6 ms·

Apple splits App Store team in two, introduces new leadership

84 points by LorenDB 2y ago

spogbiper 2y ago
Interesting that they are creating a separate team just for the EU app store, presumably because the EU is forcing Apple to make some changes. It seems like the investigations in the US, UK, Japan, etc will eventually lead to them being required to make similar changes everywhere.
- transpute 2y ago
  Geo-fenced app stores could align with geo-fenced networks bounded by GFC-style inspection and filtering of network packets.
  - AmericanChopper 2y ago
    I’m very happy for Apple to geofence the EU cryptography backdoors they’re going to have to put in eventually.
  - wmf 2y ago
    It's already happening. You can save money on the firewall if you can convince FAANGs to enforce things for you though.
- blackeyeblitzar 2y ago
  Creating a separate store just to be able to get away with anti consume anti competitive practices everywhere else is just so dishonest and unethical. I don’t understand why consumers give Apple the benefit of the doubt, trusting such a powerful entity to be benevolent. But I guess maybe it is because the everyday user isn’t visibly affected by those practices and they don’t know that they could benefit from change?
  - happymellon 2y ago
    The alternative here is Google/Samsung. I'm not sure what you expect consumers to do, but my other halfs Pixel phones have been absolutely rubbish with a significant flaw each generation. My Fitbit has been degrading ever since Google picked them up. Samsung at least gives me working reliable hardware, but are still stuck with Android and Googles forcing of shitty extras. Other Android providers exist, but after being burnt several times by providers abandoning updates and my work VPN refusing to run with old versions with security flaws, I dont blame people for just going down the route that mostly works. We need an alternative to Android, but that would require companies to make web pages again instead of apps.
  - eastbound 2y ago
    I don’t give Apple the benefit of the doubt, but Google didn’t encrypt my phone back when I was using it, and living in a city where mugging is frequent, this is criminal. Also I’ve always been disappointed with every single feature of Android, but that’s on the side of my choice matrix.
- Miraste 2y ago
  It's unlikely that the US will force Apple to make EU-style changes. It's been 26 years since the DOJ went after Microsoft and lost, and corporate regulation has only grown weaker.
  - bogwog 2y ago
    Have you been following the news on this topic lately? Antitrust enforcement has had a huge resurgence under Biden, and it's actually looking like Google may get broken up soon. See: https://www.theverge.com/2024/8/11/24216760/google-trial-monopoly-remedies-rivals https://www.theverge.com/2024/8/11/24216760/google-trial-mon...
    - lolinder 2y ago
      What Google's rivals want and what this judge ends up deciding to do and what actually gets enforced in the end are three entirely different things.
    - Miraste 2y ago
      I have, and I don't believe that higher courts will ever go along with it. Microsoft lost their initial case too, and was ordered to break up at the time. Appeals courts prevent real change like that from happening--see the fate of the recent non-compete ban. Precedent suggests the antitrust cases will end in a small fine or a procedural change, at most.
      - ASalazarMX 2y ago
        "Alphabet extrudes smaller, useles Google to satisfy regulators"
- troupo 2y ago
  --- start quote --- users will get new default settings for dialing phone numbers, sending messages, translating text, navigation, managing passwords, keyboards, and call spam filters Additionally, the App Store, Messages, Photos, Camera, and Safari apps will now be deletable for users in the EU. --- end quote --- https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=zglax7gc https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=zglax7gc Instead being on top of things and pre-empting the inevitable, they are just reacting.
- dagmx 2y ago
  It’s not a separate team for the EU App Store, it’s a separate team for other app stores in the EU. As in one team for the Apple first party store in all countries and a second team for third party stores, which just happens to be in the EU.
user_7832 2y ago
> There will now be one team for the familiar, Apple-run App Store, and another one to handle alternative app stores in the European Union Could someone explain why Apple needs someone to handle something they're not doing? I assume 3rd party companies are running their own servers and everything, is this just for the client-side software development? Tangential but it's funny how by digging their heels in so tightly Apple's being forced so much. Sideloading (or "installing an app") has hardly been difficult on android (or desktop OSes), I don't think Google needs to set up a new team.
- TheGlav 2y ago
  If there was never infrastructure to handle third party app stores, then such infrastructure would need to be built, and assumptions based on idea that there are no third-party app stores have to be revisited and reworked. They have to then provide hooks for those third party app stores that never existed before (like anything related to launching download of an app, for example.)
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- transpute 2y ago
  > why Apple needs someone to handle something they're not doing Regulatory compliance on the boundary between doing, "not doing", not "doing", "not" doing and not "not doing".
- nostrademons 2y ago
  Why do all the Big Tech companies have teams dedicated to Privacy, Trust & Safety, AI Ethics, etc? The way a large organization functions is to have a directly-responsible individual for each attribute that they care about (or don't care about, but are legally required to do), and then assume that person is looking out to advance that interest. They may or may not succeed - in large companies it's often very difficult to push the ball forward on attributes that the organization at large does not care about. But that gives the company somebody to fire and pin the blame on when negative consequences arise, which in turn shields the corporation itself from liability. And since the employees are themselves protected by the corporate liability shield, the worst that can happen is they lose their job, and don't get personally sued. This also explains why the role at Apple is being split between two executives: it gives them the option of firing the one in charge of the EU DMA efforts, if Apple is found in violation of them, without firing the one who is actually running the App Store.
dnag 2y ago
Since we're here I have a suggestion to offer. When submitting your mobile app to the App Store there is a checkbox/option somewhere asking you to if you want to distribute the app to Mac as well. DO NOT do that. If enough people do that we'll end up having a Mac app store walled garden powerful enough to extract its 30% tax.
- Apocryphon 2y ago
