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Yes, it means Sony has to add Steam to PS5 or else it is narrow and arbitrary. To me the iPhone is a console, end of story. If you like the console experience,

Yes, it means Sony has to add Steam to PS5 or else it is narrow and arbitrary. To me the iPhone is a console, end of story. If you like the console experience, it’s a great device. If you don’t, there are a million android and even alternative OS based phones out there which are more like a PC. If you want your phone to be a PC, you should do what most people around the world do and buy one of those. Instead we have these companies who are trying to force Apple to sell PCs instead of consoles. It’s in their business interests, so I get it. But I hope it doesn’t work, because there are a lot of us (myself included) who really LIKE the console experience, both on iPhone and on PS4, and don’t want a PC experience on those devices.

Razengan 6y ago
> To me the iPhone is a console, end of story. If you like the console experience, it’s a great device. If you don’t, there are a million android and even alternative OS based phones out there which are more like a PC. If you want your phone to be a PC, you should do what most people around the world do and buy one of those. This! A hundred times over, and over again. An iPhone is an iPhone, competing with a million other phones (well, maybe thousands). An iPad however, is another story, as Apple themselves like to push it as a general purpose "computer". Maybe that's why they forked out iPadOS, so that if they're ever forced to make changes based on device classification they could limit those changes to the iPad?
- strictnein 6y ago
  The discussion here is about App Stores. Apple has one, which is the dominant one in the US. Most of the rest of the mobile app market is controlled by Google.
Dahoon 6y ago
No it does not. Sony isn't like Apple. I can freely buy things in / for PlayStation games with my credit card. Not so in iOS apps. There all payment goes through Apple, taking an additional 30% cut above the 30% cut of the app price. Neither Sony, Microsoft or Nintendo does this.
- joshstrange 6y ago
  This is not true, they all take a cut, please provide proof of an app/game on one of these platforms not taking a cut if you are going to make a claim like that. It's ~30% but it can vary.
- sithlord 6y ago
  pretty sure if you buy an item (game, controller, etc) FOR a playstation, they are paying sony a royalty to produce that item.
izacus 6y ago
> To me the iPhone is a console, end of story. This would be true if iPhone would be only a toy. But it's also the only source of person-to-person communication, source of news and primary computing device for large part of USA population. And that makes it very different from a PS5. By market share. By use. By impact. And IMPACT is what we're measuring here.
- M4v3R 6y ago
  Where do you draw the line, though? PlayStation / Xbox are basically computers from a technical standpoint. They have hundreds of millions of users. They also store your personal data and credit card information should you provide it.
  - mantap 6y ago
    The only people who have only a PlayStation or Xbox as their single computer - no phone, no laptop, just a games console - are kids.
  - Apocryphon 6y ago
    Apple seems to be portraying them as (potentially) life-saving technologies, for one thing https://www.macrumors.com/2018/12/06/apple-watch-real-stories-videos/ https://www.macrumors.com/2018/12/06/apple-watch-real-storie...
    - threeseed 6y ago
      That article is referring to the Apple Watch.
      - Apocryphon 6y ago
        Sure- a device that relies on iOS and iPhones (for now) to operate.
- burlesona 6y ago
  The fact that is is my primary communication device is the REASON I want my iPhone to be a console. I'm paying extra for it. But this is very important: Nobody has to buy an iPhone. The majority of people around the world buy Android, which does allow side-loading. If you need side-loading as a feature, you have many, many options available. There's no coercion of consumers going on. There's no mandate to buy an iPhone or to use any part of the Apple ecosystem, and there are abundant alternatives. Ultimately these arguments against the Apple model are very judgmental and paternalistic. "I think that Experience X is the only morally right thing, thus society must prohibit people who bought and like Experience Y from enjoying it, because I think it's morally wrong." To me that's a really dangerous line of thinking, and I hope it fails in court.
realusername 6y ago
> To me the iPhone is a console, end of story. Not to consumers, it's replacing the computer market (especially in the developed world) and even Apple themselves market their products as computer replacements.
- vlozko 6y ago
  But that shouldn’t be an imposition on Apple to make an identical experience to what it’s replacing. It can be both a console and a replacement to a computer. The intended purpose of the two can be the same but have a different way of going about it.
gowld 6y ago
"console" doesn't mean much. Phone is special because for how humans actually live, having one phone is strong preferred over 5. But habit consoles isn't as much of a big deal. And despite what the binary thinkers claim, how humans actually live matters in law, at least as long as companies insist upon the peculiar formation of intellectual property rights.
mthoms 6y ago
>To me the iPhone is a console, end of story. I'm so tired of hearing this ridiculous analogy. From a purely technical stand point it may be true, but for a large chunk of the population, the smartphone is their one and only connection to the digital world. It controls their connection to their bank accounts, governments, news/discourse, family, friends, dating life, education (formal and informal), medical information, insurance policies, wayfinding, weather forecasts and emergency services. For those with disabilities, it affords them a quality of life they might not otherwise have. For others still, it contains their most personal thoughts, ideas, dreams and memories. One can certainly argue that because of all that, the app ecosystem should be tightly controlled. That's fair. But the smartphone has grown beyond a simple "nice-to-have" utility. It's a base-level necessity for modern life. Since this trend is only accelerating, we need to recognize that and frame our discussions accordingly.
- DivisionSol 6y ago
  Making laws based on ephemeral societal standards lays groundwork for abuse. I would rather a law on the technicality of things, than opinions and feelings.
- bhupy 6y ago
  Only 10 years ago, none of what you said was true. Who knows what the world will look like 10 years from now. Basing policy on the current ephemeral norms rather than consistently applied principles seems ill-advised. Also, even in a world where the mobile phone is that ubiquitous and important, there's no inherent societal obligation that one absolutely NEEDS to use a particular company's phone, especially in a market that has plenty of alternatives.
  - mthoms 6y ago
    My comment was not about a particular company, nor was it advocating for any specific policy. It was merely illustrating why equating smartphones with consoles is foolish and lazy. >Basing policy on the current ephemeral norms rather than consistently applied principles seems ill-advised. I agree. What "consistently applied principle" did you interpret my comment to be against?
gowld 6y ago
How does letting me have a PC experience hurt your console experience? What gives you the right to force Epic into a console experience for everyone?
- vlozko 6y ago
  Because it can’t be both ways. If tomorrow Facebook decides to only offer its app only through Epic App Store, consumers now have reckon with a privacy compromised app. And Apple now has to spend tons more resources playing a failing game of whack a mole closing all sorts of security and privacy holes that could have been avoided if the misbehaving apps weren’t allowed in the first place. Lots of people buy an iPhone for the walled garden, peace of mind experience.
  - Aldo_MX 6y ago
    Most of the recent jailbreaks involve Safari vulnerabilities, so you don't even need to install an app to compromise your iPhone, the walled garden is just security through obscurity.
    - abc-xyz 6y ago
      Let’s compare malware on Windows, OSX, Android vs iOS, shall we?
      - Aldo_MX 6y ago
        That's like saying "let's compare species of ants on Africa, Asia, America vs Antarctica", you would need to melt the ice first; iOS is uncharted territory.
        abc-xyz 6y ago
        No it isn’t. iOS have had malware problems as well as a result of people jailbreaking their device to install software from third-parties. Apple fortunately makes it increasingly difficult to jailbreak it. We can also see that Apple were unable to protect their OSX devices as a result of allowing third-party app installations.
sushid 6y ago
This is so ridiculous. Do you sign into your bank or trade stocks on your XBox? Where would you access important documents outside of your desktop/laptop?
- M4v3R 6y ago
  Playstation Network does store my credit card details on file for future purchases. It stores my personal data. It also has a web browser that could be used for pretty much anything.
ksk 6y ago
Well, then the good thing for you is that you have to simply not install those other stores, and keep buying from Apple's official app store. Why prevent other users/devs from using them?

