10 ms·

Epic is asking a court to stop Google from yanking Bandcamp off the Play Store

103 points by grmnygrmny2 4y ago

ecf 4y ago
My cynical opinion is that it feels Tim Sweeney is purchasing companies in hopes he finds the “right” one that that causes enough public outrage to get his way in regards to App Store cuts.
- valdiorn 4y ago
  Good. It should cause outrage.
  - riversflow 4y ago
    The only outrage I feel is that Tim Sweeney is using the compensation of starving artists, the main demographic on Bandcamp as I understand it, to try and make himself and EPIC richer or more relatively powerful. I don't give two hoots about "breaking up the App Store Model" and I doubt many/most musicians do either. I personally feel that 30% isn't even outrageous considering the value proposition. Relatively rich/privileged software developers making their problem (App Stores wanting a 30% cut) the musicians' problem isn't noble, it's evil. Edit: The way I see it, Tim Sweeney/EPIC is responsible for breaking the status quo that allowed bandcamp’s niche to operate the way they did, which seems a reasonable assumption. That acquisition turned the userbase into a pawn in the App store battle.
    - _readyforit 4y ago
      The thing is… 30% is a lot for the artists on Bandcamp. Say I sell my album for $10 for easy math. I think Bandcamp takes something like 10-15%, there’s a small PayPal fee (~1%) and the rest goes to me. That’s ~$8.41 in my pocket. If Google takes their cut at the beginning for providing…the App Store where the buyer downloaded the app… the artist’s cut becomes ~$5.89. For a $10 album. It just doesn’t line up with the whole point of Bandcamp.
      - CharlesW 4y ago
        > The thing is… 30% is a lot for the artists on Bandcamp. How do you feel about 10%, which is what it probably would be according to TFA?
    - stale2002 4y ago
      > I don't give two hoots about "breaking up the App Store Model" and I doubt many/most musicians do either Well you should. Because regardless of if Epic bought bandcamp or not, the fee that google charges would come directly out of musicians pockets. Regardless of who is running bandcamp, that feel would directly cause artists to not make as much money. > I personally feel that 30% isn't even outrageous Ok, and now the end result is that fee is coming out of artists pockets. If you don't care about artist compensation, and want them to make less money, well fine. But don't pretend like you are on the side of artist compensation.
      - hamburglar 4y ago
        Yes, 100%. Epic or no, google announced that they were going to start taking an additional (and rather large) cut of payments for music sales which they have no part in. Bandcamp built a payment system that facilitates artists making money at zero cost to google, and now google wants to prevent that unless they get a cut. You can argue that google provides the foothold that gets the app on the device, so maybe a small fee could be justified, but taking place in all transactions that enables in perpetuity despite providing no technical contribution to them is ridiculous. Bandcamp could do a billion dollars a week in sales and it wouldn’t cost google a dime.
    - spywaregorilla 4y ago
      Sweeney / Epic donated $144 million to Ukraine. As far as virtue signaling goes, I think they've shown they do in fact have a fair amount of principles. Platform monopolies are real problems.
- passivate 4y ago
  So far he has lost a ton of cash on lawyer fees, M&A costs, etc. And EPIC now has to individually manage the acquired companies, make sure they're not competing against each other in the same market, etc, etc. I don't think this type of "spending current money to save future money" works. I don't care which company is doing it, but someone needs to break the App Store toll-booth. Apple/Google/Anyone else trying to limit general purpose computing on mobile/PC platforms is a terrible thing for computing, but thats just my view. The ideal situation is we have a default app store - where the system integrator enforces all their policies, but then a user can voluntarily choose to download a separate app store where that store is run by different less exploitative policies. To make it easy for users, you can have an central store-front which then re-directs users to the different store pages. No different than a "Nike store" on Amazon.
  - fabianhjr 4y ago
    At least in Android it is already the case, I have installed both F-Droid and Huawei's AppGallery in an otherwise stock android. (And prefer to get as much as possible from F-Droid) Apple on the other hand has a war against "evil" sideloading. :P
