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Apparently their Steam page ships a Mac version: https://store.steampowered.com/app/837470/Untitled_Goose_Game/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/837470/Untitl

Apparently their Steam page ships a Mac version: https://store.steampowered.com/app/837470/Untitled_Goose_Game/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/837470/Untitled_Goose_Gam... It would be interesting to hear Panic's input here. They're a long-time Mac studio, surely they've got some suggestions for regulators.

jojobas 4y ago
It's mind-boggling that the free market is not enough to regulate a gatekeeping monopoly into irrelevance. I guess even when Apple close all the loopholes to running "unauthorized" software there will be people silly enough to buy their computers.
- lapcat 4y ago
  > It's mind-boggling that the free market is not enough to regulate a gatekeeping monopoly into irrelevance. The Mac App Store is not a monopoly. Mac developers can independently distribute their apps.
  - jojobas 4y ago
    In other words, "can't you just right-click?" https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/unsigned.html https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/unsigned.html
    - lapcat 4y ago
      It's not clear why you're citing my own blog post back to me. As I mentioned, Mac developers can independently distribute their own apps, signed with a Developer ID certificate. It's annoying to be sure, but not a major hurdle for professional Mac developers, such as Panic.
      - jojobas 4y ago
        Didn't realize it's you. It's fascinating you made a 180 on the issue while it got worse since you wrote it. I could bet that in under 5 years Apple will refuse to "notarize" at least some software and prevent unsigned software from running altogether.
        lapcat 4y ago
        > It's fascinating you made a 180 on the issue How so?
        jojobas 4y ago
        Your old text reads as if you consider this whole approach wrong and warn people against saying there's still a way to distribute software without consent from Apple. Now you're saying it's all good. Go figure.
        lapcat 4y ago
        The question of the blog post was whether it's viable for Mac developers to distribute apps without signing and notarizing them, and I argued that it wasn't: "This is why every Mac developer I know signs up for Developer ID and ships only signed, notarized apps. It would be financial suicide to do otherwise." I've been philosophically opposed to Gatekeeper since its introduction more than 10 years ago, and that hasn't changed. The mostly good news is that Apple mostly doesn't prevent non-malware developers from distributing their apps on the Mac. I'm aware of only 2 cases where Apple has intentionally abused its authority there: (1) Apple canceled the developer account of Epic Games after the famous trial. (2) Apple canceled the developer account of Kapeli after an allegation of App Store review fraud. However, the account was later restored, and Dash for Mac is currently signed and notarized. https://kapeli.com/dash https://kapeli.com/dash
        jojobas 4y ago
        "Mostly" isn't good enough. Nothing prevents Apple from refusing to certify anything on any grounds.
  - devwastaken 4y ago
    Apple requires $100 year to have the base ability to sign applications. As of Ventura you cannot bypass gatekeeper without a signature for a number of popular solutions. Electron being one of them. Apple developer license is apart of the app store. This in effect means that apple and the app store are a monopoly. A monopoly is not defined by 100% control. It is defined by whom has the overwhelming control.
    - lapcat 4y ago
      > Apple requires $100 year to have the base ability to sign applications. Government regulators aren't going to get involved over $100. > As of Ventura you cannot bypass gatekeeper without a signature for a number of popular solutions. Electron being one of them. I'm not sure what you mean. I'm not sure you technically understand what you mean.
      - devwastaken 4y ago
