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Google Play Developer Antitrust Litigation

229 points by binkHN 4y ago

6451937099 4y ago
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capableweb 4y ago
> A settlement has been reached with Google LLC, Google Ireland Limited, Google Commerce Limited, Google Asia Pacific Pte. Limited, and Google Payment Corp. (“Google”) in an antitrust class action lawsuit about the Google Play store. The lawsuit was brought by U.S. app developers. The lawsuit alleged that Google monopolized (or attempted to monopolize) alleged markets related to the distribution of Android OS apps and in-app products in violation of U.S. and California law. Google denies all allegations and the settlement is not an admission of wrongdoing by Google. That last part has always irked me in settlements like this. Like how is it not an admission of wrongdoing if you finally say "Ok, I'll give you money for this problem to go away". You might say that you're not admitting you're at fault but the conclusion of you paying "victims" what they are "owed", you are admitting you're at fault. Imagine someone stole something from you, that you value at 100 USD. Then when you try to convince them to give it back because they took it from you, they say "Ok, I'll give you 100 USD but that doesn't mean I'm admitting I took it, I just don't want to deal with it", wouldn't you take it as that person actually admitting they took it, although they don't want to confess to it?
- 6451937099 4y ago
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- Y_Y 4y ago
  What if you were rich and hated talking to people? If someone falsely accused you if stealing a hundred dollars wouldn't it be rational to just pay them to go away? (ignoring second order effects like reputation) That's not to say Google aren't 104% at fault here though. It's even possible that they're at fault but don't realise it (or can't admit it) and so think they're paying to make a false accusation go away, despite the legal reality.
- midoridensha 4y ago
  That's always bothered me too. I think someone should be forced to admit to wrongdoing, or else keep battling in court to prove their side. That said, how does Google monopolize Android app distribution? You're free to install APKs yourself. So why isn't Apple being prosecuted? There's no such ability on that platform. Why does it always feel like Google is constantly being hounded about stuff that Apple gets off scot-free for? Not that Google should go scot-free, but Apple should be dealt with first as it's the bigger offender and has far more marketshare.
  - dmitrygr 4y ago
    > has far more marketshare Android maintained its position as the leading mobile operating system worldwide in the fourth quarter of 2022, controlling the mobile OS market with a close to 71.8 percent share, while iOS accounted for around 27.6 percent of the mobile operating system market.Jan 17, 2023 https://www.statista.com/statistics/272698/global-market-share-held-by-mobile-operating-systems-since-2009/#:~:text=Android%20maintained%20its%20position%20as,the%20mobile%20operating%20system%20market https://www.statista.com/statistics/272698/global-market-sha....
    - cma 4y ago
      The iOS dollar share of the app market is still higher I believe.
      - sinoue 4y ago
        Funny that Apple may need to help Google and Samsung gain marketshare in order to keep the most profitable segment of the market while staying out of the monopoly category.
        pjmlp 4y ago
        That is pretty much the main reason why Microsoft rescued Apple from insolvency.
- ocdtrekkie 4y ago
  I think for the purposes of law, the statement exists for the purposes of not being admissible in further cases, but in non-legal discussion of if a company did something wrong, we should all be comfortable agreeing they did something wrong. Google would far rather defend their position in a lawsuit like this if they had a case for a multitude of reasons outside of plain cost, except for the fact that they are aware they are liable and can avoid the heaviest penalties by settling.
- water-your-self 4y ago
  I didnt take your 100USD, but heres 10 big ones to let it go.
- nine_k 4y ago
  I'm too lazy to dive into the proceedings proper. How did the suit handle the presence of sideloading from arbitrary sources, and the fact that F-Droid is alive and somehow popular? Or was it mostly about in-app purchases?
  - Ensorceled 4y ago
    It's a settlement, what proceedings? The only proceedings would be the court approving the class action status. What does sideloading or F-Droid have to do with anything?
  - blihp 4y ago
    It was just about Google Play policies from 2016-2021. App Developers get a pro rata share of the settlement fund based on the commissions they paid Google during that period. It's basically a partial return of commissions over 15%. I for one plan to live a life of excess with mine: a hamburger with cheese and all the toppings. (assuming I even get that much)
