5 ms·

But even in real life this doesn't hold. > I can't just walk into Walmart and set up a stand and make money, if I want to sell in Walmart I have to work with t

But even in real life this doesn't hold. > I can't just walk into Walmart and set up a stand and make money, if I want to sell in Walmart I have to work with them and give them a similar sized cut. Apple's App Store might be Walmart, but the phone I bought is not Walmart. Regular people understand the idea of "I bought a thing, and now the greedy company won't let me do what I want with it unless I buy their overpriced add-on", see printers. Apple is no more entitled to a cut of everything I put on my iPhone anymore than Walmart is entitled to a cut of everything I put on my table simply because they made the table.

immibis 3y ago
Apple users do not understand that. That was the comment's point.
- _aavaa_ 3y ago
  I don't think so. It seemed very strong about "Even if they would know, they still wouldn't care". Which I think is absolutely false. See people constantly complaining about having to buy expensive inkjet cartridges.
kemayo 3y ago
> Apple's App Store might be Walmart, but the phone I bought is not Walmart. I don't know if that's inherently correct in people's eyes. For a counterexample, note that video game consoles are very popular, and I don't see any widespread opposition to the idea that e.g. Nintendo is controlling what you can play on a Switch.
- _aavaa_ 3y ago
  I wouldn't be so sure. A major reason people pick PC gaming over consoles is specifically because they have control over what they are allowed to do.
  - t888 3y ago
    And they are free to make that choice. Surely consumers who care about this choose Android.
    - _aavaa_ 3y ago
      Rights are things that you cannot choose to give up. You explicitly cannot trade them away since the poorest people would be forced to do that in order to afford anything. I assert that I have rights under the first sale doctrine which let me do whatever I want with the things I own. Apple has no more of a right to dictate what I put on my device than Walmart has a right to dictate when I put on my table simply because they sold it to me.
      - t888 3y ago
        [dead]
      - ethbr1 3y ago
        The failure of the courts to update first sale doctrine to the digital age is the root cause of many ills. Unfortunately, it's a tricky question, because it's more akin to compelling speech when the content is served by another party at a future time. If I get a device that uses cloud functionality... is whoever I sell that device to entitled to that functionality?
        _aavaa_ 3y ago
        Well the more important question is are you entitled to that functionality, or can it be taken away on a whim? But those are more "advanced" questions. We still haven't even established the fact that I should indeed own the thing I purchased (see music or movies or anything). So we have a while to go before we get to questions of transference of services.
    - jobs_throwaway 3y ago
      The point of the suit is, they should be free to make that choice on their iPhone. No one is going to remove the app store, and if you love sucking from the teat of Apple so much, you can continue to do so in an environment where there are competing app stores
- dotnet00 3y ago
  While interest in doing so on handhelds has lessened a little due to phones almost always being more capable, wanting to be able to run custom software on consoles is common enough that lots of effort is spent on the cat and mouse game between console hackers and console makers.
  - kemayo 3y ago
    Yes, piracy is admittedly very popular. (And maybe 0.02% of said custom software isn't piracy, but...)
    - dotnet00 3y ago
      You might think that, but at least back during the PSP and PSVita days (when I was into consoles), a large chunk of it was about the homebrew. For a decent chunk of the Vita's existence you only could do homebrew and emulators. Piracy is always just a service problem, with most other pirates being people who weren't going to be customers anyway.
- bombcar 3y ago
  The consoles are the most obvious example, but there are other things, too. Perhaps the "best" counter argument is the Mac App Store and Steam - both of which take a big cut, both of which can be "easily" bypassed for many apps, and both of which customers don't really seem to care about from a monetary point of view. People care much more about what is or is not permitted, not where the money goes.
  - kemayo 3y ago
    In fairness, from everything I've heard the Mac App Store is really not doing well.
  - stale2002 3y ago
    > both of which take a big cut, both of which can be "easily" bypassed for many apps, and both of which customers don't really seem to care about from a monetary point of view. This isn't true. You cannot bypass the stream 30% fee from the consumer side. Because of practices that stream does, which are arguably anti-competitive, I cannot buy the same exact game, from the game developer's website, and receive a 30% discount. If such discounts were possible, and it was clearly advertised that I could just get the game for cheaper from a different location, customers would absolutely take that option almost always.
    - kemayo 3y ago
      You can bypass the Steam fee as the publisher. Steam's rule is that you can't sell a Steam key for your game somewhere else consistently cheaper than it's sold on Steam. You're free to go wild with pricing, so long as it's on a completely separate distribution platform. See: https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/features/keys https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/features/keys (At the very least, if they're trying to do a most-favored-nation rule, they're not listing it in their policies and are enforcing it through back-channels.)