        <https://developer.apple.com/developer-id/ https://developer.apple.com/developer-id/> <https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202491 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202491> Mac Ventura only allows for "App store and identified developers". Meaning the application must be signed with an apple developer cert to go through gatekeeper.
        lapcat 4y ago
        > Mac Ventura only allows for "App store and identified developers". This has nothing to do with Ventura. It's been true for many years. Keep in mind that I am personally a professional Mac developer. You're out of your depth here.
    - mike_hearn 4y ago
      > As of Ventura you cannot bypass gatekeeper without a signature for a number of popular solutions. Electron being one of them. You can do so the same way you always could. Perhaps you're mixing it up with ARM Macs requiring code to be signed by something? (it doesn't have to be by an Apple certificate). You can still run self-signed code on macOS even with Apple Silicon and the latest OS versions and there's no sign they'll ever change that. Our distribution tool Conveyor will self-sign apps for you out of the box and create a web page that tells users what to do [1], albeit we should make it less wordy. > Apple developer license is apart of the app store A Developer ID is separate from the app store, they're different certificate types. I distribute Mac software outside the store with one, no problem. [1] example: https://downloads.hydraulic.dev/eton-sample/selfsigned/download.html https://downloads.hydraulic.dev/eton-sample/selfsigned/downl...
- paulryanrogers 4y ago
  The market cannot solve all problems.
- renewiltord 4y ago
  Apple's not really a monopoly here, is it? In the operating system market, it's small. In the laptop market, it's small. In the Mac OS market, it's small. EDIT: Guys, you can literally just install using Steam or Epic. It's really not a problem.
  - jojobas 4y ago
    It might be small-ish in terms of units shipped, but nowhere near small in revenue and profit. I guess it's not exactly a laptop monopoly, but a walled laptop monopoly alright.
    - frumper 4y ago
      I can't remember using the Mac App Store for anything that wasn't made by Apple. I've had Macs for 14 years. I install plenty of software. The Mac App Store is pretty much the last place I go for software. It's nothing like the iOS App Store.
    - wilg 4y ago
      It's not a monopoly because you can buy phones and computers from plenty of other people. A large player is not a monopoly, and the choice exists if you don't like their offerings. I don't see how this is some kind of societal issue.
  - blululu 4y ago
    Depends on how you think about monopolies and bundling. For the most part Apple's devices and products face a pretty competitive landscape. But there are some areas where they have a very strong market position. The revenue for paid apps in America skews very heavily to the Apple App Store (people make apps for iOS only in the US but never Android only). The alternatives to going through the App Store are really not viable. The switching costs to consumers are very high and people buy phones because of core features (battery, camera, speakers, connectivity, display, touch screen). The availability and pricing of paid apps is such an afterthought for consumers as to be irrelevant. In this one small market Apple exerts its market dominance influence to take a lot of money from 3rd party developers. Of course this is small potatoes compared to all the other markets that they compete in and even as a fraction of their revenue. But this is Hacker News. A lot of developers hang out here. Some of whom have certainly had some bad experiences with the policies, restrictions and fees imposed by the App Store.
- vintermann 4y ago
  It's a bit of karmic justice for the Untitled Goose Game developers though, since they took Epic's money to make it an Epic games store exclusive. You help build one walled garden, you get kicked out of another.
  - jojobas 4y ago
    Choosing your publisher/distributor is not the same as choosing what runs on your hardware.
lapcat 4y ago
> surely they've got some suggestions for regulators. Regulators?
- pornel 4y ago
  They were still able to release the game for Mac via Steam (a competitor) instead, because macOS isn't fully iOSified yet. On iOS, if Apple's store rejected them, there's no recourse. Apple blocks other stores from existing, and there's no competition in distribution, review, and of course payments and the cut.