- elefanten 4y ago
  If the expected value of (the cost of defending vs the accusation + the cost of losing the defense) is sufficiently greater than $100, it makes sense to pay the $100.
  - capableweb 4y ago
    So the judicial system is just another version of the financial system, another extension of capitalism rather than being about actual justice?
    - ceejayoz 4y ago
      Civil litigation between two private parties? Yes. Criminal litigation, or the SEC/EPA/FEC/etc. going after someone for a civil violation? Less (although variably) so.
    - DannyBee 4y ago
      Civil litigation is just a dispute resolving mechanism, not a right/wrong decider.
      - Ensorceled 4y ago
        There are a LOT of people in this discussion who REALLY want it to be wrong decider and punisher ...
      - Dracophoenix 4y ago
        IANAL. In this context, possibly not. However, in US courts, culpability is a major consideration in many types of civil litigation. Lawsuits concerning malpractice, contract violations, torturous interference, defamation, wrongful death, etc. go beyond merely mediating a dispute.
        DannyBee 4y ago
        No, actually, they don't. Really. In all of the things you list, the main damages are viewed as monetary, and the expected relief is monetary. This is actually what gets so many people upset - people see it as, like, "they killed my son" and the civil court's #1 job is literally to figure out "how much should someone pay for killing your son". That is a mismatch for how people often feel about it (they really want the court to help prevent it from happening, etc), but for the most part, civil courts can't do that effectively It's a little more nuanced than that, since there are "punitive damages" and such, but as far as mechanisms to improve society go, it's not necessarily the right hammer for all the nails. So like I said, there is a small amount of injunctive relief/etc, but the vast majority of civil litigation has a monetary outcome. If you are interested, it may be worth reading some of the history of how these systems came about - the transformation from two people walking in front of the king and asking him to settle their issue, to what we have now.
- Waterluvian 4y ago
  What alternative is there? For the court to say to both parties, “no, you’re not allowed to come to this mutually agreeable resolution. Keep paying lawyers to litigate this and keep using up the court’s time.” ? I mean… maybe there’d an idea in there, but I’m not sure it’s practical.
  - capableweb 4y ago
    > What alternative is there? No need to find an alternative. Same outcome but remove the "Ok, sure I'm guilty, but I don't admit to actually doing it". If you agree to lose the case, agree that you're in the wrong.
    - Waterluvian 4y ago
      Who decides what counts as a win or a lose when parties agree to a settlement? Are there cases where it’s not obvious who is really doing all the winning? Mind you I don’t have any answers and I’m not intending on being adversarial. I just don’t immediately see how this can work.
    - jonas21 4y ago
      The plaintiffs are free to not settle and continue the case if that's what they want. Are you proposing that they should be forced to do that?
      - mrguyorama 4y ago
        What's good for an individual set of plaintiffs (mostly their lawyers) is actively unhealthy and unhelpful for society as a whole, and indeed should be avoided.
    - j16sdiz 4y ago
      It is more like: instead of paying $X for lawyers and waste time in court, business would rather pay $Y and settle the case.
- eric-hu 4y ago
  Consider a similar case where you probably favor the defendants. Random patent troll company registered in Texas files 1000's of lawsuits against companies that it alleges infringes on a trivial patent, i.e. one click checkout. All companies settle because the cost of going to court is greater than the requested settlement amount of $500k. Should we also see these companies admit that they infringed on (likely frivolous) patents?
  - neodypsis 4y ago
    Or when companies issue a refund, even though they're not at fault, to avoid having to deal with nasty customers.
  - thayne 4y ago
    I get your point, but in that case, I'd rather see it go to court and the patent get invalidated. While settling might be good for the settling parties, it doesn't stop patent troll from making more frivolous suites, and I don't think it is better for society as a whole. Just to be clear I don't think settlements are always bad. But there are definitely cases (in both directions), where settlements result in a worse outcome for society.
    - 29083011397778 4y ago
      I distinctly recall cheering on old Newegg when a patent troll accidentally sued them. Newegg said they would be taking the issue to court, and actually prevented the patent troll from backing out of the suit, IIRC.
      - neodypsis 4y ago
        How could they have accidentally sued someone?
