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Lets hope that the anti-trust judiciary has enough technical understanding to realise how restrictive and damaging to competition - Apple’s policy of not allowi

Lets hope that the anti-trust judiciary has enough technical understanding to realise how restrictive and damaging to competition - Apple’s policy of not allowing alternative web browser engines on IOS is. They should force Apple to allow alternative engines to Webkit, thus enabling much stronger competition to Safari and to native Apps on Apple mobile devices.

zimpenfish 5y ago
> They should force Apple to allow alternative engines to Webkit I would be A-OK with that if the alternative engines provided the same privacy and security guarantees to me that Mobile Safari does (with penalties for breaching those guarantees.)
- makeitdouble 5y ago
  Those guarantees are currently provided by Apple and you seem to trust them. What would stop you from chosing alternative browsers from other companies you trust to provide the same guarantees ?
  - sbuk 5y ago
    Google and Mozilla's track record? https://www.csoonline.com/article/3243284/firefox-users-are-ticked-after-mozilla-secretly-installed-mr-robot-add-on.html https://www.csoonline.com/article/3243284/firefox-users-are-... https://www.pcmag.com/archive/google-accused-of-tracking-safari-usage-without-permission-294281 https://www.pcmag.com/archive/google-accused-of-tracking-saf...
    - makeitdouble 5y ago
      Apple were heavily relying on Google and Yahoo from maps, integrated web search, to weather data for a long time. At no point they asked you if you wanted to give your location to Yahoo. Would you give a pass to Apple for how they handled privacy in the past and not to Mozilla who comparatively had only a few hiccups ?
      - sbuk 5y ago
        Let's leave the goalposts where they are. Besides, I'm extremely confident that Apple only ever used Google for mapping in the early days of iOS/iPhone OS. In which case, if you took the time to read the ToS, it's there.
        makeitdouble 5y ago
        They stayed on Google Maps for 4~5 years until the writing was on the wall that it wouldn’t help them in the future (android being the elephant in the room). They still happily relied on whoever service they could rely on. Do you remember the facebook and twitter accounts setup directly in the system preferences ? Or right now they’re still sending data to Weatherchannel, until they complete Dark Sky’s integration I assume. Service providers where mostly in the deal to get user data, and Apple’s push on privacy only started well into Cook’s tenure. But you have trust in them in their current business position (it only was “the early days”). By that token I don’t think it’s unrealistic to assume at some point you’ll find other companies that are either new or show they changed enough to get your trust.
        sbuk 5y ago
        And they tell you this is happening. The links I shared illustrate Google and Mozilla doing things without asking or informing the user. Apple do indeed have form in this area too, battery/processor throttling springs to mind. With regards maps, although what this has to do with your original question is beyond me, Apple informed the user very clearly on where the data is from and what data they were collecting, they still do. It was originally a combination of TomTom and OpenStreetMap, by the way. Also, Jobs was pushing privacy in 2010 - "Privacy means people know what they're signing up for, in plain English and repeatedly. I believe people are smart and some people want to share more data than other people do. Ask them. Ask them every time. Make them tell you to stop asking them if they get tired of your asking them. Let them know precisely what you're going to do with their data." I agree that companies can change. Big companies rarely do. I'm concerned that it's only a matter of time before Mozilla make the decision to switch to blink, which would be the end for them and the open web. Interestingly, of the complaints made in this article, 6 are Editors Drafts, not agreed upon standards, or Working Drafts, again experimental un-agreed 'standards'. I'll concede that a working draft is close enough to being standardised. The rest, bar one, are implemented in WebKit. So the complaint in the article is that the WebKit project is holding up the web by not including Google's experimental features in a bid to say Apple should be allowing other, less secure rendering engines on a platform where users store a ridiculous amount of PII. It's being framed as 'freedom' - I'm sceptical. They'll be caterwauling about 'choice', but by enforcing 'choice', there is very real, and frankly sinister, risk that it will be lost irrevocably along with any semblance of an open web. Careful what you wish for.
