Netflix stops paying the ‘Apple tax’ on its $853M in annual iOS revenue
techcrunch.com
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I am however not surprised by the slow rate of new features in stores because there still aren’t “tiers” for developers to willingly become early adopters of new store capabilities. When there are millions of apps, why does it make sense to delay any new feature until the infrastructure has grown to provide that feature to all million apps?
Clearly there should be a way to roll out enhanced storefronts to a few apps at a time. For example, charge early adopters/beneficiaries for complex new features and don’t roll them out to all apps right away (if ever).
And then, developers shouldn’t have to sacrifice 30% for features they don’t use, either. I’d rather have a tiny percentage as the base to provide only essential features, with infrastructure upgrade options! I should be able to give up some low X% for “basic payment processing and auto-installation on devices”, with an option of X+N% to provide “that, plus hosting of app preview videos and several dozen screenshot images”, a higher option of X+2N% for “all that, plus an increased chance of being featured”, etc.
Apple tax should be stopped, people are paying penalty to use their sub par software, this is as ridiculous as it gets.
Sony can decide who's games can be published on the PS4, and they get a cut of every single sale, physical or digital.
Incredibly, Miele have a monopoly on the retail sale of their whitegoods. When someone buys from a retailer, the retailer act as mere agents; the actual sale is actually directly between Miele and the customer.
And don't forget this result in a higher price for customer, while Costco's model save customer money.
I am however, see it as less of a problem if they charge fee over one-time purchase and make me aware of whether I am paying it.
There are other arguments to be made about the store fees, but Costco is pretty much like apple store and vendors don't even have the option of saying "hey they will not stock it but you can pick it there anyways", which is what Apple allows you to do by having an app that can be registered / paid for elsewhere.
Apple Store is no cheaper and 30% is a huge cut, many service providers raise the price for iOS user to compensate this. So customer gets no benefit paying the 30% premium, at least not in Netlfix's case. Watching Netflix on iPhone doesn't necessary make a different experience. This is all because Apple had a monopoly on iOS platforms, had there be another App Store, I am sure many users will go there to avoid the 30% cut on themselves. It is called Apple Tax for a reason.
Having a Costco subscription doesn't interfere with the customer from buying things from Walmart or Amazon. Costco couldn't demand to pay 30% lower wholesale prices than Amazon and then charge the same retail prices because suppliers would just sell through Amazon instead and have access to all the same customers. Even customers who have a Costco card can trivially buy anything from Amazon if the product is not available at Costco or even if Amazon just has the lower price.
The difference with Apple is that iOS users can't do that. Users can't reasonably buy an iOS app through anybody but Apple.
Another difference is that a phone is more than a thing to put apps on. A Costco card is only for buying things at Costco. Someone may buy an iPhone because they prefer the OS, or the hardware, and then get stuck with the App Store because it's not sold separately. Nobody pays for a Costco membership because they like the design of the card.
It's not really a market if the seller thinks there's no alternatives, and the buyer has no choice but to put up with anything. Works the other way around, too.
Just because this cruise happens to be the nicest, most comfortable vessel in the sea doesn't mean you have a right to expect space to be reserved on the ship for competitor's stores.
And in this company town, yes they own all the stores and playgrounds, but you can still get stuff delivered from anywhere. (All these phones have web browsers that give you unencumbered access to the wider internet. No you can't play Fortnite through a web browser, but you can't play football by mail-order either, so the analogy holds.)
Try telling that to your customers. "Yeah sure just sell your phone and buy an Android device to use our app". And having them use Safari? Yeah right. Apple doesn't even provide push notifications for web apps. Have you ever wondered why that is?
The fact is, if your customer has an iOS device, you must include Apple in the transaction and pay them 30%. And if you're a smaller developer there's no way they will let you get away with what Netflix and Epic have done. Oh you thought the review process was completely fair and impartial? Well, i've got some bad news about that too.
