I have been working on https://1launch.eu for the past two months. Very MVP stage. I don't plan to be in the same niche as european-alternatives, but it is very much inspired by this. It is largely meant to be a ProductHunt / AngelList for Europe with a couple of key features especially for the European market (like instant translation into all 24 languages of the EU to launch in the whole European market in one go). If you want to launch on the platform or want to be involved in a different way, send me an email on hackernews@1launch.eu

> This is because app stores do a lot of heavy lifting to provide security for the app ecosystem. Specifically, they provide integrity, ensuring that apps being delivered are not tampered with, consistency, ensuring all users get the same app, and transparency, ensuring that the record of versions of an app is truthful and publicly visible.

The Google Play Store does none of this, lol. All apps created since 2021 have to make use of Google Play App Signing, which means Google holds the keys used to sign the app. They leverage this to include stuff like their Play Integrity in the builds that are served. The Android App Bundle format means that completely different versions of the app are delivered depending on the type of device, locale, etc. There is 0 transparency about this for the end-user.

I think just doing files and then syncing the files with another solution it's okay.

For example my local apps: Synthing syncs the files between my computer and phone for Note taking(just markdown and org files) obsidian on my phone, emacs/vim on my PC. Todo and reminders: org mode in emacs (desktop) orgzly on mobile. Password manager: KeePassxc desktop, keepassdx mobile. Calendar: just sync the ics file. Photos: just sync files use the default app. I can continue with this with every app, I don't know why people overcomplicate things