        sli 4y ago
        If I had to guess, in the general sense: when you run your mouth to the point of making legal threats, the person or firm you're threatening will start actual legal proceedings themselves because they think (or know) you're full of shit. It's worth noting that that's not at all what Newegg claims happened.[0] So "accidentally" in this case is probably more accurately states as biting off more than one can chew. [0]: https://www.newegg.com/insider/patent-trolls-learn-mess-newegg/ https://www.newegg.com/insider/patent-trolls-learn-mess-newe...
- ABCLAW 4y ago
  >Like how is it not an admission of wrongdoing if you finally say "Ok, I'll give you money for this problem to go away". Because an admission could be used against you in future litigation, thus defeating the purpose of settling in the first place. Settlement functions as a method of allowing litigants to liquidate their conflicts without wasting court resources and expending exorbitant amounts of money going through all steps of the court mandated conflict resolution procedure. Even if you don't agree that you are at fault, there is some chance that a judge may not agree with you. If you think that chance is 10%, and the suit is worth 100M + you expect to pay 20M in fees, wouldn't it make sense for you to settle for 10M? Regardless of how the case turns out, you're 10M ahead of your anticipated fee spend and 20M ahead of your risk adjusted expected result, and the other side ends up with the risk adjusted value of their claim.
  - paulryanrogers 4y ago
    There is a risk that settling sweeps chronic, bad behavior under the rug. Which is especially bad when powerful actors can use settlement to coerce victims into hiding the truth, and enabling future bad behaviors.
    - largbae 4y ago
      It absolutely does that... but the victim(s) sign the settlement, so it seems they are not ready to die on that hill.
      - bmitc 4y ago
        This is the issue though with these large companies. They have such immense wealth and power in the courts that they're basically untouchable. They do what they want and then pay people off without ever admitting guilt to make the flies go away.
      - mikepurvis 4y ago
        Sure, I think it's clear that settlements work from a game theory perspective, in the sense that two rational actors working for their own best interest can accept one. But the larger question is about whether this state of affairs is good for society. As citizens of a democracy, we (theoretically) get to have a say in how courts are run, and if the way the courts are run permits wealthy corporations to buy their way of repeated violations and be utterly unrepentant about it, maybe the rules need re-examining.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > how is it not an admission of wrongdoing if you finally say "Ok, I'll give you money for this problem to go away" Have you never paid a fine or penalty that you totally did not deserve and that you could probably have gotten out of if you made a mountain out of a mole hill?
- walrus01 4y ago
  so I recently say an image of a paper check that was issued for an equifax data breach class action lawsuit settlement and it was for something like $5.71. just insulting all around.
- rendaw 4y ago
  That's because they might not be at fault. Companies settle when they did nothing wrong - they settle because the cost of going to court and paying those fees to prove they did nothing wrong is expected to be higher than settling. This is like someone stole $100 from you, and you _think_ it's Henry, and Henry says "it wasn't me, but I'll give you $10 to stop bothering me." Maybe Henry did it, maybe he didn't.
- bushbaba 4y ago
  > That last part has always irked me in settlements like this. Like how is it not an admission of wrongdoing if you finally say "Ok, I'll give you money for this problem to go away" If it'll cost you Y to settle, and Y is substantially less than the cost across defending yourself, PR Hit, and time spent not on core business. You might want to settle. Sure you could fight, win, sue for damages, etc. BUT that's really unlikely to win when the plaintiff isn't another multi-national court and the lawsuit wasn't totally frivolous.
- chrismcb 4y ago
  No. It not necessarily. Maybe it is cheaper for them to just pay up. Even if they aren't guilty, there might be a chance a court would find them guilty and the punishment would be far worse.
- onion2k 4y ago
  Imagine someone stole something from you, that you value at 100 USD. Then when you try to convince them to give it back because they took it from you, they say "Ok, I'll give you 100 USD but that doesn't mean I'm admitting I took it, I just don't want to deal with it", wouldn't you take it as that person actually admitting they took it, although they don't want to confess to it? Imagine that defending yourself in court was going to cost you $250,000 regardless of whether you won or lost. Wouldn't you just give them $100 with the caveat that it's not an admission of guilt?