    - anonymousab 4y ago
      > At least in Android it is already the case There are roadblocks and deficiencies though, a major one being that sideloaded app stores cannot automatically update their applications, making them permanently inferior and crippled compared to Google's offering.
      - IshKebab 4y ago
        They're actually fixing that finally (I'm sure it has absolutely nothing to do with Epic's lawsuits...)
      - newaccount74 4y ago
        Also, some apps from F-Droid are crippled compared to what they can do when downloading from Play Store, eg. the K9 mail app from F-Droid doesn't have support for push email, it can only check at intervals. I don't know what the reason for this is, but the result is that Android is not a truly "open" platform.
- antihero 4y ago
  I think it is pretty outrageous to spend a grand on a phone and then be told that I’m not allowed to put what I want on it or spend money supporting artists or publishers without a middle man. It’s absolutely insane and I’m not sure why it isn’t subject to a huge antitrust investigation. And this is coming from someone that likes Apple!
  - tpmoney 4y ago
    Except this is about Google, and about Android, where you can put what you want and spend money without that middle man. You just need to side load, or install some other app store.
- robonerd 4y ago
  Bless him for it.
MikusR 4y ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31203907 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31203907
warning26 4y ago
While I generally agree with Epic's positions, it seems like a bit of a stretch here, considering that Android allows both sideloading and alternative app stores. Unlike on iOS, there's nothing on Android stopping Bandcamp from releasing a standalone sideloadable app with any payment system they desire.
- PeterisP 4y ago
  Antitrust rules apply for abuse of dominant market power (which Google certainly has) even if theoretical alternatives exist. It does not matter that it's not literally a monopoly, as that is not the legal bar that needs to be passed for Google to be limited in what they can and can't do.
  - bko 4y ago
    Bandcamp is using their own billing system, bypassing Google's cut. Every app could do this and cut Google out all together. An app could just let you download the app, pay some amount when you're in the app which would unlock the functionality. I don't think its unreasonable for Google to have a problem with this. They want to get the reach of the app store, and make money off it, without paying a cut to the host like everyone else. What am I missing here?
    - colechristensen 4y ago
      That Google’s cut of payments is very high which points to market position abuse
      - lolinder 4y ago
        High compared to what? It's the same as Apple's, so you're not comparing to other app stores. Amazon charges the same percentage on Kindle for eBooks. When people claim that the app store fees are excessively large they're usually comparing to payment processor fees, but neither major app store functions solely as a payment processor. So if not that, what are we comparing to when we say the fee is high?
draw_down 4y ago
kotaKat 4y ago
So... Sweeney wasn't happy with 30%, and now he's not happy with a sweetheart 10% deal? Pull the app and pull a Fortnite at this point and make people sideload it. I'm too tired of watching this fight over and over again, especially now that they're in the position of actually having a special deal that was given to them (even if it was pre-Epic).
- spywaregorilla 4y ago
  He's not ok with sweet heart deals conceptually. Because they're bullshit
  - CharlesW 4y ago
    Then I have good news, in that this isn't some special "sweetheart deal". 10% is the standard rev share for music streaming apps that participate in Google's "Play Media Experience Program".
    - spywaregorilla 4y ago
      That's still a sweetheart deal, and also looks like it's 5% better than the standard play media deal https://play.google.com/console/about/programs/mediaprogram/ https://play.google.com/console/about/programs/mediaprogram/ To qualify you must - App primarily offering video, audio, or books in which users pay to consume content - Over 100,000 monthly active installs on Google Play - High quality user experience with strong Google Play rating - Developer account in good standing - Integration of specific Google platforms and APIs based on type of media content - Additional requirements apply depending on the type of media content
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
unethical_ban 4y ago