- saagarjha 5y ago
  What kinds of penalties do you have in mind? Do you think Safari should be held up to the same standard other browsers are if they surpass it in security or privacy on any front?
  - zimpenfish 5y ago
    > Do you think Safari should be held up to the same standard other browsers are if they surpass it in security or privacy on any front? Definitely.
- _Algernon_ 5y ago
  This is about forcing Apple to allow other engines. You can still choose not to use them. It follows that there is no reason that your choice of engine should be the default and only option for everyone that uses an iOS device.
  - zimpenfish 5y ago
    > You can still choose not to use them. Not necessarily - if an app I am required to use for work chooses to use Chrome/whatever as its engine, for example, I don't have a choice there. Same for my bank / doctor / school / etc.
  - yourenotsmart 5y ago
    Users can't make an informed choice about what browser engine they use. They don't understand what a browser engine is, and what impact it has on their security, battery performance and so on. So no, you can't choose. When we say "you can choose" we need to realize that this is only good when you can make an educated, informed choice. If you can't, you need to be protected. And that's Apple's role. Random choice is not a choice. Would you have your infant "choose" what drugs to take for headache for example? What criteria will they use? Pill shape, color, size and flavor. Well that's basically also our proverbial mom and pop picking a browser engine. Furthermore browser engines have this peculiar habit of getting into everything. Open any app at all and it's probably using WebKit without you realizing it. What if the app uses some random outdated fork of Netscape, why not? Do you realize what "choice" you made by opening that app? No.
    - agust 5y ago
      Yes, users can make an informed choice about what product to use or to buy. This is true for computers, this is true for mobile devices, this is true for any kind of software, and obviously this is true for web browsers. People have been doing it on all other OSes since web browsers have existed. There is no reason to prevent competition in such a market, and hopefully regulators will become aware of the issue and act on it soon.
      - 5y ago
cookiengineer 5y ago
> They should force Apple to allow alternative engines to Webkit, thus enabling much stronger competition to Safari and to native Apps on Apple mobile devices. The ironic part here is that back in 2007-2013 Microsoft was sued by the European Union [1], and was forced to implement a downloader GUI that offers a randomized overview of available Browsers [2]; and their website/download links. Back then Microsoft's defense was that an enduser could just install another Operating System on the hardware if they didn't want to be forced to use Internet Explorer. And now, 10 years later, here we are, where Apple absolutely controls the Hardware _and_ the Software. Yet the European Union does seemingly nothing against it. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Corp._v._Commission https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Corp._v._Commission [2] (with screenshots) https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-fined-731m-by-eu-in-browser-choice-screw-up/ https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-fined-731m-by-eu-in-...
- enaaem 5y ago
  The EU looks at the health of the market and there is plenty of competition and Apple only controls a small fraction of it. Windows on the other hand was installed on like >90% of computers.
- bartread 5y ago
  But when that happened didn't Microsoft have something like 95%+ of the global desktop operating system market share? Whereas Apple has nowhere close to that in mobile market share and likely never will. They are not a monopoly in the same way Microsoft was a monopoly. With Apple you have viable alternatives from Android handset manufacturers: alternatives that are suitable for the average person on the street. With Microsoft this was not the case. When that case started Apple were basically dead in the water on the desktop... and then you had Linux, which was not suitable for the average user (yes, I'm sure we can all cherry pick a story about somebody's grandparent being perfectly happy with Linux back in the day but these anecdotes, whilst fun and interesting, do not add up to meaningful data).
