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If some other business is "putting your business model at risk," isn't that called competition? Since when is Apple's business model sacred? I don't think Sween

If some other business is "putting your business model at risk," isn't that called competition? Since when is Apple's business model sacred? I don't think Sweeney is some kind of good guy, butI know for sure Apple is a predatory bully who would love to own the world, just like some other giant tech companies we could all name.

ChrisLomont 6y ago
What if the other business is taking benefits and agreeing to contracts, then breaks that contract? Isn’t that called a contract violation? Epic could make their own platform to sell games on, but they want the market Apple has built and the devices Apple has created. The courts will decide, and since for decades courts have sided with platform creators being allowed to police content and charge access fees (SEGA, Nintendo, and later Sony, all have such cases), I think Epic will lose. Despite some claims Apple has some monopoly, their share of mobile is far too small to count as such. I expect the courts to tell Epic to sell Android only if they don’t like Apple terms.
- mrgordon 6y ago
  Of course Google also kicked them out of their store for the same reason...
- Barrin92 6y ago
  >Epic could make their own platform to sell games on, but they want the market Apple has built and the devices Apple has created. logic also works the other way around. Without software smartphones are expensive scrap metal. Every popular piece of software that runs on the phone adds value to it.
  - ChrisLomont 6y ago
    So that means third parties have the legal right to put on Apple phones whatever they please? I think not. As such, the contract between the companies is the legally binding method to access Apple hardware. Apparently Apple has designed the contract so millions of apps got developed for the phones. Epic wanted different terms, but has no legal right to unilaterally break contracts to do so. The courts will likely side with Apple. There’s ample precedent for platform owners to have wide latitude on fees to publish.
    - kohtatsu 6y ago
      I want to believe I own this phone, not Apple, despite them trying their darnedest to keep me out.
    - Barrin92 6y ago
      >So that means third parties have the legal right to put on Apple phones whatever they please? I think not. It just means that the argument was terrible because Apple didn't 'built the market themselves'. Developers and third parties are what made smartphones so valuable, and Apple is a part of that, but not some sort of messiah, and not even the major contributor. the market value of everything that runs on the phone is much larger than the phone. As to what should be the case, yes I think people should have the right to run on their phone whatever software they want. If they only want to run Apple software they can do that no problem, there is no downside here. What are you afraid of, too much competition and freedom? If the Apple experience is so great they've got nothing to lose. Also applies to game consoles in my opinion. I'd love freely moddable console games and if developers could publish on a playstation without paying fees to sony or being limited by them. I'd love to see platforms unlocked so that there is a maximum amount of opportunity for everyone to do what they want with it. That's how creative things are made.
      - ChrisLomont 6y ago
        > the market value of everything that runs on the phone is much larger than the phone. Not by any metric I can find. Apple has a market cap of 2 trillion; half their revenue of 260B is phone. The market cap of all mobile companies is dwarfed by Apple.... Mobile app sales total 76B a year, including both iOS and Android. The iOS part is around half of that value. So by one simple metric, Apple revenue on phones is around 130B a year, mobile revenue on iOS is around 38B..... What metric did you base this "much larger" claim? Did you base it on market numbers or make it up? >I'd love freely moddable console games and if developers could publish There's plenty of such platforms. They don't take off. Ask yourself why. Conspiracy stuff like "the big men stop them" is not the answer. Even huge players like Steam have tried - and they certainly have the resources to push such a thing. It failed. Why didn't developers rush to these free to publish on platforms? Maybe you are missing important things about the value of the platform versus the value of the software. >What are you afraid of, too much competition and freedom? Competition is not breaking contracts as you see fit. Competition will not exist without rule of law - this is basic econ. You'll end up with chaos and theft when contracts cannot be enforced. And you're welcome to do whatever you want. Buy other hardware if you don't like Apple's terms of service. Build a product and sell it if you think there's demand for a different product. People buy Apple because they find more value in it, as is, than their other choices. The same as people who value freedom and openness are allowed to buy other products as they see fit. I don't understand why people continually think they have some rights they simply don't historically, legally, or even morally. Just like I'd expect you to claim it's immoral for some other entity to force things you created to adhere to their whims, or hand over value to you because you demand it, you have no moral right to do that to others. I guess we just see it differently on the morality of forcing others to bend their work to our whims. You also forget that once Atari did let developers publish will nilly on Atari 2600, and there was such a deluge of crap, that the market and platform crashed. Nintendo and all following companies learned that lesson: everyday consumers don't have the skill to protect themselves from crap, so to make a solid consumer platform, the owner of the hardware should provide significant protection for users.
