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Since Steve Jobs died, Apple's valuation has gone up 10x and revenue about 4x. It stands to reason that a larger company would attract more antitrust scrutiny,

Since Steve Jobs died, Apple's valuation has gone up 10x and revenue about 4x. It stands to reason that a larger company would attract more antitrust scrutiny, but it's hard to blame the executives for that.

MBCook 2y ago
I don’t think that’s what’s attracting it though. They’ve been going around demanding 30% of everyone’s revenue, no matter how tenuous the connection. And it’s getting them in trouble. Sure 30% of smurfberries is fine. That’s their rule, who cares. And they have a rule it doesn’t apply to physical goods, which is why you can order stuff in the Amazon app. But then they decided that people giving yoga lessons over the time during the lockdowns owed them 30%. And other apps that had been in the store for 15 years suddenly seemed to require 30% when they didn’t before. Want to sell e-books? You have to give Apple 30%. Now there isn’t 30% anywhere to give. But you have to. So saith Apple. Instead of keeping their cut the same or even lowering it, they’ve been effectively increasing it by deciding their rules apply to more and more apps and services. Which looks exactly like monopoly jacking up prices. “Just don’t have an iPhone app” isn’t really viable at this point for a lot of businesses. It’s not 2008. They didn’t actually need to do any of this. It’s not like they were going to collapse if they didn’t keep deciding to expand what was “theirs”. And every single time they’ve gotten in a fight with a government they keep doubling down and getting in trouble. Instead of giving an inch they dig in until they’re ordered to give up 12 miles. I like apple products. I’ve been using them forever. I do not like where the management has been going.
- jcranmer 2y ago
  The 30% starts off as a publisher/retailer's slice of the fee, for which 30% isn't a bad fee. But Apple has extended its 30% take from "this is what we take for people who buy stuff on our store" to "this is what we take for any transactions within applications buy from our store." This is (very weakly!) justifiable if you're looking at microtransactions as buying-on-an-installment-plan, but Apple is going much further and demanding 30% on what's effectively regular credit card transactions. And if people consider American credit cards' 3% fees to be borderline usurious, think how much outrage a credit card with 30% merchant fees would create. And that's basically what Apple is trying to push now, a credit card with 30% merchant fees. No wonder they're desperate to prohibit apps from telling people "you can buy it cheaper anywhere but Apple."
  - jjtheblunt 2y ago
    That’s a big cut, but it’s not exactly the same, because (for an example) credit card companies don’t have an automated and actual human team evaluating safety of and legitimacy for products sold.
    - jsjohnst 2y ago
      merchant providers don’t generally also handle customer service for the payments either, but that doesn’t entirely excuse apple’s behavior none the less
    - jcranmer 2y ago
      So Apple is clearly vetting everybody on Patreon to make sure they're kosher, which is why they get a larger take of the money than Patreon does? The 30% fee is cromulent when it's stuff that's clearly related to the app store activity. I'm not even that upset about charging a 30% fee on video game microtransactions. But the 30% fee is being charged on purchases made within app for content consumed outside of the app, which really starts to look a lot more like a 30% credit card transaction fee.
    - happymellon 2y ago
      > credit card companies don’t have an automated and actual human team evaluating safety of and legitimacy for products sold. Neither does Apple. They have a "review" process, but that's a far cry from actually providing real indemnity, and if they dont do that then its not worth the cost.
- jsjohnst 2y ago
  > They’ve been going around demanding 30% of everyone’s revenue Sorta Apples vs Oranges, but you should see how high the cut is for selling goods via places like Walmart/Amazon/Best Buy/etc.
  - microtherion 2y ago
    Or how high the cuts were for app vendors on pre-Apple cell phone stores.
- bigiain 2y ago
