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It’s time for tech (not just Apple) to be broken up. If only we haven’t defanged the regulatory agencies …

by xyst 2y ago

hermitdev 2y ago
> It’s time for tech (not just Apple) to be broken up. If only we haven’t defanged the regulatory agencies … I think you mean we should de-FAANG the regulatory agencies.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
simonh 2y ago
Broken up in what way, and how would it help?
- desert_rue 2y ago
  Generally, the Apple Store would be a separate company from Apple phones. A user gets to choose which store they want to use on their phone. Along with other things like which map app is the default. This way, the different stores could compete - by charging lower fees or offering more services. Like the android store does a bare-bones check of the app and so it only charges 10%. Apple checks every app throughly, so it charges 15%. Some open source store might have 0% fee, have no app checks, no payment processing, and it is 100% on the user not to download infested software.
  - highwaylights 2y ago
    Although I agree in principle, the counter-argument to this is that Apple would ultimately be blamed in the minds of consumers for not keeping those devices protected from bad software. They could say I told you so, but that doesn’t help them after the golden goose of the App Store has already been cooked.
    - johnnyanmac 2y ago
      >the counter-argument to this is that Apple would ultimately be blamed in the minds of consumers for not keeping those devices protected from bad software. To be brash, maybe consumers need to learn how to protect themselves or move to dumb hardware that is impractical to hack. I don't understand this trend of blaming corporations for not being the de facto gatekeeper of security. They should help minimize spam/malware, but if you're going out of your way to disable those securities (likened to turning off Windows Defender after 2 warnings), your insecurities are self-inflicted. Many "opponents" aren't asking to change the default experience. They simply want the reigns to take those risks and tinker. Most people can barely even find the theme settings on Android; I won't believe a signifigant portion will get through idiot-proof safeguards just because "well they have a chance to now!"
      - rblatz 2y ago
        I don’t know look at all those people turning off sound check (volume leveling between songs) on their iPhones based on complete fabrications and misunderstanding of what it is and how it works. It’s buried deep, but people still do it.
      - dwaite 2y ago
        As a technically minded person, I must say I don’t know how to protect myself from secretly malicious apps. A weather app needs my location and network access. It doesn’t need to sell ongoing location tracking information associated with my device identifier and IP addresses to marketing companies.
        johnnyanmac 2y ago
        > It doesn’t need to sell ongoing location tracking information associated with my device identifier and IP addresses to marketing companies. fortunately, GDPR covers that already. Or CPPA if you reside in California. But that's not quite what by Malicious. Malice implies intent for bad desires. A company selling your weather tracking data with dubious consent is simply greedy. It very likely wouldn't be in your top 10 list of perpetrators if your phone was hacked, wiped, or stolen.
  - wredue 2y ago
    What a cluster fuck that would become. I can see it now: needing to have 15 different stores with subscriptions to get apps who all have different deals with different apps for exclusivity. No thanks.
    - juliangmp 2y ago
      I think an important aspect is that exclusivity deals should just be illegal in general. In that scenario, or with movie streaming right now, the different stores/platforms don't actually compete with each other. They are in a money throwing contest over who can get the most exclusive licences. Their actual product, streaming a video to your device, isn't relevant to competing at all. This is also the sole reason why I will refuse to install the epic games launcher. They whine about steams dominant market share while they try to force people to use their platform. Instead of actually competing with Steam, because that would require epic to make a better product and that needs effort.
    - heavyset_go 2y ago
      And yet that isn't the case on Android, macOS, Windows, etc. This nightmare scenario only exists in your own mind and you're spooking yourself over it.
      - wredue 2y ago
        Android store is the only one anyone gives a shit about, and even there, to suggest that android is anything but a monopolized store is you living in a land of rainbows and unicorns We are already seeing it on PC where epic is buying titles. Microsoft it’s trying to make my exact nightmare scenario a reality each passing day. Just cause you lack imagination of corporate bullshit harming consumers in an unending chain doesn’t mean everyone is unable to see it.
      - rblatz 2y ago
        Windows store, steam, Xbox game pass, epic… That’s just off the top of my head, then you have the package mangers like WinGet and chocolatey.
- Terretta 2y ago
  If it was an open platform, then Apple couldn't charge any more than Steam which is on an open platform, because nobody would pay that much unless forced to. Wait, Steam charges more? Never mind.
  - danShumway 2y ago
    If you're suggesting that Steam doesn't have an effective monopoly on the PC market, I have bad news for you. One of the biggest differences between Steam and Apple is that Steam does a better job of hiding the effects from users who will lash out at creators who talk about problems on the platform. An indie creator I follow recently implored fans to buy their next game on Steam and not other platforms... because in order to be profitable they absolutely needed to get their game to be ranked on Steam above a certain review threshold, and reviews of the game would only count towards their ranking if matched with specifically a Steam purchase. And once again, I get this weird feeling. I'm struck that at the point where a creator is begging users to reinforce the most dominant PC gaming platform because if those users buy the game somewhere else that has better creator terms and fees, the platform will (in effect) punish their store listing, something might be going wrong with the market. Sometimes Apple advocates will point at similarly bad situations in other markets and say, "what, are you going to regulate that too?" Don't threaten me with a good time.
    - maximus-decimus 2y ago
      A huge difference is Steam doesn't come pre-installed on your computers nor does it block you from installing other game managers.
      - danShumway 2y ago
        Fair point. I do think Steam is engaged in anti-competitive behavior, but that doesn't mean they're the full equivalent of the app store. And we can see on the PC market the large number of indie games that very literally would not exist if PCs were locked into only using Steam. My point here is more that Steam is not really a good argument for justifying a pricing model. But it's a good clarification that in many ways Steam has "only" mostly locked down the PC gaming market, where Apple has gone further and locked down the actual software that can be loaded onto the phone.
brigadier132 2y ago
Apple doesnt need to be broken up, they just need to be forced to open their devices. No proprietary apis that only they have access to, when you open the phone for the first time you should be able to pick what store to use and they have to allow alternative browsers
- idle_zealot 2y ago
  I agree that consumer ownership rights to their computers are the more pressing issue, but Apple should probably also be broken up. The problem is how to do that without destroying the value they bring to consumers, i.e. where do you draw the lines internally?
  - brigadier132 2y ago
    I don't think it's possible to break them up without immense value destruction.
    - throwaway48476 2y ago
      Breaking up standard oil famously created a lot more value.
      - ben_w 2y ago
        Apparently that's still controversial (I learned just now while trying to learn more about the breakup). However, it was easy to see cut lines in Standard Oil. Breaking up (and privatising) the UK national rail network didn't work so well; a few years after it happened, the party who did it lost power, and had apparently forgotten they had even done this to the trains as they were running ads saying "you paid the taxes so where are the trains". Apple's iPhone can clearly be split into "hardware" and "software" because Android QED; but that's not sufficient because the Play Store gets much the same criticism. Likewise the App Store can obviously be split off, the technical issues are demonstrated by what already exists. But, the Samsung store isn't stopping the criticism of the Play Store, so alt stores are also not enough here for iOS either. I was expecting anti-trust issues before it reached "just" one trillion dollars of market cap, let alone three, so who knows.
lmm 2y ago
Nah, just Apple. Whenever any other tech company tries bullshit like this, alternatives pop up and people switch to them. When Apple tries it people make excuses for them.
jasonfarnon 2y ago
If only we haven’t defanged the regulatory agencies … FTC is more active than it's ever been under Liza Khan, particularly in this sphere