As for push notifications—it's not surprising that Apple doesn't allow the HTTP version because it would be chaos for battery life. Besides, any website can offer a totally free native app that simply performs push notifications for your site. You don't need to give up 30% of anything to Apple for that.
You listed the very limited set of notifications that are useful. and while there could be a couple more, everyone else should stop asking and doing it
Web push notifications use a browser-vendor-provided server to trigger notifications, the exact same architecture as APNS.
> Besides, any website can offer a totally free native app that simply performs push notifications for your site. You don't need to give up 30% of anything to Apple for that.
Iff you buy a Mac, pay their dev fees, rewrite your site as a native app, and put up with their review bullshit. That's not really an alternative to them supporting the standard.
This is false.
What Netflix and Epic are doing is completely within the terms Apple has laid out. The only thing they can't do is direct their iOS app customers elsewhere for the purpose of a monetary transaction.
And it's not limited to big corps. There are countless examples of small developers doing the exact same thing. For example, I subscribe to 1Password for use on my iOS device, and Apple doesn't get a single cent of that subscription fee.
> AgileBits are a very small private company
>>> And if you're a smaller developer there's no way they will let you get away with what Netflix and Epic have done.
So now we're getting somewhere. This is the height of the wall around this particular walled garden. Now let me ask this: What percentage of the population would even consider owning two smartphones? That's how close to an idealized monopoly this walled garden is. So granted, it's not a monopoly in an idealized sense. But we now quantify how "monopolish" it is.
Most people have one cable TV subscription. Which means if you want HBO on your cable TV box, you can only subscribe through your current cable TV provider. You can call this a monopoly if you like, doesn't make it wrong or illegal.
It is, however, the exact reason for having network neutrality requirements.
That said, I would not pay for 2 personal smartphones.
Edit: spelling
It would be like if the company town made you leave your clothes behind if you decide to leave.
Netflix will still continue to work on iOS, so it seems like it is working out for them. They very much have the legal right to do this.
I don't have to 'beg' to later cancel my subscription. I don't have to worry about my credit card being stolen. I don't have to worry about a bunch of sophomoric engineers breaking their own website and creating grief for me.
I am in control with Apple. I prefer it. I am the customer.
I realize Netflix is no startup. I realize I may be paranoid and not even a fan of the Stripe madness that every two-bit startup uses.
But Netflix is still YAFS (Yet Another Friggin Subscription) that I have to manage on some other platform.
I prefer to have Apple be the "overseer" of even Netflix.
Would I cancel my Netflix subscription if I'm not at least provided the option of continuing my Apple management of their subscription? I'm leaning heavily toward it.
Don't be naive, everyone. This is more than just about the 30% cut. This is also about Netflix having a LOT of extra data on their customers they can't get within the Apple ecosystem.... home addresses, full names, credit card data, and possibly (yes, quiet possibly) cross-referencing that with other data providers to determine credit scores, income brackets, lifestyle choices, etc.
Why wouldn't' Netflix want a complete 'subscriber per zip code' breakdown. Yes, they could guesstimate it with IP addresses (and probably do), but now they could even say, "Hmmm... these subscribers appear to have 700 beacon scores, are single, and pay with a Titanium credit card. Surely, we could charge them more per month and they'd still pay. Or at least spam, er, offer them premium packages".
Not saying they don't have the right. Just as long as they don't say I don't have the right to stick with my Protective Shield of Apple.
After 2018 and all the data breaches the past two years, it's almost enough to want to pay cash for everything - or just bow out altogether. What little things I want to stay with, I prefer some 'middleman' that I can trust. Like Apple.
P.S. I am not an Apple Fanboy. But they are devoted to my privacy like no other Big tech company. So, they get my business. For now.
I am no developer of iOS, but I am quite sure that Apple gives this information to developers. I worked in a payment system for years and this kind of information is quite common to share with your API users. I think they're even obligated by law because you can't really have a monetary transfer without sharing more details between both parties involved (yeah, you also have more information about the seller when money is involved).
