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Tim Cook's line of argument seemed a bit weird to me. On one hand he's saying that he doesn't know if Apple's customers would be able to distinguish between App

• aero-glide2 5y ago
  Why not give customers the choice to run other app stores? Imagine if all the software on your laptop must be downloaded from the windows store..
  • exporectomy 5y ago
    Sometimes less freedom is a good thing. It frees the customer's mind to let an organization they trust make the tedious product evaluations for you. We do it all the time with retail shopping where we enjoy the curated decisions of the shop's owner instead of a giant bazaar.
    • aero-glide2 5y ago
      I own the hardware (the floor space of the store). Should I not be able to decide who sets up shop in my phone?
      • Jailbird 5y ago
        I think the zoning laws in your area prevent you from operating a nuclear plant or a meat processing facility. (Sorry, it's just Hello Kitty shops for you! :) )
    • celsoazevedo 5y ago
      On the other hand, when Apple decides to block some app (eg: certain VPN apps in China) for reasons that aren't in your interest, you're screwed. Being able to use a different app store (which may or may not be as "curated" as Apple's own store) or to simply download the app from the devs website and install it doesn't seem to be a problem for Android users. Or for Windows, Linux and even macOS (eg: is it that bad being able to install Steam?) The thing is, most people will use the store that comes with the phone. I have F-Droid installed for some open source apps, but my parents have no idea of what that is. They use Google's Play Store, like most users... if Facebook wants them to use their apps, that's where their app needs to be.
      • notriddle 5y ago
        https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27221083 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27221083 Apparently, yes, it is a problem.
        • celsoazevedo 5y ago
          They're trying to defend their own store and business model... of course having a more open system is a problem. After years of "there are no viruses for mac", I find it funny to see an Apple exec saying that his own family members have been infected by malware on macOS.
    • pjc50 5y ago
      But we do allow more than one or two shops to exist.
    • cs2733 5y ago
      I'm with you on this... and then remember the many useful tools that are only available outside the app store. BTW, Have you seen the app store catalog for macOS on apple silicon? Still very sparse. Trusting one company to provide the whole stack is not necessarily practical, even for the average user.
      • exporectomy 5y ago
        If your phone is a central part of your IT job (you mention tools), then you need flexibility. But if you're like me any just use it as a phone, casual web browser, and messenger device, freedom is no value. I'm confident all the basic important stuff will be available and if it's not, I don't really care anyway. I don't want to have to think about or manage my phone. I want it to just do its basic job and get out of my way. I think a lot of people are like this.
    • calsy 5y ago
      They curate their stores to draw in customers, placing popular items up front and usually having SALE signs up. Why? because it is an extremely competitive environment. The store owners pay rent, they are not obliged to give a 30% commission on purchases to the company who owns the shopping centre and they are not forced to use the shopping centres chosen payment service to make sure they collect on commissions. Less freedom is not a good thing. Nothing is being taken away from you when you provide other options, quite the opposite.
  • vbezhenar 5y ago
    > Why not give customers the choice to run other app stores? Why would Apple want to do so? That would obviously reduce their earnings. > Imagine if all the software on your laptop must be downloaded from the windows store.. I bet that is Microsoft's dream. They can't just do that because of disruption would be too big. But they did something similar with Windows RT, so they definitely looking into it.
    • Hamuko 5y ago
      >They can't just do that because of disruption would be too big. Microsoft became rather antitrust shy at some point. Not sure if that's the case anymore but I think it affected many of the decisions.
      • dan-robertson 5y ago
        They became shy exactly when they lost a massive antitrust suit in the late 90’s.
  • FredPret 5y ago
    But you do! Buy an Android. Or jailbreak the iPhone. As a consumer, his comments were spot on about me at least.
  • jrsj 5y ago
    Because my grandma is clueless and I give her an iPhone so she doesn’t install malware like she managed to on her Android phone
    • johnchristopher 5y ago
      Could the guest mode on android or enterprise/fleet thingy be used to achieve that (preventing user from installing malware) ?
    • celsoazevedo 5y ago
      It's weird that a clueless person was able to download and install a malware apk when by default Android forces you to go to your settings and allow apps to install other apps (the behaviour has changed over the years, but you always need to do something). Not to mention that Google Play Protect scans your apps and warns you if it finds something sketchy. In any case and as much as I like my own clueless grandma, I don't think my Android phone should only allow me to use the play store or that windows/macos/linux should stop me from installing Steam just because she's clueless about tech.
      • dan-robertson 5y ago
        What’s your argument here, that the GP is lying or that their grandmother wanted the malware or something else? I find it very easy to believe that some malware vendor managed to trick someone into enabling things in settings. I would also believe that malware was just sitting in the play store[1] and available to install the normal way. [1] same goes for the App Store.