It’s time for tech (not just Apple) to be broken up. If only we haven’t defanged the regulatory agencies …

by xyst 2y ago

It’s time for tech (not just Apple) to be broken up. If only we haven’t defanged the regulatory agencies …

> It’s time for tech (not just Apple) to be broken up. If only we haven’t defanged the regulatory agencies … I think you mean we should de-FAANG the regulatory agencies.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

simonh 2y ago

Broken up in what way, and how would it help?

desert_rue 2y ago
Generally, the Apple Store would be a separate company from Apple phones. A user gets to choose which store they want to use on their phone. Along with other things like which map app is the default. This way, the different stores could compete - by charging lower fees or offering more services. Like the android store does a bare-bones check of the app and so it only charges 10%. Apple checks every app throughly, so it charges 15%. Some open source store might have 0% fee, have no app checks, no payment processing, and it is 100% on the user not to download infested software.
- highwaylights 2y ago
  Although I agree in principle, the counter-argument to this is that Apple would ultimately be blamed in the minds of consumers for not keeping those devices protected from bad software. They could say I told you so, but that doesn’t help them after the golden goose of the App Store has already been cooked.
  - johnnyanmac 2y ago
    >the counter-argument to this is that Apple would ultimately be blamed in the minds of consumers for not keeping those devices protected from bad software. To be brash, maybe consumers need to learn how to protect themselves or move to dumb hardware that is impractical to hack. I don't understand this trend of blaming corporations for not being the de facto gatekeeper of security. They should help minimize spam/malware, but if you're going out of your way to disable those securities (likened to turning off Windows Defender after 2 warnings), your insecurities are self-inflicted. Many "opponents" aren't asking to change the default experience. They simply want the reigns to take those risks and tinker. Most people can barely even find the theme settings on Android; I won't believe a signifigant portion will get through idiot-proof safeguards just because "well they have a chance to now!"
    - rblatz 2y ago
      I don’t know look at all those people turning off sound check (volume leveling between songs) on their iPhones based on complete fabrications and misunderstanding of what it is and how it works. It’s buried deep, but people still do it.
    - dwaite 2y ago
      As a technically minded person, I must say I don’t know how to protect myself from secretly malicious apps. A weather app needs my location and network access. It doesn’t need to sell ongoing location tracking information associated with my device identifier and IP addresses to marketing companies.
      - johnnyanmac 2y ago
        > It doesn’t need to sell ongoing location tracking information associated with my device identifier and IP addresses to marketing companies. fortunately, GDPR covers that already. Or CPPA if you reside in California. But that's not quite what by Malicious. Malice implies intent for bad desires. A company selling your weather tracking data with dubious consent is simply greedy. It very likely wouldn't be in your top 10 list of perpetrators if your phone was hacked, wiped, or stolen.
- wredue 2y ago
  What a cluster fuck that would become. I can see it now: needing to have 15 different stores with subscriptions to get apps who all have different deals with different apps for exclusivity. No thanks.
  - juliangmp 2y ago
    I think an important aspect is that exclusivity deals should just be illegal in general. In that scenario, or with movie streaming right now, the different stores/platforms don't actually compete with each other. They are in a money throwing contest over who can get the most exclusive licences. Their actual product, streaming a video to your device, isn't relevant to competing at all. This is also the sole reason why I will refuse to install the epic games launcher. They whine about steams dominant market share while they try to force people to use their platform. Instead of actually competing with Steam, because that would require epic to make a better product and that needs effort.
  - heavyset_go 2y ago
    And yet that isn't the case on Android, macOS, Windows, etc. This nightmare scenario only exists in your own mind and you're spooking yourself over it.
    - wredue 2y ago