I didn't think about it this way before, but it really looks like Epic might have bought out Bandcamp just to make this strategic legal play. Some (niche reddit subs) think Musk bought out Twitter just to shit on the short sellers of TWTR that overlap with targeting Tesla, and "just because he could".
unethical_ban 4y ago
Also - I think Android is still a superior OS for Bandcamp users, since iOS doesn't allow local loading of music through the app. Nevertheless, I downloaded all my purchases and put them on my Android FS.
thisarticle 4y ago
More and more it looks like Epic just wants access to these major platforms and wants other companies and developers to pay for it.
- belltaco 4y ago
  Is that what happens when a Windows program is not put on Windows Store? Thieves!
  - thisarticle 4y ago
    They’re free to distribute an APK like everyone else.
    - stale2002 4y ago
      Got it. So if back in 1999, internet explorer only allowed you to download something, if they took a percentage fee, then you'd be OK this with use of monopolistic power.
    - jahnu 4y ago
      Can you think of any reasons why this might not be a realistic choice?
    - prmoustache 4y ago
      It is not about buying/delivering the app. It is about doing payment within the app once it is installed. In that case Epic is paying/maintaining its payment infra. Your point is irrelevant
parkingrift 4y ago
I’ll side with Epic when they agree to let me sideload skins in Fortnite. Open your platform, Epic!
- spywaregorilla 4y ago
  Fortnite skins are a store, not a marketplace. There's a big difference.
  - parkingrift 4y ago
    While this is an absolutely true statement that distinction is an active choice by Fortnite to monopolize their platform.
    - jedimastert 4y ago
      Do other people allowed to sell skins on the store? Is side-loading an official feature elsewhere? I feel like if side-loading or community skins aren't actually supported then it's an important distinction
      - parkingrift 4y ago
        Neither side-loading nor community skins are supported, and that is my point. Epic prefers complete monopoly control over their platform.
        spywaregorilla 4y ago
        It's not a platform, it's a store. The term monopoly does not apply. It's not a clever gotcha, it's just you not understanding the difference.
        parkingrift 4y ago
        Again, Epic is the one who has made that decision. Epic has decided to be the exclusive vendor of skins and emotes for Fortnite. The only reason it’s a store is because… Epic wanted to be the only vendor. Whereas you’re acting like it’s something inherent to the product category. No, it was a decision Epic made.
rchaud 4y ago
> “However, Google is now modifying its rules to require Bandcamp (and other apps like it) to exclusively use Google Play Billing for payments for digital goods and services, and pay a revenue share to Google,” [Bandcamp CEO Ethan] Diamond says. A great example of two polar opposite worlds: - Bandcamp: lets artists set their prices, lets consumers purchase lossless DRM-free files. Mobile site works fine without Google. No uninvited algorithmic feeds ruining your personally curated collection. - Google: entire business relies on the open web, yet the mobile platform follows a sharecropping model from the 1800s, the video platform pays creators fractions of a penny per view, and everything is nailed down with DRM.
mattkevan 4y ago
Feels like Epic bought Bandcamp just to use them as a pawn in their crusade. Hoping nothing bad happens to it as it’s one of my favourite places on the Web.
SethMurphy 4y ago
So why can I make an Amazon purchase, using Amazon pay, through their android app installed through the Play Store. Is Google getting a cut there? Bandcamp must really be a threat to Google.
- makeitdouble 4y ago
  I find it fascinating that the base assumption here is that it’s all a level playing field, rules are evenly enforced and it’s up to each developper to pull themselves from their bootstraps to make it work. I have of course no idea how Amazon does their deals (just anyone outside Amazon I guess).
sentientslug 4y ago
I guess this is how I find out that Bandcamp was acquired by Epic...
smokey_circles 4y ago
I'm torn on this one. I agreed with epic when they made this argument with Apple but that's because the App Store was the only way around. Epic could just distribute an APK they build themselves. They just can't use the play store. Simple link on a website. Or the app. Doesn't the desktop launcher auto update? Android is a lot more open so it's just weird to cry foul here but I also understand it does have an effect on their visibility.

