5 ms·

As an iOS user, I do not want the publisher knowing anything about me. I'm happy to pay for the app, but I do not want to tell the publisher a single thing othe

by ev1 5y ago

As an iOS user, I do not want the publisher knowing anything about me. I'm happy to pay for the app, but I do not want to tell the publisher a single thing other than the fact that it is paid. Nothing else. I do not want to share my email, I do not want to share any form of cardholder data. I want to cancel in one tap for any subscription. I do not want to go through shitty, abusive retention flows.

offtotheraces 5y ago
Until last year it took 11 taps to cancel through iOS. Bet it’s a whole lot less if you try to cancel HBO from their website.
- kmonsen 5y ago
  It’s an infinite number of taps to cancel nytimes though. I guess Apple subscription is an equalizer, they all become somewhat horrible.
- scrose 5y ago
  This is a very odd comparison. You’re comparing a past workflow for one service against an existing workflow for an entirely separate service, but only speculating on whether it is actually less. It’s currently 6 taps to cancel a single subscription in Apple and 2 taps extra for each service you want to cancel right after. I love knowing that I don’t have to figure out what magical incantation I have to do to cancel any/every service I sign up for.
- ev1 5y ago
  When I say cancel in one tap, what I mean is I have a list of every subscription I am holding, and I pick that one and it goes. I do not want any kind of retention, I do not want to be messaged in any way, just stop renewal. I do not want to call in, live chat, give a reason, etc.
  - sharken 5y ago
    So sort of a one-click buy experience, only for cancelling a subscription. I think that would be great, except many companies care more about holding on to users than the user itself. But i think it's a great idea, it could even be listed as a feature/badge when signing up. [X] Easy one-click cancellation.
    - graftak 5y ago
      The App Store provides just that
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
- Talanes 5y ago
  I value the thought I have to put into figuring out what to click more than I do the actual effort of clicking. Also, those numbers aren't as great if you count typing a url in your tap count.
- howinteresting 5y ago
  Last I checked, it's also incredibly difficult to cancel an Apple subscription if you've switched away from the ecosystem and all you have on hand is Linux and Android.
webmobdev 5y ago
It is quite sad that most Americans see Apple's exploitation of a lacunae in their law (not allowing easy cancellation of subscriptions) as some benevolent act from it. Two questions: 1. Are you fine (edit) as a consumer (/edit) paying 30% more for this, especially when you are just trading data collection from the App maker to Apple? 2. Wouldn't you rather that everyone had this protection, and not depend on the mercy of corporates for this? I absolutely am not fine allowing Apple to charge 30% extra, especially when other payment processors only charge around 2 to 5%. And Apple forcing themselves as a middle man is more of a concern here as they have more potential to exploit me commercially, using my data, than some non-BigTech app maker. The 2nd question is more pertinent to all of us as consumers - thanks to Indian laws and regulation, I can easily unsubscribe to any service, and that protects me from exploitation both from Apple and any unscrupulous service. That is what we should all be working towards (more consumer rights). Any support for Apple on this is totally misguided - if they genuinely cared about your rights here, they wouldn't be gauging 30% of you in in-apps payment, without even telling you that money goes to Apple.
- ev1 5y ago
  I'm fine paying another relatively neutral party provided they do not pass ANYTHING on to the final publisher. No name, email, country, anything. Too many bad experiences. If the alternative was to subscribe with Stripe or Braintree, I would just not subscribe. Sure, I might trust Stripe, but I do not trust the end-company to be reasonable or safe stewards of the data that can be exported. Time and time again, repeatedly, this has been proven. There is a difference between trusting a single company to run all your transactions through them and giving your card out to the 20+ places you subscribe to. I trust Apple (and Google) on data security several orders of magnitude more than any generic publisher. While I may not like the privacy part, at least they tend to hold it better than any other generic app.
  - ev1 5y ago
    As an additional note: I would love to see such a privacy-respecting third party exist. Ideally, they would collect nothing at all and exist via prepaid value. Several years ago there was a company similar to this called UltimateGameCard - they were a neutral third party not associated with any publisher that strictly handled paid-in-store prepaid value PINs that collected no personal information and were partnered with dozens to hundreds of game publishers, and supported hundreds of different major games (and several software publishers). They were available in almost every store, and using them required no privacy violations. Explicitly, their largest customer base were minors (like me at the time), and not collecting PII or even name made it great and a first choice for them. The low incidence of fraud and inability to chargeback the company (cash only in hand; and you could still dispute the game publisher via the prepaid company to get value added back) resulted in extremely low fees, to the point where games would give you bonus value if you chose this instead of a credit card or other. They had contracts with basically every major publisher - Club Penguin, Runescape, Everquest, etc, and your funds were good almost every game you'd play. They generally respected both sides of the market: you, a 12 year old, could ask customer service if you were genuinely ripped off or accidentally claimed too much value at a specific publisher but didn't use it yet, and they would treat you like an adult. The game publisher could refund the value if you didn't spend it yet, and not be hit with any form of chargeback or dispute fee or any increase in fees at all. And since it was paid in cash, if you were lying about it or just upset you failed your loot box gamble, you got nothing back. It was also more or less publisher contract based so random IAP trash couldn't just sign up and take money - all the big names were on this. I would love a system like this again.
8ytecoder 5y ago
It’s also why I don’t pay for or use apps that use their own data sync instead of iCloud (looking at you sleep cycle).