- elondaits 5y ago
  Perhaps they realize that opening up the browser on iOS would disproportionally benefit Google and nobody else.
least 5y ago
Ironically Apple ensuring that every browser on iOS runs webkit is one of the only things preventing Chrome from having a complete hegemony of the web. If you actually want stronger competition the best thing you could do is separate Chrome from Google.
- Hammershaft 5y ago
  What funding mechanism would chrome have seperate from Google?
  - fouc 5y ago
    A good concern given how firefox/Mozilla was co-opted to some extent
  - imbnwa 5y ago
    The same one Firefox procures?
    - vhgyu75e6u 5y ago
      So an agreement with Google to have Google as the default browser of Firefox?
      - imbnwa 5y ago
        Doh, misread the question
- cromwellian 5y ago
  If this rule had applied to Windows, there would be no Mozilla.
- summerlight 5y ago
  Or forcing Apple to accept real competition in the browser engine market and fund their team appropriately. Google puts literally several thousands of manpower into Chrome while Apple puts roughly one tenth into Safari. This is not acceptable.
yourenotsmart 5y ago
Apple allows alternate browsers on iOS. Good luck having bunch of lawyers figure out what the impact of a browser "engine" is. And honestly good luck having regular users care about this, either. The reason Apple won't have a problem with it is because the whole argument is just in the echo chamber of web developers who want their new shiny.
- makeitdouble 5y ago
  Wasn’t it the same issue with telecoms ? I don’t remember my parents losing sleep at night because third party ISP couldn’t get the same access to copper lines. Yet we got meaningful regulation of that market. I think as long as there’s big enough third parties losing money there is hope for change.
  - yourenotsmart 5y ago
    So which parties are "losing money" here?
    - gogopuppygogo 5y ago
      Facebook
      - yourenotsmart 5y ago
        Ah yes, the Facebook Browser Engine... (?)
        gogopuppygogo 5y ago
        Google monetizes chrome. Google is an advertising company. Apple monetizes Safari. They sell hardware and subscription services. Facebook monetizes in part through these browsers. The changes to Safari hurt Facebook revenue.
    - makeitdouble 5y ago
      Microsoft I’d guess ? If Google were to lose android I wonder if they’d also push for more regulation on Apple. I wish I could just say “Firefox”, but I’m afraid they would be small potatoes in this.
tannhaeuser 5y ago
Let's then also hope that the anti-trust judiciary understands that a closed-loop Web where the browser, the so-called "standards", the content/ads, and gatekeeping are made by the same party, is antithetical to what made the Web successful and got public spending behind in the first place. And that solving an economic problem of the software industry (nobody wanting to install your app, and nobody wanting to buy it either when everything is "free" as long you accept erosion of your privacy) isn't the job of the web, especially when it clearly is detrimental to the original purpose of the web as a medium for easy self-publishing.
- fouc 5y ago
  Good point about the standards being made by the same party. It's also hard to imagine that w3c & Mozilla haven't had their motives affected at some level.
IfOnlyYouKnew 5y ago
In terms of competition law, the skins-over-webkit they do allow are plenty. Anti-trust doesn't so much care about competition to improve web APIs. Because it's not really a market, what with no money changing hands etc. In MS/IE/Netscape times, the idea of licensing browsers was still fresh. And, more importantly, browsers differed In more than just synthetic benchmark scores: IE had ActiveX plugins that weren't available for any browser or operating system, and those were widely used, discriminating against other OS, an actual market. A similar situation would be Apple intentionally crippling Google Docs, or amazon.com. The changes to ads and tracking are the closest we've gotten in the last decade, and Apple has a pretty good case that they are doing so with the user's interest in mind.