I mean, I don't see how Apple would share less information with Netflix, them say, Stripe itself. Of course Netflix has some more information about you because you're using their platform to make the payment, however about the payment data itself I would say the information they can get with both Apple or Stripe is similar [1].
[1]: Unless of course Netflix made their own payment system, that also would make sense considering their size. In this case they would have more information about you, like full Credit Card number instead of only the bin number of your Credit Card. However I don't think this would make my point much different.
[1] There was a very brief period of time in the early days of Google supporting paid apps when some very limited customer information was provided (iirc, it was maybe email address and city level information) but that changed very quickly and I don't believe Apple ever provided this.
They did bend enough in 2011 to allow their customers to choose to share some limited information when subscribing to the digital version of a magazine.
>As for subscriber data, Apple will allow customers to provide publishers with name, e-mail and zip code information at the time of subscription. This is optional
It analyzes product reviews to detect fake ones.
Lots of banks have virtual cards now that you can generate for one time use or for subscription services with a dollar/expiration date limits. I highly recommend seeing if your bank has such a feature.
This is also about Netflix having a LOT of extra data on their customers
Apple's privacy stance is what Steve Jobs believed in, and what Tim Cook has stuck with, because they know that leaving privacy-based decisions up to third-party developers never ends well.
Here are excerpts from Jobs 2010 interview with Walt Mossberg [0]:
“Silicon Valley is not monolithic,” Jobs responded, “We’ve always had a very different view of privacy than some of our colleagues in the Valley.” Apple, for instance, does not leave it up to developers to decide whether to be dutiful about warning users that their apps are tracking their location data, instead forcing pop-ups on users to alert them that an app is tracking them, and to turn off that ability if they don’t want. “We do a lot of things like that, to ensure that people know what these apps are doing,” he added.
"Privacy means people know what they’re signing up for, in plain English, and repeatedly. I’m an optimist; I believe people are smart, and some people want to share more data than other people do. Ask them. Ask them every time. Make them tell you to stop asking them if they get tired of your asking them. Let them know precisely what you’re going to do with their data."
“A lot of people in the Valley think we’re really old-fashioned about this,” Jobs said in the interview, “And maybe we are, but we worry about stuff like this.”
[0]: https://qz.com/1236322/apples-steve-jobs-tried-to-warn-faceb...
As opposed to leaving their API wide open so anyone could access anybodys photos and files? Hence, the fappening.
Apple is a marketing company, not a technology company.
SJ was obsessed with control more than privacy and believed developers would make a mess of his beautiful iPhone. Every decision always started from that angle.
No, I believe privacy that we understand it today is wholly Tim Cook. This is his vision for Apple and how he wants to run the company. Good for him and it definitely plays better against Android.
as for your point, i don't think it was an either-or situation. i think both jobs and cook considered both control and privacy (among considerations like litigation, as you mention). jobs seemed more overtly a control freak though (not that that's always a bad thing).
It seems perfectly compatible for Jobs to make those statements about privacy after weighing the cost for Apple to implement robust cloud infrastructure and services, and (potentially) deciding Apple would just not compete in that space.
It's like Google finally conceding it won't be a social network, only not having wasted a ton of resources before pulling the plug. Actually, with their messaging apps being spun up and spun down, Google may still be in the midst of pulling.
If that's the case, wouldn't it be better to not, you know, not speculate? Anyone can come up with a plausible sounding reason for x once there is some evidence of y, but it doesn't change the underlying fact that it is all a conjecture -- drawing conclusion(s) from incomplete information.
I pointed you to information refuting your central claim but since you are not privy to salient information, saying nothing is much better than expanding on your conjecture.
Also, how is an interview complete information?
I also pointed out later that I don't see the information you provided as refuting what I said, but compatible with it. From your response, it seems reasonable to ask what refuting is happening here.