by ev1 5y ago

offtotheraces 5y ago

Until last year it took 11 taps to cancel through iOS. Bet it’s a whole lot less if you try to cancel HBO from their website.

kmonsen 5y ago
It’s an infinite number of taps to cancel nytimes though. I guess Apple subscription is an equalizer, they all become somewhat horrible.
scrose 5y ago
This is a very odd comparison. You’re comparing a past workflow for one service against an existing workflow for an entirely separate service, but only speculating on whether it is actually less. It’s currently 6 taps to cancel a single subscription in Apple and 2 taps extra for each service you want to cancel right after. I love knowing that I don’t have to figure out what magical incantation I have to do to cancel any/every service I sign up for.
ev1 5y ago
When I say cancel in one tap, what I mean is I have a list of every subscription I am holding, and I pick that one and it goes. I do not want any kind of retention, I do not want to be messaged in any way, just stop renewal. I do not want to call in, live chat, give a reason, etc.
- sharken 5y ago
  So sort of a one-click buy experience, only for cancelling a subscription. I think that would be great, except many companies care more about holding on to users than the user itself. But i think it's a great idea, it could even be listed as a feature/badge when signing up. [X] Easy one-click cancellation.
  - graftak 5y ago
    The App Store provides just that
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
Talanes 5y ago
I value the thought I have to put into figuring out what to click more than I do the actual effort of clicking. Also, those numbers aren't as great if you count typing a url in your tap count.
howinteresting 5y ago
Last I checked, it's also incredibly difficult to cancel an Apple subscription if you've switched away from the ecosystem and all you have on hand is Linux and Android.

webmobdev 5y ago

It is quite sad that most Americans see Apple's exploitation of a lacunae in their law (not allowing easy cancellation of subscriptions) as some benevolent act from it. Two questions: 1. Are you fine (edit) as a consumer (/edit) paying 30% more for this, especially when you are just trading data collection from the App maker to Apple? 2. Wouldn't you rather that everyone had this protection, and not depend on the mercy of corporates for this? I absolutely am not fine allowing Apple to charge 30% extra, especially when other payment processors only charge around 2 to 5%. And Apple forcing themselves as a middle man is more of a concern here as they have more potential to exploit me commercially, using my data, than some non-BigTech app maker. The 2nd question is more pertinent to all of us as consumers - thanks to Indian laws and regulation, I can easily unsubscribe to any service, and that protects me from exploitation both from Apple and any unscrupulous service. That is what we should all be working towards (more consumer rights). Any support for Apple on this is totally misguided - if they genuinely cared about your rights here, they wouldn't be gauging 30% of you in in-apps payment, without even telling you that money goes to Apple.

ev1 5y ago
I'm fine paying another relatively neutral party provided they do not pass ANYTHING on to the final publisher. No name, email, country, anything. Too many bad experiences. If the alternative was to subscribe with Stripe or Braintree, I would just not subscribe. Sure, I might trust Stripe, but I do not trust the end-company to be reasonable or safe stewards of the data that can be exported. Time and time again, repeatedly, this has been proven. There is a difference between trusting a single company to run all your transactions through them and giving your card out to the 20+ places you subscribe to. I trust Apple (and Google) on data security several orders of magnitude more than any generic publisher. While I may not like the privacy part, at least they tend to hold it better than any other generic app.
- ev1 5y ago
  As an additional note: I would love to see such a privacy-respecting third party exist. Ideally, they would collect nothing at all and exist via prepaid value. Several years ago there was a company similar to this called UltimateGameCard - they were a neutral third party not associated with any publisher that strictly handled paid-in-store prepaid value PINs that collected no personal information and were partnered with dozens to hundreds of game publishers, and supported hundreds of different major games (and several software publishers). They were available in almost every store, and using them required no privacy violations. Explicitly, their largest customer base were minors (like me at the time), and not collecting PII or even name made it great and a first choice for them. The low incidence of fraud and inability to chargeback the company (cash only in hand; and you could still dispute the game publisher via the prepaid company to get value added back) resulted in extremely low fees, to the point where games would give you bonus value if you chose this instead of a credit card or other. They had contracts with basically every major publisher - Club Penguin, Runescape, Everquest, etc, and your funds were good almost every game you'd play. They generally respected both sides of the market: you, a 12 year old, could ask customer service if you were genuinely ripped off or accidentally claimed too much value at a specific publisher but didn't use it yet, and they would treat you like an adult. The game publisher could refund the value if you didn't spend it yet, and not be hit with any form of chargeback or dispute fee or any increase in fees at all. And since it was paid in cash, if you were lying about it or just upset you failed your loot box gamble, you got nothing back. It was also more or less publisher contract based so random IAP trash couldn't just sign up and take money - all the big names were on this. I would love a system like this again.

8ytecoder 5y ago

It’s also why I don’t pay for or use apps that use their own data sync instead of iCloud (looking at you sleep cycle).