6 ms·

Apple's defense that they are not a monopolist in any traditional sense is correct as far as it goes. But a novel definition of monopoly may be warranted. As

Apple's defense that they are not a monopolist in any traditional sense is correct as far as it goes. But a novel definition of monopoly may be warranted. As smartphones become more and more a part of the fundamental infrastructure of society, and remain relatively expensive and slow to replace, it's not crazy to say that iPhone users are a market in itself and that market should be protected from monopoly. In the same way that a company in the 1800s might not have been a national or regional monopoly, but very much was a monopoly in their own company town, or how car manufacturers in the 20th Century were forced to allow competition in repair services. I think ultimately, right now, my personal sense is that iPhones don't quite rise to the level of their own market that needs to be opened up, but it's close.

mcintyre1994 6y ago
I heard a similar interesting idea on a recent episode of the Advanced Tech Podcast. Someone on there suggested that the mobile economy might be a legitimate market, and iOS has always had a hugely outsized share of the money flowing through app stores etc.
whatever1 6y ago
Following Apples way of thinking, Standard oil was not a monopoly. You could choose to source your energy from coal, power your train with steam etc. But the fact is that it was one.
- 52-6F-62 6y ago
  That comparison would be calling every other phone on the market not just inferior, but entirely different technology. Seeing as they all can access the same networks and be comprised of varying hardware and use varying operating systems I just don’t think that’s true. It’s like Apple being the sole supplier of a specific type of unleaded fuel. And people like me choosing that fuel because it might be more expensive and more restrictive, but I don’t have to worry as much about the condition of my car engine on a regular basis for using it. There are plenty of other just as powerful, or even more powerful, fuels on the market that function on the same principles but with different features.
  - toyg 6y ago
    It’s more like Apple were effectively stopping you from using the fuel in cars they don’t approve of.
    - yladiz 6y ago
      It would be more akin to Apple only letting you use the fuel that they sell for the cars they sell, just like Tesla did with their proprietary charging connector (before being forced, at least in the EU, to use a standard connector).
mlthoughts2018 6y ago
> “As smartphones become more and more a part of the fundamental infrastructure of society” This perspective underpins a lot of the pushback against Apple & Google but I just don’t understand it. Any cell phone, and especially a smartphone, is not integral to modern society. Random usage by consumers is recreational. Businesses have a million ways to replace things they ask employees to rely on smartphones for. In fact not all uses of smartphones are productivity increasing, and it could easily be argued that we need better ways to just switch them off, whether at work or at home, to get things done. An iPhone is like a video game console. Whether you use for seemingly “important” things like PagerDuty or day trading or checking your child’s location or hailing a car ride for a home-bound elder or sick person ... the smartphone is purely extra consumer gadgetry to do it and it could be accomplished many other ways. Given that smartphones are just an optional, convenient luxury item, I don’t see how any argument about them being critical to modern society can possibly be used to claim Apple must be forced to operate its app distribution channel a certain way or cannot set its own monetization policies.
- enragedcacti 6y ago
  17% of people in the US use their smartphone as their only portal to the internet [1]. Is your argument that as long as they can go use a computer at a library that their smartphone is a luxury item? Access to the internet (or someone to access it for you) is basically a prerequisite for existing in modern society and phones are how people choose to do it most of the time. This like saying "hey, if you don't like buying from standard oil, just get a horse!" when 1) you might already have a car, 2) you can't afford a horse on top of that, and 3) society has restructured itself such that a horse is not even viable in your day-to-day life. [1] https://www.androidpolice.com/2019/06/17/pew-smartphone-only-internet-use/ https://www.androidpolice.com/2019/06/17/pew-smartphone-only...
  - parasubvert 6y ago
    It is an incredible lack of imagination to think we are at the end of history on mobile device OSes and thus they should become utilities. Oil is a natural resource. This is software that didn’t exist 12 years ago.
jbverschoor 6y ago
The same can be said about creating graphics / games engines such as Unreal and Unity. As game engines become more and more a part of the fundamental infrastructure of games, and remain relatively expensive and slow to replace, it's not crazy to say that Unreal developers are a market in itself and that market should be protected from monopoly.
pjmlp 6y ago
Looking forward to 3rd party stores for Unreal plugins.
- gsich 6y ago
  Nothing is stopping you.
  - pjmlp 6y ago
    Epic might.
    - gsich 6y ago
      Why? There are 3rd party resources available for ue4.
dageshi 6y ago
They aren't relatively expensive. There's tons of cheap android phones out there which have 80-90% of the functionality in an iphone, just with a much crappier user experience and terrible cameras, but they work! Somehow people have come to the conclusion that if something is so good that they can't contemplate using anything else then it's a monopoly.
- aetherson 6y ago
  That's the reason my sense is that it doesn't rise to the level of it's own monopoly. But those "cheap" phones are still a major expense for a lot of people.
ece 6y ago
To help convince you that Apple is a kind of monopoly, I found this article to be illuminating: https://techcrunch.com/2020/08/09/apple-goes-to-war-with-the-gaming-industry/ https://techcrunch.com/2020/08/09/apple-goes-to-war-with-the... If you want to get a game on iOS today, you have to go through the app store+IAP or Apple Arcade or make a browser-based game. That comes down to: pay the Apple cut/tax or make a browser based game. This is the opposite of what Steam/GOG/Itch do: buy it once, play on 3+ platforms. Not allowing emulators/flash/alternative browser engines a few years ago might have been overlooked, but not allowing MS xCloud, GF now, Stadia, FB gaming while pushing Apple Arcade and individual app store game submissions definitely seems like an anti-competitive move to me. This combined with offering pre-installed apps that compete with Spotify/news/video app store apps (at a higher price) and trying to force apps to add subscriptions through iOS like Hey and Wordpress, Apple has shown it's willing and able to exploit the monopoly they have on iOS users. A platform-agnostic free market is more important than the iOS+Metal+AppStore monopoly Apple offers it's users IMO, if you must have a "guaranteed" walled garden, build one for yourself using privacy/security/parental controls. Every other user should be able to run the apps that they want and expect, and developers should be able to negotiate fairer terms.
- 013a 6y ago
  The statistic I've found which illuminates this point to even people who know nothing about the situation: By revenue, Apple is the third largest gaming company on the planet, without making a single game. Most people think about that for a second, then say "oh wow." Google is the only other company like Apple in the top twenty largest gaming companies, and at least they're trying to make some games and improve the ecosystem via Stadia. But Apple: they take 30%. For games like Fortnite, that represents hundreds of millions of dollars; have they actually provided hundreds of millions of dollars in value back?
013a 6y ago
I think we need to view it from the perspective of developers who release internet-hosted applications; not consumers. Consumers do have some amount of choice, but developers generally have to release applications for internet-hosted applications on as many devices as possible (because mobile web isn't "there" (yet?)). Its not about App Store revenue or leveraging really powerful proprietary iOS platform technology; its just about eyes-on-glass and meeting customers where they are. Without iOS users, many internet-hosted applications would fail (see: Hey). With app stores, its difficult to build correlates to traditional marketplaces, but I think about it like: imagine if Toyota decided to begin building roads that only Toyota cars can drive on, and Toyota cars can only drive on those roads. Toyota defers the cost of building these roads on-to the businesses the roads connect. Toyota cars are awesome, so many consumers want them. Some businesses greatly benefit from being on the Toyota network, but others find the fees far too high. And, additionally, Toyota can refuse to connect your business to their network, for any reason, and has a demonstrated history of refusing to connect businesses to the network for very poor reasons. There is a good argument for the App Store to be made: It helps with security, with privacy, with convenience, its not all bad. But, I also believe freedom is more important than any of those. I think there's a middle-ground to be found, which looks something like forcing Apple to approve any application submitted to the store which does not break the law.

