I fear google will use this to purge low cost or even free "no-nonsense" (no ads, in app purchases, unnecessary features, etc.).
there already had been a pattern of google discriminating against such apps
and from a pure monetary sense it makes sense, while for most users such no-nonsense apps are preferable they make little money for Google and compete with apps which do
in a certain way google has motivation to feature _especially_ consumer hostile apps using all kinds of dark patterns to trick, blackmail or outright scam people into paying more
such a bias is probably illegal under the recent (EU) digital markets act as but that is even more motivation for google do kill a lot of such useful apps now before it's more strictly enforced
I go to F-Droid for no-nonsense apps. You can never be too sure what apps will do behind your back if they are not open source.
Also, almost all of F-Droid is no-nonsense, so I don't have to spend time trying to choose the least sleazly looking app like I would have on other stores.
The no-nonsense apps are a dying breed on Google Play. Even a lot of non-shovelware apps are subscription-only, or don't work if you're offline, or introduce new enshittification features with each update. At that point, I'm just going to use their mobile website.
F-Droid exists, fortunately. That's where I go if I want simple apps without any BS. Vinyl for music playback, AntennaPod for podcasts, Tusky for Mastodon, etc
That was the best thing that ever happened, because now you can go to F-Droid and just search for 'fossify' apps, and you'll get the newly forked FOSS versions of SMT apps. Now green-themed instead of orange-themed.
I can see selective enforcement happening a lot. "We don’t allow apps that crash, force close, freeze, or otherwise function abnormally." feels like it might be enforced a lot more strictly for some apps than others.
there already had been a pattern of google discriminating against such apps
and from a pure monetary sense it makes sense, while for most users such no-nonsense apps are preferable they make little money for Google and compete with apps which do
in a certain way google has motivation to feature _especially_ consumer hostile apps using all kinds of dark patterns to trick, blackmail or outright scam people into paying more
such a bias is probably illegal under the recent (EU) digital markets act as but that is even more motivation for google do kill a lot of such useful apps now before it's more strictly enforced