103 points by grmnygrmny2 4y ago

ecf 4y ago

My cynical opinion is that it feels Tim Sweeney is purchasing companies in hopes he finds the “right” one that that causes enough public outrage to get his way in regards to App Store cuts.

valdiorn 4y ago
Good. It should cause outrage.
- riversflow 4y ago
  The only outrage I feel is that Tim Sweeney is using the compensation of starving artists, the main demographic on Bandcamp as I understand it, to try and make himself and EPIC richer or more relatively powerful. I don't give two hoots about "breaking up the App Store Model" and I doubt many/most musicians do either. I personally feel that 30% isn't even outrageous considering the value proposition. Relatively rich/privileged software developers making their problem (App Stores wanting a 30% cut) the musicians' problem isn't noble, it's evil. Edit: The way I see it, Tim Sweeney/EPIC is responsible for breaking the status quo that allowed bandcamp’s niche to operate the way they did, which seems a reasonable assumption. That acquisition turned the userbase into a pawn in the App store battle.
  - _readyforit 4y ago
    The thing is… 30% is a lot for the artists on Bandcamp. Say I sell my album for $10 for easy math. I think Bandcamp takes something like 10-15%, there’s a small PayPal fee (~1%) and the rest goes to me. That’s ~$8.41 in my pocket. If Google takes their cut at the beginning for providing…the App Store where the buyer downloaded the app… the artist’s cut becomes ~$5.89. For a $10 album. It just doesn’t line up with the whole point of Bandcamp.
    - CharlesW 4y ago
      > The thing is… 30% is a lot for the artists on Bandcamp. How do you feel about 10%, which is what it probably would be according to TFA?
  - stale2002 4y ago
    > I don't give two hoots about "breaking up the App Store Model" and I doubt many/most musicians do either Well you should. Because regardless of if Epic bought bandcamp or not, the fee that google charges would come directly out of musicians pockets. Regardless of who is running bandcamp, that feel would directly cause artists to not make as much money. > I personally feel that 30% isn't even outrageous Ok, and now the end result is that fee is coming out of artists pockets. If you don't care about artist compensation, and want them to make less money, well fine. But don't pretend like you are on the side of artist compensation.
    - hamburglar 4y ago
      Yes, 100%. Epic or no, google announced that they were going to start taking an additional (and rather large) cut of payments for music sales which they have no part in. Bandcamp built a payment system that facilitates artists making money at zero cost to google, and now google wants to prevent that unless they get a cut. You can argue that google provides the foothold that gets the app on the device, so maybe a small fee could be justified, but taking place in all transactions that enables in perpetuity despite providing no technical contribution to them is ridiculous. Bandcamp could do a billion dollars a week in sales and it wouldn’t cost google a dime.
  - spywaregorilla 4y ago
    Sweeney / Epic donated $144 million to Ukraine. As far as virtue signaling goes, I think they've shown they do in fact have a fair amount of principles. Platform monopolies are real problems.
passivate 4y ago
So far he has lost a ton of cash on lawyer fees, M&A costs, etc. And EPIC now has to individually manage the acquired companies, make sure they're not competing against each other in the same market, etc, etc. I don't think this type of "spending current money to save future money" works. I don't care which company is doing it, but someone needs to break the App Store toll-booth. Apple/Google/Anyone else trying to limit general purpose computing on mobile/PC platforms is a terrible thing for computing, but thats just my view. The ideal situation is we have a default app store - where the system integrator enforces all their policies, but then a user can voluntarily choose to download a separate app store where that store is run by different less exploitative policies. To make it easy for users, you can have an central store-front which then re-directs users to the different store pages. No different than a "Nike store" on Amazon.
- fabianhjr 4y ago
  At least in Android it is already the case, I have installed both F-Droid and Huawei's AppGallery in an otherwise stock android. (And prefer to get as much as possible from F-Droid) Apple on the other hand has a war against "evil" sideloading. :P
  - anonymousab 4y ago
    > At least in Android it is already the case There are roadblocks and deficiencies though, a major one being that sideloaded app stores cannot automatically update their applications, making them permanently inferior and crippled compared to Google's offering.
    - IshKebab 4y ago
      They're actually fixing that finally (I'm sure it has absolutely nothing to do with Epic's lawsuits...)
    - newaccount74 4y ago
      Also, some apps from F-Droid are crippled compared to what they can do when downloading from Play Store, eg. the K9 mail app from F-Droid doesn't have support for push email, it can only check at intervals. I don't know what the reason for this is, but the result is that Android is not a truly "open" platform.
antihero 4y ago
I think it is pretty outrageous to spend a grand on a phone and then be told that I’m not allowed to put what I want on it or spend money supporting artists or publishers without a middle man. It’s absolutely insane and I’m not sure why it isn’t subject to a huge antitrust investigation. And this is coming from someone that likes Apple!
- tpmoney 4y ago
  Except this is about Google, and about Android, where you can put what you want and spend money without that middle man. You just need to side load, or install some other app store.
robonerd 4y ago
Bless him for it.

