In August 2025, Google announced that starting next year, it will no longer be possible to develop apps for the Android platform without first registering centrally with Google. This registration will involve:
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Paying a fee to Google
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Agreeing to Google’s Terms and Conditions
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Providing government identification
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Uploading evidence of the developer’s private signing key
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Listing all current and future application identifiers
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Here is the https://keepandroidopen.org/
Honestly, I don’t know if having play services running in a profile that can be deleted would pass that standard for certification. Probably not, I guess.
As for being a fork, I mean the larger community of Graphene, Lineage, Calyx if it continues to exist, and probably a couple Chinese manufacturers who rely on AOSP to manage a fork that is collaboratively developed going forward, that no longer relies on Google’s maintenance of the project.
Yeah that’s just a gargantuan task or someone would have done it already. Sadly, too few people care to make that happen.
Huawei did it (HarmonyOS) but only because they’re a huge company with the necessary resources, and because they were legally prevented from using Android.
I know, but it’s looking more and more like there won’t be an alternative for long. I’d rather have a consortium of interests united in moving a fork forward as the core for all of their own OS’s.