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Their comparison of other apps in the store is quite disingenuous. Yes, you technically have other music players, but they're not as integrated into the OS as
by atonse 7y ago
Their comparison of other apps in the store is quite disingenuous.
Yes, you technically have other music players, but they're not as integrated into the OS as Apple Music is. We picked Apple Music for this reason, even though it's a rather bad UI.
Same with Maps. Not that I want to give Google more of my location data but others that want to use Google Maps as their default maps app, can't right now without all kinds of third party hacks.
So yes, the competition does exist, but due to deliberate actions BY APPLE to stifle their APIs to keep them heavily restricted, these apps really aren't first class citizens on the OS.
I largely favor Apple's approach of minimizing data sharing, but their apps are often inferior to the third party alternatives. They should use their app store stick to instead have a MFi-like certification program for data. If you want to be a first-party app for Maps, Mail, locations, etc, you have to demonstrate that you won't abuse that data, and have the right infrastructure to protect it.
Update: Look at web browsing. All those browsers use WKWebKit, so they're all actually just Safari. And Apple's fine with telling the public that they have choice here. That's just blatantly false, and I don't see how their legal team allowed them to make such a statement.
- wlesieutre 7y agoYep, same goes for Mail and Safari. Sure you can install other browsers. But if you want to have website links open in Firefox or whatever, that relies on every single app that links come from implementing their own capability to launch a different browser for links (most of them never will), and then you have to set the default in each app. Having done a stint on Android, I miss being able to pick default handlers for everything.
- Eric_WVGG 7y agoand Apple Maps. I was very excited to get turn-by-turn directions while bicycling via Apple Watch; Apple Maps frequently sends me down freeways if it thinks I’m driving, or the wrong way on 1-way streets if it thinks I'm walking. If the Watch platform was open enough that any Maps app could "snap in," this situation would be just fine. But as long as Apple apps are first-class citizens and everyone else has to deal with limited APIs, I'm not inclined to give Apple the benefit of the doubt on this. This extends to hardware too, incidentally. It's literally impossible for competitors to make earbuds or styluses that can compete with the Airpods or Apple Pencil, because those use private/secret APIs. Not cool.
- threeseed 7y agoAnd yet there are many Maps, Airpods and Apple Pencil competitors. And in the case of hardware you are basically asking for the iPhone to be made into an open platform that anyone must be able to integrate with. Pretty bizarre and definitely something that would have major implications for the entire industry.
- munk-a 7y agoI mean, Apple's advertising is stating that it's an open platform with free competition, so either their idiots or lying - they can't have it both ways.
- scarface74 7y agoI searched the entire article for the word “open”. It appeared 13 times. But: One of those times was “Open the App” One was referring to using Safari to get to the “open internet” The other 11 were invisible labels to open the collapsible divs.
- munk-a 7y agoOne blurb was... > Developers also receive free marketing opportunities through our store design, including the new Today editorial feature, personalized recommendations, search tools, top lists, and social marketing. All this helps to support the millions of successful apps on the App Store. And then... > A store that welcomes competition. > We believe competition makes everything better and results in the best apps for our customers. > We also care about quality over quantity, and trust over transactions. That’s why, even though other stores have more users and more app downloads, the App Store earns more money for developers. Our users trust Apple — and that trust is critical to how we operate a fair, competitive store for developer app distribution.
- scarface74 7y agoWas either blurb incorrect?
- parthdesai 7y agoThe browsers you are installing are a skin on top of WebKit. iirc, you have to use WebKit for the browser in iOS.
- jtbayly 7y agoFine. How about email though? Drives me crazy that I can't specify which app I want to use to send an email.
- parthdesai 7y agoOh, i wasn't disagreeing with OP, i was saying that even the "choice" you have for browsers is not exactly a choice.
- wlesieutre 7y agoIt's not a choice of rendering and javscript engines, but it's still a choice of browser sync ecosystem. I'm loosely locked in to Safari on Mac/iOS if I want my phone's default browser to sync its bookmarks to my computer, because my phone's default browser can't be anything but Safari.
- phmagic 7y agoI wholeheartedly agree as an iOS dev and as an iOS power user. However I fear regulators don't have this granular view and technical depth. I'm more concerned about misinformed, blanket regulation more than the API-restrictions.
- atonse 7y agoI agree – I'm pushing for a solution that Apple can implement without needing any outside help or influence (like MFi for data). But they may need the threat of legal action or government action to push them in that direction.
