For anyone using any Simple Mobile Tools app be aware that they were sold few days ago (4 dec 2023) to a very privacy unfriendly company:

https://github.com/SimpleMobileTools/General-Discussion/issues/241

Is suggested to remove them or stop updating them.

BTW the company is an israeli publisher that buys apps and fills them with ads asking weekly fees to avoid them…

Someone has made an alternatives list: https://libreddit.nullnet.services/r/SimpleMobileTools/comments/18929pq/simplemobiletools_was_sold_alternatives/

One of the dev of SMT has forked them: https://github.com/FossifyX

And another group of dev announced a fork too: https://github.com/goastian

News Source on Telegram: https://t.me/Libreware/1210

  • LWD@lemm.ee
    312·
    10 months ago

    OP is correct but the wording is a little confusing. FossifyX was made by a developer originally from the project.

    The other fork is made by a completely unrelated group, a for-profit called Astian. I’m a little concerned by them, as they have services to sell and they also acquired Midori, turning it into “a different browser” that ditched WebKit for Google’s Chromium engine in the process.

    • dsemy@lemm.eeEnglish
      14·
      10 months ago

      They did not ditch WebKit for Blink, they ditched it for Gecko (Firefox), which is a good thing IMO.

      • LWD@lemm.ee
        4·
        10 months ago

        True. I’m still very suspicious of them, but I was completely wrong about that bit.

  • niisyth@lemmy.caEnglish
    14·
    10 months ago

    FFS, I moved from Quickpic for the same reason and now Simple Gallery Pro.

    Ugh

    • ragica@lemmy.ml
      6·
      10 months ago

      Aves is really good. Used Simple Gallery Pro for years and it was great. But switching to Aves is painless for me.

    • Feral@feddit.ukEnglish
      12·
      10 months ago

      FWIW, QuickPic Pro ad-free is available by Cheetah Mobile the company who bought it. Also a modded fork of the last verion before it was bundled with ads is available from github.

      • niisyth@lemmy.caEnglish
        1·
        10 months ago

        Cheetah Mobile aren’t exactly well known for their business ethics. Partly why a lot of folks bailed.

  • kpw@kbin.social
    13·
    10 months ago

    Anyone knows what F-Droid will do? Will they switch over to a fork? Maybe the people who installed it via F-Droid don’t have to switch at all. @fdroid

    • Possibly linux@lemmy.zipEnglish
      3·
      10 months ago

      I don’t think they need to do anything. As long as an app meets the F-droid rules it should be fine. Only time will tell of the F-droid version becomes unmaintained