  Also, full of badly-ported Catalyst apps.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- Miraste 2y ago
  Even worse, a lack of software and market penetration on the Mac App Store is the only thing stopping Apple from disabling non-App-Store applications on Macs like they do on iOS. They've already implemented the technical side of it under the guise of "security."
  - drexlspivey 2y ago
    That's the only thing stoping Apple? Not the fact that if they did that every mac out there would become unusable?
    - solardev 2y ago
      I wonder how many people this actually applies to. Is it primarily developers who need non-app store software? Is there still a sizable number of people using Macs for other work (like school or design) like in the old days?
      - dazed_confused 2y ago
        I would say about 95% the software on my MacBook have nothing to do with the App Store. Whether for work, research, normal student stuff.
lapcat 2y ago
The entire App Store is still within the marketing department, which is all you need to know about how the App Store is run. This reorganization is internal to marketing, and the leaders are all part of that team.
- peppertree 2y ago
  Can you site any references to back that up? AppStore came out of iTunes and has always been part of services under Eddy Cue.
  - lapcat 2y ago
    From the submitted article: > Apple Fellow and former marketing SVP Phil Schiller will continue to oversee both of the new divisions. From Apple: > Phil Schiller is an Apple Fellow, responsible for leading the App Store and Apple Events." https://www.apple.com/leadership/phil-schiller/ https://www.apple.com/leadership/phil-schiller/ https://9to5mac.com/2024/08/21/app-store-vp-departing-apple-amid-broader-restructuring/ https://9to5mac.com/2024/08/21/app-store-vp-departing-apple-... > According to his LinkedIn, Fischer currently holds the title of “Vice President, Head of Worldwide App Store and Apple Arcade.” He joined Apple in 2003 and led marketing and partnerships for iTunes before shifting to the App Store in 2010. > Longtime Apple veteran Carson Oliver will lead the App Store team, while App Store product director Ann Thai will lead the alternative app distribution team. Oliver joined Apple in 2012 and currently serves as Senior Director of Business Management for the App Store. Thai joined Apple in 2010 and worked on Apple’s education apps marketing, eventually becoming “Worldwide Product Director, App Store and Apple Arcade” in January 2020. Marketing. Marketing. Marketing. Marketing.
    - willseth 2y ago
      None of this supports your claim that these roles are "within the marketing department". Phil Schiller is a _former_ marketing VP, a position he left 4 years ago. Carson Oliver has been business management roles his entire tenure at Apple. Ann Thai worked in apps marketing, but moved to product 4 years ago. These execs have marketing experience, but none of them came directly from marketing roles and one has no marketing background. Fischer, the guy who's leaving, hasn't worked in marketing since 2010.
renewiltord 2y ago
This is great. We get to see the experiment play out in real time. If it sucks, it'll only suck for the EU. If it rules, it's possible the global App Store will take on those characteristics or we may be able to do this by just importing from the EU.
- hu3 2y ago
  I'm sure it's on Apple's best interest to make it suck as much as possible within safe margins. So they can go like: "Seee! I told you it would be bad! Blame EU!"
- madeofpalk 2y ago
  Except we won’t actually see, because Apple still has their thumb massively on the scale to prevent any real competition. https://developer.apple.com/support/alternative-payment-options-on-the-app-store-in-the-eu/ https://developer.apple.com/support/alternative-payment-opti...
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
lacker 2y ago
It's gotta be tough running the "EU Alternative App Store" team, when the best thing for Apple overall would be if the alternative app store was a complete product failure, while technically satisfying all laws and regulations. Imagine doing a great job and building a great product, and upper management being like, well... strategically, ideally this product wouldn't be so great. Let's put someone more incompetent in charge, who will create a buggier, worse-designed product. Let's put a leader in place who will make this thing as bad as legally permissible.
- ASalazarMX 2y ago
  Apple is the kind of King Solomon that would indeed give the baby to the second woman, but cut in half regardless. Wonder if their corporate code of conduct has "Be a massive arrogant prick" instead of "Don't be evil".
specialist 2y ago
The Correct Answer™ is for Apple to divest the App Store. The party running a marketplace can not be allowed to also compete in that marketplace. Ditto Google, Amazon, Walmart, and so forth.
moi2388 2y ago
Am I seriously the only person who dislikes the alternative app stores and being allowed to install apps outside of app stores? If there were problems with the margins or which types of apps were allowed regulations should have tackled that instead. I don’t want my mother or grandmother to be able to install apps from random sources ever.
- Doxin 2y ago
  You're not the only one. The crux however is that you can't force that on everyone. There's nothing stopping apple from adding a fuse bit you can set yourself to disallow alternative app stores. That'd be completely legal. As long as it's a free choice to set that bit.
- troupo 2y ago
  > If there were problems with the margins or which types of apps were allowed regulations should have tackled that instead. Yes, and no. So, regulations did say: you can't prevent users from using other default apps than the ones you tell users to use. Hence users get a lot of new default settings: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41322904 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41322904 On the other hand you can't really have a regulation listing all possible apps and app features that should be allowed on the app store: there are just too many of them. So the best course of action is to let users install the apps on their own. As a result for no reason at all Apple now allows gaming emulators on the App Store because alternative app stores allow them. It's a tough balance to strike.
- TiredOfLife 2y ago
  Then don't use that feature. This year alone Apple removed VPN apps on behalf of a Fascist country that they can't even do business in due to sanctions.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- arepublicadoceu 2y ago
  > I don’t want my mother or grandmother to be able to install apps from random sources ever. If your mother or grandmother is tech-savvy enough to navigate the hurdles of enabling sideloading in the settings and deal with the scary warnings that come with it, then God bless them. My mother has used Android for many years, and even though they have had their Windows installation plagued with various viruses, she hasn’t managed to install a single virus on her Android phone yet. And yes, I check every time I go back home.

