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> Speaking of commissions, remember that Apple receives a 15% or 30% commission on the subscription revenue from Hyperweb and Insight Browser. In fairness, howe

> Speaking of commissions, remember that Apple receives a 15% or 30% commission on the subscription revenue from Hyperweb and Insight Browser. In fairness, however, we can't begrudge this commission, since of course Apple has to pay expenses for important upkeep and maintenance, such as… App Store editorial? Kinda short sighted. Aside from editorial: - Overhead of support (cancelled subscriptions, subscription refunds - for example if you forget to cancel, apple will refund you). It costs money to pay people to do this. - Fraud (for example, people using the app store to launder money, requires hiring teams). Also app screening. It costs money to pay people to do this. - Card transaction fees (baked in and not insubstantial) - Bandwidth (using App Store to push updates is not free!). Managing infra as well. It costs money to pay people to do this. - Free apps (your 15-30% is being used by Apple to subsidize free apps) - Development (the App Store, updates, app packaging). It costs money to pay people to do this. I actually do agree with Apple that they should be allowed to charge a substantial percentage to cover costs (and some reasonable profit). I do think a lot of the above costs should at least partially be paid by hardware cost, but that's a hard ask for long tail devices. To be fair: 30% is insane, and I'm glad that they're getting serious regulatory and legal pressure around this. I'm not sure what their break even point for revenue is, I'm sure someone would be happy to educate me.

eviks 3y ago
One point of education: since your list includes costs that can be arbitralily set by Apple (eg, cross-subsidies), no one is going to educate you on what the break-point is (and also it requires too intimate knowledge of financials of a very secretive company)
herbst 3y ago
Nobody would buy apple phones without the appstore. It's their selling point. So its very well in their interest to keep those free apps, and everything, alive without other devs having to subsidize it. 15-30% really is insane.
Apocryphon 3y ago
All those features and they couldn't be bothered to edit the Essential Apps section.
- parl_match 3y ago
  I can't imagine it's as high priority for them as support, fraud, security updates, keeping servers running, etc. It is a bit sloppy, though.
  - Apocryphon 3y ago
    Seems like this could lead to support / fraud issues: > Hyperweb has two In-App Purchases: a monthly $2.99 USD subscription and a $29.99 USD yearly subscription. According to the App Store version history, the app was updated only once in the past year, on March 21, 2023. The app support link https://hyperweb.app/ https://hyperweb.app/ and the privacy policy link https://hyperweb.app/privacy https://hyperweb.app/privacy both give 404 Page Not Found errors. According to a Reddit post from a Hyperweb user, "Submitted a support email and it came back as undeliverable." Thus, Hyperweb gives all appearances of abandonware, although it remains in the iOS App Store and presumably continues to collect subscription revenue. Sounds like they need to update policy so that defunct developers can't continue to charge for in-app purchases.
lapcat 3y ago
> Kinda short sighted. What do you think is more likely, that an App Store developer doesn't understand the App Store, or that the remark was sarcasm? > for example if you forget to cancel, apple will refund you LOL no they will not. > Free apps (your 15-30% is being used by Apple to subsidize free apps) I'm painfully aware of this. For some reason, little indie developers are tasked with subsidizing corporations that make $billions per year in advertising revenue.
- robertlagrant 3y ago
  > For some reason, little indie developers are tasked with subsidizing corporations that make $billions per year in advertising revenue. They're not tasked with this. They're choosing to make apps because it's their preferred option to do so under the current percentages.
  - lapcat 3y ago
    This reply completely misses the point. Apple designed the whole system where paid apps, regardless of income, subsidize free apps, regardless of income. It's of course true that some indie developers choose to participate in the system rather than not participate, because they individually find it worthwhile financially. But indie developers did not design the system. Neither did they negotiate the system with Apple. The choice is merely take it or leave it. (Indeed, developers had to sue Apple in order to get the App Store Small Business Program 15% cut. That was a lawsuit settlement term.)
    - robertlagrant 3y ago
      It doesn't miss the point. Saying someone has tasked people with something is just not true. I might as well claim that someone has tasked me with writing this reply. They haven't, at all. I'm choosing it.
      - lapcat 3y ago
        Fine, if you want to be unreasonably pedantic, then I give up. You win the argument of word choice. You can collect your prize at the door.
FireBeyond 3y ago
> - Card transaction fees (baked in and not insubstantial) At Apple's scale? About as insubstantial as they are capable of getting. > - Free apps (your 15-30% is being used by Apple to subsidize free apps) Why on earth is this something that Apple developers providing revenue to Apple should have to do?

eviks 3y ago

One point of education: since your list includes costs that can be arbitralily set by Apple (eg, cross-subsidies), no one is going to educate you on what the break-point is (and also it requires too intimate knowledge of financials of a very secretive company)

herbst 3y ago

Nobody would buy apple phones without the appstore. It's their selling point. So its very well in their interest to keep those free apps, and everything, alive without other devs having to subsidize it. 15-30% really is insane.

Apocryphon 3y ago

All those features and they couldn't be bothered to edit the Essential Apps section.

parl_match 3y ago
I can't imagine it's as high priority for them as support, fraud, security updates, keeping servers running, etc. It is a bit sloppy, though.
- Apocryphon 3y ago
  Seems like this could lead to support / fraud issues: > Hyperweb has two In-App Purchases: a monthly $2.99 USD subscription and a $29.99 USD yearly subscription. According to the App Store version history, the app was updated only once in the past year, on March 21, 2023. The app support link https://hyperweb.app/ https://hyperweb.app/ and the privacy policy link https://hyperweb.app/privacy https://hyperweb.app/privacy both give 404 Page Not Found errors. According to a Reddit post from a Hyperweb user, "Submitted a support email and it came back as undeliverable." Thus, Hyperweb gives all appearances of abandonware, although it remains in the iOS App Store and presumably continues to collect subscription revenue. Sounds like they need to update policy so that defunct developers can't continue to charge for in-app purchases.

lapcat 3y ago

> Kinda short sighted. What do you think is more likely, that an App Store developer doesn't understand the App Store, or that the remark was sarcasm? > for example if you forget to cancel, apple will refund you LOL no they will not. > Free apps (your 15-30% is being used by Apple to subsidize free apps) I'm painfully aware of this. For some reason, little indie developers are tasked with subsidizing corporations that make $billions per year in advertising revenue.

robertlagrant 3y ago
> For some reason, little indie developers are tasked with subsidizing corporations that make $billions per year in advertising revenue. They're not tasked with this. They're choosing to make apps because it's their preferred option to do so under the current percentages.
- lapcat 3y ago
  This reply completely misses the point. Apple designed the whole system where paid apps, regardless of income, subsidize free apps, regardless of income. It's of course true that some indie developers choose to participate in the system rather than not participate, because they individually find it worthwhile financially. But indie developers did not design the system. Neither did they negotiate the system with Apple. The choice is merely take it or leave it. (Indeed, developers had to sue Apple in order to get the App Store Small Business Program 15% cut. That was a lawsuit settlement term.)
  - robertlagrant 3y ago
    It doesn't miss the point. Saying someone has tasked people with something is just not true. I might as well claim that someone has tasked me with writing this reply. They haven't, at all. I'm choosing it.
    - lapcat 3y ago
      Fine, if you want to be unreasonably pedantic, then I give up. You win the argument of word choice. You can collect your prize at the door.

FireBeyond 3y ago

> - Card transaction fees (baked in and not insubstantial) At Apple's scale? About as insubstantial as they are capable of getting. > - Free apps (your 15-30% is being used by Apple to subsidize free apps) Why on earth is this something that Apple developers providing revenue to Apple should have to do?