

~~~
qntmfred
You can access the store from Chrome on mobile

------
nfriedly
That's a shame. I love Firefox mobile and use it pretty much exclusively, so
this just means I'll spend less time browsing the Play Store.

~~~
dinesh_babu
why in god's name would you browse the play store in Firefox instead of the
app?

~~~
Touche
The great thing about the web is links. Some times you click them and they
take you places. If the place it takes you asks you to open an app instead...
that's a bad experience.

~~~
ntlve
I'm curious as to why you think it is a bad experience?

~~~
wernercd
Why would you think it's a good experience?

I can't count the number of times I'm annoyed when I click on a link to a
website - say, clicking a link on news.google.com or a link here - get moved
to that website and BAM there is a "you want to use our app. Click here to
download it."

No. I don't want your F(!&^NG app. I want your website. Don't show me that.

The next time I go to the same website? BAM! Go To Our App page again!

A news page, blog or a forum doesn't need an app. I don't need to be
constantly badgered to use said sh&%^y app.

Just my 2c rant.

~~~
jaredmcateer
That's not the same thing that is being discussed here. What's being discussed
is that you click, for example, a youtube link in your web browser and android
opens up the youtube app to view the video. Android will give you the choice
to open it up in a variety of supported applications, including the browser,
you can set your permanent preference if you want to not be asked again.

~~~
pjc50
How does one override this? It's especially annoying with e.g. youtube links
in twitter - twitter hides it behind a URL shortener, takes me to the browser
to load the URL, discovers it's youtube and tries to bounce me into the app.
I'd much prefer to be left in the browser.

~~~
yincrash
You can clear it in settings for the app that currently holds the default.

------
ifdefdebug
Is it just me, or did anybody else see here a comment from a Google dev just
one minute ago, stating this was "just a simple bug", going to be "fixed in
short time"? I refreshed the page and now it's gone.

Edit: well I don't really know if the comment came from a Google dev, I
guessed so because it looked very authoritative.

~~~
myko
It was published on an Android fan site but didn't identify a specific
developer:

[http://www.androidcentral.com/heres-whats-google-play-
store-...](http://www.androidcentral.com/heres-whats-google-play-store-being-
blocked-firefox-mobile)

------
Brakenshire
Now might be a good time to mention that Firefox on Android has a built-in
marketplace which allows you to install most FirefoxOS Apps as full Android
Apps, with access to most of the device APIs.

Unfortunately, I find that most of the apps aren't very good at all (and in no
way is it a replacement for Google Play) but it's something interesting to
keep an eye on.

------
callahad
Why this is bad: Google is saying "I don't care whether or not your browser
can view this site, _I won 't even let you try._"

If more online properties go this way, we effectively give Google the
exclusive ability to develop and drive the Web platform at a fundamental
level. For instance, Servo, an experimental, highly-parallel rendering engine
written in Rust, won't be able to improve the efficiency or security of the
Web as a whole if it's not allowed access to the Web in the first place.

~~~
sabret00the
What makes this so bad for consumers is that if you search for an app via
Google, you can't even open links directly.

------
staircasebug
If you visit Gmail with Firefox on Android, Google will serve up a low-
fidelity, non-ajax version of the site/app... a very poor user experience vs
Android Chrome. I feel like this is done intentionally as Safari on iOS gives
the same user experience as Android Chrome.

Also, Google search omits many filters and feature options in Firefox and
again, it seems intentional since Safari on iOS offers the same UX as Android
Chrome.

------
imnes
Doesn't appear to be related to Firefox. I tried it from Chrome on my desktop
(with dev-tools emulating a Nexus 5). See screenshot. Looks like if you're on
a mobile device at all they want you to use the app instead of your browser.