84 points by LorenDB 2y ago

Interesting that they are creating a separate team just for the EU app store, presumably because the EU is forcing Apple to make some changes. It seems like the investigations in the US, UK, Japan, etc will eventually lead to them being required to make similar changes everywhere.

transpute 2y ago
Geo-fenced app stores could align with geo-fenced networks bounded by GFC-style inspection and filtering of network packets.
- AmericanChopper 2y ago
  I’m very happy for Apple to geofence the EU cryptography backdoors they’re going to have to put in eventually.
- wmf 2y ago
  It's already happening. You can save money on the firewall if you can convince FAANGs to enforce things for you though.
blackeyeblitzar 2y ago
Creating a separate store just to be able to get away with anti consume anti competitive practices everywhere else is just so dishonest and unethical. I don’t understand why consumers give Apple the benefit of the doubt, trusting such a powerful entity to be benevolent. But I guess maybe it is because the everyday user isn’t visibly affected by those practices and they don’t know that they could benefit from change?
- happymellon 2y ago
  The alternative here is Google/Samsung. I'm not sure what you expect consumers to do, but my other halfs Pixel phones have been absolutely rubbish with a significant flaw each generation. My Fitbit has been degrading ever since Google picked them up. Samsung at least gives me working reliable hardware, but are still stuck with Android and Googles forcing of shitty extras. Other Android providers exist, but after being burnt several times by providers abandoning updates and my work VPN refusing to run with old versions with security flaws, I dont blame people for just going down the route that mostly works. We need an alternative to Android, but that would require companies to make web pages again instead of apps.
- eastbound 2y ago
  I don’t give Apple the benefit of the doubt, but Google didn’t encrypt my phone back when I was using it, and living in a city where mugging is frequent, this is criminal. Also I’ve always been disappointed with every single feature of Android, but that’s on the side of my choice matrix.
Miraste 2y ago
It's unlikely that the US will force Apple to make EU-style changes. It's been 26 years since the DOJ went after Microsoft and lost, and corporate regulation has only grown weaker.
- bogwog 2y ago
  Have you been following the news on this topic lately? Antitrust enforcement has had a huge resurgence under Biden, and it's actually looking like Google may get broken up soon. See: https://www.theverge.com/2024/8/11/24216760/google-trial-monopoly-remedies-rivals https://www.theverge.com/2024/8/11/24216760/google-trial-mon...
  - lolinder 2y ago
    What Google's rivals want and what this judge ends up deciding to do and what actually gets enforced in the end are three entirely different things.
  - Miraste 2y ago
    I have, and I don't believe that higher courts will ever go along with it. Microsoft lost their initial case too, and was ordered to break up at the time. Appeals courts prevent real change like that from happening--see the fate of the recent non-compete ban. Precedent suggests the antitrust cases will end in a small fine or a procedural change, at most.
    - ASalazarMX 2y ago
      "Alphabet extrudes smaller, useles Google to satisfy regulators"
troupo 2y ago
--- start quote --- users will get new default settings for dialing phone numbers, sending messages, translating text, navigation, managing passwords, keyboards, and call spam filters Additionally, the App Store, Messages, Photos, Camera, and Safari apps will now be deletable for users in the EU. --- end quote --- https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=zglax7gc https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=zglax7gc Instead being on top of things and pre-empting the inevitable, they are just reacting.
dagmx 2y ago
It’s not a separate team for the EU App Store, it’s a separate team for other app stores in the EU. As in one team for the Apple first party store in all countries and a second team for third party stores, which just happens to be in the EU.