- maratc 4y ago
  > Imagine someone stole something from you, that you value at 100 USD. Now reverse it and imagine that someone accuses you of stealing something from them that they value at 100 USD. They say they have witnesses and video surveillance camera recordings to prove they're right! You would never do something like that, but considering the costs of litigations in tens of thousands, would you agree to say > "Ok, I'll give you 100 USD but that doesn't mean I'm admitting I took it, I just don't want to deal with it"
geekbird 4y ago
LOL. My employer has this blocked as a phishing site.
- ceejayoz 4y ago
  I really wish the courts would set up settlements.gov; each genuine class action gets a subdomain.
  - mosesofmason 4y ago
    Yes, I have to check hacker news to confirm whether the site is legit...
  - Something1234 4y ago
    Why a subdomain and not just a random page? Are class actions always at the federal level and not the state level? Also lawyers wouldn't like that very much, camp lejune is being a pile of pain.
    - ceejayoz 4y ago
      Subdomain to avoid polluting the .gov namespace too much. States could do similar; settlements.ny.gov. I’m tired of the “phishing or real?” game with these things.
      - ratorx 4y ago
        Your original comment suggests you are proposing: [class action identifier].settlements.gov Parent is asking why not: settlements.gov/[class action identifier] Using a different page rather than subdomain wouldn’t have any real phishing downsides and would avoid polluting DNS entirely, so seems better.
        ec109685 4y ago
        Wildcard can avoid the dns polluting. The domain prefix stands out a bit more and let’s them have their own cookies.
thrdbndndn 4y ago
Genuine question: how was Apple rarely sued in similar fashion? Not just compared to Android/Google, but also the way they bundle programs in their operating systems, compared to Microsoft browser case in the US/EU. To my untrained eyes, they're worse in almost every aspect. Is it just the boring answer "they have better lawyers", or are there things fundamentally different?
- dvngnt_ 4y ago
  in Europe they have been. I think they have to open it up at least there in the future along with usb-c
- allisdust 4y ago
  Because they have cornered the market for top 5% incomes while leaving the rest 95% to their competitors. Since their market share is always less, they always get less scrutiny. Outside of developed world, no one uses apple products unless paid by their workplace (for example mac books) or if they are in the top 1% of their country.
  - dahfizz 4y ago
    This lawsuit only applies to the US, where ios has a majority of the market.
  - zimspy 4y ago
    Or in my social circles they want to appear to be top 1%.
- dahfizz 4y ago
  They vertically integrated beyond the scope of the law. Microsoft got in trouble for forcing their hardware suppliers to only ship windows machines. By taking the hardware in house, Apple does the same but it's legal. Google loses an antitrust case for monopolizing app stores on Android. By making alternative app stores technically impossible, Apple doesn't have the same issue. It really feels like the went mega-monopoly so hard that the law doesn't apply to them.
cft 4y ago
We developed a free social media application back in 2016 that cost us about $500,000 to build. We provided multiple safety filters including world filters, neural net pornography detection for profile avatars, etc. The application had a user profile search function. We had about 100,000 downloads in less than a year. I'm sure that 99.9% of user profiles did not contain any sexual material. Certainly less than Twitter has, where you can search for explicit porn. Google found a rare edge case that our ML model missed and removed the app from the Play store. With a single automated email half a million dollars was gone from my bootstrapped company. Is there anything I can do?
- adventurer 4y ago
  I was banned around that time, myself. I ported to objective-c and applied to iTunes. the exact same app. made it through their manual review process. Still banned in the dev console even after this settlement. If there’s any way to get back in, someone please let us know. Unfortunately, I believe the only answer is to create a LLC.
- JanSt 4y ago
  Did you get that case to a lawyer?
- GTP 4y ago
  Be quick at contacting a lawyer, because you may have a limited time frame to act on it. It could even be that the terms already expired, but given the entity of the damage it is well worth paying a good lawyer for a consultancy.
- kobalsky 4y ago
  > Certainly less than Twitter has, where you can search for explicit porn Where you using the same content rating as Twitter?
  - cft 4y ago
    Same, 18+
skyfoxxy 4y ago
Hmm what about Canadian app developers. This seems limited to US. Do we need to organize a separate class action?

