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>I see no evidence that this harms consumers at all. Quite the opposite. Your entire argument is refuted if Apple isn't allowed to abuse it's market position

>I see no evidence that this harms consumers at all. Quite the opposite. Your entire argument is refuted if Apple isn't allowed to abuse it's market position and you're allowed to have "Apple Pay +30% price" "Stripe Payment" "Payment X" - you would quickly see the real value of App Store and Apple Payment processing convenience - that 30% would probably come down to 10% where it provides the convenience value. If consumers weren't harmed consumer choice would have no effect. This "users are idiots and they need Apple to tell them what's best for them" is like Stockholm syndrome with Apple fans, it's especially entertaining to hear it so often on a "hacker" newsgroup. Good thing papa Apple decided you can't have that dangerous Fortnite scam tricking you in to using a different payment system, you're better off not wasting time on games anyway - really if you look at it that way they are saving you from bad choices two times - win/win for Apple users I'd say.

TheOtherHobbes 6y ago
It's not Stockholm syndrome, it's familiarity with how things worked on other platform. Windows/IE literally wasted hundreds of millions of person hours by being leaky, insecure, virus-prone crap. You could - if you chose to - make quite a nice income out of sending out phishing emails on our open email system. Likewise for randomsware, only more so. And so on. iOS may have other flaws, but worrying that your iPhone is going to be locked by a Bitcoin hacker isn't one of them. And realistically, users are idiots - at least technically. We've all heard of PC users who click on every random thing and end up with twenty-odd toolbars and almost every possible virus. The only reason phones aren't the same is because security is locked down. These are consumer devices. They are not hacker devices. If you want an open hacker device, go build one and see if you can persuade people to buy it. You won't - of course - because in userland locked down security is a feature, not a bug. And users care more about not having to pay a ransom to unlock their own phones than they do about running with root privileges. Not having to think about this is valuable. Having said all that, there's definitely room to negotiate the costs of all of this, and also to open up selected services that can be proven to be secure. But those costs, the access to useful non-risky APIs for devs, and access for third party service providers, are all different issues to the core validity of the model itself.
- friedman23 6y ago
  > Windows/IE literally wasted hundreds of millions of person hours by being leaky, insecure, virus-prone crap How do you explain that I've been using mac os for decades, I am able to install third party software, and I have not run into any of the issues you are describing?
- saagarjha 6y ago
  > iOS may have other flaws, but worrying that your iPhone is going to be locked by a Bitcoin hacker isn't one of them. This is enforced by the platform sandbox, not the App Store. They are entirely separate things.
  - quesera 6y ago
    An alternate App Store would operate outside the sandbox though, right? Otherwise, the alternate App Store would be relegated to installing apps within its own sandbox. And people would continue to howl about it.
    - saagarjha 6y ago
      The app could just hand off installation to the privileged system daemon that can do that part for it.
- reader_mode 6y ago
  >Windows/IE literally wasted hundreds of millions of person hours by being leaky, insecure, virus-prone crap. You could - if you chose to - make quite a nice income out of sending out phishing emails on our open email system. Likewise for randomsware, only more so. And so on. And so your argument is that Microsoft should have forbidden anyone from using a different browser engine (like Apple does) to make things safer ? What if someone installed Chrome or Firefox - that could have leaks and then you would think less of the platform - right ?
  - iguy 6y ago
    No. That wasn't the argument at all. It's that people aren't exactly stretching their imaginations to picture their phone ecosystem going to hell. They've all been there before, and have vivid memories of what they don't want. They are also not crazy to have different preferences for a phone and for a desktop. Just like you have different preferences when selecting a hotel room vs a house.
nodamage 6y ago
> you would quickly see the real value of App Store and Apple Payment processing convenience - that 30% would probably come down to 10% where it provides the convenience value. That might be good for developers but it does not necessarily also imply that consumers are harmed. You assume that if a store charged a lower rate that the savings would be passed onto the consumer, but this does not reflect the real world where developers might simply choose to pocket the difference instead. As an example, the Epic Games Store is charging $59.99 for the new release of Cyberpunk 2077. What's the cost on Steam? Also $59.99.
- reader_mode 6y ago
  In that case everyone would keep using Apple to pay if it actually provided convince/value.

TheOtherHobbes 6y ago

It's not Stockholm syndrome, it's familiarity with how things worked on other platform. Windows/IE literally wasted hundreds of millions of person hours by being leaky, insecure, virus-prone crap. You could - if you chose to - make quite a nice income out of sending out phishing emails on our open email system. Likewise for randomsware, only more so. And so on. iOS may have other flaws, but worrying that your iPhone is going to be locked by a Bitcoin hacker isn't one of them. And realistically, users are idiots - at least technically. We've all heard of PC users who click on every random thing and end up with twenty-odd toolbars and almost every possible virus. The only reason phones aren't the same is because security is locked down. These are consumer devices. They are not hacker devices. If you want an open hacker device, go build one and see if you can persuade people to buy it. You won't - of course - because in userland locked down security is a feature, not a bug. And users care more about not having to pay a ransom to unlock their own phones than they do about running with root privileges. Not having to think about this is valuable. Having said all that, there's definitely room to negotiate the costs of all of this, and also to open up selected services that can be proven to be secure. But those costs, the access to useful non-risky APIs for devs, and access for third party service providers, are all different issues to the core validity of the model itself.

friedman23 6y ago
> Windows/IE literally wasted hundreds of millions of person hours by being leaky, insecure, virus-prone crap How do you explain that I've been using mac os for decades, I am able to install third party software, and I have not run into any of the issues you are describing?
saagarjha 6y ago
> iOS may have other flaws, but worrying that your iPhone is going to be locked by a Bitcoin hacker isn't one of them. This is enforced by the platform sandbox, not the App Store. They are entirely separate things.
- quesera 6y ago
  An alternate App Store would operate outside the sandbox though, right? Otherwise, the alternate App Store would be relegated to installing apps within its own sandbox. And people would continue to howl about it.
  - saagarjha 6y ago
    The app could just hand off installation to the privileged system daemon that can do that part for it.
reader_mode 6y ago
>Windows/IE literally wasted hundreds of millions of person hours by being leaky, insecure, virus-prone crap. You could - if you chose to - make quite a nice income out of sending out phishing emails on our open email system. Likewise for randomsware, only more so. And so on. And so your argument is that Microsoft should have forbidden anyone from using a different browser engine (like Apple does) to make things safer ? What if someone installed Chrome or Firefox - that could have leaks and then you would think less of the platform - right ?
- iguy 6y ago
  No. That wasn't the argument at all. It's that people aren't exactly stretching their imaginations to picture their phone ecosystem going to hell. They've all been there before, and have vivid memories of what they don't want. They are also not crazy to have different preferences for a phone and for a desktop. Just like you have different preferences when selecting a hotel room vs a house.

nodamage 6y ago

> you would quickly see the real value of App Store and Apple Payment processing convenience - that 30% would probably come down to 10% where it provides the convenience value. That might be good for developers but it does not necessarily also imply that consumers are harmed. You assume that if a store charged a lower rate that the savings would be passed onto the consumer, but this does not reflect the real world where developers might simply choose to pocket the difference instead. As an example, the Epic Games Store is charging $59.99 for the new release of Cyberpunk 2077. What's the cost on Steam? Also $59.99.

reader_mode 6y ago
In that case everyone would keep using Apple to pay if it actually provided convince/value.