“Am I the only one who is convinced Apple is focused on privacy because its cloud tech is really far behind Google and privacy was a path largely ignored in a data driven world?”
I pointed to the explanation given in 2010 by the founder/CEO of Apple, regarding their stance on privacy — it was conceived because of the risk of third-party developers going rogue as has happened with Facebook/CambridgeAnalytica (even though Zuck was in the audience). Apple’s privacy position was taken independent of Google.
Google’s competitive advantage over Apple today wrt cloud tech comes from public-facing cloud infrastructure & expertise that was previously internal to Google — Google’s cloud advantage was completely non-existent back in 2010 when Jobs granted that interview.
In 2010, GCP didn’t really exist yet, developers/end users could only interact with sandboxed apps on App Engine; GCP was still in infancy, the market leader in cloud tech was and still is AWS.
Google’s main competitive advantage back then was in search, Apple recognized this and did not try to compete head-to-head with Google (like Yahoo! or Bing), or the way Google competed but failed against Facebook. (Apple would later go up against Google in maps.)
OTOH, Apple did try to compete head-to-head with Amazon using iBooks, but they shot themselves in the foot by colluding with publishers to raise prices.
From what I can tell from recaptcha requests, Google still hasn’t figured out how to teach something to identify storefronts, bicycles, crosswalks, or traffic lights.
That said, more consideration of privacy as part of product development practice in business, even if non-businesses may end up winning more from this, is a good thing.
Nobody much cares about Apple TV either.
Apple is taking a sizable chunk of revenue and they don't have enormous leverage.
Taking away Netflix from Apple users would hurt Apple more than Netflix and people will happily sign up on via their browser. It's not like Netflix is a fly by night org they have a similar rep to Apple because users don't make fine distinctions.
Apple will suck it up and any negative for Netflix will be a rounding error compared to the pile of cash saved.
Would you pay 30% more via the App Store if given the choice?
It also can trigger negative repercussions if you do have an ongoing relationship with the company, like IIRC Steam locks your whole account if you go that path on the basis that it indicates fraud to be blocked (not just that you wanted to cancel)
1. Navigate to list of subscriptions.
2. Find desired subscription in list.
3. Click cancel.
Nobody else does that and it is so nice.
Play Store > Menu > Subscriptions > select subscription > Cancel Subscription
Seems pretty similar to me.
Click “more”
Click “account”
Click “cancel”
Off course, this isn’t the same as having a centralized location for managing all subscriptions, but at least in this case the cancellation process is the same number of steps.
I've always believed that they should be the ones providing subscription management, because scummy "hope they forget to cancel!" business practices exist offline too, so Apple could never become the central place for managing all of your subscriptions.
It's strange. Sure I trust Visa and my bank with the literal fruit of my labour so far in life, but I don't think I could abide them knowing what exactly I use their financial tools to do (besides what little information a vendor chooses to share).
It probably doesn't make any difference in reality, but I just feel more comfortable with one party having full access to my funds but little to no information about how those funds are used, and another with all that usage information but little/easily revoked access to my funds.
Edit: I also think the current rigorous process around directly contesting transactions with your bank/card provider does more good than harm, and on contemplation wouldn't scrap it for ease of canceling subscriptions.
No idea how they'd pull it off – do you have to set up relationships with every provider, globally?! – but it's certainly an interesting idea. The number of subscriptions we have is only going in one direction.
I have a weird money management system that involves two bank accounts, one of which regularly can go down to a zero balance. When this happens, I rely on the bank to deny the transaction when I use my debit card, which they do—I have overdraft "protection" turned off—unless it's an autorenewing subscription. My bank has told me these types of transactions can't be blocked because they're considered pre-approved.
My point being, the credit card company knows which transactions are "subscriptions", so they should be able to provide you with a list. No provider relationship needed.
