faze

Google is the master of leeching and rent-seeking.

Just as they pit advertisers against each other to drive up prices for impressions on third party sites, for which they keep a large middelman fee, they use the same tactics on Google Play. Developers get to bid on the #1 search result spot, while Google is milking them for 30% of gross revenue for providing a rather abysmal ZIP file download service. They are only able to charge such high fees because of the exclusivity and network effects from being pre-installed on every GMS Android phone.

Other examples of similar rent-seeking platforms are Apple App Store, Windows Store, Steam.

This site loads incredibly slow. What is actually happening in between the time I get a Google frame with blank content and the content finally appearing?

The extreme sluggishness is a problem I've also noticed on the Google Careers site.

And why would I put in time learning these APIs if I have no guarantees they will continue existing?