user_7832 2y ago

> There will now be one team for the familiar, Apple-run App Store, and another one to handle alternative app stores in the European Union Could someone explain why Apple needs someone to handle something they're not doing? I assume 3rd party companies are running their own servers and everything, is this just for the client-side software development? Tangential but it's funny how by digging their heels in so tightly Apple's being forced so much. Sideloading (or "installing an app") has hardly been difficult on android (or desktop OSes), I don't think Google needs to set up a new team.

TheGlav 2y ago
If there was never infrastructure to handle third party app stores, then such infrastructure would need to be built, and assumptions based on idea that there are no third-party app stores have to be revisited and reworked. They have to then provide hooks for those third party app stores that never existed before (like anything related to launching download of an app, for example.)
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
transpute 2y ago
> why Apple needs someone to handle something they're not doing Regulatory compliance on the boundary between doing, "not doing", not "doing", "not" doing and not "not doing".
nostrademons 2y ago
Why do all the Big Tech companies have teams dedicated to Privacy, Trust & Safety, AI Ethics, etc? The way a large organization functions is to have a directly-responsible individual for each attribute that they care about (or don't care about, but are legally required to do), and then assume that person is looking out to advance that interest. They may or may not succeed - in large companies it's often very difficult to push the ball forward on attributes that the organization at large does not care about. But that gives the company somebody to fire and pin the blame on when negative consequences arise, which in turn shields the corporation itself from liability. And since the employees are themselves protected by the corporate liability shield, the worst that can happen is they lose their job, and don't get personally sued. This also explains why the role at Apple is being split between two executives: it gives them the option of firing the one in charge of the EU DMA efforts, if Apple is found in violation of them, without firing the one who is actually running the App Store.

dnag 2y ago

Since we're here I have a suggestion to offer. When submitting your mobile app to the App Store there is a checkbox/option somewhere asking you to if you want to distribute the app to Mac as well. DO NOT do that. If enough people do that we'll end up having a Mac app store walled garden powerful enough to extract its 30% tax.

Apocryphon 2y ago
Also, full of badly-ported Catalyst apps.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
Miraste 2y ago
Even worse, a lack of software and market penetration on the Mac App Store is the only thing stopping Apple from disabling non-App-Store applications on Macs like they do on iOS. They've already implemented the technical side of it under the guise of "security."
- drexlspivey 2y ago
  That's the only thing stoping Apple? Not the fact that if they did that every mac out there would become unusable?
  - solardev 2y ago
    I wonder how many people this actually applies to. Is it primarily developers who need non-app store software? Is there still a sizable number of people using Macs for other work (like school or design) like in the old days?
    - dazed_confused 2y ago
      I would say about 95% the software on my MacBook have nothing to do with the App Store. Whether for work, research, normal student stuff.

lapcat 2y ago

The entire App Store is still within the marketing department, which is all you need to know about how the App Store is run. This reorganization is internal to marketing, and the leaders are all part of that team.