  - lapcat 4y ago
    > They were still able to release the game for Mac Which is why I was asking about regulators. > On iOS if Apple's store rejects you, that's game over. Everyone knows this, it doesn't need to be said. But fewer people are familiar with the Mac situation.
lelandfe 4y ago
https://twitter.com/TechEmails/status/1412850761231392773 https://twitter.com/TechEmails/status/1412850761231392773 Cabel Sasser emailed Phil Schiller ideas on the app review process in 2016. A good chunk of it wound up getting implemented. I'd love to see a sequel. Unrelatedly, I think the tone in his email is a perfect example of giving successful constructive criticism.
- lapcat 4y ago
  > A good chunk of it wound up getting implemented. It did? 1) "When we decided to pull Coda from the App Store (due to sandboxing)" Sandboxing is still required. 2) "we regained our ability to release software the moment we need to" Nope, nothing has changed there. 3) "we could fill a small book with frustrating and tragicomic App Review anecdotes" This was written before the Untitled Goose Game rejections. 4) "Reviews are often the dumping ground of the uninformed" Still painfully true! 5) Refunds: "And when this happens, we can do nothing." Still true. Developers can't issue their own refunds, and the App Store doesn't even have an official refund policy. I've been seeing more and more people get their App Store refund requests rejected by Apple, for no apparent reason. 6) Low app prices Still a problem of course!
  - lelandfe 4y ago
    Mhm, review responses were added[0], Apple moved away from the "no refunds" policy[1], and completely stopped holding up bug fixes over guideline infractions[2]. That's a solid portion of his list! (I also think most of what you listed were not asks in that email) [0] https://developer.apple.com/app-store/ratings-and-reviews/ https://developer.apple.com/app-store/ratings-and-reviews/ [1] https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204084 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204084 [2] https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=84w3e5bm https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=84w3e5bm
    - lapcat 4y ago
      > review responses were added This was just about the least Apple could do. You can't have a conversation, you can only post one reply. And in my experience, App Store reviewers almost never correct their bad reviews, even if you reply with info that will fix their problem. > Apple moved away from the "no refunds" policy Apple still has no official refund policy. You can request a refund, which Apple may or may not grant, as I mentioned, at Apple's own discretion, for any reason or no reason. So I don't see how anything has changed from Cabel's email. > completely stopped holding up bug fixes over guideline infractions Completely wrong. What happens is that App Review still rejects your bug fix updates. But then you can request that App Review let your update go through, and fix the problem in the next update. The problem is that this can still take an indefinite amount of time, because App Review can reject you at any time, even when you're asleep, then you have to contact them, then they have to see your message and respond, all of which can take half a day or more. It's a joke. We're still delayed.
shadowgovt 4y ago
What needs to be regulated in this context? The game is available via Steam and not the Mac App Store. One distributor decided hosting it was worth the reputation, the other did not. Win-win for consumers in that there is more choice than otherwise.
- devwastaken 4y ago
  Even via steam you still need to buy an apple dev license and sign it. If apple could get away with it, they would stop any app sourcing outside of the app store. They've made pushes in Ventura to make any non-signed executable not work out of the box. Nothing about apples behavior is "win win". They're a corp that benefits from special protections against both civil and criminal liabilities as well as benefitting from masses of intellectual property. It's not some sort of balanced game, the scales were tipped completely into corpo land since early 2000s