229 points by binkHN 4y ago

6451937099 4y ago

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> A settlement has been reached with Google LLC, Google Ireland Limited, Google Commerce Limited, Google Asia Pacific Pte. Limited, and Google Payment Corp. (“Google”) in an antitrust class action lawsuit about the Google Play store. The lawsuit was brought by U.S. app developers. The lawsuit alleged that Google monopolized (or attempted to monopolize) alleged markets related to the distribution of Android OS apps and in-app products in violation of U.S. and California law. Google denies all allegations and the settlement is not an admission of wrongdoing by Google. That last part has always irked me in settlements like this. Like how is it not an admission of wrongdoing if you finally say "Ok, I'll give you money for this problem to go away". You might say that you're not admitting you're at fault but the conclusion of you paying "victims" what they are "owed", you are admitting you're at fault. Imagine someone stole something from you, that you value at 100 USD. Then when you try to convince them to give it back because they took it from you, they say "Ok, I'll give you 100 USD but that doesn't mean I'm admitting I took it, I just don't want to deal with it", wouldn't you take it as that person actually admitting they took it, although they don't want to confess to it?

6451937099 4y ago
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Y_Y 4y ago
What if you were rich and hated talking to people? If someone falsely accused you if stealing a hundred dollars wouldn't it be rational to just pay them to go away? (ignoring second order effects like reputation) That's not to say Google aren't 104% at fault here though. It's even possible that they're at fault but don't realise it (or can't admit it) and so think they're paying to make a false accusation go away, despite the legal reality.
midoridensha 4y ago
That's always bothered me too. I think someone should be forced to admit to wrongdoing, or else keep battling in court to prove their side. That said, how does Google monopolize Android app distribution? You're free to install APKs yourself. So why isn't Apple being prosecuted? There's no such ability on that platform. Why does it always feel like Google is constantly being hounded about stuff that Apple gets off scot-free for? Not that Google should go scot-free, but Apple should be dealt with first as it's the bigger offender and has far more marketshare.
- dmitrygr 4y ago
  > has far more marketshare Android maintained its position as the leading mobile operating system worldwide in the fourth quarter of 2022, controlling the mobile OS market with a close to 71.8 percent share, while iOS accounted for around 27.6 percent of the mobile operating system market.Jan 17, 2023 https://www.statista.com/statistics/272698/global-market-share-held-by-mobile-operating-systems-since-2009/#:~:text=Android%20maintained%20its%20position%20as,the%20mobile%20operating%20system%20market https://www.statista.com/statistics/272698/global-market-sha....
  - cma 4y ago
    The iOS dollar share of the app market is still higher I believe.
    - sinoue 4y ago
      Funny that Apple may need to help Google and Samsung gain marketshare in order to keep the most profitable segment of the market while staying out of the monopoly category.
      - pjmlp 4y ago
        That is pretty much the main reason why Microsoft rescued Apple from insolvency.
ocdtrekkie 4y ago
I think for the purposes of law, the statement exists for the purposes of not being admissible in further cases, but in non-legal discussion of if a company did something wrong, we should all be comfortable agreeing they did something wrong. Google would far rather defend their position in a lawsuit like this if they had a case for a multitude of reasons outside of plain cost, except for the fact that they are aware they are liable and can avoid the heaviest penalties by settling.
water-your-self 4y ago
I didnt take your 100USD, but heres 10 big ones to let it go.
nine_k 4y ago
I'm too lazy to dive into the proceedings proper. How did the suit handle the presence of sideloading from arbitrary sources, and the fact that F-Droid is alive and somehow popular? Or was it mostly about in-app purchases?
- Ensorceled 4y ago
  It's a settlement, what proceedings? The only proceedings would be the court approving the class action status. What does sideloading or F-Droid have to do with anything?
- blihp 4y ago
  It was just about Google Play policies from 2016-2021. App Developers get a pro rata share of the settlement fund based on the commissions they paid Google during that period. It's basically a partial return of commissions over 15%. I for one plan to live a life of excess with mine: a hamburger with cheese and all the toppings. (assuming I even get that much)
elefanten 4y ago
If the expected value of (the cost of defending vs the accusation + the cost of losing the defense) is sufficiently greater than $100, it makes sense to pay the $100.
- capableweb 4y ago
