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This is a very bad look on Apple. Regardless of the enforceability of their agreements, the sense of entitlement that underlies Apple’s position is shocking. T

by bww 6y ago

This is a very bad look on Apple. Regardless of the enforceability of their agreements, the sense of entitlement that underlies Apple’s position is shocking. The claim that Epic has “lined [its] pockets at Apple’s expense” implies that Apple deserves to sit in the middle of every transaction that happens on their devices and take a margin. This is the world’s most valuable company we’re talking about here; assertions like this demonstrate an unbelievable lack of self-awareness. Let’s also not forget that Apple already extracts huge amounts of money from developers even if they don’t make a cent on transaction margins. It’s not possible to develop for iOS without a Mac, and therefore even the smallest developer making free apps has paid Apple for at least: one computer, one of each device class they develop for, and the cost of their developer account subscription. Large companies like Epic buy thousands of computers and test devices from Apple. The idea that anything is happening “at Apple’s expense” is preposterous. Maybe next Toyota will decide that they deserve a percentage of Uber’s revenue because Toyota's cars help facilitate Uber’s business?

cjoelrun 6y ago
Isn't a better analogy that car dealerships deserve revenue for selling Toyota's cars? Running an app store and providing a safe platform for users isn't free right?
- KindOne 6y ago
  Car dealership analogy is flawed. In some states its illegal for the car manufacturer to directly sale to the consumer, they have to go through car dealerships. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_US_dealership_disputes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_US_dealership_disputes
  - Google234 6y ago
    A grocery store would be a fine alternative.
  - zaksoup 6y ago
    Honestly, I think this makes it an even better analogy! Apple is exactly like the dealership groups suing Tesla to prevent them from selling directly to consumers.
    - gazarullz 6y ago
      Not really, Tesla hasn’t placed their cars in dealerships for years bound by a contract, and all of a sudden decided that dealerships don’t deserve the margin the same Tesla would have been bound to pay through the above contract terms.
  - joshuaellinger 6y ago
    The dealership model comes from the abuses by the OEMs during the first part of the 1930s. They would sell you cars and then charge a ton for repairs and lock you in to only getting repairs from them. The local dealerships are small businesses incorporated in the states so they can be subject to more political pressure and local control. It has been eroded over the years but originally the dealerships protected consumers from the sort of bad behavior you see from Telsa and Apple. Not that I love the dealership model but there is real competition at the local level on car repair in a way that there doesn't appear to be with Telsa.
- bosswipe 6y ago
  Running the only app store and banning all others is less than free, it makes them piles of money in many ways.
  - bawolff 6y ago
    Having positive net profit is not the same thing as having no costs or negative costs.
- stale2002 6y ago
  > Isn't a better analogy that car dealerships deserve revenue for selling Toyota's cars? That depends. Is the car dealership making it impossible for me, as a buyer, to buy from different car dealerships, and forcing me to only buy it from them? That would be a more similar analogy. Epic would likely not have any problem at all, if it was possible to easily install the epic app store on the iPhone. But its not. Because Apple makes it almost impossible for competitors to install other app stores on the iPhone.
  - DonaldPShimoda 6y ago
    Uhhh well isn't it more like Tesla? There are no Tesla dealerships in the traditional sense — only Tesla-owned sales locations. You can't buy a new Tesla from any local dealership; you can only get them directly from Tesla's stores. You can switch to Android, and in fact Android holds the global majority of smartphone users (yes yes, iOS is the majority in the US by a small margin). I think we need to rethink the whole vertical integration thing entirely, instead of trying to reason about vertically integrated platforms in terms of non-vertically-integrated platforms. It doesn't seem to work.