zimpenfish 5y ago

> They should force Apple to allow alternative engines to Webkit I would be A-OK with that if the alternative engines provided the same privacy and security guarantees to me that Mobile Safari does (with penalties for breaching those guarantees.)

makeitdouble 5y ago
Those guarantees are currently provided by Apple and you seem to trust them. What would stop you from chosing alternative browsers from other companies you trust to provide the same guarantees ?
- sbuk 5y ago
  Google and Mozilla's track record? https://www.csoonline.com/article/3243284/firefox-users-are-ticked-after-mozilla-secretly-installed-mr-robot-add-on.html https://www.csoonline.com/article/3243284/firefox-users-are-... https://www.pcmag.com/archive/google-accused-of-tracking-safari-usage-without-permission-294281 https://www.pcmag.com/archive/google-accused-of-tracking-saf...
  - makeitdouble 5y ago
    Apple were heavily relying on Google and Yahoo from maps, integrated web search, to weather data for a long time. At no point they asked you if you wanted to give your location to Yahoo. Would you give a pass to Apple for how they handled privacy in the past and not to Mozilla who comparatively had only a few hiccups ?
    - sbuk 5y ago
      Let's leave the goalposts where they are. Besides, I'm extremely confident that Apple only ever used Google for mapping in the early days of iOS/iPhone OS. In which case, if you took the time to read the ToS, it's there.
      - makeitdouble 5y ago
        They stayed on Google Maps for 4~5 years until the writing was on the wall that it wouldn’t help them in the future (android being the elephant in the room). They still happily relied on whoever service they could rely on. Do you remember the facebook and twitter accounts setup directly in the system preferences ? Or right now they’re still sending data to Weatherchannel, until they complete Dark Sky’s integration I assume. Service providers where mostly in the deal to get user data, and Apple’s push on privacy only started well into Cook’s tenure. But you have trust in them in their current business position (it only was “the early days”). By that token I don’t think it’s unrealistic to assume at some point you’ll find other companies that are either new or show they changed enough to get your trust.
        sbuk 5y ago
        And they tell you this is happening. The links I shared illustrate Google and Mozilla doing things without asking or informing the user. Apple do indeed have form in this area too, battery/processor throttling springs to mind. With regards maps, although what this has to do with your original question is beyond me, Apple informed the user very clearly on where the data is from and what data they were collecting, they still do. It was originally a combination of TomTom and OpenStreetMap, by the way. Also, Jobs was pushing privacy in 2010 - "Privacy means people know what they're signing up for, in plain English and repeatedly. I believe people are smart and some people want to share more data than other people do. Ask them. Ask them every time. Make them tell you to stop asking them if they get tired of your asking them. Let them know precisely what you're going to do with their data." I agree that companies can change. Big companies rarely do. I'm concerned that it's only a matter of time before Mozilla make the decision to switch to blink, which would be the end for them and the open web. Interestingly, of the complaints made in this article, 6 are Editors Drafts, not agreed upon standards, or Working Drafts, again experimental un-agreed 'standards'. I'll concede that a working draft is close enough to being standardised. The rest, bar one, are implemented in WebKit. So the complaint in the article is that the WebKit project is holding up the web by not including Google's experimental features in a bid to say Apple should be allowing other, less secure rendering engines on a platform where users store a ridiculous amount of PII. It's being framed as 'freedom' - I'm sceptical. They'll be caterwauling about 'choice', but by enforcing 'choice', there is very real, and frankly sinister, risk that it will be lost irrevocably along with any semblance of an open web. Careful what you wish for.
saagarjha 5y ago
What kinds of penalties do you have in mind? Do you think Safari should be held up to the same standard other browsers are if they surpass it in security or privacy on any front?
- zimpenfish 5y ago
  > Do you think Safari should be held up to the same standard other browsers are if they surpass it in security or privacy on any front? Definitely.
_Algernon_ 5y ago
This is about forcing Apple to allow other engines. You can still choose not to use them. It follows that there is no reason that your choice of engine should be the default and only option for everyone that uses an iOS device.
- zimpenfish 5y ago
  > You can still choose not to use them. Not necessarily - if an app I am required to use for work chooses to use Chrome/whatever as its engine, for example, I don't have a choice there. Same for my bank / doctor / school / etc.
- yourenotsmart 5y ago
  Users can't make an informed choice about what browser engine they use. They don't understand what a browser engine is, and what impact it has on their security, battery performance and so on. So no, you can't choose. When we say "you can choose" we need to realize that this is only good when you can make an educated, informed choice. If you can't, you need to be protected. And that's Apple's role. Random choice is not a choice. Would you have your infant "choose" what drugs to take for headache for example? What criteria will they use? Pill shape, color, size and flavor. Well that's basically also our proverbial mom and pop picking a browser engine. Furthermore browser engines have this peculiar habit of getting into everything. Open any app at all and it's probably using WebKit without you realizing it. What if the app uses some random outdated fork of Netscape, why not? Do you realize what "choice" you made by opening that app? No.
  - agust 5y ago
    Yes, users can make an informed choice about what product to use or to buy. This is true for computers, this is true for mobile devices, this is true for any kind of software, and obviously this is true for web browsers. People have been doing it on all other OSes since web browsers have existed. There is no reason to prevent competition in such a market, and hopefully regulators will become aware of the issue and act on it soon.
    - 5y ago

cookiengineer 5y ago

> They should force Apple to allow alternative engines to Webkit, thus enabling much stronger competition to Safari and to native Apps on Apple mobile devices. The ironic part here is that back in 2007-2013 Microsoft was sued by the European Union [1], and was forced to implement a downloader GUI that offers a randomized overview of available Browsers [2]; and their website/download links. Back then Microsoft's defense was that an enduser could just install another Operating System on the hardware if they didn't want to be forced to use Internet Explorer. And now, 10 years later, here we are, where Apple absolutely controls the Hardware _and_ the Software. Yet the European Union does seemingly nothing against it. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Corp._v._Commission https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Corp._v._Commission [2] (with screenshots) https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-fined-731m-by-eu-in-browser-choice-screw-up/ https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-fined-731m-by-eu-in-...