  So the judicial system is just another version of the financial system, another extension of capitalism rather than being about actual justice?
  - ceejayoz 4y ago
    Civil litigation between two private parties? Yes. Criminal litigation, or the SEC/EPA/FEC/etc. going after someone for a civil violation? Less (although variably) so.
  - DannyBee 4y ago
    Civil litigation is just a dispute resolving mechanism, not a right/wrong decider.
    - Ensorceled 4y ago
      There are a LOT of people in this discussion who REALLY want it to be wrong decider and punisher ...
    - Dracophoenix 4y ago
      IANAL. In this context, possibly not. However, in US courts, culpability is a major consideration in many types of civil litigation. Lawsuits concerning malpractice, contract violations, torturous interference, defamation, wrongful death, etc. go beyond merely mediating a dispute.
      - DannyBee 4y ago
        No, actually, they don't. Really. In all of the things you list, the main damages are viewed as monetary, and the expected relief is monetary. This is actually what gets so many people upset - people see it as, like, "they killed my son" and the civil court's #1 job is literally to figure out "how much should someone pay for killing your son". That is a mismatch for how people often feel about it (they really want the court to help prevent it from happening, etc), but for the most part, civil courts can't do that effectively It's a little more nuanced than that, since there are "punitive damages" and such, but as far as mechanisms to improve society go, it's not necessarily the right hammer for all the nails. So like I said, there is a small amount of injunctive relief/etc, but the vast majority of civil litigation has a monetary outcome. If you are interested, it may be worth reading some of the history of how these systems came about - the transformation from two people walking in front of the king and asking him to settle their issue, to what we have now.
Waterluvian 4y ago
What alternative is there? For the court to say to both parties, “no, you’re not allowed to come to this mutually agreeable resolution. Keep paying lawyers to litigate this and keep using up the court’s time.” ? I mean… maybe there’d an idea in there, but I’m not sure it’s practical.
- capableweb 4y ago
  > What alternative is there? No need to find an alternative. Same outcome but remove the "Ok, sure I'm guilty, but I don't admit to actually doing it". If you agree to lose the case, agree that you're in the wrong.
  - Waterluvian 4y ago
    Who decides what counts as a win or a lose when parties agree to a settlement? Are there cases where it’s not obvious who is really doing all the winning? Mind you I don’t have any answers and I’m not intending on being adversarial. I just don’t immediately see how this can work.
  - jonas21 4y ago
    The plaintiffs are free to not settle and continue the case if that's what they want. Are you proposing that they should be forced to do that?
    - mrguyorama 4y ago
      What's good for an individual set of plaintiffs (mostly their lawyers) is actively unhealthy and unhelpful for society as a whole, and indeed should be avoided.
  - j16sdiz 4y ago
    It is more like: instead of paying $X for lawyers and waste time in court, business would rather pay $Y and settle the case.
eric-hu 4y ago
Consider a similar case where you probably favor the defendants. Random patent troll company registered in Texas files 1000's of lawsuits against companies that it alleges infringes on a trivial patent, i.e. one click checkout. All companies settle because the cost of going to court is greater than the requested settlement amount of $500k. Should we also see these companies admit that they infringed on (likely frivolous) patents?
- neodypsis 4y ago
  Or when companies issue a refund, even though they're not at fault, to avoid having to deal with nasty customers.
- thayne 4y ago
  I get your point, but in that case, I'd rather see it go to court and the patent get invalidated. While settling might be good for the settling parties, it doesn't stop patent troll from making more frivolous suites, and I don't think it is better for society as a whole. Just to be clear I don't think settlements are always bad. But there are definitely cases (in both directions), where settlements result in a worse outcome for society.
  - 29083011397778 4y ago
    I distinctly recall cheering on old Newegg when a patent troll accidentally sued them. Newegg said they would be taking the issue to court, and actually prevented the patent troll from backing out of the suit, IIRC.
    - neodypsis 4y ago
      How could they have accidentally sued someone?
      - sli 4y ago
        If I had to guess, in the general sense: when you run your mouth to the point of making legal threats, the person or firm you're threatening will start actual legal proceedings themselves because they think (or know) you're full of shit. It's worth noting that that's not at all what Newegg claims happened.[0] So "accidentally" in this case is probably more accurately states as biting off more than one can chew. [0]: https://www.newegg.com/insider/patent-trolls-learn-mess-newegg/ https://www.newegg.com/insider/patent-trolls-learn-mess-newe...