[http://snag.gy/Dl0ay.jpg](http://snag.gy/Dl0ay.jpg)

------
marak830
That is quite disappointing. I do wonder if there is a valid reason. In which
I mean I hope there is one.

~~~
mariusz79
Yes, there is a valid reason - market share wars

~~~
TheCapn
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor)

Without evidence its not really worthwhile to sling mud like that. Chances are
they implemented some feature in the Play store that FF mobile doesn't
support. When a FF mobile user goes to the site and its broken who would they
blame most likely? Google? or Firefox? Experience tells me they'd blame
Google.

~~~
VlijmenFileer
And rightly so, because it was Google that fucked up by implementing crap only
supported by their proprietary crap browser.

------
RyanMcGreal
The same message comes up on the default Android browser. I'm using Android
4.4.2 on a Galaxy S3.

------
Sesetamhet
Just a bug :P. [http://www.androidcentral.com/heres-whats-google-play-
store-...](http://www.androidcentral.com/heres-whats-google-play-store-being-
blocked-firefox-mobile)

------
jMyles
Is this payback for the Mozilla - Yahoo deal? Or am I reading too much into
things?

~~~
calbear81
Surprising that you're the first to mention the most obvious answer which is
that with the search deal ended, there is less affordance to "play nice" with
competitive browsers. This is not at all unusual and perhaps before there was
more consideration given to have their mobile offering work on one of their
largest commercial search partners.

Also, lot's of people are lamenting the seeming betrayal of "don't be evil"
but I think it really hasn't been about that for a while. Google has bigger
ambitions to change the world now as their investment in driverless cars,
medical devices, VR, etc. has shown. Those ideas require large capital
investment and anything they can do to generate more revenue to fund those
truly game-changing ideas are probably seen as fair (regardless of whether
they adhere to an open internet/standards based approach). One day, we'll all
see that the "ends justify the means" or so we hope.

------
gioi
Sightly off-topic but:

Do we _really_ need user agent? What are good reasons we should keep on using
them? I could find none...

~~~
hrjet
Disabling the user-agent breaks quite a few websites as of today, but I agree,
it's a good way forward to break the hegemony of certain websites and
browsers.

------
jdalgetty
Title should specify this is on android and not desktop. Firefox is accessing
the store fine for me on OSX.

~~~
gphilip
Fixed, thanks.

------
myfonj
For those lazy but curious, hurl:
[http://hurl.eu/hurls/75bc3ea92343cf38b3711597c5bd4a2e25bed84...](http://hurl.eu/hurls/75bc3ea92343cf38b3711597c5bd4a2e25bed842/7e0dd3048409eaaa4f8b1ef95db7cebefb926ede)
(GET of `[https://play.google.com/store`](https://play.google.com/store`) with
User-Agent header of Fx 35 on Android)

------
interdrift
I wonder what caused this. That would be a step back...

------
brudgers
Google broke Youtube with IE mobile years ago by simply refusing to serve up
HTML5 to it. It's just the way they do business.

Relevant items on HN:
[https://hn.algolia.com/?query=youtube%20windows%20phone&sort...](https://hn.algolia.com/?query=youtube%20windows%20phone&sort=byPopularity&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=story)

------
squiros
luckily, firefox has a useragent plugin. you can change it to 'i hate chrome
because chrome is stupid, and so is google play' and you can access the google
play store again. or you can simply use apkleecher and bypass that as well.
this is why firefox is king. adaptability for whatever idiocy plagues you.

------
gcb0
have you seen firebox for android? it's years ahead of chrome.

you can have extensions to begin with. from ad blockers to stylish, which let
people with poor vision actually use the browser.

also it allows you to disable all sort of asinine tracking that is forced in
chrome.

expect Google to play a Microsoft on Mozilla harder and harder now.

~~~
omaranto
Firefox for Android also has nicer default fonts and MathJax works! (MathJax
on Chrome for Android renders with parts of formulas overlapping other parts
and overlapping surrounding text.)

------
cognivore
I sometimes wonder if browsers are going to become runtimes. For Google
services you obviously use Chrome. For others they choose to support runtimes
Chrome and Firefox. Microsoft supports IE as the runtime for there services.

It's awful, but it seems like the direction things are going.

