They don't have to be, as far as I understand it. I've installed a few websites as apps on my phone (because their app had trackers in it) and they can work really well. Examples are Bluesky and Flipboard.

An example where I agree with you is LinkedIn - installed as a web app due to trackers - but they know this, and the whole point of their app is to get you with Facebook and Microsoft trackers, so they make the web app experience miserable on purpose.

But (and correct me if I'm wrong) a PWA made by a non-surveillance capitalist could be just as good as a native app.

Half of the equation is that those making the PWA need to make it well. The other half is that the platform you install it on has to support it well. And Google and Apple have decided to support PWAs as little as possible (in some cases removing support for them altogether. See Apple removing the ability to use them entirely in the EU). And since those two companies make the two most commonly used mobile OS’… well it’s better to just go with a native app.

The #1 biggest problem with PWAs on iOS for example is the lack of push notification support, which for a lot of apps is a nonstarter. Is that the PWA makers fault? No. Does it make that PWA suck anyway? Yes.

You're right, I didn't even think of that

There are tons of apps that you use that are just well packaged PWAs, packaged as an app store app, and you don't even know about it.

PWAs only suck on when they suck, just like everything else.

You do know that a pwa can be packaged up in an app container and you won't even be able to tell the difference?

It doesn't actually have to operate like a pwa, and require native pwa sport.

There are tons of apps that you use that are just well packaged PWAs, packaged as an app store app

So… native apps, that interface with a PWA using a web view or something.

There’s the kicker.

But it's never going anywhere even less then lemmy. Video is expensive both in storage and bandwidth compared to text.

Yep, just like electron or Tauri. A web view wrapped in a native application.

These are very common these days, it's the same use case and value proposition. Mainly because it's just easier to develop UIs with web technologies that look the same everywhere, never without the app.

I think they need to find a way to distribute the heavy video parts among volunteers. I think it would be more practical to have it distributed.

Greyjay isn't foss

Federation still is a bit broken

It's free, and I see an official Github repository containing the code, is that not foss?

Source code doesn't make it foss

Windows XP is open source by that definition

By the acronym, opening up the source code to the public would make it open source. What is Grayjay missing to be open source then? Accepting contributions?

No, that's not how it works. It is source available

I understand what you're saying. What would make GrayJay open source? Allowing for community contribution?

Edit: I looked it up thanks to your unhelpfullness, and open source seems to mean making the code available for the community to use, modify, and share, which Grayjay seems to do. I'm pretty sure I'm right here, but I do want to hear your definition and argument. Is your issue that the license doesn't allow others to make money using the source code?

Open source/libre/foss all have to do with the license. Grayjay doesn't have a license that meets the criteria because it places arbitrary restrictions on the code.

It has nothing to do with contributions. You can ship the code on a CD and that is totally fine as long as it has the proper license.