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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 r

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.

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.