~~~
sp332
It used to be that way, but it's been getting better over time. The browser
teams are working on standardizing more seriously and more quickly than
before. Each team has their own experimental stuff, but they all aim for
standardization instead of proprietary features.

~~~
gcp
It used to be that way, but it's been getting worse over time.

Seriously, the last 5 years have undone much of the "web standards web" that
took a decade to accomplish. If you use Google services, you're going to
suffer if you don't use Chrome. Thinking about it, maybe it's only Google that
has "regressed" because IE and MS have been getting better at it.

------
phireal
Working for me now (14.08 GMT).

------
jaxonb
I'm not jumping on this bandwagon. What are you looking for - plugins for the
Firefox browser? Go to the Firefox store. And hey, Firefox is my backup
browser. But I haven't seen any anti-Firefox campaigns from Google, though
I've certainly seen anti-Google campaigns from Firefox, and I thought, they
need to choose their battles a little more carefully. You start a war, there's
always a chance you'll become a casualty.

------
droopybuns
This seems consistent with the other poor design decision in the play store:
no anonymous app reviews.

A team that forces you to compromise your anonymity in order to write a
positive app review has no qualms about forcing you to use a different
browser. That team must be filled with former MS employees.

~~~
a3n
> That team must be filled with former MS employees.

Nah, just people. People are the same everywhere.

"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends
upon his not understanding it."
[https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Upton_Sinclair](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Upton_Sinclair)

------
andrewgjohnson
Can you browse the App Store on iOS using Firefox? Seems like a bit of a red
herring issue to be honest.

~~~
0942v8653
As one commenter said, you can use it in Chrome on android. And until recently
(it's in development now) it was mozzila's decision not to make Firefox for
iOS.

~~~
Steuard
What would it mean to make Firefox for iOS? My understanding was that iOS
requires all browsers to use the same rendering engine under the hood, so
"Firefox" there wouldn't be much more than a different skin for Safari. (Has
that changed?)

~~~
untog
No. It will be a skin around the Webkit runtime - but with Firefox Sync and
similar enabled. Maybe a few extra APIs, too...

~~~
fpgeek
In other words, more of a SafariFox than a Firefox.

------
lcedp
Works for me: [https://s3.amazonaws.com/pushbullet-uploads/ujvlIvV7Mia-
fXRn...](https://s3.amazonaws.com/pushbullet-uploads/ujvlIvV7Mia-
fXRnH1aX5UsBdzGcThKC60devQbBjjaJ/Screenshot_2015-02-11-20-45-25.png)

------
whizzkid
This was an unexpected move from Google.

I am guessing they are trying to have singleton system around their app market
but this is not how it is supposed to be done.

They can give users a unique email address with play store domain and ask them
to sign in if they want to give a different user experience to Google users.
And you need to have installed Google OS or Chrome in order to get that email
address.

With this way, Google is no different than the 90s enterprise companies whose
sites were only supporting IE in order to function.

This is not the first time Google is doing this, and I am guessing this will
not be the last one either. Since they got Eric Schmidt on board, they are
focusing more on revenue than being the Internet hero. I can not really blame
them though..

~~~
gsnedders
> This was an unexpected move from Google

> This is not the first time Google is doing this

Really, this should be no surprise precisely because it's far from the first
time; numerous Google properties use UA-sniffing (many in combination with
whitelists, which is nothing but badness for the open web, where _any_
standards compliant browser should be fine!). An increasing number are
supporting Chrome _only_ at initial launch, which really is sad.

The fact that Opera, who nowadays build on top of the Chromium Content API,
have a comment in browser.js after dodging the UA-sniffing saying the
following says a lot:

> Google, please make sure your obfuscator does not change class names, so our
> patch continues working (or stop browser-sniffing as we both use and
> contribute to Blink!) - love, Opera.

(from
[https://github.com/operasoftware/browserjs/blob/ceef10b34f63...](https://github.com/operasoftware/browserjs/blob/ceef10b34f63259c1aea2edb7d0f35f2b29ab4c4/OPRdesktop/browserjs-25.0.js#L252))

------
davidgerard
> Update 9:05 a.m. PT: Google has informed VentureBeat that the issue
> experienced by Firefox users on Android is a bug, and a fix will be issued
> “very soon.”

i.e. "whoops, we got caught"

------
masto
The bug has been fixed:

[https://twitter.com/ficus/status/565234296294625280](https://twitter.com/ficus/status/565234296294625280)

------
mewwts
Does it work in Chrome?

