SEATTLE — MiKandi has debuted Mint List, the world’s first third-party Chrome app store.
The Mint List Chrome app store, while still in beta, was developed to deliver the best of the adult web, curating HTML5 apps, themes and extensions from premier adult brands around the world.
“MiKandi’s mission is to aggregate and deliver the best adult experiences on mobile," MiKandi CEO Jesse Adams said. "While we’re fully committed to Android and the power of native apps, Mint List is our push into HTML5.
“The majority of our visitors, including many non-Android users, discover MiKandi from the Chrome browser. Unfortunately, the difficulties we had developing an alternative Chrome App store raise concerns about the openness of the HTML5 app ecosystem on Chrome.”
Although Mint List is a safe alternative Chrome web store for adults, MiKandi soon discovered restrictions after soft launching last Wednesday.
“We had previously been able to write flags to the registry to enable installs, but Google’s Chrome update last week significantly reduced the ability of third parties to deliver their own apps,” MiKandi co-founder Jennifer McEwen said. “We were able to build a workaround solution but it appears that Google intends to tightly control the delivery of HTML5 apps on Chrome.”
In order to install apps outside of Google’s official Chrome Web Store, users must first download and run the Mint Installer, a simple application that enables installs of Chrome Apps from MiKandi Mint List.
With Chrome, Google cites security issues and user protection as reasons to justify the restrictions in its latest update, but MiKandi senses a broader policy change, Adams said.
“With these latest updates, Google has lost the balance between openness and security with Chrome,” Adams said. “People love Android because it always strives for this balance. The Mint List App Store for Chrome is about extending that mission on the web.”
Studios, performers, and developers interested in featuring their adult HTML5 apps, themes, and extensions on Mint List are encouraged to email MiKandi. .
A promotional video for Mint List is available here.