(I'm in the US, no idea if Australia is the same)
A big bank has the muscle to attempt this, because most service providers would be too scared to let these transactions fail and send collections after people because having too many charge backs paints a target on your back and they could get booted off the network.
This generally lines up with my philosophy that all payments should be initiated by users on a one-off basis. It really shouldn't be too much hassle to approve every monthly recurring cost you have.
Steve Jobs is laughing in his grave.
Apple did try ads and they failed. So they changed their business to something they can handle. Something even required by law through GDPR.
The most obvious prove was that Apple had insufficiently implemented GDPR according to a consumer organisation on the EU, a month after implementation. Where they surveyed all tech companies.
They love GDPR because they think it would hurt their competitors though
> I don't have to worry about my credit card being stolen.
But I don't think it is going to last long, I got a message from Kik telling, their bot developers should be registered as an Apple Developer[1]!
Meanwhile, Facebook mentions in their bot developer guidelines that no digital goods should be sold in their Messenger platform; likely to 'not' avoid Apple Tax.
The cost of Apple's gatekeeping -- their review bureaucracy -- is entirely their own doing and benefits no one. Software can and should be sold directly. There is zero justification for a middleman with digital delivery.
They say it's for consumers which is absolute nonsense when you look at what makes it into the store. Most of it is garbage.
The effect on "real" developers is staggering: Discoverability is virtually non-existent, the review process is time wasting, opaque and capricious. There is constant downward pressure on pricing. Reviews have to be aggressively managed, either by begging users for positive reviews or buying them and risking a ban, since people tend to review when they're pissed off. And then, Apple takes 30% off the top for your trouble.
The 2 million apps (or whatever it is now) boast is laughable. Apart from the expected stuff (browsers, social networks, etc) there is a dearth of worthwhile software. Which is a shame given the capabilities of the platform and its overall utility.
I don't see the US regulating Apple (or any big tech) given the prestige and money coming into the country, so I'm sure status quo will remain. But Apple should really be forced to open up iOS as a platform. And I say that as someone opposed to government intervention.
I will say this, if they ever close macOS as a platform, I'm changing careers and throwing away all of my Apple products. Which would be a shame, since they really are the best in a number of areas.
It's simply a power and money grab. Anyone who says anything else is full of shit.
When Steve Jobs was asked about the exorbitant fee when the app store was born, he said it wasn't an issue because people were going to be using web apps instead anyway. And that's exactly what we should have done.
That was actually the reason I ditched my Android and switched to an iPhone a few years back. After writing an app for both platforms and seeing how terrifyingly easy it was to get on the Play store ($25 and 4 hours after uploading the apk) vs Apple's more rigorous review process which took close to a month, checked out our company's DUNS number and _actually_ tested/used the app.
Also the cluster hell that is the forced Android permission system and how intrusive the most basic ones are vs. Apple's opt-in "Read contacts? (Yes/No)" while using the app are why I'd never go back.
An optional appstore with verifications is one (great) thing, making it mandatory is another. We have the entirery of desktop computers history to know that. That's like saying "I ditched Linux/OSX/Windows because they allowed me to install things not from their package manager/store".
And if what you meant is "I enjoy a well curated app store", well the truth is that apple's store is not well curated at all, that many apps are being abusive anyway especially from the big ones, and that there are several alternative stores for Android if you want one.
I just can't agree with "I want apple to make it impossible for me to be in control of what runs on my device even if they disagree", and I think both stores are absolutely terrible so I don't get the whole "I ditched terrible for execrable".
> Also the cluster hell that is the forced Android permission system and how intrusive the most basic ones are vs. Apple's opt-in "Read contacts? (Yes/No)" while using the app are why I'd never go back.
That hasn't been the case for quite some time, apps now ask for granular permissions and they do so when they need it the first time. There are still some holdouts that don't upgrade to the newer api on purpose but that's why google is bumping the minimum api version to publish on the store soon and force those leftover to clean up.