    - stale2002 6y ago
      > You can't buy a new Tesla from any local dealership; you can only get them directly from Tesla's stores. No, not really. I am pretty sure that it is perfectly legal for other people to buy and then resell teslas. I do not believe that Tesla is suing people who resell Teslas. > the global majority of smartphone users In the USA, the Iphone has about 50% of the smart phone market. And when it comes to US anti-trust law, thats all that matters.
      - DonaldPShimoda 6y ago
        > I am pretty sure that it is perfectly legal for other people to buy and then resell teslas. We're not talking about reselling — we're talking about people selling brand-new product. Most people don't buy a Toyota new from Toyota directly; they go to a local Toyota dealership. But you can't buy a new Tesla through a dealership, because Tesla doesn't allow it. You can only buy a new Tesla through Tesla directly. > In the USA, the Iphone has about 50% of the smart phone market. And when it comes to US anti-trust law, thats all that matters. You missed my point. I was saying that Android is a viable alternative to iOS, as shown by the fact that most people in the world (and many people in the US) use Android instead of iOS. If the policies of iOS are not to your liking, you can choose to not support the platform.
- mgoetzke 6y ago
  If they were personally involved in each individual app sale that argument would hold. Since the extra cost between selling 1 copy and 1 million copies is not the same as between selling 1 car and 1 million cars.
ecf 6y ago
> Maybe next Toyota will decide that they deserve a percentage of Uber’s revenue because Toyota's cars help facilitate Uber’s business? There are many car manufacturers that Uber could choose from in just the same way that there are many platforms that developers can develop for. Stop trying to spread the idea that the ability to make apps for the iPhone is an inalienable right.
- paxys 6y ago
  There aren't many platforms there are exactly two. And the costs of switching between them are significant enough that this argument holds less water by the day.
  - jjcon 6y ago
    > there are exactly two If we are talking about platforms and not codebases there are waaay more than two. iOS (App store) Android (Google Play) FireOS (Amazon App Store) LineageOS (Fdroid) One UI (Galaxy Store) To name a few. These all have distinct and thriving marketplaces for apps with decent market share (some can overlap). The code base they use is irrelevant for this context.
    - asdfasgasdgasdg 6y ago
      How many of those are installed on more than 1% of mobile devices (however broadly construed)? I think the answer is two. Amazon has like 10% of the tablet market share, but the tablet market is like 1/20th the size of the phone market. Just to demonstrate that this is the variable that matters, consider the case where there are exactly three devices that have each of the other marketplaces installed on them, respectively. Would they present a meaningful competitive alternative to the big two?
      - Google234 6y ago
        Apple store is on like less than 10% of phones to be fair
      - 6y ago
wilsonnb3 6y ago
You can buy your Mac, iPhones, and ipads used and give no money to apple for any of those purchases.
heisenbit 6y ago
Yes, and they should be more careful for their IPR stance not to become a mess. They demand a cut of the final price of the app product while they were fighting Qualcomm which also wanted a cut of the final value of the phone product. The demands for a percentage can be stretched only so far until they become totally disconnected from the reality and run the danger to be reigned in by a judge.
ArkVark 6y ago
The logical next step is for individual countries to regulate the maximum % commission that a digital marketplace can charge its developers. Which will place Apple in a much more difficult position than if they unilaterally reduced their commission level to 15%.

