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OS X Mountain Lion’s Gatekeeper is ideally meant to warn users about potentially malicious apps sitting around the web. That’s a good thing! But Gatekeeper could also be interpreted as Apple heavily discouraging less savvy users from installing non-Mac App Store apps entirely. It’s one step away from turning the current app freedom on the Mac into the app dictatorship of iOS.
Of course, it’s no where near a real problem yet but it’s at the very least, a curious move. Apple has made it known that developers can activate Gatekeeper on Mac OS X 10.7.3 to see how their apps would behave under Gatekeeper’s security level. If the app doesn’t pass Gatekeeper’s rules, the warning message above would pop up to users.
Um. Yeah.
That doesn’t do much to calm our fears of an Apple apphoarding future. I mean, OS X is explicitly telling you to move the app to the Trash. Even worse, the app receiving the throngs of Gatekeeper’s wrath is Adium. Adium. The instant messaging client that everyone has installed on their Macs. If Gatekeeper is treating Adium like this, no app will be able to escape its harsh shadow (as an aside, Adium is an app Apple is trying to kill with Mountain Lion). How many people will blindly follow these instructions? [MacRumors via @adampash]
Not so much as a safety feature in the OS as Apple selling it as a freedom from installing apps that they don’t want you to run (malicious or otherwise).
People wanting to run more than just the stock Apple products should look at alternatives, such as more friendly versions of Linux or going to Windows now that it’s looking to give OSX a run for its money.
For Apple users, the walled garden just got a bit taller.
I think this article is very misleading as gatekeeper is option software not something you have to install and it will work in much the same was as the repository’s do on Ubuntu by only allowing you do download from selected vendors, my understanding is the user will be able to (if they choose to install gatekeeper) choose which vendors to include in the ok list.
This is going to be my last post here (and last article read too, aside from maybe Frontline), I’m off to the astoundingly better reporting at The Verge full time.
You’re an idiot. Gatekeeper is there for the majority of people who blind install, Apple wants them in the App Store to reduce that risk. The people who’ll be using unsigned and unapproved applications will be the people that a) know what the application is, and b) who understand the risks involved.
iOS is a walled garden, it’s well understood. It isn’t exactly a dictatorship, Apple for the most part has eased off it’s app review guidelines, you make an app then for the most part you can ship it. Don’t want to play in the walled garden? Fine, make a web app, Apple doesn’t give a shit about what web content you load.
It’s not ‘explicitly telling you’, it’s recommending you should do something. There’s a little question mark button there, the warning is to discourage the 99% of people who ‘blindly follow instructions’ and ended up getting spanked with trojans.
And you’re trying to create the impression that they’ve singled out Adium? I could pick *any* piece of Mac software I use *right now* and the chances are I’d get that warning. Apple has literally just taken the bandages off and let it out into the big wide world, give developers some time to adapt, give Apple some time to improve.
Good luck to Giz UK, but you need to stop reposting shit like this if you ever want to stand on your own.
The problem is with this Chan chap. I’m only reading this because of your “raw nerve” reply – Casey is the worst of all the writers in my opinion. Typically American, regurgatated, juvenile rubbish, I tend to skip all his stuff. Its easy – just skip.
I think you misunderstood this one. He says exactly what you said and that it could be like iOS, which is a legitimate fear.
oh… it’s backwards day, I find myself agreeing with your comment.
The article does sensationalise this issue somewhat, but there is also a concern that this could go further. I agree that it should be re-written into something less hyperbolic because as it stands this feature doesn’t stop you from installing stuff, this is just a warning like you get on Windows Vista or 7 EXCEPT for the explicit “you should move it to the trash” instruction. Maybe that should be changed in the release version and everyone can calm down. Personally I’d rather you didn’t go to the Verge full time. Their writing may be of a higher quality then some seen here, but their commenters are a bunch of pricks.
Oh, that UAC thing in Windows 7 that I instantly turned off as soon as I installed it. I remember (vaguely) that.
exactly, cybershrike says this bollocks can be switched off too, so it’s just the same really.
Guys, I love you but you really need to stop reposting this sensationalist nonsense from the American Giz. Every time I see a stupid article on Giz US (like this one) I pray you guys read it, think “well thats just stupid/incorrect/sensationalist” and either ignore or rewrite it.
Whilst there is a legitimate concern that GateKeeper could force the desktop environment into a Mac App Store only environment and yes, the wording in the dialog isn’t great (needs a “continue” button at the very least). Odds are it will be reworked, it is after all a developer preview.
The topic is something that should be written about, however the article above ignores key facts.
1) The default setting is Mac App Store Apps AND developer signed apps (signing is free)
2) Adium isn’t signed, so it’s throwing up the warning. Of COURSE IT ISN’T, the developer preview only came out TODAY, by the time 10.8 launches I would expect the majority of developers to have their apps signed.
3) You can turn the damn thing off. You can also override it without changing from the default setting (right click > open bypasses GateKeeper)
Seems like some Giz US writers have some vendetta against Apple with their editorialising (since before the iPhone 4 came out…I wonder why…). Criticism is perfectly acceptable, except when it’s rubbish like the above.
“Seems like some Giz US writers have some vendetta against Apple with their editorialising (since before the iPhone 4 came out…I wonder why…). Criticism is perfectly acceptable, except when it’s rubbish like the above.”
It’s funny, If you ask a Google/Android fan I’m sure they will tell you their vendetta is a against Google/Android.
I agree with the rest of your points (in fact I posted much the same thing just now). As a reward for your clear-headed and balanced viewpoint please accept this star.
The title of this article would have been more enticing without the apostrophe and the word “gatekeeper”.
If MS did this they’d be hauled up before Washington and Brussels faster tha n you can say “$500m fine please”.