Just look at how each OS handles e.g. location permissions.
Though if we're being frank, just like I said about the app store quality, I believe that apple permission system is well above others, but it's still nowhere near good enough. Rule is, don't install crap on your phone thinking "the permission system will protect me from all abuse", it won't.
Sure, and it's great that Android has side-loading and it would be nice if Apple offered that too without a Mac/Dev License and XCode. But, given the option between the two ecosystems, I continue to choose iOS.
> There are still some holdouts that don't upgrade to the newer api on purpose but that's why google is bumping the minimum api version to publish on the store soon
I've heard a similar argument 4+ years ago, this was supposed to be fixed in Lollipop: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8461466
Now (like right now and for the first time) google is making is impossible to publish new apps, or update to existing apps, using the older api.
That's two very different things, "X is deprecated but still there, the new Y is available for those who want it" and "X is removed now, you must use Y".
Recurring revenue is a much different proposition— even for small or first time apps. A player like netflix which handles it’s own marketing, payment and all other ancilliary services doesn’t need to anything the apple store is offering other than distribution. I would understand if apple took $1 or some one time download fee but to regularly claim 30% of Netflix revenue seems like a stretch. While I think apple could make the case that they signed up through iOS, i think it is equally fair for Netflix to disable this option.
that is fine if you ever show up as featured. Which is 1% of the apps, and even then, from already big companies after they spent the marketing money. Other than that, for distribution (really?) and payment, there are tons of alternatives/competition the small apps cannot even consider.
App store is nothing other than a racketeering scheme where you have to pay if you can't "protect" yourself against. It is "robber barons"/"ma-bell"/etc all over again.
I don't think I found any of these through their listings or search, maybe those could be better? But the space is huge, maybe random blogs etc. can do better than any centralised store.
The Apple app store is actually a huge improvement over that model; it just seems unfair because digital sales shouldn't cost much, right? Right??
Well, Apple created the marketplace. They spend a lot of money making that marketplace work correctly, keeping their software platforms and merchant facilities robust for customers and developers, and putting that marketplace in the hands of hundreds of millions of people. They built this opportunity for devlopers and every developer who has built an app did so knowing exactly what the terms were.
If you don't like it, don't complain after you voluntarily and knowingly agreed to the terms.
In the past, you bought hardware that could run software from more than one retailer.
You are free to make that choice.
Meanwhile, I'd appreciate if you didn't object to my right to choose a managed ecosystem if that is what I prefer. I like the Apple ecosystem the way it is, thank you very much.
i do not believe that apple allows you to sideload apps without jailbreaking (which voids warranty iirc). Therefore, the user is not free to make that choice.
You are free to make that choice [of running software from more than one retailer] by choosing a different computing platform. Hundreds of models of Android phone are available at every price point, from super-budget to super-premium.
It's important to me that I can choose a platform that has a strongly walled ecosystem because I greatly prefer the advantages of it more than I dislike the disadvantages. That's my opinion and I am happy that a product exists that satisfies my needs. If you don't like Apple's ecosystem, don't buy their products.
Asking for an Apple device that uses the Android/AOSP business model is like insisting that Jeep builds a Wrangler with a Tesla drivetrain. If that's really what you want and you're willing to put the effort in, you can make it yourself. It's entirely possible.
The market has your back though, because Android gives you a very different experience from Apple.
Or even if Jeep started adding specific "features" that attempted to make it difficult for people to modify their car.
Apple used to literally sue people for this stuff. That's immoral. And the courts shutdown those frivolous lawsuits from Apple.
It is perfectly reasonable for people to modify products that they own. If you don't like then, then feel free to not modify your product. You own it, and all.
You could never buy software for your phone from more than one retailer. Or are you trying to force the desktop computing model onto Apple ?
It used to be that the maker of the OS spent tremendous efforts to attract developers. They did this for free to gain app market share.