jojobas 4y ago

It's mind-boggling that the free market is not enough to regulate a gatekeeping monopoly into irrelevance. I guess even when Apple close all the loopholes to running "unauthorized" software there will be people silly enough to buy their computers.

lapcat 4y ago
> It's mind-boggling that the free market is not enough to regulate a gatekeeping monopoly into irrelevance. The Mac App Store is not a monopoly. Mac developers can independently distribute their apps.
- jojobas 4y ago
  In other words, "can't you just right-click?" https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/unsigned.html https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/unsigned.html
  - lapcat 4y ago
    It's not clear why you're citing my own blog post back to me. As I mentioned, Mac developers can independently distribute their own apps, signed with a Developer ID certificate. It's annoying to be sure, but not a major hurdle for professional Mac developers, such as Panic.
    - jojobas 4y ago
      Didn't realize it's you. It's fascinating you made a 180 on the issue while it got worse since you wrote it. I could bet that in under 5 years Apple will refuse to "notarize" at least some software and prevent unsigned software from running altogether.
      - lapcat 4y ago
        > It's fascinating you made a 180 on the issue How so?
        jojobas 4y ago
        Your old text reads as if you consider this whole approach wrong and warn people against saying there's still a way to distribute software without consent from Apple. Now you're saying it's all good. Go figure.
        lapcat 4y ago
        The question of the blog post was whether it's viable for Mac developers to distribute apps without signing and notarizing them, and I argued that it wasn't: "This is why every Mac developer I know signs up for Developer ID and ships only signed, notarized apps. It would be financial suicide to do otherwise." I've been philosophically opposed to Gatekeeper since its introduction more than 10 years ago, and that hasn't changed. The mostly good news is that Apple mostly doesn't prevent non-malware developers from distributing their apps on the Mac. I'm aware of only 2 cases where Apple has intentionally abused its authority there: (1) Apple canceled the developer account of Epic Games after the famous trial. (2) Apple canceled the developer account of Kapeli after an allegation of App Store review fraud. However, the account was later restored, and Dash for Mac is currently signed and notarized. https://kapeli.com/dash https://kapeli.com/dash
        jojobas 4y ago
        "Mostly" isn't good enough. Nothing prevents Apple from refusing to certify anything on any grounds.
- devwastaken 4y ago
  Apple requires $100 year to have the base ability to sign applications. As of Ventura you cannot bypass gatekeeper without a signature for a number of popular solutions. Electron being one of them. Apple developer license is apart of the app store. This in effect means that apple and the app store are a monopoly. A monopoly is not defined by 100% control. It is defined by whom has the overwhelming control.
  - lapcat 4y ago
    > Apple requires $100 year to have the base ability to sign applications. Government regulators aren't going to get involved over $100. > As of Ventura you cannot bypass gatekeeper without a signature for a number of popular solutions. Electron being one of them. I'm not sure what you mean. I'm not sure you technically understand what you mean.
    - devwastaken 4y ago
      <https://developer.apple.com/developer-id/ https://developer.apple.com/developer-id/> <https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202491 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202491> Mac Ventura only allows for "App store and identified developers". Meaning the application must be signed with an apple developer cert to go through gatekeeper.
      - lapcat 4y ago
        > Mac Ventura only allows for "App store and identified developers". This has nothing to do with Ventura. It's been true for many years. Keep in mind that I am personally a professional Mac developer. You're out of your depth here.
  - mike_hearn 4y ago
    > As of Ventura you cannot bypass gatekeeper without a signature for a number of popular solutions. Electron being one of them. You can do so the same way you always could. Perhaps you're mixing it up with ARM Macs requiring code to be signed by something? (it doesn't have to be by an Apple certificate). You can still run self-signed code on macOS even with Apple Silicon and the latest OS versions and there's no sign they'll ever change that. Our distribution tool Conveyor will self-sign apps for you out of the box and create a web page that tells users what to do [1], albeit we should make it less wordy. > Apple developer license is apart of the app store A Developer ID is separate from the app store, they're different certificate types. I distribute Mac software outside the store with one, no problem. [1] example: https://downloads.hydraulic.dev/eton-sample/selfsigned/download.html https://downloads.hydraulic.dev/eton-sample/selfsigned/downl...
paulryanrogers 4y ago
The market cannot solve all problems.
renewiltord 4y ago
Apple's not really a monopoly here, is it? In the operating system market, it's small. In the laptop market, it's small. In the Mac OS market, it's small. EDIT: Guys, you can literally just install using Steam or Epic. It's really not a problem.
- jojobas 4y ago
  It might be small-ish in terms of units shipped, but nowhere near small in revenue and profit. I guess it's not exactly a laptop monopoly, but a walled laptop monopoly alright.
  - frumper 4y ago
    I can't remember using the Mac App Store for anything that wasn't made by Apple. I've had Macs for 14 years. I install plenty of software. The Mac App Store is pretty much the last place I go for software. It's nothing like the iOS App Store.
  - wilg 4y ago
    It's not a monopoly because you can buy phones and computers from plenty of other people. A large player is not a monopoly, and the choice exists if you don't like their offerings. I don't see how this is some kind of societal issue.
- blululu 4y ago
  Depends on how you think about monopolies and bundling. For the most part Apple's devices and products face a pretty competitive landscape. But there are some areas where they have a very strong market position. The revenue for paid apps in America skews very heavily to the Apple App Store (people make apps for iOS only in the US but never Android only). The alternatives to going through the App Store are really not viable. The switching costs to consumers are very high and people buy phones because of core features (battery, camera, speakers, connectivity, display, touch screen). The availability and pricing of paid apps is such an afterthought for consumers as to be irrelevant. In this one small market Apple exerts its market dominance influence to take a lot of money from 3rd party developers. Of course this is small potatoes compared to all the other markets that they compete in and even as a fraction of their revenue. But this is Hacker News. A lot of developers hang out here. Some of whom have certainly had some bad experiences with the policies, restrictions and fees imposed by the App Store.
vintermann 4y ago
It's a bit of karmic justice for the Untitled Goose Game developers though, since they took Epic's money to make it an Epic games store exclusive. You help build one walled garden, you get kicked out of another.
- jojobas 4y ago
  Choosing your publisher/distributor is not the same as choosing what runs on your hardware.

