6 ms·

You gotta amortize that cost over all iphone revenue streams (not just one app)

paulmd 5y ago
seems like there's an implication here that apple should be running the app store as a charity or at least at-cost. that's always such a weird one with this site's libertarian/pro-business bent. it's good to make a successful business and make money... no not like that! there is nothing stopping anyone from setting up their own competing ecosystem (another walled garden, even). Google did exactly that, featurephones still exist, etc. There are legitimate end-user reasons for doing it this way (namely, facebook and others would immediately start their own app stores to end-run around app review so they could exploit permissions and exploit user privacy for profit, just as they already got caught doing). https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/01/facebook-and-google-offered-gift-cards-for-root-level-access-to-ios-users-data/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/01/facebook-and-google-... People are mad because they don't like Apple's business model, which doesn't involve them, so they want Apple to be forced to do business with them on their own terms. Very anti-libertarian, which is again ironic but not out of character for libertarians. Bioshock was right, libertarians are pro-freedom of business right up until someone else has a bigger business. This is very much in the range of Apple's freedom of business. Go make your own software ecosystem and you can do whatever you want with your app store. Again, just like Google did.
- josephg 5y ago
  I don't think anyone here has any problem with Apple and Google (and others) competing on who can make the best phone. The problem is that you need to compete in the market of smartphones to be able to compete in the market of app stores. Its quite similar to Microsoft pushing Internet Explorer with Windows a few decades ago - Microsoft was using a competitive advantage in one arena (operating systems) as leverage to gain a monopoly position in another arena (web browsers). The effect of that business strategy is it raises the cost of competition. Competitors now need to compete in both markets (OSes and browsers / phones and app stores). The expense of doing that knocks out almost all your competitors. All else being equal, less competition is bad for innovation and bad for consumers. Having both Steam and the Epic games store on windows is inconvenient, but both stores are forced to compete with each other on price and features to retain customers. In the long run this is means cheaper games and better platforms. This is obvious in the smartphone market too - the iPhone forced Android to become a way better operating system to compete. (Early versions of android were awful.) And Android in turn innovated on notifications and widgets and lots of other stuff, which forced the iPhone to raise its game. There's no competition for the app stores - and predictably the iphone app store is fine, but it hasn't improved much in years. Epic makes video games. They want to compete with the app store without competing with the iPhone. Whether you agree with them or not, I think they certainly have a case and deserve their day in court to argue it.
  - paulmd 5y ago
    Let me put it this way - Microsoft signed on to the suit too, but how many competing app stores does Microsoft allow on the Xbox? They have their own twisted logic on why Apple should have to open up and they shouldn't, but none of these companies are doing it for the morals, they want to use the courts to lever open Apple's bank vault and will then immediately turn around and argue why those rules shouldn't apply to them. They also don't really care about the impact it will have on end-users w/r/t large apps immediately starting their own "app stores" to bypass app review and start exploiting user data. Apple's an easy target because Apple as a corporation is far more unpopular than, say, Microsoft or Sony, but these other companies use the exact same business model, and when it comes down to it they will cite the exact same reasons. "Oh we wouldn't want malware, sexual content, or malicious software to take root on the Xbox" and so on.
    - josephg 5y ago
      I hear what you’re saying, but the business model is different on the Xbox and PlayStation. On those consoles the devices themselves are sold at a loss with the expectation that the user will buy at least a few games. That’s not true of the iPhone - you bought the thing. What you do with it should arguably not be up to Apple any more. Maybe a better example would be the Nintendo switch - and I’m sympathetic to the idea that I should be able to install and run whatever software I want on my device. I wish I could install Netflix, but I can’t and that’s really annoying. I hear you about big companies forcing you into their app stores so they can exploit your user data. That’s a real worry; and I’m not sure what the right approach is there. Does this happen on android, where you can enter dev mode and install other app stores? I love that aspect of the iPhone - although I also wish I could have sexual content on my phone without Apple judging me for it.
      - paulmd 5y ago
        This is all a far cry from grandparent's "it should be illegal to operate on a percentage-of-gross-revenue business model, only fixed prices". Why do you think it should be legal for clients to sue because they don't like the pricing model? Apple only controls 13% of the smartphone market. They're not a monopoly here. They're in fact the minority player in the market, significantly so. Monopoly rules only come into play when a monopoly actually exists, and a business exploits that monopoly to their competitive advantage. Is 13% a monopoly power?
- astrange 5y ago
  > seems like there's an implication here that apple should be running the app store as a charity or at least at-cost. Apple actually claimed they did this until recently, right?