- gumby 7y agoAs someone who is really quite happy with the curated apple App Store: I agree with your points 100%. When I say "quite happy with" I mean that my android-using friends (mostly non-technical) all seem to have various security hassles with their machines, while I and my iOS using friends (also mostly non-technical) don't seem to have vary many at all. I do feel the monopoly (platform-specific; I don't really feel it's at all a "monopoly" in the legal sense) has allowed apple to become lazy in this regard. They have always used "secret" APIs, partially due to their own corporate structure which discourages intercommunication between groups. The real protection comes from the sandboxing restrictions and other security approaches.. Interestingly I don't find the App Store especially compelling on my mac.
- klodolph 7y agoPrivate APIs are understandable. It takes a while from when you make an API to when you can figure out the right kind of security model for that API. I just think that there should be a roadmap for those private APIs to become public, with some exception. I'd say the reason why sandboxing on the Mac isn't as compelling is for a few reasons. One of them might be if you haven't personally experienced a ransomware attack. The other factor is that the sandbox is being added after-the-fact to an existing system, and it's completely opaque.
- atonse 7y agoAgree with this. I'm not saying Private APIs are necessarily bad (they can be a testing ground), but after 12 years, we still don't have a solution to the "default app" issue.
- munk-a 7y agoI'm pretty happy with the default app situation on windows tbh - sure a fresh install is loaded with edge and warns you about switching off of it... but once you do you can forget it even exists - ditto with pretty much everything else.
- gumby 7y ago
- scarface74 7y agoIf you want to be a first-party app for Maps, Mail, locations, etc, you have to demonstrate that you won't abuse that data, and have the right infrastructure to protect it. How are they suppose to ensure that companies aren’t lying about what they will use your data for - are they going to pinky promise? How is Apple going to ensure that there is an infrastructure in place to ensure that customers’ data is protected? A meaningless third party certification?
- clay_the_ripper 7y agoSome rules are better than none at all. Just because there are edge cases doesn’t mean the rules won’t work for 99% of cases. Same thing goes for “certified” sustainable forestry or fishing. Could some people cheat? Sure. But that doesn’t mean that having processes in place and rules to follow won’t work.
- scarface74 7y agoBoth Google and Facebook were caught breaking the rules when it came to using internal certificates and were having users install privacy invasive apps. https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/01/facebook-google-scandal/ https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/01/facebook-google-scandal/ Not to mention FB buying a VPN provider specifically to spy on users. So if Apple can’t trust two of the largest tech companies in the world to follow the rules, are they suppose to trust Joe Random Developer?
- clay_the_ripper 7y agoWhile you're not wrong, I think it's a fallacy to say that just because people break the rules doesn't mean we should not make rules. Lots of people get speeding tickets, that doesn't mean we should abolish speed limits. Companies break rules, they get caught, the rules get changed and improved and hopefully things tend to get better (in theory).
- scarface74 7y ago
- smoser 7y agoI guess my app slipped through the App Review team since it allows for setting a default browser. https://www.producthunt.com/posts/uptime-3 https://www.producthunt.com/posts/uptime-3
- atonse 7y agoYour app does that, that's not a system-wide default browser.
- vetinari 7y agoOn Android, it is being done by the system. The apps do not have to care which browser the user prefers, the user sets the default one system-wide and the apps just ask to open URL, without being bothered which one to pick.
- anoncake 7y ago> We picked Apple Music for this reason, even though it's a rather bad UI. You "voted with your wallet" for anticompetetive behaviour.
- sigjuice 7y agoWhat are the specific things that make third party music apps not as integrated?
- scarface74 7y agoLook at web browsing. All those browsers use WKWebKit, so they're all actually just Safari. And Apple's fine with telling the public that they have choice here. That's just blatantly false, and I don't see how their legal team allowed them to make such a statement. A web browser is more than just a rendering engine + JavaScript runtime. Are Chrome and the new Chromium backed Microsoft browser the same even though they use the same rendering engine?
- lern_too_spel 7y agoPeople wouldn't complain as much if WKWebKit weren't so awful. Every iDevice is five years behind in web standards support, and there's not a thing the users can do about it. On any other platform, it would be as simple as installing another web browser.
- BlackFingolfin 7y agoFive years? Citation needed? Also, do "people" other than nerds really complain about this?
- scarface74 7y agoThe only people “complaining” are a few computer geeks.