MikusR 4y ago

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31203907 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31203907

warning26 4y ago

While I generally agree with Epic's positions, it seems like a bit of a stretch here, considering that Android allows both sideloading and alternative app stores. Unlike on iOS, there's nothing on Android stopping Bandcamp from releasing a standalone sideloadable app with any payment system they desire.

PeterisP 4y ago
Antitrust rules apply for abuse of dominant market power (which Google certainly has) even if theoretical alternatives exist. It does not matter that it's not literally a monopoly, as that is not the legal bar that needs to be passed for Google to be limited in what they can and can't do.
- bko 4y ago
  Bandcamp is using their own billing system, bypassing Google's cut. Every app could do this and cut Google out all together. An app could just let you download the app, pay some amount when you're in the app which would unlock the functionality. I don't think its unreasonable for Google to have a problem with this. They want to get the reach of the app store, and make money off it, without paying a cut to the host like everyone else. What am I missing here?
  - colechristensen 4y ago
    That Google’s cut of payments is very high which points to market position abuse
    - lolinder 4y ago
      High compared to what? It's the same as Apple's, so you're not comparing to other app stores. Amazon charges the same percentage on Kindle for eBooks. When people claim that the app store fees are excessively large they're usually comparing to payment processor fees, but neither major app store functions solely as a payment processor. So if not that, what are we comparing to when we say the fee is high?

draw_down 4y ago

kotaKat 4y ago

So... Sweeney wasn't happy with 30%, and now he's not happy with a sweetheart 10% deal? Pull the app and pull a Fortnite at this point and make people sideload it. I'm too tired of watching this fight over and over again, especially now that they're in the position of actually having a special deal that was given to them (even if it was pre-Epic).

spywaregorilla 4y ago
He's not ok with sweet heart deals conceptually. Because they're bullshit
- CharlesW 4y ago
  Then I have good news, in that this isn't some special "sweetheart deal". 10% is the standard rev share for music streaming apps that participate in Google's "Play Media Experience Program".
  - spywaregorilla 4y ago
    That's still a sweetheart deal, and also looks like it's 5% better than the standard play media deal https://play.google.com/console/about/programs/mediaprogram/ https://play.google.com/console/about/programs/mediaprogram/ To qualify you must - App primarily offering video, audio, or books in which users pay to consume content - Over 100,000 monthly active installs on Google Play - High quality user experience with strong Google Play rating - Developer account in good standing - Integration of specific Google platforms and APIs based on type of media content - Additional requirements apply depending on the type of media content

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

unethical_ban 4y ago

I didn't think about it this way before, but it really looks like Epic might have bought out Bandcamp just to make this strategic legal play. Some (niche reddit subs) think Musk bought out Twitter just to shit on the short sellers of TWTR that overlap with targeting Tesla, and "just because he could".