mcintyre1994 6y ago

I heard a similar interesting idea on a recent episode of the Advanced Tech Podcast. Someone on there suggested that the mobile economy might be a legitimate market, and iOS has always had a hugely outsized share of the money flowing through app stores etc.

whatever1 6y ago

Following Apples way of thinking, Standard oil was not a monopoly. You could choose to source your energy from coal, power your train with steam etc. But the fact is that it was one.

52-6F-62 6y ago
That comparison would be calling every other phone on the market not just inferior, but entirely different technology. Seeing as they all can access the same networks and be comprised of varying hardware and use varying operating systems I just don’t think that’s true. It’s like Apple being the sole supplier of a specific type of unleaded fuel. And people like me choosing that fuel because it might be more expensive and more restrictive, but I don’t have to worry as much about the condition of my car engine on a regular basis for using it. There are plenty of other just as powerful, or even more powerful, fuels on the market that function on the same principles but with different features.
- toyg 6y ago
  It’s more like Apple were effectively stopping you from using the fuel in cars they don’t approve of.
  - yladiz 6y ago
    It would be more akin to Apple only letting you use the fuel that they sell for the cars they sell, just like Tesla did with their proprietary charging connector (before being forced, at least in the EU, to use a standard connector).

mlthoughts2018 6y ago

> “As smartphones become more and more a part of the fundamental infrastructure of society” This perspective underpins a lot of the pushback against Apple & Google but I just don’t understand it. Any cell phone, and especially a smartphone, is not integral to modern society. Random usage by consumers is recreational. Businesses have a million ways to replace things they ask employees to rely on smartphones for. In fact not all uses of smartphones are productivity increasing, and it could easily be argued that we need better ways to just switch them off, whether at work or at home, to get things done. An iPhone is like a video game console. Whether you use for seemingly “important” things like PagerDuty or day trading or checking your child’s location or hailing a car ride for a home-bound elder or sick person ... the smartphone is purely extra consumer gadgetry to do it and it could be accomplished many other ways. Given that smartphones are just an optional, convenient luxury item, I don’t see how any argument about them being critical to modern society can possibly be used to claim Apple must be forced to operate its app distribution channel a certain way or cannot set its own monetization policies.