Razengan 6y ago

> To me the iPhone is a console, end of story. If you like the console experience, it’s a great device. If you don’t, there are a million android and even alternative OS based phones out there which are more like a PC. If you want your phone to be a PC, you should do what most people around the world do and buy one of those. This! A hundred times over, and over again. An iPhone is an iPhone, competing with a million other phones (well, maybe thousands). An iPad however, is another story, as Apple themselves like to push it as a general purpose "computer". Maybe that's why they forked out iPadOS, so that if they're ever forced to make changes based on device classification they could limit those changes to the iPad?

strictnein 6y ago
The discussion here is about App Stores. Apple has one, which is the dominant one in the US. Most of the rest of the mobile app market is controlled by Google.

Dahoon 6y ago

No it does not. Sony isn't like Apple. I can freely buy things in / for PlayStation games with my credit card. Not so in iOS apps. There all payment goes through Apple, taking an additional 30% cut above the 30% cut of the app price. Neither Sony, Microsoft or Nintendo does this.

joshstrange 6y ago
This is not true, they all take a cut, please provide proof of an app/game on one of these platforms not taking a cut if you are going to make a claim like that. It's ~30% but it can vary.
sithlord 6y ago
pretty sure if you buy an item (game, controller, etc) FOR a playstation, they are paying sony a royalty to produce that item.

izacus 6y ago

> To me the iPhone is a console, end of story. This would be true if iPhone would be only a toy. But it's also the only source of person-to-person communication, source of news and primary computing device for large part of USA population. And that makes it very different from a PS5. By market share. By use. By impact. And IMPACT is what we're measuring here.