  - scarface74 6y ago
    I would say that for Basecamp’s Hey. But Epic selling virtual currency to buy costumes and dance moves add as much value as Candy Crush Saga. The entire free to play games with in app consumables is a stain on the entire mobile market.
manquer 6y ago
Well Apple is not saying it is putting their business model at risk ( it does and it should) they are saying their philosophy to user security is at risk . i.e. if Epic wins in court apple has a tough choice, either reduce their own rates substantially and / or allow alternative stores . For all apple's flaws, having single app store is better for user security as you know who to trust, it also gives conveniently makes Apple monopoly that they exploit to make 50B+ a year. The question is will Apple sacrifice revenu for user security or is security and privacy are only there when it makes Apple money.
- jtdev 6y ago
  I don’t want .msi like installers for iOS apps scattered across the web... I know this is an unpopular opinion among techies, but I quite like the garden that Apple has walled off.
  - manquer 6y ago
    The problem here is not the walling itself , it is lack of regulations over what they can, they cannot do. Which allows walled gardens to kick out apps they don't like, impose all sorts of rules, and charge outrageously Developers associate the freedom of open standards and protocol to these abuses. In the early GNU years, the same philosophy applied to source availability. Closed source does make similar abuse fare more easier. Abuses can be prevented with well built regulation. Developers do not like to get into governance and policy so they want to solve it technically, Open Source or open protocols and standards etc, sometimes that opens up avenues vulnerabilities in design, which devs generally are tech savy enough to be immune to and come up with even more tech like https, adblockers hardware keys etc. This cat and mouse game leaves rest of the population far behind and vulnerable, sometimes you just have to do governance than look for pure tech solutions.
- Bud 6y ago
  Please don't make up figures and share them in public. No, Apple didn't make $50B in profit "a year" or last year or in ANY year from App Store fees. Takes about 30 seconds to look up Apple's financials and disprove that. And no, Apple doesn't have a "monopoly". Sony, Google, and Microsoft also get 30% of all revenue from their app stores. Claiming Apple has a "monopoly" is ludicrous and just shows that you don't know what a real monopoly is.
scarface74 6y ago
Yes, they want to own the world by selling products that costs three times more than the competition. Apple is the last company you can accuse of going after global domination by chasing market share.
- wayneftw 6y ago
  The newest iPhone is $399. The iPad $299. Which competing products are nearly as desirable in that price range? They now have 50% market share in the US and there’s no sign of that stopping when 90% of the youth market only wants an Apple. They’re a monopoly through and through at this point. If this lawsuit doesn’t get them another one will. It’s just a matter of time.
  - scarface74 6y ago
    The average selling price of an Android phone is $260. $100 less than the cheapest iPhone. https://www.statista.com/statistics/951537/worldwide-average-selling-price-android-smartphones/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/951537/worldwide-average... They now have 50% market share.... They’re a monopoly through and through at this point That’s not how monopolies work. Can you name one case in the past 50 years where a company was declared a monopoly with a 50% market share?
    - wayneftw 6y ago
      That’s worldwide. Nobody wants cheap Android devices in the US. That is how monopolies work. You don’t need 50% market share to be a monopoly, but having that certainly grants you monopoly power. Here's an example of 2 things that Apple can currently do, straight from justice.gov: "Market power and monopoly power are related but not the same. The Supreme Court has defined market power as "the ability to raise prices above those that would be charged in a competitive market,"(8) and monopoly power as "the power to control prices or exclude competition."(9)" [1] You can't have a very successful app business without being in Apple's app store in the US, which would exclude you from half the population. [1] https://www.justice.gov/atr/competition-and-monopoly-single-firm-conduct-under-section-2-sherman-act-chapter-2 https://www.justice.gov/atr/competition-and-monopoly-single-...