~~~
rquirk
Yep, just tried it. Firefox not supported, Chrome works fine. It's like
Microsoft in the early 2000s all over again.

~~~
nkuttler
Hehe, I was just thinking of the 90s..
[http://www.anybrowser.org/campaign/](http://www.anybrowser.org/campaign/)

This can't be intentional, can it?

~~~
s_kilk
Even if it is intentional, they'll still claim it's an unfortunate mistake and
just backpedal from it if the pressure is high enough.

Edit: there really isn't a downside for Google. If no-one complains, then they
get a clean shot at locking out a competitor. If they people complain loudly
enough, they can just revert the change and pretend like it was a mistake.
Within a week the whole episode will be forgotten and they can just cook up
another scheme.

------
Too
Clickbait headline. As bad as this is, the headline make it sound like Firefox
was removed from the play store all together, which is far far worse.

------
jagtesh
I think we're just making a big deal out of this. As someone pointed out,
they're likely using technologies not implemented in other browsers yet. Has
the OP tried using play store on Aurora? In any case, I feel Google has the
ethical and moral right to use whatever they see fit for their own web
applications.

And let this be said people, this isn't something new. Not even from Google.
Inbox doesn't work on non-chrome browsers.

Even apple restricts using iCloud anything other than Safari. So, why the
commotion?

~~~
dombili
>Even apple restricts using iCloud anything other than Safari.

Are you sure? I can login to iCloud just fine on Firefox (35.0.1) and Canary.

~~~
jagtesh
I stand corrected. Maybe it's limited to mobile browsers (doesn't work on
Chrome mobile).

------
Mandatum
"Embrace, extend and extinguish" comes to mind. They've played the long con.

Personally not against it, I see Chrome as a better product.

------
captn3m0
The Chrome Webstore used to act similarly (I believe it was because of WebP
support, but I might be wrong). It works now, though.

------
eridal
time to switch to f-droid, as an open-source app store.

[http://f-droid.org/](http://f-droid.org/)

------
hutattedonmyarm
It works from mobile safari (iOS 8.1.3)

~~~
law
I tested it with Cyanogenmod's stock browser customized with an iPhone user-
agent, and it also works fine. It seems like Google is trying to coerce
"eligible users" into using the Google Play app, but won't prevent others from
accessing the site.

------
sz4kerto
I suppose this way they can control access to the store of users coming from
AOSP devices. Firefox is available in 3rd party app stores, Chrome isn't. So
AOSP users who are not aware of other browsers (=average non-techies) can
simply not browse the Play Store.

------
eitland
For twitter users: Google play seems to be @GooglePlay. Tag with
#ChromeIsTheNewIE and ask if it is malice or incompentence (those are the only
two I can come up with : )

------
telany
Nothing happens right away.

------
Chahat
Plz gogel play store working right now

------
wenderson
Ooiiiii

------
9927984798
Fackook

------
engendered
Is this a reasonable complaint? Why would you be browsing the play store from
Android in a browser? If you try to open it in the Chrome browser, it just
forces you to the play store app, which rather makes sense.

Every platform and browser requires support and attention, and in this case
they chose not to support an edge case that really makes no sense, and simply
causes usability issues (so how do you install an app from the Play Store in
Firefox?). But cue the typical "don't be evil" sorts of comments.

EDIT: Wow, five downvotes within 2 minutes. The Google hate is strong in this
case (and is probably a coordinated effort), where an app _ignoring Android
URL intents_ is used in a comically irrelevant fashion....don't be evil, hurr
durr.

And the decline of HN continues.