  - whywhywhywhy 3y ago
    Plenty of people complain vocally if you don't release your game on Steam, same deal when a musician doesn't release their music on Spotify. I think a lot of developers will be surprised how many customers actually side with the convenience of the platform over the actual person creating the value.
eecc 3y ago
I've been a loyal iPhone user since what? the iPhone 3. The moment Apple is forced to "open up to the competition", all Meta apps are going to magically move to the Meta Store, where they'll likely be able to shove all sorts of tracking garbage down my throat. Same for Alphabet, same for Samsung, same for Microsoft. The experience will turn into a hopeless struggle against EULAs and consents, unless one refuses to install any third-party spyware and do the digital equivalent of moving into a forest cabin. The oddball, while everyone else sheepishly complies. Evenyone loves to hate Apple, everyone forgets that the first commercial music store to sell unencrypted and hugh fidelity AAC files was Apple's. The rest was "squirting" tunes on Zune or inflicting Realmedia on their paying customers. Nope.
- _aavaa_ 3y ago
  I don't think your points about Google, Facebook and Microsoft. Firstly. If they are doing things we don't want them to do, the solution is regulations, not a monopoly. So if you're unhappy with their behaviour, that should be made illegal. Secondly. Apple's protection against tracking comes from the OS level. The OS stops them from accessing my contacts and my GPS location, not apple's 30% tax. > sell unencrypted and hugh fidelity AAC files was Apple's. So what. How unencrypted are those audio files now? They've since moved on to FairPlay.
  - eecc 3y ago
    Sure, let’s wait for the regulators to wake up and haggle with the lobbyists while the rest of the world takes a beating. Ever heard of the expression “closing the barn door after the horse has bolted”?
  - katbyte 3y ago
    How about we regulate tracking apps etc first then force Apple to change?
    - _aavaa_ 3y ago
      This argument leads nowhere since it just as well applies the other way around. Both are problems, both need solving.
donny2018 3y ago
As an iPhone user, if I wanted a phone with Samsung, Amazon, Epic and Huawei stores, 3 different preinstalled browsers and my workflows depended on sideloading some obscure app for a website in Turkey, I'd go with Android. Such an option exists for people who are into that. But I chose iPhone (and I think many other customers do) specifically for it being a walled garden. Now some other corporations like Epic, who want to have a cake and eat it too, are going to ruin one of the platform's key selling points.
- _aavaa_ 3y ago
  > my workflows depended on sideloading some obscure app And if your workflow did require an obscure app, who is Apple to decided that you cannot install it on your own phone? > But I chose iPhone (and I think many other customers do) specifically for it being a walled garden. People like this walled garden since apple promises that it's safe and they deal with all of the problems for you. But time and time again we see that their App Store features outright scams and mountains of knockoff garbage apps. People buy into the marketing of the walled garden, not the reality of it.
  - donny2018 3y ago
    >People like this walled garden since apple promises that it's safe and they deal with all of the problems for you. I get the "safety" argument, but it's also about the user experience. What if now Microsoft makes me install Microsoft store to use M365 apps, Amazon makes me install whatever store to use their products, etc? What do I win here as a consumer? I buy iPhone specifically for what it is. I get that some people don't like walled garden approach, so they have Android at their service. Apple is not a monopoly. What is the point of buying a phone knowing what you are getting, and then complaining about something you knew full well it doesn't have?
    - _aavaa_ 3y ago
      > Apple is not a monopoly. The lawsuits is literally about this. > What is the point of buying a phone knowing what you are getting, and then complaining about something you knew full well it doesn't have? Because the thing the company is offering is a behaviour that overall is not one we as a society want (Apple being allowed to dictate what businesses will and will not succeed by either locking them out of 1/2 of the major mobile OS, or by taking a 30% tax from their revenue and then competing against them).
katbyte 3y ago
But this is why the eu case made more sense? It went after Apple for not allowing side loading of app stores vs this one which seems to be going after what Apple does on its own store?
whywhywhywhy 3y ago
"Being able to do exactly what you want with a thing you paid for" is a very different angle of argument to "knowing it allows Apple to heavily tax all AppStore developers" I was tackling why I don't think that argument holds water with the average person. "now the greedy company won't let me do what I want with it unless I buy their overpriced add-on" With printers this is very tangible to the customer, with the App Store what you're describing here isn't as tangible because nothing on the App Store is actually expensive, it's either free or relatively cheap and it's more a case that the user pays little or nothing, Apple gets a cut for doing close to nothing and the dev gets screwed, printers is more the customer gets screwed.

immibis 3y ago

Apple users do not understand that. That was the comment's point.