lapcat 4y ago

> surely they've got some suggestions for regulators. Regulators?

pornel 4y ago
They were still able to release the game for Mac via Steam (a competitor) instead, because macOS isn't fully iOSified yet. On iOS, if Apple's store rejected them, there's no recourse. Apple blocks other stores from existing, and there's no competition in distribution, review, and of course payments and the cut.
- lapcat 4y ago
  > They were still able to release the game for Mac Which is why I was asking about regulators. > On iOS if Apple's store rejects you, that's game over. Everyone knows this, it doesn't need to be said. But fewer people are familiar with the Mac situation.

lelandfe 4y ago

https://twitter.com/TechEmails/status/1412850761231392773 https://twitter.com/TechEmails/status/1412850761231392773 Cabel Sasser emailed Phil Schiller ideas on the app review process in 2016. A good chunk of it wound up getting implemented. I'd love to see a sequel. Unrelatedly, I think the tone in his email is a perfect example of giving successful constructive criticism.

lapcat 4y ago
> A good chunk of it wound up getting implemented. It did? 1) "When we decided to pull Coda from the App Store (due to sandboxing)" Sandboxing is still required. 2) "we regained our ability to release software the moment we need to" Nope, nothing has changed there. 3) "we could fill a small book with frustrating and tragicomic App Review anecdotes" This was written before the Untitled Goose Game rejections. 4) "Reviews are often the dumping ground of the uninformed" Still painfully true! 5) Refunds: "And when this happens, we can do nothing." Still true. Developers can't issue their own refunds, and the App Store doesn't even have an official refund policy. I've been seeing more and more people get their App Store refund requests rejected by Apple, for no apparent reason. 6) Low app prices Still a problem of course!
- lelandfe 4y ago
  Mhm, review responses were added[0], Apple moved away from the "no refunds" policy[1], and completely stopped holding up bug fixes over guideline infractions[2]. That's a solid portion of his list! (I also think most of what you listed were not asks in that email) [0] https://developer.apple.com/app-store/ratings-and-reviews/ https://developer.apple.com/app-store/ratings-and-reviews/ [1] https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204084 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204084 [2] https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=84w3e5bm https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=84w3e5bm
  - lapcat 4y ago
    > review responses were added This was just about the least Apple could do. You can't have a conversation, you can only post one reply. And in my experience, App Store reviewers almost never correct their bad reviews, even if you reply with info that will fix their problem. > Apple moved away from the "no refunds" policy Apple still has no official refund policy. You can request a refund, which Apple may or may not grant, as I mentioned, at Apple's own discretion, for any reason or no reason. So I don't see how anything has changed from Cabel's email. > completely stopped holding up bug fixes over guideline infractions Completely wrong. What happens is that App Review still rejects your bug fix updates. But then you can request that App Review let your update go through, and fix the problem in the next update. The problem is that this can still take an indefinite amount of time, because App Review can reject you at any time, even when you're asleep, then you have to contact them, then they have to see your message and respond, all of which can take half a day or more. It's a joke. We're still delayed.

shadowgovt 4y ago

What needs to be regulated in this context? The game is available via Steam and not the Mac App Store. One distributor decided hosting it was worth the reputation, the other did not. Win-win for consumers in that there is more choice than otherwise.

devwastaken 4y ago
Even via steam you still need to buy an apple dev license and sign it. If apple could get away with it, they would stop any app sourcing outside of the app store. They've made pushes in Ventura to make any non-signed executable not work out of the box. Nothing about apples behavior is "win win". They're a corp that benefits from special protections against both civil and criminal liabilities as well as benefitting from masses of intellectual property. It's not some sort of balanced game, the scales were tipped completely into corpo land since early 2000s