  > “Just don’t have an iPhone app” isn’t really viable at this point for a lot of businesses. It’s not 2008. Interestingly, the 2008 Steve Jobs advice "Just make web apps and have people point their iP{hone's browser at your thing" is actually workable advice for an awful lot of iOS apps these days. (I'm super pissed at Patreon caving to Apple and giving Apple 30% of every payment I send to support artists/creators just because Patreon think they need an iPhone app. )
  - philistine 2y ago
    The problem comes when you want to have an accessory that connects with Bluetooth, or notifications that 100% work, or you want to maintain a sound connection even with the screen off. You know, what a phone is for.
    - cma 2y ago
      Maybe doesn't apply to Firefox on iPhone, but firefox android at least can keep sound playing with the screen off. Does the mandatory webkit integration end up interfering with that? Not that Firefox has enough marketshare there to really help...
      - happymellon 2y ago
        With Firefox I can have YouTube running in the background. None of these things are technical limitations. They are purely political to extract more rent.
m463 2y ago
> Since Steve Jobs died, Apple's valuation has gone up 10x and revenue about 4x I say momentum. What new products has apple come out with post-jobs? (I think apple pay and airtags aren't compelling, and arm is not a product) Jobs said not to chase money anyway.
- jjtheblunt 2y ago
  Airpods of all the variations for one example, and those are ubiquitous. AppleTV+ subscription based series, many of which have been extraordinarily well received, for another example.
  - MBCook 2y ago
    Wasn’t the watch the first big post-Jobs product?
  - makeitdouble 2y ago
    Airpods' major appeal is the iPhone integration. To paraphrase Jobs, it's not a product it's a feature (or an accessory here), and the core of it is still the iPhone. For comparison the original (wired) earplugs were popular, but not at the level of being a massive business. Apple had to kill the 3.5 jack ("courage") and turn the proprietary integration knob to 11 to have the airpods fly off the shelves. Is AppleTV+ turning profits ?
    - philistine 2y ago
      I mean, AirPods is an accessory to the most successful computing platform in the world. It's a Fortune 500 company all on its own. Do not discount AirPods. People stick to iPhone because they love their AirPods. I sure do.
      - makeitdouble 2y ago
        > People stick to iPhone because they love their AirPods. Wow, I had the reverse course where I jumped off the iPhone train mainly because airPods were doing nothing for me compared to the competition (mainly Shokz), and I also wanted the 3.5 jack (and NFC as a bonus). I still get that people can enjoy their airPod as a good product, but don't see it as massively better than Bose or Sony's product for instance if set in a vacuum, which makes the difference in market size extremely artificial to my eyes.
makeitdouble 2y ago
Who would you blame if not the executives ? It isn't even the bucket stopping at them, it's directly their high level decisions and strategy that created the issues.
- IMTDb 2y ago
  The point here is that the antitrust concerns are a natural consequences of them doing their job properly; with Apple becoming a bigger company - which is what is expected of them - it is quite natural that Apple will attract more scrutiny regarding their practices as a dominant player. Their high level decisions and strategy created a desirable situation: Apple is bigger than ever. That situation has undesirable side effects, but overall the tradeoff is worth it. It's what we call "rich people problem"; those are real problems - that need to be handled - but they are problems that "you wish to have" because it also means you solved a ton of other - more pressing - issues. And people don't usually look for "blame" in these situations.
  - makeitdouble 2y ago
    There's an argument that Microsoft missed the whole mobile trend because of the antitrust trial and it's outcome, making them second guess potential moves. IBM got rid of it's computer division as one of the many results of the antitrust case and it's now basically a consulting company with researchers as a side gig. For any of these companies there was a path to keep making tremendous revenue without getting regulators on one's back, though it requires keeping producing competitive products. As an example, LVMH is an ultra profitable group with a tentacular hold on its markets, but you don't see governments constantly suing them. I'm not sure why you see getting struck down by whole governments to be some desirable "rich people problem".