So, your argument falls flat. Apple is doing this to generate profit. They continue doing so because of their dominant iOS market share and that for apps there is no alternative.
Please stop making excuses for trillion dollar companies.
Yes, that's what companies do. If you don't like capitalism, your beef isn't with Apple, it's with your government.
1. Citation needed (because looks like you are pulling these numbers out of your ass).
2. And by your argument, looks like people have more choices on Android. Who would have thought?!
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
Edit: you've unfortunately been breaking the site guidelines so often that I've banned your account.
If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future.
This is simply not true. As a small app developer, I can tell you first hand that Apple only promotes and supports larger apps in the ecosystem. It is the exception, not the rule, when they promote a smaller app.
As a developer, you are on your own on the marketing and discovery front. The billing infrastructure you allude to would be easily replaceable with a dozen or so startups and wouldn't warrant a 30 percent hit that Apple charges.
Of course they're going to hype the big games. It's opportunity cost. Advertisement leads to sales, but feeding a hype train gets you more. If they stop advertising the hot new game to showcase yours then that person is not getting promoted. The guy who had no problems ignoring your game gets promoted and now everybody answers to them.
Is it awesome? No. Do I like it? Not really. But it's rational, and getting large companies to be rational is often better than you can expect.
It's no coincidence that on both stores you cannot filter out apps that have in app purchases
Go look through the Today/Games section right now. All of the featured games will be from super high quality indie developers. It isn't the ones that make the most money.
We’re a two person shop. We’ve taken zero funding. We’re nowhere near Fortnite revenue.
Apple has done an outstanding job promoting us. Last month they gave us our first Today tab feature, and at any given time we can be found in several lists.
I am actually fine if Apple doesn't do any sort of discovery or promotion of our apps. Just don't charge 30 percent then.
I’m sure many great apps went nowhere. That’s the nature of entrepreneurship. I’d say Apple’s promotion significantly improves the survival odds for small teams doing great work.
If your app doesn't meet a certain level of quality then Apple will not feature you. But if you do then it is almost certain that at some point they will. I suspect your app falls in the former category.
That just seems silly. They should at least be rotating through a list of a few hundred apps per day.
Also, as a consequence I am quickly bored by browsing the store. Top-10 lists virtually never change. Featured lists seem like the same 3 apps forever. And a “See All” link that shows nothing more than the same 3 apps from the front page is just insulting. Apple needs much, much, much more in their featuring.
I have friends at Apple who curate the App Store and I have a number of apps on the store as well. Your statement is categorically wrong.
Apple absolutely supports small developers. If you look through many of their "editor playlists" you will see plenty of smaller apps that get a lot of attention e.g. Bear, Notability, Calm. Even apps like Instagram were small once.
We have rave reviews on one of our apps and a very enthusiastic community in a unique space, but having a hell of a time getting the eye of anyone at Apple.
Then be polite, succinct and be specific about what you want. Don't just say "feature me". Say can you please include me in the playlist "Favourite Travel Apps" etc.
This is why both Apple and Google introduces the reduced rate after the first year of subscription, which in my opinion will eventually become the norm from the get go. It’s only a letter of time.
Ultimately, even such seemingly large losses are still a really small fraction of Apple’s bottom line. Once more apps find ways to do this is when Apple will start noticing.
Full disclosure: I used to work for Spotify. My personal take on the fee was that 2%-3% is the floor (credit card processing), but Apple could charge up to 5% and reasonably justify the value-add without risking price gouging or anti-competitive claims.
No, I don't think they're in financial trouble. Their CFO, Barry McCarthy, is a pro--he took Netflix public.
Personally, I’d be willing to pay the “Apple Tax” on top of a subscription services’ cost for the peace of mind that comes from knowing that cancelling is easy. What a pain it will be when all the other subscription services stop paying the “Apple Tax”. I hope Apple comes up with a solution. Clearly their current cut is too much.
Appears that will never happen.