enaaem 5y ago
The EU looks at the health of the market and there is plenty of competition and Apple only controls a small fraction of it. Windows on the other hand was installed on like >90% of computers.
bartread 5y ago
But when that happened didn't Microsoft have something like 95%+ of the global desktop operating system market share? Whereas Apple has nowhere close to that in mobile market share and likely never will. They are not a monopoly in the same way Microsoft was a monopoly. With Apple you have viable alternatives from Android handset manufacturers: alternatives that are suitable for the average person on the street. With Microsoft this was not the case. When that case started Apple were basically dead in the water on the desktop... and then you had Linux, which was not suitable for the average user (yes, I'm sure we can all cherry pick a story about somebody's grandparent being perfectly happy with Linux back in the day but these anecdotes, whilst fun and interesting, do not add up to meaningful data).
elondaits 5y ago
Perhaps they realize that opening up the browser on iOS would disproportionally benefit Google and nobody else.

least 5y ago

Ironically Apple ensuring that every browser on iOS runs webkit is one of the only things preventing Chrome from having a complete hegemony of the web. If you actually want stronger competition the best thing you could do is separate Chrome from Google.

Hammershaft 5y ago
What funding mechanism would chrome have seperate from Google?
- fouc 5y ago
  A good concern given how firefox/Mozilla was co-opted to some extent
- imbnwa 5y ago
  The same one Firefox procures?
  - vhgyu75e6u 5y ago
    So an agreement with Google to have Google as the default browser of Firefox?
    - imbnwa 5y ago
      Doh, misread the question
cromwellian 5y ago
If this rule had applied to Windows, there would be no Mozilla.
summerlight 5y ago
Or forcing Apple to accept real competition in the browser engine market and fund their team appropriately. Google puts literally several thousands of manpower into Chrome while Apple puts roughly one tenth into Safari. This is not acceptable.

yourenotsmart 5y ago

Apple allows alternate browsers on iOS. Good luck having bunch of lawyers figure out what the impact of a browser "engine" is. And honestly good luck having regular users care about this, either. The reason Apple won't have a problem with it is because the whole argument is just in the echo chamber of web developers who want their new shiny.

makeitdouble 5y ago
Wasn’t it the same issue with telecoms ? I don’t remember my parents losing sleep at night because third party ISP couldn’t get the same access to copper lines. Yet we got meaningful regulation of that market. I think as long as there’s big enough third parties losing money there is hope for change.
- yourenotsmart 5y ago
  So which parties are "losing money" here?
  - gogopuppygogo 5y ago
    Facebook
    - yourenotsmart 5y ago
      Ah yes, the Facebook Browser Engine... (?)
      - gogopuppygogo 5y ago
        Google monetizes chrome. Google is an advertising company. Apple monetizes Safari. They sell hardware and subscription services. Facebook monetizes in part through these browsers. The changes to Safari hurt Facebook revenue.
  - makeitdouble 5y ago
    Microsoft I’d guess ? If Google were to lose android I wonder if they’d also push for more regulation on Apple. I wish I could just say “Firefox”, but I’m afraid they would be small potatoes in this.

tannhaeuser 5y ago

Let's then also hope that the anti-trust judiciary understands that a closed-loop Web where the browser, the so-called "standards", the content/ads, and gatekeeping are made by the same party, is antithetical to what made the Web successful and got public spending behind in the first place. And that solving an economic problem of the software industry (nobody wanting to install your app, and nobody wanting to buy it either when everything is "free" as long you accept erosion of your privacy) isn't the job of the web, especially when it clearly is detrimental to the original purpose of the web as a medium for easy self-publishing.

fouc 5y ago
Good point about the standards being made by the same party. It's also hard to imagine that w3c & Mozilla haven't had their motives affected at some level.

IfOnlyYouKnew 5y ago

In terms of competition law, the skins-over-webkit they do allow are plenty. Anti-trust doesn't so much care about competition to improve web APIs. Because it's not really a market, what with no money changing hands etc. In MS/IE/Netscape times, the idea of licensing browsers was still fresh. And, more importantly, browsers differed In more than just synthetic benchmark scores: IE had ActiveX plugins that weren't available for any browser or operating system, and those were widely used, discriminating against other OS, an actual market. A similar situation would be Apple intentionally crippling Google Docs, or amazon.com. The changes to ads and tracking are the closest we've gotten in the last decade, and Apple has a pretty good case that they are doing so with the user's interest in mind.