        • celsoazevedo 5y ago
          His grandmother already has an iPhone, so it's unlikely that she was using Android 10 or 11 (which made it fairly easy to install an apk file). Until Android 9 you had to go through some menus and allow sideloading, something that "clueless" people usually don't do. It's more likely that the "malware" came from an app installed via the Play Store. Three or so years ago I was asked by someone to see if there was a virus on their phone. The "virus" was in fact a religious app, installed via the official store, which was opening a popup with ads every few hours. Now, I could be wrong and it's possible that his grandma actually sideloaded an apk. If she did, I still think that you should be able to install an app that isn't allowed by Apple on their store, after all they block more than just malware: apps with free licenses, some VPN apps in some countries, torrent apps without any illegal content in it, etc. If Apple wants to continue on this path, hopefully they'll go a step further and also remove the web browser and the ability to receive calls. Scam calls are a problem after all and we don't want people to send all their savings to "Microsoft" or "Amazon".
  • sokoloff 5y ago
    Customers have that choice today. On the Android platform.
    • nr2x 5y ago
      Which is partially why Apple makes it very hard to move to Android. No iMessage, Calendars, Contacts, iTunes Purchases, etc.
      • d3nj4l 5y ago
        You can very easily link your iCal with Google Calendar, and likewise sync your contacts with your Google account. I know because I've done both.
        • nr2x 5y ago
          You can't access iCloud calendars on an Android phone, they even block it over the browser.
          • kitsunesoba 5y ago
            It's a bit convoluted, but you can get the CalDAV URLs for your calendars which then work just fine with any CalDAV client (including those on Android). When googling "iCloud caldav" detailed instructions are the first result.
            • nr2x 5y ago
              Key point here is "very hard to move to Android". Seeing as this is not at all easy (and I have gotten to work via this method at some point), it presents a barrier to changing platforms. Likewise ,not allowing access to calendar on a mobile browser is pretty blatant.
  • jodrellblank 5y ago
    Also on HN today, endless comments about how Amazon is a shitheap full of fake products and fake reviews and wishing Amazon would tighten up: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27253047 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27253047 > "Why not give customers the choice to run other app stores?" Why can't people who don't want Apple's curation and want to install other app stores buy Android phones, instead of trying to ruin nice things for everyone else?
• akg_67 5y ago
  I hope multiple App Stores don’t become a thing on iOS. The reason I like iPhone is that I am assured that apps I download from App Store are not shit and curated by Apple. Apple has vested interest to keep apps made available to be clean and not going to compromise iPhone. Android play store, in comparison, is full of crap and free for all, basically buyer (or downloader) beware. Phone is used by too broad of user groups, from very young to very old, for apps to be left unchecked unlike laptops and desktops.
  • Nextgrid 5y ago
    How do you explain that the majority of apps are contaminated by spyware like the Facebook SDK and dozens of other equivalents? (which for the record is in breach of the GDPR and Apple could be considered complicit if they allow this while at the same time requiring all apps to comply with local laws and has removed apps who break or could be used to break the law before) How do you explain scam apps that deliberately mislead users into signing up to a "free trial" subscription that renews at a ridiculous price 3 days later?
    • akg_67 5y ago
      Have you looked at Google play store, in comparison? Apple is still doing 100x better job. 100% cleanliness is utopia but I will take an App Store that weeds out lot of contaminated apps than every other app being contaminated in some sort of way.
      • rjzzleep 5y ago
        I do think that the apple app store has better quality apps. But to be frank, those 3 day trial autorenew apps are definitely more common on iOS. There are so many highly rated iOS apps that look great and where you can't even get past the initial stage without having to sign up to a subscription without even know what it is.
      • detaro 5y ago
        Nobody is proposing that the Apple app store should go away, or that other stores shouldn't be curated. (E.g. exactly because the play store is as it is, on Android I go look at F-Droid first, because if it has something I trust it more)
• tomp 5y ago
  You're making Tim Cook sound stupid and/or evil, but he does have a point. > If customers really value real, safe drugs, even if there's multiple drug suppliers (some offering fake, unsafe drugs), people should still go to a pharmacy? > It seems like a decision that they shouldn't have to make. > Will people not be able to distinguish between safe drugs and fake unsafe drugs? > They've never had to do it before.
  • ohgodplsno 5y ago
    Equating alternative app stores to literal drug dealers. I don't think I even need to say anything to point out how bad of an argument it is.
