I'm one of those people and I went through enough app publishing that I can already tell you that it's very likely it'll get rejected again in future updates.
We went through this song and dance for actual file explorers more times than I can count. It usually "sticks" for a few updates before the rejections start again.
The policy hasn't changed.
It also doesn't change the fact that they demand access to every single personal photo, media item and document on device instead of using an API that allows user to have control over what they share with the app - it's the same behaviour as Facebook, Instagram and other companies showed before the policy was enacted.
Instead of respecting the user, they demand the user gives them access to everything with "trust us, we won't do anything bad" attitude while refusing to do better.
The problem is that I WANT to give an app access to everything. I don't want my OS to think of "photos" vs "documents". I want a filesystem, and I want apps to be able to share access to it.
Google and apple are the ones "not respecting the users" by focusing exclusively on lowest common denominator users and pushing to increase their monopoly controls.
The day Android stops letting Syncthing have access to my entire filesystem is the day Android becomes entirely useless to me.
I agree that this access is indeed exploited by Facebook and the like, but the solution simply can't be to remove the capability entirely.
Seems to me there must be some middle ground here - maybe Google decides to keep this functionality around for apps that need it (and punish those who exploit it) and add some type of additional user interaction before an app can get full file system access. I know in MacOS, for example, the built in finder hides a lot of system files until you flip a switch manually to enable them. Could have something similar (with a warning).
This is already the case. The apps in practice abuse this and refuse to start until the user gives them all the personal data if no store enforcement exists.
But I want to be able to, being well informed hopefully, to give an app access to everything. It is (well...) my data and phone, screw these companies.
We went through this song and dance for actual file explorers more times than I can count. It usually "sticks" for a few updates before the rejections start again.
The policy hasn't changed.
It also doesn't change the fact that they demand access to every single personal photo, media item and document on device instead of using an API that allows user to have control over what they share with the app - it's the same behaviour as Facebook, Instagram and other companies showed before the policy was enacted. Instead of respecting the user, they demand the user gives them access to everything with "trust us, we won't do anything bad" attitude while refusing to do better.