_aavaa_ 3y ago
I don't think so. It seemed very strong about "Even if they would know, they still wouldn't care". Which I think is absolutely false. See people constantly complaining about having to buy expensive inkjet cartridges.

kemayo 3y ago

> Apple's App Store might be Walmart, but the phone I bought is not Walmart. I don't know if that's inherently correct in people's eyes. For a counterexample, note that video game consoles are very popular, and I don't see any widespread opposition to the idea that e.g. Nintendo is controlling what you can play on a Switch.

_aavaa_ 3y ago
I wouldn't be so sure. A major reason people pick PC gaming over consoles is specifically because they have control over what they are allowed to do.
- t888 3y ago
  And they are free to make that choice. Surely consumers who care about this choose Android.
  - _aavaa_ 3y ago
    Rights are things that you cannot choose to give up. You explicitly cannot trade them away since the poorest people would be forced to do that in order to afford anything. I assert that I have rights under the first sale doctrine which let me do whatever I want with the things I own. Apple has no more of a right to dictate what I put on my device than Walmart has a right to dictate when I put on my table simply because they sold it to me.
    - t888 3y ago
      [dead]
    - ethbr1 3y ago
      The failure of the courts to update first sale doctrine to the digital age is the root cause of many ills. Unfortunately, it's a tricky question, because it's more akin to compelling speech when the content is served by another party at a future time. If I get a device that uses cloud functionality... is whoever I sell that device to entitled to that functionality?
      - _aavaa_ 3y ago
        Well the more important question is are you entitled to that functionality, or can it be taken away on a whim? But those are more "advanced" questions. We still haven't even established the fact that I should indeed own the thing I purchased (see music or movies or anything). So we have a while to go before we get to questions of transference of services.
  - jobs_throwaway 3y ago
    The point of the suit is, they should be free to make that choice on their iPhone. No one is going to remove the app store, and if you love sucking from the teat of Apple so much, you can continue to do so in an environment where there are competing app stores
dotnet00 3y ago
While interest in doing so on handhelds has lessened a little due to phones almost always being more capable, wanting to be able to run custom software on consoles is common enough that lots of effort is spent on the cat and mouse game between console hackers and console makers.
- kemayo 3y ago
  Yes, piracy is admittedly very popular. (And maybe 0.02% of said custom software isn't piracy, but...)
  - dotnet00 3y ago
    You might think that, but at least back during the PSP and PSVita days (when I was into consoles), a large chunk of it was about the homebrew. For a decent chunk of the Vita's existence you only could do homebrew and emulators. Piracy is always just a service problem, with most other pirates being people who weren't going to be customers anyway.
bombcar 3y ago
The consoles are the most obvious example, but there are other things, too. Perhaps the "best" counter argument is the Mac App Store and Steam - both of which take a big cut, both of which can be "easily" bypassed for many apps, and both of which customers don't really seem to care about from a monetary point of view. People care much more about what is or is not permitted, not where the money goes.
- kemayo 3y ago
  In fairness, from everything I've heard the Mac App Store is really not doing well.
- stale2002 3y ago
  > both of which take a big cut, both of which can be "easily" bypassed for many apps, and both of which customers don't really seem to care about from a monetary point of view. This isn't true. You cannot bypass the stream 30% fee from the consumer side. Because of practices that stream does, which are arguably anti-competitive, I cannot buy the same exact game, from the game developer's website, and receive a 30% discount. If such discounts were possible, and it was clearly advertised that I could just get the game for cheaper from a different location, customers would absolutely take that option almost always.
  - kemayo 3y ago
    You can bypass the Steam fee as the publisher. Steam's rule is that you can't sell a Steam key for your game somewhere else consistently cheaper than it's sold on Steam. You're free to go wild with pricing, so long as it's on a completely separate distribution platform. See: https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/features/keys https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/features/keys (At the very least, if they're trying to do a most-favored-nation rule, they're not listing it in their policies and are enforcing it through back-channels.)
- whywhywhywhy 3y ago
  Plenty of people complain vocally if you don't release your game on Steam, same deal when a musician doesn't release their music on Spotify. I think a lot of developers will be surprised how many customers actually side with the convenience of the platform over the actual person creating the value.