    • giobox 5y ago
      I think that’s a little unfair - this example implies there are good _and_ bad actors in an unregulated app distribution system, which we already have some evidence for. Given we have seen real malware like Xcodeghost that has successfully breached apples own App Store review process, he clearly has a point. Removing all binaries compiled with Xcodeghost to protect consumers would have been harder with multiple stores hosting binaries for sale vs one, and is indeed an example of one benefit of the single storefront. Incidentally, the internal emails from Apple regarding handling the Xcodeghost problem have arguably been some of the most interesting documents we’ve seen in this trial. There are trade offs here, and while one option may appear to be fairer it is not going to be a free lunch. There’s always issues with software analogies if you dig too deeply too!
    • tomp 5y ago
      I'm attacking the argument in general, not a specific instance of it.
    • bryan0 5y ago
      You’re right. The counter examples here are comparing the availability of non-Apple approved apps to matters of life and death. It’s disingenuous.
  • fartcannon 5y ago
• lucasyvas 5y ago
  This exchange appears to be open admission of unapolegtic, monopolistic behaviour. Also, the suggestion that customers want it to stay like it is is a flat out lie given his preceding statement where he admits they've never offered the choice, so can't possibly know.
  • bnj 5y ago
    It’s really interesting to observe the way that we can all read that exchange with different interpretations. I don’t see the conflict you’re pointing to at all— to me, it makes sense that Cook can say users don’t want to navigate multiple stores if they had done, for example, focus groups. Meanwhile the experiment that he didn’t want to run is whether users could distinguish between good quality app stores and bad quality ones, which he doesn’t know because they’ve never had to do it before. That all seems sensible enough to me.
    • lucasyvas 5y ago
      I think you have a good point, but is there any proof they have focus tested it? My second question would be, are focus groups equipped to make a decision for potentially billions of users (given the sheer volume, and that focus groups are cherry-picked)?
      • cmorgan31 5y ago
        Focus groups? Who is unaware of what they are buying at this point? We have had no choice but one store and if we demanded two stores we would be on Android. Why in the hell do you think they’d go out to do market research on a key marketing plan they already devised? Privacy is their next marketing angle and third party app stores don’t go hand in hand with that desire.
  • stjohnswarts 5y ago
    I don't get the whole Apple thing though. I can see the prices as inflated, but there are literally dozens of other options to iphones if you don't like iphone. Do you just want government to step in and run Apple as it sees fit like corps in China?
• crazygringo 5y ago
  There's nothing weird about it. If there were no food regulations, I don't know if I'd be able to pick restaurants and grocery store brands that were safe to eat. But I definitely know I want safe food to eat. Most people want safe food but they want the government to figure out what that means. Same thing here -- most people just want a safe app store. They don't want the work of having to figure out which app stores are how safe. They just want Apple to figure that out for them.
  • whimsicalism 5y ago
    Apple isn't the govt
  • kmonsen 5y ago
    It would more be like if food safety inspections were optional, but only restaurants that opt in would be allowed to show a sign they were inspected either physically or on their web page. It would be trivial to be able to check for this. Door dash would show a sign saying which restaurant is safe to avoid being sued after an incident. If you think restaurants and food safety is a good analogy it’s not a good argument for Apple in my opinion.
    • judge2020 5y ago
      Apple is still the food inspector in this situation, and epic wants an App Store without any apple oversight - I doubt they allow a notarization-type system to be the outcome of this court case.
    • azinman2 5y ago
      Except now there isn’t just 1 inspector, but many. And you have to figure out which you trust. Now imagine there’s a very popular restaurant, but it uses an inspector you don’t know if you trust. But you want to eat the food because all your friends are already there… so you’ll go. This is exactly what would happen— various companies once they reach a certain size will just want to have their own store because either it makes them more money or they have less restrictions. Just look at Facebook and the new 14.5 privacy features that are cutting into their ability to collect data. If you let FB the chance to pull out, they’d do it in a heartbeat knowing they could easily force everyone to install their App Store… which would have 0 privacy restrictions and far less oversight (just look at the Cambridge Analytica scandal for how FB might run an App Store). Given Apple mostly makes money selling hardware, they’re the best incentivized to protect its user base. Disclaimer: I work for Apple but all views my own.
• an_opabinia 5y ago
  The average iPhone user would not be able to tell the difference between an official App Store and a sophisticated copy.
  • Hamuko 5y ago
    Even though one of them is preloaded on the device and the other one has to be separately added?
    • nr2x 5y ago
      Depends a) on who is doing the adding and b) if they know what they are adding.
      • lanstin 5y ago
        Therefor the average user will not be able to keep themselves safe. QED. Om the other hand, I do want root on my devices. It can see both sides and it is not clear to me what the solution is. I have already left Android because I don’t have time or interest to security assess all the evil apps that look real similar to the free flow games I like or the solitaire games. But thirty percent is steep. And arguably Epic can curate games as well or better than Apple. Debian for phones would be good but so far the open source things are pricy and underpowered. And the it is true the Apple store has a lot of bad apps already and fake reviews. Lot of evil people clustering around so many chances to become rich without delighting customers.