M4v3R 6y ago
Where do you draw the line, though? PlayStation / Xbox are basically computers from a technical standpoint. They have hundreds of millions of users. They also store your personal data and credit card information should you provide it.
- mantap 6y ago
  The only people who have only a PlayStation or Xbox as their single computer - no phone, no laptop, just a games console - are kids.
- Apocryphon 6y ago
  Apple seems to be portraying them as (potentially) life-saving technologies, for one thing https://www.macrumors.com/2018/12/06/apple-watch-real-stories-videos/ https://www.macrumors.com/2018/12/06/apple-watch-real-storie...
  - threeseed 6y ago
    That article is referring to the Apple Watch.
    - Apocryphon 6y ago
      Sure- a device that relies on iOS and iPhones (for now) to operate.
burlesona 6y ago
The fact that is is my primary communication device is the REASON I want my iPhone to be a console. I'm paying extra for it. But this is very important: Nobody has to buy an iPhone. The majority of people around the world buy Android, which does allow side-loading. If you need side-loading as a feature, you have many, many options available. There's no coercion of consumers going on. There's no mandate to buy an iPhone or to use any part of the Apple ecosystem, and there are abundant alternatives. Ultimately these arguments against the Apple model are very judgmental and paternalistic. "I think that Experience X is the only morally right thing, thus society must prohibit people who bought and like Experience Y from enjoying it, because I think it's morally wrong." To me that's a really dangerous line of thinking, and I hope it fails in court.

realusername 6y ago

> To me the iPhone is a console, end of story. Not to consumers, it's replacing the computer market (especially in the developed world) and even Apple themselves market their products as computer replacements.

vlozko 6y ago
But that shouldn’t be an imposition on Apple to make an identical experience to what it’s replacing. It can be both a console and a replacement to a computer. The intended purpose of the two can be the same but have a different way of going about it.

gowld 6y ago

"console" doesn't mean much. Phone is special because for how humans actually live, having one phone is strong preferred over 5. But habit consoles isn't as much of a big deal. And despite what the binary thinkers claim, how humans actually live matters in law, at least as long as companies insist upon the peculiar formation of intellectual property rights.

mthoms 6y ago

>To me the iPhone is a console, end of story. I'm so tired of hearing this ridiculous analogy. From a purely technical stand point it may be true, but for a large chunk of the population, the smartphone is their one and only connection to the digital world. It controls their connection to their bank accounts, governments, news/discourse, family, friends, dating life, education (formal and informal), medical information, insurance policies, wayfinding, weather forecasts and emergency services. For those with disabilities, it affords them a quality of life they might not otherwise have. For others still, it contains their most personal thoughts, ideas, dreams and memories. One can certainly argue that because of all that, the app ecosystem should be tightly controlled. That's fair. But the smartphone has grown beyond a simple "nice-to-have" utility. It's a base-level necessity for modern life. Since this trend is only accelerating, we need to recognize that and frame our discussions accordingly.

DivisionSol 6y ago
Making laws based on ephemeral societal standards lays groundwork for abuse. I would rather a law on the technicality of things, than opinions and feelings.
bhupy 6y ago
Only 10 years ago, none of what you said was true. Who knows what the world will look like 10 years from now. Basing policy on the current ephemeral norms rather than consistently applied principles seems ill-advised. Also, even in a world where the mobile phone is that ubiquitous and important, there's no inherent societal obligation that one absolutely NEEDS to use a particular company's phone, especially in a market that has plenty of alternatives.
- mthoms 6y ago
  My comment was not about a particular company, nor was it advocating for any specific policy. It was merely illustrating why equating smartphones with consoles is foolish and lazy. >Basing policy on the current ephemeral norms rather than consistently applied principles seems ill-advised. I agree. What "consistently applied principle" did you interpret my comment to be against?

gowld 6y ago

How does letting me have a PC experience hurt your console experience? What gives you the right to force Epic into a console experience for everyone?

vlozko 6y ago
Because it can’t be both ways. If tomorrow Facebook decides to only offer its app only through Epic App Store, consumers now have reckon with a privacy compromised app. And Apple now has to spend tons more resources playing a failing game of whack a mole closing all sorts of security and privacy holes that could have been avoided if the misbehaving apps weren’t allowed in the first place. Lots of people buy an iPhone for the walled garden, peace of mind experience.
- Aldo_MX 6y ago
  Most of the recent jailbreaks involve Safari vulnerabilities, so you don't even need to install an app to compromise your iPhone, the walled garden is just security through obscurity.
  - abc-xyz 6y ago
    Let’s compare malware on Windows, OSX, Android vs iOS, shall we?
    - Aldo_MX 6y ago
      That's like saying "let's compare species of ants on Africa, Asia, America vs Antarctica", you would need to melt the ice first; iOS is uncharted territory.
      - abc-xyz 6y ago
        No it isn’t. iOS have had malware problems as well as a result of people jailbreaking their device to install software from third-parties. Apple fortunately makes it increasingly difficult to jailbreak it. We can also see that Apple were unable to protect their OSX devices as a result of allowing third-party app installations.

sushid 6y ago

This is so ridiculous. Do you sign into your bank or trade stocks on your XBox? Where would you access important documents outside of your desktop/laptop?

M4v3R 6y ago
Playstation Network does store my credit card details on file for future purchases. It stores my personal data. It also has a web browser that could be used for pretty much anything.

ksk 6y ago

Well, then the good thing for you is that you have to simply not install those other stores, and keep buying from Apple's official app store. Why prevent other users/devs from using them?