seems like there's an implication here that apple should be running the app store as a charity or at least at-cost. that's always such a weird one with this site's libertarian/pro-business bent. it's good to make a successful business and make money... no not like that! there is nothing stopping anyone from setting up their own competing ecosystem (another walled garden, even). Google did exactly that, featurephones still exist, etc. There are legitimate end-user reasons for doing it this way (namely, facebook and others would immediately start their own app stores to end-run around app review so they could exploit permissions and exploit user privacy for profit, just as they already got caught doing). https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/01/facebook-and-google-offered-gift-cards-for-root-level-access-to-ios-users-data/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/01/facebook-and-google-... People are mad because they don't like Apple's business model, which doesn't involve them, so they want Apple to be forced to do business with them on their own terms. Very anti-libertarian, which is again ironic but not out of character for libertarians. Bioshock was right, libertarians are pro-freedom of business right up until someone else has a bigger business. This is very much in the range of Apple's freedom of business. Go make your own software ecosystem and you can do whatever you want with your app store. Again, just like Google did.

josephg 5y ago
I don't think anyone here has any problem with Apple and Google (and others) competing on who can make the best phone. The problem is that you need to compete in the market of smartphones to be able to compete in the market of app stores. Its quite similar to Microsoft pushing Internet Explorer with Windows a few decades ago - Microsoft was using a competitive advantage in one arena (operating systems) as leverage to gain a monopoly position in another arena (web browsers). The effect of that business strategy is it raises the cost of competition. Competitors now need to compete in both markets (OSes and browsers / phones and app stores). The expense of doing that knocks out almost all your competitors. All else being equal, less competition is bad for innovation and bad for consumers. Having both Steam and the Epic games store on windows is inconvenient, but both stores are forced to compete with each other on price and features to retain customers. In the long run this is means cheaper games and better platforms. This is obvious in the smartphone market too - the iPhone forced Android to become a way better operating system to compete. (Early versions of android were awful.) And Android in turn innovated on notifications and widgets and lots of other stuff, which forced the iPhone to raise its game. There's no competition for the app stores - and predictably the iphone app store is fine, but it hasn't improved much in years. Epic makes video games. They want to compete with the app store without competing with the iPhone. Whether you agree with them or not, I think they certainly have a case and deserve their day in court to argue it.
- paulmd 5y ago
  Let me put it this way - Microsoft signed on to the suit too, but how many competing app stores does Microsoft allow on the Xbox? They have their own twisted logic on why Apple should have to open up and they shouldn't, but none of these companies are doing it for the morals, they want to use the courts to lever open Apple's bank vault and will then immediately turn around and argue why those rules shouldn't apply to them. They also don't really care about the impact it will have on end-users w/r/t large apps immediately starting their own "app stores" to bypass app review and start exploiting user data. Apple's an easy target because Apple as a corporation is far more unpopular than, say, Microsoft or Sony, but these other companies use the exact same business model, and when it comes down to it they will cite the exact same reasons. "Oh we wouldn't want malware, sexual content, or malicious software to take root on the Xbox" and so on.
  - josephg 5y ago
    I hear what you’re saying, but the business model is different on the Xbox and PlayStation. On those consoles the devices themselves are sold at a loss with the expectation that the user will buy at least a few games. That’s not true of the iPhone - you bought the thing. What you do with it should arguably not be up to Apple any more. Maybe a better example would be the Nintendo switch - and I’m sympathetic to the idea that I should be able to install and run whatever software I want on my device. I wish I could install Netflix, but I can’t and that’s really annoying. I hear you about big companies forcing you into their app stores so they can exploit your user data. That’s a real worry; and I’m not sure what the right approach is there. Does this happen on android, where you can enter dev mode and install other app stores? I love that aspect of the iPhone - although I also wish I could have sexual content on my phone without Apple judging me for it.
    - paulmd 5y ago
      This is all a far cry from grandparent's "it should be illegal to operate on a percentage-of-gross-revenue business model, only fixed prices". Why do you think it should be legal for clients to sue because they don't like the pricing model? Apple only controls 13% of the smartphone market. They're not a monopoly here. They're in fact the minority player in the market, significantly so. Monopoly rules only come into play when a monopoly actually exists, and a business exploits that monopoly to their competitive advantage. Is 13% a monopoly power?
astrange 5y ago
> seems like there's an implication here that apple should be running the app store as a charity or at least at-cost. Apple actually claimed they did this until recently, right?