ChrisLomont 6y ago

What if the other business is taking benefits and agreeing to contracts, then breaks that contract? Isn’t that called a contract violation? Epic could make their own platform to sell games on, but they want the market Apple has built and the devices Apple has created. The courts will decide, and since for decades courts have sided with platform creators being allowed to police content and charge access fees (SEGA, Nintendo, and later Sony, all have such cases), I think Epic will lose. Despite some claims Apple has some monopoly, their share of mobile is far too small to count as such. I expect the courts to tell Epic to sell Android only if they don’t like Apple terms.

mrgordon 6y ago
Of course Google also kicked them out of their store for the same reason...
Barrin92 6y ago
>Epic could make their own platform to sell games on, but they want the market Apple has built and the devices Apple has created. logic also works the other way around. Without software smartphones are expensive scrap metal. Every popular piece of software that runs on the phone adds value to it.
- ChrisLomont 6y ago
  So that means third parties have the legal right to put on Apple phones whatever they please? I think not. As such, the contract between the companies is the legally binding method to access Apple hardware. Apparently Apple has designed the contract so millions of apps got developed for the phones. Epic wanted different terms, but has no legal right to unilaterally break contracts to do so. The courts will likely side with Apple. There’s ample precedent for platform owners to have wide latitude on fees to publish.
  - kohtatsu 6y ago
    I want to believe I own this phone, not Apple, despite them trying their darnedest to keep me out.
  - Barrin92 6y ago
    >So that means third parties have the legal right to put on Apple phones whatever they please? I think not. It just means that the argument was terrible because Apple didn't 'built the market themselves'. Developers and third parties are what made smartphones so valuable, and Apple is a part of that, but not some sort of messiah, and not even the major contributor. the market value of everything that runs on the phone is much larger than the phone. As to what should be the case, yes I think people should have the right to run on their phone whatever software they want. If they only want to run Apple software they can do that no problem, there is no downside here. What are you afraid of, too much competition and freedom? If the Apple experience is so great they've got nothing to lose. Also applies to game consoles in my opinion. I'd love freely moddable console games and if developers could publish on a playstation without paying fees to sony or being limited by them. I'd love to see platforms unlocked so that there is a maximum amount of opportunity for everyone to do what they want with it. That's how creative things are made.
    - ChrisLomont 6y ago
      > the market value of everything that runs on the phone is much larger than the phone. Not by any metric I can find. Apple has a market cap of 2 trillion; half their revenue of 260B is phone. The market cap of all mobile companies is dwarfed by Apple.... Mobile app sales total 76B a year, including both iOS and Android. The iOS part is around half of that value. So by one simple metric, Apple revenue on phones is around 130B a year, mobile revenue on iOS is around 38B..... What metric did you base this "much larger" claim? Did you base it on market numbers or make it up? >I'd love freely moddable console games and if developers could publish There's plenty of such platforms. They don't take off. Ask yourself why. Conspiracy stuff like "the big men stop them" is not the answer. Even huge players like Steam have tried - and they certainly have the resources to push such a thing. It failed. Why didn't developers rush to these free to publish on platforms? Maybe you are missing important things about the value of the platform versus the value of the software. >What are you afraid of, too much competition and freedom? Competition is not breaking contracts as you see fit. Competition will not exist without rule of law - this is basic econ. You'll end up with chaos and theft when contracts cannot be enforced. And you're welcome to do whatever you want. Buy other hardware if you don't like Apple's terms of service. Build a product and sell it if you think there's demand for a different product. People buy Apple because they find more value in it, as is, than their other choices. The same as people who value freedom and openness are allowed to buy other products as they see fit. I don't understand why people continually think they have some rights they simply don't historically, legally, or even morally. Just like I'd expect you to claim it's immoral for some other entity to force things you created to adhere to their whims, or hand over value to you because you demand it, you have no moral right to do that to others. I guess we just see it differently on the morality of forcing others to bend their work to our whims. You also forget that once Atari did let developers publish will nilly on Atari 2600, and there was such a deluge of crap, that the market and platform crashed. Nintendo and all following companies learned that lesson: everyday consumers don't have the skill to protect themselves from crap, so to make a solid consumer platform, the owner of the hardware should provide significant protection for users.
- scarface74 6y ago
  I would say that for Basecamp’s Hey. But Epic selling virtual currency to buy costumes and dance moves add as much value as Candy Crush Saga. The entire free to play games with in app consumables is a stain on the entire mobile market.