~~~
wlesieutre
> Why would you be browsing the play store from Android in a browser?

Because you're browsing the web in your web browser (that's what I do with
mine, anyway), you end up on a webpage with an app review, so you click the
link to check out of the official screenshots and reviews, and all of a sudden
you're browsing the Play Store in your browser! What a crazy random
happenstance!

It's almost like that's how webpages work or something.

~~~
tuxone
It's not crazy, it's Intent Filters [0], IMHO the Android killer feature as an
open platform. As an Android user I love the ability to select my default app
in order to open an image, share an image, share a text/link and, of course,
open a Play Store app record. It's the Android way and Firefox is breaking it.

[0] [http://developer.android.com/guide/components/intents-
filter...](http://developer.android.com/guide/components/intents-filters.html)

~~~
wlesieutre
As a recent iPhone switcher, yes, I love intents. It's great to be able to set
what I open mailto: links in, etc.

Not sure I understand the connection here though, could you explain? What
intent is Firefox breaking, and why is it OK that Chrome can go to
play.google.com (in the browser, it doesn't bounce me to the Play Store app)
while Firefox is blocked?

~~~
makomk
Apparently if you open a link to the Play Store, Firefox just opens it
normally and lets you reopen it in the app if that's what you want, rather
than immediately dumping you into the app and randomly breaking stuff like tab
support in the process.

------
venomsnake
Dear firefox, please make built in user agent switcher. Thanks.

~~~
gcp
Firefox for Android supports extensions, and Phony provides this.

------
ottoflux
wow. hope --Maemo--, er... --Meego--, er... Tizen can gel, or I guess we can
wait on Firefox OS to show up on a device that isn't terrible in the US.

~~~
sp332
This isn't about Firefox OS. It's about the Firefox browser app on Android.
[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.mozilla.fi...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.mozilla.firefox)

------
98Windows
Nobody uses firefox anymore anyway so who cares?

~~~
vetinari
I'm using Firefox and I care to have a browser, that does not spy on me.

~~~
bighi
Oh no, not the spying argument again...

~~~
madez
I would like to understand you but I don't yet.

Why do you refuse an argument just because it was used in another occasion?
That appears to me to be a logical fallacy. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

The heart of the argument - that is the demand not to be spied upon - seems to
be to be perfectly reasonable and justified due to economic and security
aspects. Care to weigh in?

~~~
bighi
Looking at English dictionaries I found two main meanings of spying:

1) Observing a target with hostile intents.

2) Acquiring and tracking information.

Google has never been hostile towards me. I've never lost money because of
Google, or had health damage, or had naked pictures of me released to the web,
etc. No "harm" done to me by Google, either literal harm or figurative harm.

So, number 2. If people are complaining of Google tracking information, 99% of
things in your computer track your information. Even a simple 'sudo ls' in
linux is tracking SOME information to allow you to run other sudo commands
without inputting your password again for a while. A computer software that
does not store information is usually quite limited.

What harm (and I accept a loose definition of harm here) comes from Google
remembering what search you did yesterday or when was the last time you logged
on to gmail?

------
felipc
Jeff Atwood's App-pocalypse Now gets more relevant every day
[http://blog.codinghorror.com/app-pocalypse-
now/](http://blog.codinghorror.com/app-pocalypse-now/)

------
chrismarlow9
Chrome deleted. Default search engine in firefox set to duckduckgo. Will be
moving all my gmail/gdocs to a self hosted solution this weekend. If anybody
can recommend an open phone or a cheap/throwaway I would appreciate it.