by bww 6y ago

cjoelrun 6y ago

Isn't a better analogy that car dealerships deserve revenue for selling Toyota's cars? Running an app store and providing a safe platform for users isn't free right?

KindOne 6y ago
Car dealership analogy is flawed. In some states its illegal for the car manufacturer to directly sale to the consumer, they have to go through car dealerships. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_US_dealership_disputes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_US_dealership_disputes
- Google234 6y ago
  A grocery store would be a fine alternative.
- zaksoup 6y ago
  Honestly, I think this makes it an even better analogy! Apple is exactly like the dealership groups suing Tesla to prevent them from selling directly to consumers.
  - gazarullz 6y ago
    Not really, Tesla hasn’t placed their cars in dealerships for years bound by a contract, and all of a sudden decided that dealerships don’t deserve the margin the same Tesla would have been bound to pay through the above contract terms.
- joshuaellinger 6y ago
  The dealership model comes from the abuses by the OEMs during the first part of the 1930s. They would sell you cars and then charge a ton for repairs and lock you in to only getting repairs from them. The local dealerships are small businesses incorporated in the states so they can be subject to more political pressure and local control. It has been eroded over the years but originally the dealerships protected consumers from the sort of bad behavior you see from Telsa and Apple. Not that I love the dealership model but there is real competition at the local level on car repair in a way that there doesn't appear to be with Telsa.
bosswipe 6y ago
Running the only app store and banning all others is less than free, it makes them piles of money in many ways.
- bawolff 6y ago
  Having positive net profit is not the same thing as having no costs or negative costs.
stale2002 6y ago
> Isn't a better analogy that car dealerships deserve revenue for selling Toyota's cars? That depends. Is the car dealership making it impossible for me, as a buyer, to buy from different car dealerships, and forcing me to only buy it from them? That would be a more similar analogy. Epic would likely not have any problem at all, if it was possible to easily install the epic app store on the iPhone. But its not. Because Apple makes it almost impossible for competitors to install other app stores on the iPhone.
- DonaldPShimoda 6y ago
  Uhhh well isn't it more like Tesla? There are no Tesla dealerships in the traditional sense — only Tesla-owned sales locations. You can't buy a new Tesla from any local dealership; you can only get them directly from Tesla's stores. You can switch to Android, and in fact Android holds the global majority of smartphone users (yes yes, iOS is the majority in the US by a small margin). I think we need to rethink the whole vertical integration thing entirely, instead of trying to reason about vertically integrated platforms in terms of non-vertically-integrated platforms. It doesn't seem to work.
  - stale2002 6y ago
    > You can't buy a new Tesla from any local dealership; you can only get them directly from Tesla's stores. No, not really. I am pretty sure that it is perfectly legal for other people to buy and then resell teslas. I do not believe that Tesla is suing people who resell Teslas. > the global majority of smartphone users In the USA, the Iphone has about 50% of the smart phone market. And when it comes to US anti-trust law, thats all that matters.
    - DonaldPShimoda 6y ago
      > I am pretty sure that it is perfectly legal for other people to buy and then resell teslas. We're not talking about reselling — we're talking about people selling brand-new product. Most people don't buy a Toyota new from Toyota directly; they go to a local Toyota dealership. But you can't buy a new Tesla through a dealership, because Tesla doesn't allow it. You can only buy a new Tesla through Tesla directly. > In the USA, the Iphone has about 50% of the smart phone market. And when it comes to US anti-trust law, thats all that matters. You missed my point. I was saying that Android is a viable alternative to iOS, as shown by the fact that most people in the world (and many people in the US) use Android instead of iOS. If the policies of iOS are not to your liking, you can choose to not support the platform.
mgoetzke 6y ago
If they were personally involved in each individual app sale that argument would hold. Since the extra cost between selling 1 copy and 1 million copies is not the same as between selling 1 car and 1 million cars.

ecf 6y ago

> Maybe next Toyota will decide that they deserve a percentage of Uber’s revenue because Toyota's cars help facilitate Uber’s business? There are many car manufacturers that Uber could choose from in just the same way that there are many platforms that developers can develop for. Stop trying to spread the idea that the ability to make apps for the iPhone is an inalienable right.

paxys 6y ago
There aren't many platforms there are exactly two. And the costs of switching between them are significant enough that this argument holds less water by the day.
- jjcon 6y ago
  > there are exactly two If we are talking about platforms and not codebases there are waaay more than two. iOS (App store) Android (Google Play) FireOS (Amazon App Store) LineageOS (Fdroid) One UI (Galaxy Store) To name a few. These all have distinct and thriving marketplaces for apps with decent market share (some can overlap). The code base they use is irrelevant for this context.
  - asdfasgasdgasdg 6y ago
    How many of those are installed on more than 1% of mobile devices (however broadly construed)? I think the answer is two. Amazon has like 10% of the tablet market share, but the tablet market is like 1/20th the size of the phone market. Just to demonstrate that this is the variable that matters, consider the case where there are exactly three devices that have each of the other marketplaces installed on them, respectively. Would they present a meaningful competitive alternative to the big two?
    - Google234 6y ago
      Apple store is on like less than 10% of phones to be fair
    - 6y ago

wilsonnb3 6y ago

You can buy your Mac, iPhones, and ipads used and give no money to apple for any of those purchases.

heisenbit 6y ago

Yes, and they should be more careful for their IPR stance not to become a mess. They demand a cut of the final price of the app product while they were fighting Qualcomm which also wanted a cut of the final value of the phone product. The demands for a percentage can be stretched only so far until they become totally disconnected from the reality and run the danger to be reigned in by a judge.

ArkVark 6y ago

The logical next step is for individual countries to regulate the maximum % commission that a digital marketplace can charge its developers. Which will place Apple in a much more difficult position than if they unilaterally reduced their commission level to 15%.