enragedcacti 6y ago
17% of people in the US use their smartphone as their only portal to the internet [1]. Is your argument that as long as they can go use a computer at a library that their smartphone is a luxury item? Access to the internet (or someone to access it for you) is basically a prerequisite for existing in modern society and phones are how people choose to do it most of the time. This like saying "hey, if you don't like buying from standard oil, just get a horse!" when 1) you might already have a car, 2) you can't afford a horse on top of that, and 3) society has restructured itself such that a horse is not even viable in your day-to-day life. [1] https://www.androidpolice.com/2019/06/17/pew-smartphone-only-internet-use/ https://www.androidpolice.com/2019/06/17/pew-smartphone-only...
- parasubvert 6y ago
  It is an incredible lack of imagination to think we are at the end of history on mobile device OSes and thus they should become utilities. Oil is a natural resource. This is software that didn’t exist 12 years ago.

jbverschoor 6y ago

The same can be said about creating graphics / games engines such as Unreal and Unity. As game engines become more and more a part of the fundamental infrastructure of games, and remain relatively expensive and slow to replace, it's not crazy to say that Unreal developers are a market in itself and that market should be protected from monopoly.

pjmlp 6y ago

Looking forward to 3rd party stores for Unreal plugins.

gsich 6y ago
Nothing is stopping you.
- pjmlp 6y ago
  Epic might.
  - gsich 6y ago
    Why? There are 3rd party resources available for ue4.

dageshi 6y ago

They aren't relatively expensive. There's tons of cheap android phones out there which have 80-90% of the functionality in an iphone, just with a much crappier user experience and terrible cameras, but they work! Somehow people have come to the conclusion that if something is so good that they can't contemplate using anything else then it's a monopoly.

aetherson 6y ago
That's the reason my sense is that it doesn't rise to the level of it's own monopoly. But those "cheap" phones are still a major expense for a lot of people.

ece 6y ago

To help convince you that Apple is a kind of monopoly, I found this article to be illuminating: https://techcrunch.com/2020/08/09/apple-goes-to-war-with-the-gaming-industry/ https://techcrunch.com/2020/08/09/apple-goes-to-war-with-the... If you want to get a game on iOS today, you have to go through the app store+IAP or Apple Arcade or make a browser-based game. That comes down to: pay the Apple cut/tax or make a browser based game. This is the opposite of what Steam/GOG/Itch do: buy it once, play on 3+ platforms. Not allowing emulators/flash/alternative browser engines a few years ago might have been overlooked, but not allowing MS xCloud, GF now, Stadia, FB gaming while pushing Apple Arcade and individual app store game submissions definitely seems like an anti-competitive move to me. This combined with offering pre-installed apps that compete with Spotify/news/video app store apps (at a higher price) and trying to force apps to add subscriptions through iOS like Hey and Wordpress, Apple has shown it's willing and able to exploit the monopoly they have on iOS users. A platform-agnostic free market is more important than the iOS+Metal+AppStore monopoly Apple offers it's users IMO, if you must have a "guaranteed" walled garden, build one for yourself using privacy/security/parental controls. Every other user should be able to run the apps that they want and expect, and developers should be able to negotiate fairer terms.

013a 6y ago
The statistic I've found which illuminates this point to even people who know nothing about the situation: By revenue, Apple is the third largest gaming company on the planet, without making a single game. Most people think about that for a second, then say "oh wow." Google is the only other company like Apple in the top twenty largest gaming companies, and at least they're trying to make some games and improve the ecosystem via Stadia. But Apple: they take 30%. For games like Fortnite, that represents hundreds of millions of dollars; have they actually provided hundreds of millions of dollars in value back?

013a 6y ago

I think we need to view it from the perspective of developers who release internet-hosted applications; not consumers. Consumers do have some amount of choice, but developers generally have to release applications for internet-hosted applications on as many devices as possible (because mobile web isn't "there" (yet?)). Its not about App Store revenue or leveraging really powerful proprietary iOS platform technology; its just about eyes-on-glass and meeting customers where they are. Without iOS users, many internet-hosted applications would fail (see: Hey). With app stores, its difficult to build correlates to traditional marketplaces, but I think about it like: imagine if Toyota decided to begin building roads that only Toyota cars can drive on, and Toyota cars can only drive on those roads. Toyota defers the cost of building these roads on-to the businesses the roads connect. Toyota cars are awesome, so many consumers want them. Some businesses greatly benefit from being on the Toyota network, but others find the fees far too high. And, additionally, Toyota can refuse to connect your business to their network, for any reason, and has a demonstrated history of refusing to connect businesses to the network for very poor reasons. There is a good argument for the App Store to be made: It helps with security, with privacy, with convenience, its not all bad. But, I also believe freedom is more important than any of those. I think there's a middle-ground to be found, which looks something like forcing Apple to approve any application submitted to the store which does not break the law.