peppertree 2y ago
Can you site any references to back that up? AppStore came out of iTunes and has always been part of services under Eddy Cue.
- lapcat 2y ago
  From the submitted article: > Apple Fellow and former marketing SVP Phil Schiller will continue to oversee both of the new divisions. From Apple: > Phil Schiller is an Apple Fellow, responsible for leading the App Store and Apple Events." https://www.apple.com/leadership/phil-schiller/ https://www.apple.com/leadership/phil-schiller/ https://9to5mac.com/2024/08/21/app-store-vp-departing-apple-amid-broader-restructuring/ https://9to5mac.com/2024/08/21/app-store-vp-departing-apple-... > According to his LinkedIn, Fischer currently holds the title of “Vice President, Head of Worldwide App Store and Apple Arcade.” He joined Apple in 2003 and led marketing and partnerships for iTunes before shifting to the App Store in 2010. > Longtime Apple veteran Carson Oliver will lead the App Store team, while App Store product director Ann Thai will lead the alternative app distribution team. Oliver joined Apple in 2012 and currently serves as Senior Director of Business Management for the App Store. Thai joined Apple in 2010 and worked on Apple’s education apps marketing, eventually becoming “Worldwide Product Director, App Store and Apple Arcade” in January 2020. Marketing. Marketing. Marketing. Marketing.
  - willseth 2y ago
    None of this supports your claim that these roles are "within the marketing department". Phil Schiller is a _former_ marketing VP, a position he left 4 years ago. Carson Oliver has been business management roles his entire tenure at Apple. Ann Thai worked in apps marketing, but moved to product 4 years ago. These execs have marketing experience, but none of them came directly from marketing roles and one has no marketing background. Fischer, the guy who's leaving, hasn't worked in marketing since 2010.

renewiltord 2y ago

This is great. We get to see the experiment play out in real time. If it sucks, it'll only suck for the EU. If it rules, it's possible the global App Store will take on those characteristics or we may be able to do this by just importing from the EU.

hu3 2y ago
I'm sure it's on Apple's best interest to make it suck as much as possible within safe margins. So they can go like: "Seee! I told you it would be bad! Blame EU!"
madeofpalk 2y ago
Except we won’t actually see, because Apple still has their thumb massively on the scale to prevent any real competition. https://developer.apple.com/support/alternative-payment-options-on-the-app-store-in-the-eu/ https://developer.apple.com/support/alternative-payment-opti...

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

lacker 2y ago

It's gotta be tough running the "EU Alternative App Store" team, when the best thing for Apple overall would be if the alternative app store was a complete product failure, while technically satisfying all laws and regulations. Imagine doing a great job and building a great product, and upper management being like, well... strategically, ideally this product wouldn't be so great. Let's put someone more incompetent in charge, who will create a buggier, worse-designed product. Let's put a leader in place who will make this thing as bad as legally permissible.

ASalazarMX 2y ago
Apple is the kind of King Solomon that would indeed give the baby to the second woman, but cut in half regardless. Wonder if their corporate code of conduct has "Be a massive arrogant prick" instead of "Don't be evil".

specialist 2y ago

The Correct Answer™ is for Apple to divest the App Store. The party running a marketplace can not be allowed to also compete in that marketplace. Ditto Google, Amazon, Walmart, and so forth.

moi2388 2y ago

Am I seriously the only person who dislikes the alternative app stores and being allowed to install apps outside of app stores? If there were problems with the margins or which types of apps were allowed regulations should have tackled that instead. I don’t want my mother or grandmother to be able to install apps from random sources ever.

Doxin 2y ago
You're not the only one. The crux however is that you can't force that on everyone. There's nothing stopping apple from adding a fuse bit you can set yourself to disallow alternative app stores. That'd be completely legal. As long as it's a free choice to set that bit.
troupo 2y ago
> If there were problems with the margins or which types of apps were allowed regulations should have tackled that instead. Yes, and no. So, regulations did say: you can't prevent users from using other default apps than the ones you tell users to use. Hence users get a lot of new default settings: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41322904 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41322904 On the other hand you can't really have a regulation listing all possible apps and app features that should be allowed on the app store: there are just too many of them. So the best course of action is to let users install the apps on their own. As a result for no reason at all Apple now allows gaming emulators on the App Store because alternative app stores allow them. It's a tough balance to strike.
TiredOfLife 2y ago
Then don't use that feature. This year alone Apple removed VPN apps on behalf of a Fascist country that they can't even do business in due to sanctions.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
arepublicadoceu 2y ago
> I don’t want my mother or grandmother to be able to install apps from random sources ever. If your mother or grandmother is tech-savvy enough to navigate the hurdles of enabling sideloading in the settings and deal with the scary warnings that come with it, then God bless them. My mother has used Android for many years, and even though they have had their Windows installation plagued with various viruses, she hasn’t managed to install a single virus on her Android phone yet. And yes, I check every time I go back home.