unethical_ban 4y ago

Also - I think Android is still a superior OS for Bandcamp users, since iOS doesn't allow local loading of music through the app. Nevertheless, I downloaded all my purchases and put them on my Android FS.

thisarticle 4y ago

More and more it looks like Epic just wants access to these major platforms and wants other companies and developers to pay for it.

belltaco 4y ago
Is that what happens when a Windows program is not put on Windows Store? Thieves!
- thisarticle 4y ago
  They’re free to distribute an APK like everyone else.
  - stale2002 4y ago
    Got it. So if back in 1999, internet explorer only allowed you to download something, if they took a percentage fee, then you'd be OK this with use of monopolistic power.
  - jahnu 4y ago
    Can you think of any reasons why this might not be a realistic choice?
  - prmoustache 4y ago
    It is not about buying/delivering the app. It is about doing payment within the app once it is installed. In that case Epic is paying/maintaining its payment infra. Your point is irrelevant

parkingrift 4y ago

I’ll side with Epic when they agree to let me sideload skins in Fortnite. Open your platform, Epic!

spywaregorilla 4y ago
Fortnite skins are a store, not a marketplace. There's a big difference.
- parkingrift 4y ago
  While this is an absolutely true statement that distinction is an active choice by Fortnite to monopolize their platform.
  - jedimastert 4y ago
    Do other people allowed to sell skins on the store? Is side-loading an official feature elsewhere? I feel like if side-loading or community skins aren't actually supported then it's an important distinction
    - parkingrift 4y ago
      Neither side-loading nor community skins are supported, and that is my point. Epic prefers complete monopoly control over their platform.
      - spywaregorilla 4y ago
        It's not a platform, it's a store. The term monopoly does not apply. It's not a clever gotcha, it's just you not understanding the difference.
        parkingrift 4y ago
        Again, Epic is the one who has made that decision. Epic has decided to be the exclusive vendor of skins and emotes for Fortnite. The only reason it’s a store is because… Epic wanted to be the only vendor. Whereas you’re acting like it’s something inherent to the product category. No, it was a decision Epic made.

rchaud 4y ago

> “However, Google is now modifying its rules to require Bandcamp (and other apps like it) to exclusively use Google Play Billing for payments for digital goods and services, and pay a revenue share to Google,” [Bandcamp CEO Ethan] Diamond says. A great example of two polar opposite worlds: - Bandcamp: lets artists set their prices, lets consumers purchase lossless DRM-free files. Mobile site works fine without Google. No uninvited algorithmic feeds ruining your personally curated collection. - Google: entire business relies on the open web, yet the mobile platform follows a sharecropping model from the 1800s, the video platform pays creators fractions of a penny per view, and everything is nailed down with DRM.

mattkevan 4y ago

Feels like Epic bought Bandcamp just to use them as a pawn in their crusade. Hoping nothing bad happens to it as it’s one of my favourite places on the Web.

SethMurphy 4y ago

So why can I make an Amazon purchase, using Amazon pay, through their android app installed through the Play Store. Is Google getting a cut there? Bandcamp must really be a threat to Google.

makeitdouble 4y ago
I find it fascinating that the base assumption here is that it’s all a level playing field, rules are evenly enforced and it’s up to each developper to pull themselves from their bootstraps to make it work. I have of course no idea how Amazon does their deals (just anyone outside Amazon I guess).

sentientslug 4y ago

I guess this is how I find out that Bandcamp was acquired by Epic...

smokey_circles 4y ago

I'm torn on this one. I agreed with epic when they made this argument with Apple but that's because the App Store was the only way around. Epic could just distribute an APK they build themselves. They just can't use the play store. Simple link on a website. Or the app. Doesn't the desktop launcher auto update? Android is a lot more open so it's just weird to cry foul here but I also understand it does have an effect on their visibility.