    • d3nj4l 5y ago
      Given that tons of people blindly mash through any vaguely worded permission box, you either have to have so many strongly worded permission boxes that genuine competitors cry foul (like what Epic alleged Google was doing) or you have to make it easy for people to install alternatives, making it ripe for abuse.
    • spideymans 5y ago
      Yes. Users have always been willing to disable security measures to get shady software. Think of all the free screensaver malware out there. To a pretty big chunk of users basic computer security is inscrutable technobabble.
• abecedarius 5y ago
  > Customers “uniformly” want it to “stay like it is." I'm a customer and I don't.
  • _nalply 5y ago
    You comment on Hacker News. Therefore you are not an “uniform” customer.
• LexGray 5y ago
  A fairly obvious situation where the top google result is “Kid friendly happy fun town App Store” set up by dark web Corp where you can get pre hacked versions of all major commercial apps for free with built in cheats at the cost of porn pop ups and just trust me levels of scamware. Most would go straight to Apple with their issues and how do you fix “I don’t know. My cousin installed it for me”?
  • musicale 5y ago
    > Most would go straight to Apple with their issues and how do you fix “I don’t know. My cousin installed it for me”? Presumably Apple has run into the "my cousin installed it for me" issue with Macs and they don't want to deal with it (or pay for it) at iPhone scale.
  • ric2b 5y ago
    So where's the evidence that this is a common issue with Android?
• tolmasky 5y ago
  I'm a customer (and I have no apps on the AppStore), and I constantly feel that the customer perspective is the best reason to want multiple AppStores: the Apple AppStore sucks. 1. Search is worthless. It's basically only useful for exact string matches on app names. And even then, you get the competitor app's ad that takes up 80% of the screen. They took every bad aspect of Google's search (the confusing take-up too much space ads), with none of the good parts (you know, the actual searching smarts). 2. The review section sucks. Instead of providing a streamlined system to get help from the developer, they just give you a place to rant. Reading the reviews isn't exactly ergonomic on a phone screen either, so it's just a waste bin to throw complaints at. Imagine if Apple actually lived up to their lip service of app quality and integrated a support mechanism that would reward apps that promptly replied (they would be marked with the "helpful developer" badge and get more prominent search placement for example). 3. Discovery is non-existent. At some point in the last 5 years I kind of just stopped "window shopping" the AppStore. I used to think that the Top Charts were a lazy way to encourage trying new things out -- but wow, it was way better than what we have now. The first thing the AppStore shoves in my face is these absurdly long profiles on developers or whatever as if the AppStore is a magazine I want to read. I don't. I don't care about some editorial article about the makers of some game. And it takes up the entirety of the start screen instead of trying to customize a variety of app suggestions just for me. This is such a missed opportunity. I would spend so much more money on the AppStore if it helped me at all to see new things. The experience instead requires you to be proactive to find things. Hence why it's really just a glorified database that's only really useful if you already know exactly what you want ahead of time. 4. It isn't safe at all. There are so many scams on the store. Subscription scams, etc. Apple does this weird thing where they simultaneously pretend they don't exist, and uses them as proof that their arcane review system is needed. If the store had no scams, they'd say "see, our filters work!". If it does have scams, they say "see, this is why the filters are so necessary, imagine how much worse it would be without them!". Anyways, as a customer, being "on the AppStore" no longer means anything to me from a quality or security perspective. 5. The UI feels generally like it was designed by a government bureaucracy or something. The tabs are: "Today", "Games", "Apps", "Arcade", "Search". The only tab that makes sense on first glance is Search (but then you find out how much the Search sucks). Why is there an "Apps" section in the "AppStore"? Aren't they all apps? It's like how there's Apple TV+ in the TV app of Apple TV. And what the hell is the difference between Games and Arcade? 40% of the UI is dedicated to games, but split into two opaque categories, with "Apps" in-between them. And "Today" is of course this stupid magazine interface I've already complained about. It seems like it's an infinite scroll interface of random bullshit, but eventually you do reach the end of "Today," where you find how to redeem a gift card and read the Terms & Conditions. All very "Today" items. Anyways, the AppStore Tim describes only makes sense in the abstract. I wish they would just open the stupid store on someone's phone in the trial and just try to use it. They've managed to perfectly capture the combination of boredom and cheapness of the free samples section of a grocery store, complete with the employee not knowing what aisle you can actually find the product at if you end up actually liking it and wanting to buy it.
• deleted 5y ago
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