eecc 3y ago

I've been a loyal iPhone user since what? the iPhone 3. The moment Apple is forced to "open up to the competition", all Meta apps are going to magically move to the Meta Store, where they'll likely be able to shove all sorts of tracking garbage down my throat. Same for Alphabet, same for Samsung, same for Microsoft. The experience will turn into a hopeless struggle against EULAs and consents, unless one refuses to install any third-party spyware and do the digital equivalent of moving into a forest cabin. The oddball, while everyone else sheepishly complies. Evenyone loves to hate Apple, everyone forgets that the first commercial music store to sell unencrypted and hugh fidelity AAC files was Apple's. The rest was "squirting" tunes on Zune or inflicting Realmedia on their paying customers. Nope.

_aavaa_ 3y ago
I don't think your points about Google, Facebook and Microsoft. Firstly. If they are doing things we don't want them to do, the solution is regulations, not a monopoly. So if you're unhappy with their behaviour, that should be made illegal. Secondly. Apple's protection against tracking comes from the OS level. The OS stops them from accessing my contacts and my GPS location, not apple's 30% tax. > sell unencrypted and hugh fidelity AAC files was Apple's. So what. How unencrypted are those audio files now? They've since moved on to FairPlay.
- eecc 3y ago
  Sure, let’s wait for the regulators to wake up and haggle with the lobbyists while the rest of the world takes a beating. Ever heard of the expression “closing the barn door after the horse has bolted”?
- katbyte 3y ago
  How about we regulate tracking apps etc first then force Apple to change?
  - _aavaa_ 3y ago
    This argument leads nowhere since it just as well applies the other way around. Both are problems, both need solving.

donny2018 3y ago

As an iPhone user, if I wanted a phone with Samsung, Amazon, Epic and Huawei stores, 3 different preinstalled browsers and my workflows depended on sideloading some obscure app for a website in Turkey, I'd go with Android. Such an option exists for people who are into that. But I chose iPhone (and I think many other customers do) specifically for it being a walled garden. Now some other corporations like Epic, who want to have a cake and eat it too, are going to ruin one of the platform's key selling points.

_aavaa_ 3y ago
> my workflows depended on sideloading some obscure app And if your workflow did require an obscure app, who is Apple to decided that you cannot install it on your own phone? > But I chose iPhone (and I think many other customers do) specifically for it being a walled garden. People like this walled garden since apple promises that it's safe and they deal with all of the problems for you. But time and time again we see that their App Store features outright scams and mountains of knockoff garbage apps. People buy into the marketing of the walled garden, not the reality of it.
- donny2018 3y ago
  >People like this walled garden since apple promises that it's safe and they deal with all of the problems for you. I get the "safety" argument, but it's also about the user experience. What if now Microsoft makes me install Microsoft store to use M365 apps, Amazon makes me install whatever store to use their products, etc? What do I win here as a consumer? I buy iPhone specifically for what it is. I get that some people don't like walled garden approach, so they have Android at their service. Apple is not a monopoly. What is the point of buying a phone knowing what you are getting, and then complaining about something you knew full well it doesn't have?
  - _aavaa_ 3y ago
    > Apple is not a monopoly. The lawsuits is literally about this. > What is the point of buying a phone knowing what you are getting, and then complaining about something you knew full well it doesn't have? Because the thing the company is offering is a behaviour that overall is not one we as a society want (Apple being allowed to dictate what businesses will and will not succeed by either locking them out of 1/2 of the major mobile OS, or by taking a 30% tax from their revenue and then competing against them).

katbyte 3y ago

But this is why the eu case made more sense? It went after Apple for not allowing side loading of app stores vs this one which seems to be going after what Apple does on its own store?

whywhywhywhy 3y ago

"Being able to do exactly what you want with a thing you paid for" is a very different angle of argument to "knowing it allows Apple to heavily tax all AppStore developers" I was tackling why I don't think that argument holds water with the average person. "now the greedy company won't let me do what I want with it unless I buy their overpriced add-on" With printers this is very tangible to the customer, with the App Store what you're describing here isn't as tangible because nothing on the App Store is actually expensive, it's either free or relatively cheap and it's more a case that the user pays little or nothing, Apple gets a cut for doing close to nothing and the dev gets screwed, printers is more the customer gets screwed.