manquer 6y ago

Well Apple is not saying it is putting their business model at risk ( it does and it should) they are saying their philosophy to user security is at risk . i.e. if Epic wins in court apple has a tough choice, either reduce their own rates substantially and / or allow alternative stores . For all apple's flaws, having single app store is better for user security as you know who to trust, it also gives conveniently makes Apple monopoly that they exploit to make 50B+ a year. The question is will Apple sacrifice revenu for user security or is security and privacy are only there when it makes Apple money.

jtdev 6y ago
I don’t want .msi like installers for iOS apps scattered across the web... I know this is an unpopular opinion among techies, but I quite like the garden that Apple has walled off.
- manquer 6y ago
  The problem here is not the walling itself , it is lack of regulations over what they can, they cannot do. Which allows walled gardens to kick out apps they don't like, impose all sorts of rules, and charge outrageously Developers associate the freedom of open standards and protocol to these abuses. In the early GNU years, the same philosophy applied to source availability. Closed source does make similar abuse fare more easier. Abuses can be prevented with well built regulation. Developers do not like to get into governance and policy so they want to solve it technically, Open Source or open protocols and standards etc, sometimes that opens up avenues vulnerabilities in design, which devs generally are tech savy enough to be immune to and come up with even more tech like https, adblockers hardware keys etc. This cat and mouse game leaves rest of the population far behind and vulnerable, sometimes you just have to do governance than look for pure tech solutions.
Bud 6y ago
Please don't make up figures and share them in public. No, Apple didn't make $50B in profit "a year" or last year or in ANY year from App Store fees. Takes about 30 seconds to look up Apple's financials and disprove that. And no, Apple doesn't have a "monopoly". Sony, Google, and Microsoft also get 30% of all revenue from their app stores. Claiming Apple has a "monopoly" is ludicrous and just shows that you don't know what a real monopoly is.

scarface74 6y ago

Yes, they want to own the world by selling products that costs three times more than the competition. Apple is the last company you can accuse of going after global domination by chasing market share.

wayneftw 6y ago
The newest iPhone is $399. The iPad $299. Which competing products are nearly as desirable in that price range? They now have 50% market share in the US and there’s no sign of that stopping when 90% of the youth market only wants an Apple. They’re a monopoly through and through at this point. If this lawsuit doesn’t get them another one will. It’s just a matter of time.
- scarface74 6y ago
  The average selling price of an Android phone is $260. $100 less than the cheapest iPhone. https://www.statista.com/statistics/951537/worldwide-average-selling-price-android-smartphones/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/951537/worldwide-average... They now have 50% market share.... They’re a monopoly through and through at this point That’s not how monopolies work. Can you name one case in the past 50 years where a company was declared a monopoly with a 50% market share?
  - wayneftw 6y ago
    That’s worldwide. Nobody wants cheap Android devices in the US. That is how monopolies work. You don’t need 50% market share to be a monopoly, but having that certainly grants you monopoly power. Here's an example of 2 things that Apple can currently do, straight from justice.gov: "Market power and monopoly power are related but not the same. The Supreme Court has defined market power as "the ability to raise prices above those that would be charged in a competitive market,"(8) and monopoly power as "the power to control prices or exclude competition."(9)" [1] You can't have a very successful app business without being in Apple's app store in the US, which would exclude you from half the population. [1] https://www.justice.gov/atr/competition-and-monopoly-single-firm-conduct-under-section-2-sherman-act-chapter-2 https://www.justice.gov/atr/competition-and-monopoly-single-...