      Android store is the only one anyone gives a shit about, and even there, to suggest that android is anything but a monopolized store is you living in a land of rainbows and unicorns We are already seeing it on PC where epic is buying titles. Microsoft it’s trying to make my exact nightmare scenario a reality each passing day. Just cause you lack imagination of corporate bullshit harming consumers in an unending chain doesn’t mean everyone is unable to see it.
    - rblatz 2y ago
      Windows store, steam, Xbox game pass, epic… That’s just off the top of my head, then you have the package mangers like WinGet and chocolatey.
Terretta 2y ago
If it was an open platform, then Apple couldn't charge any more than Steam which is on an open platform, because nobody would pay that much unless forced to. Wait, Steam charges more? Never mind.
- danShumway 2y ago
  If you're suggesting that Steam doesn't have an effective monopoly on the PC market, I have bad news for you. One of the biggest differences between Steam and Apple is that Steam does a better job of hiding the effects from users who will lash out at creators who talk about problems on the platform. An indie creator I follow recently implored fans to buy their next game on Steam and not other platforms... because in order to be profitable they absolutely needed to get their game to be ranked on Steam above a certain review threshold, and reviews of the game would only count towards their ranking if matched with specifically a Steam purchase. And once again, I get this weird feeling. I'm struck that at the point where a creator is begging users to reinforce the most dominant PC gaming platform because if those users buy the game somewhere else that has better creator terms and fees, the platform will (in effect) punish their store listing, something might be going wrong with the market. Sometimes Apple advocates will point at similarly bad situations in other markets and say, "what, are you going to regulate that too?" Don't threaten me with a good time.
  - maximus-decimus 2y ago
    A huge difference is Steam doesn't come pre-installed on your computers nor does it block you from installing other game managers.
    - danShumway 2y ago
      Fair point. I do think Steam is engaged in anti-competitive behavior, but that doesn't mean they're the full equivalent of the app store. And we can see on the PC market the large number of indie games that very literally would not exist if PCs were locked into only using Steam. My point here is more that Steam is not really a good argument for justifying a pricing model. But it's a good clarification that in many ways Steam has "only" mostly locked down the PC gaming market, where Apple has gone further and locked down the actual software that can be loaded onto the phone.

brigadier132 2y ago

Apple doesnt need to be broken up, they just need to be forced to open their devices. No proprietary apis that only they have access to, when you open the phone for the first time you should be able to pick what store to use and they have to allow alternative browsers

idle_zealot 2y ago
I agree that consumer ownership rights to their computers are the more pressing issue, but Apple should probably also be broken up. The problem is how to do that without destroying the value they bring to consumers, i.e. where do you draw the lines internally?
- brigadier132 2y ago
  I don't think it's possible to break them up without immense value destruction.
  - throwaway48476 2y ago
    Breaking up standard oil famously created a lot more value.
    - ben_w 2y ago
      Apparently that's still controversial (I learned just now while trying to learn more about the breakup). However, it was easy to see cut lines in Standard Oil. Breaking up (and privatising) the UK national rail network didn't work so well; a few years after it happened, the party who did it lost power, and had apparently forgotten they had even done this to the trains as they were running ads saying "you paid the taxes so where are the trains". Apple's iPhone can clearly be split into "hardware" and "software" because Android QED; but that's not sufficient because the Play Store gets much the same criticism. Likewise the App Store can obviously be split off, the technical issues are demonstrated by what already exists. But, the Samsung store isn't stopping the criticism of the Play Store, so alt stores are also not enough here for iOS either. I was expecting anti-trust issues before it reached "just" one trillion dollars of market cap, let alone three, so who knows.

lmm 2y ago

Nah, just Apple. Whenever any other tech company tries bullshit like this, alternatives pop up and people switch to them. When Apple tries it people make excuses for them.

jasonfarnon 2y ago

If only we haven’t defanged the regulatory agencies … FTC is more active than it's ever been under Liza Khan, particularly in this sphere