ABCLAW 4y ago
>Like how is it not an admission of wrongdoing if you finally say "Ok, I'll give you money for this problem to go away". Because an admission could be used against you in future litigation, thus defeating the purpose of settling in the first place. Settlement functions as a method of allowing litigants to liquidate their conflicts without wasting court resources and expending exorbitant amounts of money going through all steps of the court mandated conflict resolution procedure. Even if you don't agree that you are at fault, there is some chance that a judge may not agree with you. If you think that chance is 10%, and the suit is worth 100M + you expect to pay 20M in fees, wouldn't it make sense for you to settle for 10M? Regardless of how the case turns out, you're 10M ahead of your anticipated fee spend and 20M ahead of your risk adjusted expected result, and the other side ends up with the risk adjusted value of their claim.
- paulryanrogers 4y ago
  There is a risk that settling sweeps chronic, bad behavior under the rug. Which is especially bad when powerful actors can use settlement to coerce victims into hiding the truth, and enabling future bad behaviors.
  - largbae 4y ago
    It absolutely does that... but the victim(s) sign the settlement, so it seems they are not ready to die on that hill.
    - bmitc 4y ago
      This is the issue though with these large companies. They have such immense wealth and power in the courts that they're basically untouchable. They do what they want and then pay people off without ever admitting guilt to make the flies go away.
    - mikepurvis 4y ago
      Sure, I think it's clear that settlements work from a game theory perspective, in the sense that two rational actors working for their own best interest can accept one. But the larger question is about whether this state of affairs is good for society. As citizens of a democracy, we (theoretically) get to have a say in how courts are run, and if the way the courts are run permits wealthy corporations to buy their way of repeated violations and be utterly unrepentant about it, maybe the rules need re-examining.
JumpCrisscross 4y ago
> how is it not an admission of wrongdoing if you finally say "Ok, I'll give you money for this problem to go away" Have you never paid a fine or penalty that you totally did not deserve and that you could probably have gotten out of if you made a mountain out of a mole hill?
walrus01 4y ago
so I recently say an image of a paper check that was issued for an equifax data breach class action lawsuit settlement and it was for something like $5.71. just insulting all around.
rendaw 4y ago
That's because they might not be at fault. Companies settle when they did nothing wrong - they settle because the cost of going to court and paying those fees to prove they did nothing wrong is expected to be higher than settling. This is like someone stole $100 from you, and you _think_ it's Henry, and Henry says "it wasn't me, but I'll give you $10 to stop bothering me." Maybe Henry did it, maybe he didn't.
bushbaba 4y ago
> That last part has always irked me in settlements like this. Like how is it not an admission of wrongdoing if you finally say "Ok, I'll give you money for this problem to go away" If it'll cost you Y to settle, and Y is substantially less than the cost across defending yourself, PR Hit, and time spent not on core business. You might want to settle. Sure you could fight, win, sue for damages, etc. BUT that's really unlikely to win when the plaintiff isn't another multi-national court and the lawsuit wasn't totally frivolous.
chrismcb 4y ago
No. It not necessarily. Maybe it is cheaper for them to just pay up. Even if they aren't guilty, there might be a chance a court would find them guilty and the punishment would be far worse.
onion2k 4y ago
Imagine someone stole something from you, that you value at 100 USD. Then when you try to convince them to give it back because they took it from you, they say "Ok, I'll give you 100 USD but that doesn't mean I'm admitting I took it, I just don't want to deal with it", wouldn't you take it as that person actually admitting they took it, although they don't want to confess to it? Imagine that defending yourself in court was going to cost you $250,000 regardless of whether you won or lost. Wouldn't you just give them $100 with the caveat that it's not an admission of guilt?
maratc 4y ago
> Imagine someone stole something from you, that you value at 100 USD. Now reverse it and imagine that someone accuses you of stealing something from them that they value at 100 USD. They say they have witnesses and video surveillance camera recordings to prove they're right! You would never do something like that, but considering the costs of litigations in tens of thousands, would you agree to say > "Ok, I'll give you 100 USD but that doesn't mean I'm admitting I took it, I just don't want to deal with it"