MBCook 2y ago

I don’t think that’s what’s attracting it though. They’ve been going around demanding 30% of everyone’s revenue, no matter how tenuous the connection. And it’s getting them in trouble. Sure 30% of smurfberries is fine. That’s their rule, who cares. And they have a rule it doesn’t apply to physical goods, which is why you can order stuff in the Amazon app. But then they decided that people giving yoga lessons over the time during the lockdowns owed them 30%. And other apps that had been in the store for 15 years suddenly seemed to require 30% when they didn’t before. Want to sell e-books? You have to give Apple 30%. Now there isn’t 30% anywhere to give. But you have to. So saith Apple. Instead of keeping their cut the same or even lowering it, they’ve been effectively increasing it by deciding their rules apply to more and more apps and services. Which looks exactly like monopoly jacking up prices. “Just don’t have an iPhone app” isn’t really viable at this point for a lot of businesses. It’s not 2008. They didn’t actually need to do any of this. It’s not like they were going to collapse if they didn’t keep deciding to expand what was “theirs”. And every single time they’ve gotten in a fight with a government they keep doubling down and getting in trouble. Instead of giving an inch they dig in until they’re ordered to give up 12 miles. I like apple products. I’ve been using them forever. I do not like where the management has been going.

jcranmer 2y ago
The 30% starts off as a publisher/retailer's slice of the fee, for which 30% isn't a bad fee. But Apple has extended its 30% take from "this is what we take for people who buy stuff on our store" to "this is what we take for any transactions within applications buy from our store." This is (very weakly!) justifiable if you're looking at microtransactions as buying-on-an-installment-plan, but Apple is going much further and demanding 30% on what's effectively regular credit card transactions. And if people consider American credit cards' 3% fees to be borderline usurious, think how much outrage a credit card with 30% merchant fees would create. And that's basically what Apple is trying to push now, a credit card with 30% merchant fees. No wonder they're desperate to prohibit apps from telling people "you can buy it cheaper anywhere but Apple."
- jjtheblunt 2y ago
  That’s a big cut, but it’s not exactly the same, because (for an example) credit card companies don’t have an automated and actual human team evaluating safety of and legitimacy for products sold.
  - jsjohnst 2y ago
    merchant providers don’t generally also handle customer service for the payments either, but that doesn’t entirely excuse apple’s behavior none the less
  - jcranmer 2y ago
    So Apple is clearly vetting everybody on Patreon to make sure they're kosher, which is why they get a larger take of the money than Patreon does? The 30% fee is cromulent when it's stuff that's clearly related to the app store activity. I'm not even that upset about charging a 30% fee on video game microtransactions. But the 30% fee is being charged on purchases made within app for content consumed outside of the app, which really starts to look a lot more like a 30% credit card transaction fee.
  - happymellon 2y ago
    > credit card companies don’t have an automated and actual human team evaluating safety of and legitimacy for products sold. Neither does Apple. They have a "review" process, but that's a far cry from actually providing real indemnity, and if they dont do that then its not worth the cost.
jsjohnst 2y ago
> They’ve been going around demanding 30% of everyone’s revenue Sorta Apples vs Oranges, but you should see how high the cut is for selling goods via places like Walmart/Amazon/Best Buy/etc.
- microtherion 2y ago
  Or how high the cuts were for app vendors on pre-Apple cell phone stores.
bigiain 2y ago
> “Just don’t have an iPhone app” isn’t really viable at this point for a lot of businesses. It’s not 2008. Interestingly, the 2008 Steve Jobs advice "Just make web apps and have people point their iP{hone's browser at your thing" is actually workable advice for an awful lot of iOS apps these days. (I'm super pissed at Patreon caving to Apple and giving Apple 30% of every payment I send to support artists/creators just because Patreon think they need an iPhone app. )
- philistine 2y ago
  The problem comes when you want to have an accessory that connects with Bluetooth, or notifications that 100% work, or you want to maintain a sound connection even with the screen off. You know, what a phone is for.
  - cma 2y ago
    Maybe doesn't apply to Firefox on iPhone, but firefox android at least can keep sound playing with the screen off. Does the mandatory webkit integration end up interfering with that? Not that Firefox has enough marketshare there to really help...
    - happymellon 2y ago
      With Firefox I can have YouTube running in the background. None of these things are technical limitations. They are purely political to extract more rent.

m463 2y ago

> Since Steve Jobs died, Apple's valuation has gone up 10x and revenue about 4x I say momentum. What new products has apple come out with post-jobs? (I think apple pay and airtags aren't compelling, and arm is not a product) Jobs said not to chase money anyway.

jjtheblunt 2y ago
Airpods of all the variations for one example, and those are ubiquitous. AppleTV+ subscription based series, many of which have been extraordinarily well received, for another example.
- MBCook 2y ago
  Wasn’t the watch the first big post-Jobs product?
- makeitdouble 2y ago
  Airpods' major appeal is the iPhone integration. To paraphrase Jobs, it's not a product it's a feature (or an accessory here), and the core of it is still the iPhone. For comparison the original (wired) earplugs were popular, but not at the level of being a massive business. Apple had to kill the 3.5 jack ("courage") and turn the proprietary integration knob to 11 to have the airpods fly off the shelves. Is AppleTV+ turning profits ?
  - philistine 2y ago
    I mean, AirPods is an accessory to the most successful computing platform in the world. It's a Fortune 500 company all on its own. Do not discount AirPods. People stick to iPhone because they love their AirPods. I sure do.
    - makeitdouble 2y ago
      > People stick to iPhone because they love their AirPods. Wow, I had the reverse course where I jumped off the iPhone train mainly because airPods were doing nothing for me compared to the competition (mainly Shokz), and I also wanted the 3.5 jack (and NFC as a bonus). I still get that people can enjoy their airPod as a good product, but don't see it as massively better than Bose or Sony's product for instance if set in a vacuum, which makes the difference in market size extremely artificial to my eyes.

makeitdouble 2y ago

Who would you blame if not the executives ? It isn't even the bucket stopping at them, it's directly their high level decisions and strategy that created the issues.

IMTDb 2y ago
The point here is that the antitrust concerns are a natural consequences of them doing their job properly; with Apple becoming a bigger company - which is what is expected of them - it is quite natural that Apple will attract more scrutiny regarding their practices as a dominant player. Their high level decisions and strategy created a desirable situation: Apple is bigger than ever. That situation has undesirable side effects, but overall the tradeoff is worth it. It's what we call "rich people problem"; those are real problems - that need to be handled - but they are problems that "you wish to have" because it also means you solved a ton of other - more pressing - issues. And people don't usually look for "blame" in these situations.
- makeitdouble 2y ago
  There's an argument that Microsoft missed the whole mobile trend because of the antitrust trial and it's outcome, making them second guess potential moves. IBM got rid of it's computer division as one of the many results of the antitrust case and it's now basically a consulting company with researchers as a side gig. For any of these companies there was a path to keep making tremendous revenue without getting regulators on one's back, though it requires keeping producing competitive products. As an example, LVMH is an ultra profitable group with a tentacular hold on its markets, but you don't see governments constantly suing them. I'm not sure why you see getting struck down by whole governments to be some desirable "rich people problem".