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The counter-argument is that Apple's implementations aren't "playing fairly", because iOS's restrictions mean Apple can give its own features special integratio

by _bxg1 7y ago

The counter-argument is that Apple's implementations aren't "playing fairly", because iOS's restrictions mean Apple can give its own features special integration into the OS that third-parties don't have access to. Of course, some degree of this is inevitable with any platform. So there isn't a clear line where it becomes anti-competitive.

aabhay 7y ago
As long as Apple makes great products, the truth is that people will support a monopoly. I always think of the Microsoft-IE antitrust debacle as karma for making a truly horrible product.
AmericanChopper 7y ago
I don’t think that’s a valid counter-argument at all. The same line of reasoning applies to any service. There’s plenty of products that are essentially 3rd party implementations of features in other services. If you’re going to make a product like that, you absolutely must know that your entire value prop can be wiped out if the 3rd party ever happens to get around to implementing that feature themselves. Apple does plenty of stuff that could be argued as anti-competitive, but I don’t think “implementing my product as a feature” is one of them. It is perhaps a good reason to think twice before making an iOS app though. But as a consumer I prefer it to the opposite approach, which I’d consider a company like Atlassian to have. If you ask Atlassian when they’re going to implement a rather basic and highly demanded feature, the answer tends to be “never, buy it on the market place”.
- _bxg1 7y ago
  > If you’re going to make a product like that It's... it's basically all products. Virtually any product on iOS would function and perform and integrate better if implemented by Apple. It's just a question of at what point it gets popular enough that they want to bother doing so. > The same line of reasoning applies to any service iOS is a special case because of how locked-down it is. Not only can't third-parties do things like draw over other parts of the UI or add items to system UIs, they can't even (truly) run in the background. Of course, on Android, apps can do all of these things and that's part of why it's a security nightmare. Which is why as I said, there's no clear answer to the problem. But it is a problem.
  - AmericanChopper 7y ago
    > It's... it's basically all products I looked through every app I have installed on my iPhone and I only found a couple that would fall into that category. I have a shopping list app which Apple could theoretically implement as a feature if it wanted to (but not fully, as this particular shopping list app allows me to share lists with android users), and Authy. The rest of the apps I have installed are just interfaces for 3rd party services. Apple doesn’t have the power to subvert the value of those services any more than any other service provider does (Apple has a maps app, I still use google maps). I guess Apple could also make a Sudoku app if it really wanted to, but I’d consider that pretty unlikely. I think there’s a strong argument for saying something like Spotify vs Apple Music is anti-competitive, but for rather different reasons.
- TheOtherHobbes 7y ago
  Would Apple have implemented these feature if the originals didn't exist? Unless the answer to that question is a clear "yes" in every case, this behaviour is de facto - and possibly de jure - on the wrong side of anti-monopoly law. The problem is that iOS and MacOS are not specifically operating systems. iOS especially is an OS bundled with a curated non-trivial application suite. That suite puts Apple into direct competition with iOS developers. And of course Apple has an impossibly huge monopolistic advantage in that space. The ethical and above-board option would be to buy the rights to these apps and/or acquihire the devs who make them. Apple has done that in the past, but seems less and less inclined to operate like that now.
  - AmericanChopper 7y ago
    All of that is very much just your opinion, and very much not an opinion shared by the courts or the legislature. It’s also a criticism that applies equally to all products or services that expose any interface that a 3rd party can develop integrations for.

by _bxg1 7y ago

aabhay 7y ago

As long as Apple makes great products, the truth is that people will support a monopoly. I always think of the Microsoft-IE antitrust debacle as karma for making a truly horrible product.

AmericanChopper 7y ago

I don’t think that’s a valid counter-argument at all. The same line of reasoning applies to any service. There’s plenty of products that are essentially 3rd party implementations of features in other services. If you’re going to make a product like that, you absolutely must know that your entire value prop can be wiped out if the 3rd party ever happens to get around to implementing that feature themselves. Apple does plenty of stuff that could be argued as anti-competitive, but I don’t think “implementing my product as a feature” is one of them. It is perhaps a good reason to think twice before making an iOS app though. But as a consumer I prefer it to the opposite approach, which I’d consider a company like Atlassian to have. If you ask Atlassian when they’re going to implement a rather basic and highly demanded feature, the answer tends to be “never, buy it on the market place”.

_bxg1 7y ago
> If you’re going to make a product like that It's... it's basically all products. Virtually any product on iOS would function and perform and integrate better if implemented by Apple. It's just a question of at what point it gets popular enough that they want to bother doing so. > The same line of reasoning applies to any service iOS is a special case because of how locked-down it is. Not only can't third-parties do things like draw over other parts of the UI or add items to system UIs, they can't even (truly) run in the background. Of course, on Android, apps can do all of these things and that's part of why it's a security nightmare. Which is why as I said, there's no clear answer to the problem. But it is a problem.
- AmericanChopper 7y ago
  > It's... it's basically all products I looked through every app I have installed on my iPhone and I only found a couple that would fall into that category. I have a shopping list app which Apple could theoretically implement as a feature if it wanted to (but not fully, as this particular shopping list app allows me to share lists with android users), and Authy. The rest of the apps I have installed are just interfaces for 3rd party services. Apple doesn’t have the power to subvert the value of those services any more than any other service provider does (Apple has a maps app, I still use google maps). I guess Apple could also make a Sudoku app if it really wanted to, but I’d consider that pretty unlikely. I think there’s a strong argument for saying something like Spotify vs Apple Music is anti-competitive, but for rather different reasons.
TheOtherHobbes 7y ago
Would Apple have implemented these feature if the originals didn't exist? Unless the answer to that question is a clear "yes" in every case, this behaviour is de facto - and possibly de jure - on the wrong side of anti-monopoly law. The problem is that iOS and MacOS are not specifically operating systems. iOS especially is an OS bundled with a curated non-trivial application suite. That suite puts Apple into direct competition with iOS developers. And of course Apple has an impossibly huge monopolistic advantage in that space. The ethical and above-board option would be to buy the rights to these apps and/or acquihire the devs who make them. Apple has done that in the past, but seems less and less inclined to operate like that now.
- AmericanChopper 7y ago
  All of that is very much just your opinion, and very much not an opinion shared by the courts or the legislature. It’s also a criticism that applies equally to all products or services that expose any interface that a 3rd party can develop integrations for.