geekbird 4y ago

LOL. My employer has this blocked as a phishing site.

ceejayoz 4y ago
I really wish the courts would set up settlements.gov; each genuine class action gets a subdomain.
- mosesofmason 4y ago
  Yes, I have to check hacker news to confirm whether the site is legit...
- Something1234 4y ago
  Why a subdomain and not just a random page? Are class actions always at the federal level and not the state level? Also lawyers wouldn't like that very much, camp lejune is being a pile of pain.
  - ceejayoz 4y ago
    Subdomain to avoid polluting the .gov namespace too much. States could do similar; settlements.ny.gov. I’m tired of the “phishing or real?” game with these things.
    - ratorx 4y ago
      Your original comment suggests you are proposing: [class action identifier].settlements.gov Parent is asking why not: settlements.gov/[class action identifier] Using a different page rather than subdomain wouldn’t have any real phishing downsides and would avoid polluting DNS entirely, so seems better.
      - ec109685 4y ago
        Wildcard can avoid the dns polluting. The domain prefix stands out a bit more and let’s them have their own cookies.

thrdbndndn 4y ago

Genuine question: how was Apple rarely sued in similar fashion? Not just compared to Android/Google, but also the way they bundle programs in their operating systems, compared to Microsoft browser case in the US/EU. To my untrained eyes, they're worse in almost every aspect. Is it just the boring answer "they have better lawyers", or are there things fundamentally different?

dvngnt_ 4y ago
in Europe they have been. I think they have to open it up at least there in the future along with usb-c
allisdust 4y ago
Because they have cornered the market for top 5% incomes while leaving the rest 95% to their competitors. Since their market share is always less, they always get less scrutiny. Outside of developed world, no one uses apple products unless paid by their workplace (for example mac books) or if they are in the top 1% of their country.
- dahfizz 4y ago
  This lawsuit only applies to the US, where ios has a majority of the market.
- zimspy 4y ago
  Or in my social circles they want to appear to be top 1%.
dahfizz 4y ago
They vertically integrated beyond the scope of the law. Microsoft got in trouble for forcing their hardware suppliers to only ship windows machines. By taking the hardware in house, Apple does the same but it's legal. Google loses an antitrust case for monopolizing app stores on Android. By making alternative app stores technically impossible, Apple doesn't have the same issue. It really feels like the went mega-monopoly so hard that the law doesn't apply to them.

cft 4y ago

We developed a free social media application back in 2016 that cost us about $500,000 to build. We provided multiple safety filters including world filters, neural net pornography detection for profile avatars, etc. The application had a user profile search function. We had about 100,000 downloads in less than a year. I'm sure that 99.9% of user profiles did not contain any sexual material. Certainly less than Twitter has, where you can search for explicit porn. Google found a rare edge case that our ML model missed and removed the app from the Play store. With a single automated email half a million dollars was gone from my bootstrapped company. Is there anything I can do?

adventurer 4y ago
I was banned around that time, myself. I ported to objective-c and applied to iTunes. the exact same app. made it through their manual review process. Still banned in the dev console even after this settlement. If there’s any way to get back in, someone please let us know. Unfortunately, I believe the only answer is to create a LLC.
JanSt 4y ago
Did you get that case to a lawyer?
GTP 4y ago
Be quick at contacting a lawyer, because you may have a limited time frame to act on it. It could even be that the terms already expired, but given the entity of the damage it is well worth paying a good lawyer for a consultancy.
kobalsky 4y ago
> Certainly less than Twitter has, where you can search for explicit porn Where you using the same content rating as Twitter?
- cft 4y ago
  Same, 18+

skyfoxxy 4y ago

Hmm what about Canadian app developers. This seems limited to US. Do we need to organize a separate class action?