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What you're saying is that you're OK with basically every single developer declaring their app as free, and then asking for your credit card, which will be proc

by slver 5y ago

What you're saying is that you're OK with basically every single developer declaring their app as free, and then asking for your credit card, which will be processed in god knows what ways with most of them. So developers get in the shortterm to avoid the 30% cut. But what happens next? The payment process becomes much more cumbersome and much less safe for users. So they start avoiding any payments on iPhone. Apple loses basically all funding to maintain and curate the store. And in the long-term developers lose the entire platform, because it's based on the goodwill of the users. Who wins?

devit 5y ago
This will not happen as long as Apple's cut percentage is lower than the percentage of users that will give up or not download the app when asked for their credit card in-app. Obviously any reasonable Apple's cut will satisfy this requirement.
- Retric 5y ago
  4 users or 4 million the review process needs to be done and done well otherwise it’s just as risky as installing random crap people download from the internet. So the issue is Apples ‘cut’ needs to cover all those apps with few buyers. It’s a complex problem because applications like BonziBuddy mean you can’t actually trust users to detect issues. That’s not to say Apple ensures quality, just that minimum standards have actual value. On the other hand it’s reasonable for large companies to disagree with subsidizing lone developers. As such a substantial fee to submit apps would likely be required.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
SheinhardtWigCo 5y ago
This is FUD. Where is the evidence that letting developers choose how to process payments leads to rampant fraud? The online payment landscape outside the App Store is actually very safe for users. Try to cancel an in-app subscription without Googling how to do it. Good luck. Also, if you try using the store, you’ll see it’s not curated in any meaningful way. It’s full of garbage and fake reviews. Someone properly incentivized to improve it could do a much better job.
- coldtea 5y ago
  >This is FUD. Where is the evidence that letting developers choose how to process payments leads to rampant fraud? Here, for one: https://www.pandasecurity.com/en/mediacenter/mobile-security/android-more-infected-than-ios/#:~:text=Android%2Dpowered%20connected%20devices%20are,Nokia's%20latest%20threat%20intelligence%20report https://www.pandasecurity.com/en/mediacenter/mobile-security.... And in the general open web, for another, where online fraud is a multi-billion business...
  - SheinhardtWigCo 5y ago
    Not a single sentence in that article is relevant to this topic.
    - coldtea 5y ago
      The topic is opening up the app store, allowing developers to implement their own payments, and someone asked: "where is the evidence that letting developers choose how to process payments leads to rampant fraud?" Well, Android is open to sideloading and less "walled" and ends up with 50 times more malware than IOS. That's what "that article" is about. If someone connects the dots, they'll see that (a) opening up iOS similarly will lead to similar levels of malware, (b) letting developers have their own payment systems in such an environment would just lead to tons of that malware getting people's credit card details, charging for BS, and so on.
  - oblio 5y ago
    Yeah, online fraud is a multi-billion business. But how big is the open web? I'd imagine that it's transactions are on the order of hundreds of billions and most likely trillions, which would make that fraud an unavoidable drop in the bucket. And with Apple's system, are there any studies that shoes it makes a material difference in this fraud level? Even if it did, I'm not sure it's worth giving up all this freedom when we already have a system that works.
- LexGray 5y ago
  I have worked a few places where customer credit card information was kept in spreadsheets or other open databases. At the scale of an app developer who has trouble affording a $99 developer account spending money on securing customer information is a virtual non starter. Also third party interfaces you may attempt to use are often purchased and repurposed. There are huge numbers of dark pattern companies who thrive on the ability to thwart subscription cancellation and the Apple method can at least be googled. I have not seen any platform which has resolved the fake review problem through incentives and many that are far worse.
ipaddr 5y ago
The user. If I like netflix and want to pay outside of iOS I should be able to manage that without apple taking a cut. Managing payment outside of a closed system makes so much more sense. Apple losing all funding to operate the app store is the least of all issues. They can shutdown the store and thirdparty stores would take over. If they can't afford the app they probably won't sell many phones. Perhaps taking some of the phone profits to fund the app store would make business sense.

by slver 5y ago

devit 5y ago

This will not happen as long as Apple's cut percentage is lower than the percentage of users that will give up or not download the app when asked for their credit card in-app. Obviously any reasonable Apple's cut will satisfy this requirement.

Retric 5y ago
4 users or 4 million the review process needs to be done and done well otherwise it’s just as risky as installing random crap people download from the internet. So the issue is Apples ‘cut’ needs to cover all those apps with few buyers. It’s a complex problem because applications like BonziBuddy mean you can’t actually trust users to detect issues. That’s not to say Apple ensures quality, just that minimum standards have actual value. On the other hand it’s reasonable for large companies to disagree with subsidizing lone developers. As such a substantial fee to submit apps would likely be required.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

SheinhardtWigCo 5y ago

This is FUD. Where is the evidence that letting developers choose how to process payments leads to rampant fraud? The online payment landscape outside the App Store is actually very safe for users. Try to cancel an in-app subscription without Googling how to do it. Good luck. Also, if you try using the store, you’ll see it’s not curated in any meaningful way. It’s full of garbage and fake reviews. Someone properly incentivized to improve it could do a much better job.

coldtea 5y ago
>This is FUD. Where is the evidence that letting developers choose how to process payments leads to rampant fraud? Here, for one: https://www.pandasecurity.com/en/mediacenter/mobile-security/android-more-infected-than-ios/#:~:text=Android%2Dpowered%20connected%20devices%20are,Nokia's%20latest%20threat%20intelligence%20report https://www.pandasecurity.com/en/mediacenter/mobile-security.... And in the general open web, for another, where online fraud is a multi-billion business...
- SheinhardtWigCo 5y ago
  Not a single sentence in that article is relevant to this topic.
  - coldtea 5y ago
    The topic is opening up the app store, allowing developers to implement their own payments, and someone asked: "where is the evidence that letting developers choose how to process payments leads to rampant fraud?" Well, Android is open to sideloading and less "walled" and ends up with 50 times more malware than IOS. That's what "that article" is about. If someone connects the dots, they'll see that (a) opening up iOS similarly will lead to similar levels of malware, (b) letting developers have their own payment systems in such an environment would just lead to tons of that malware getting people's credit card details, charging for BS, and so on.
- oblio 5y ago
  Yeah, online fraud is a multi-billion business. But how big is the open web? I'd imagine that it's transactions are on the order of hundreds of billions and most likely trillions, which would make that fraud an unavoidable drop in the bucket. And with Apple's system, are there any studies that shoes it makes a material difference in this fraud level? Even if it did, I'm not sure it's worth giving up all this freedom when we already have a system that works.
LexGray 5y ago
I have worked a few places where customer credit card information was kept in spreadsheets or other open databases. At the scale of an app developer who has trouble affording a $99 developer account spending money on securing customer information is a virtual non starter. Also third party interfaces you may attempt to use are often purchased and repurposed. There are huge numbers of dark pattern companies who thrive on the ability to thwart subscription cancellation and the Apple method can at least be googled. I have not seen any platform which has resolved the fake review problem through incentives and many that are far worse.

ipaddr 5y ago

The user. If I like netflix and want to pay outside of iOS I should be able to manage that without apple taking a cut. Managing payment outside of a closed system makes so much more sense. Apple losing all funding to operate the app store is the least of all issues. They can shutdown the store and thirdparty stores would take over. If they can't afford the app they probably won't sell many phones. Perhaps taking some of the phone profits to fund the app store would make business sense.