I hope, one day, we get compulsory licensing for movies and TV shows, like is available for music -- then we can really watch whatever, as long as it has been digitized.
There wasn't any one thing that made me decide to cancel, one day I realized I hadn't used it in several months and the UI made it a pain to use when I did, so I canceled.
The problem is a huge percentage of users assume deleting the app will also stop their subscription, but it does not.
"You have a subscription for this app's services through Apple Pay. Do you want to unsubscribe?"
They could even say something like
"You have a subscription for this app's services through Apple Pay. Do you want to unsubscribe? Note that this app is still installed on your iPad" (assuming you deleted it from your iphone)
As a tangent I notice that while Apple's hardware and OS are best in class their support infrastructure is arguably close to worst in class. Every time I have to deal with their support and order systems (apple.com) I run into issues that make it almost seem like they're still doing everything on paper and that none of their systems are connected.
I've never seen a simpler and more straightforward billing UX as Apple's.
Settings -> <Name> -> Subscriptions
Settings -> iTunes & App Store -> tap on your Apple ID at the top of the screen -> tap on view Apple ID -> scroll to subscriptions and tap on that
It’s not obvious or intuitive in my opinion.
You can also like the parent poster said, use App Store -> Profile Picture -> Tap Apple ID -> Subscriptions.
I don't like how it doesn't show the purchase method on the TouchID screen - it's fine if you are using it a lot, but if you only use it infrequently, it's annoying to not know which payment method it is using.
I was trying out a bunch of weather apps (why is is so hard for a simple concise app with a radar without a bunch of needless fluff/wasted space) and 1 of them automatically turned into $99/year after 3 or 7 days (I forget).
The app didn't even work and would almost _always_ have the time wrong making the weather HUD also inaccurate. I tried to tell apple about this and they refused a refund. Thankfully my credit card company allowed a chargeback
I can only blame myself for forgetting these things, but it would be nice for a prompt prior to the subscription starting next time you use the app.
You can tell people what it'll cost and ask for a card, or, you can say it is free and not ask up front (you can ask later if you want but having not given you a card for the free trial if the customer has lost interest they're not going to give you one later)
It may be great for consumers but it's been a constant headache for devs and publishers since the beginning of the App Store because it's very hard to work out the source of any shrinkage. Netflix is probably better positioned to pursue these cases but for a lot of indie devs the cost of investigation far outweights any benefit so they have to accept it as a part of the business cost on top of the 30% already charged by AAPL.
I loathe the constant spam (from reputable merchants) and junk snail mail I get every day. Every few months I spend 20 min unsubscribing and refiltering email. Most people I know just let it clog up their mail app. I probably spend at least the same amount of time with junk mail.
I realize it's difficult for an advertiser to reach me for actually useful things. But when I travel and see TV adverts, I'm glad I'm not constantly reminded that I should give luxury cars as Christmas gifts or how awesome shower gel is. I'm not interested in refinancing my mortgage every month or consolidation of debt I don't have. I don't care that my cellphone provider is broadcasting a NYE live show or the last car dealership I bought a car from wants me to switch insurance companies.
I am a flutter developer myself, so technically I could publish all my apps on iOS and Android with minimal changes. But since Apples developer program would eat up a significant portion of my potential yearly earnings I simply publish only on the Play Store that only charges a modest 25€ one time registration fee.
I’d say 90% better review and 10% the annual fee, personally. Not convinced it’s worth it.
This trade off is typically okay for iFolk though.
Some people were up in arms about crap being pushed onto Steam, and it had no long term effect (Before or after anything was done about it)
But as far as $99, between my $300 a year Linux Academy subscription, $144 a year JetBrains Resharper subscription and the money I spend on Udemy, $99 a year is nothing.
Last time I used iOS had terrible apps for Keepass (I tested them all, trust me [1]), while Android has at least two very good implementations (both opensource, one based on the official C# implementation with a native interface in Mono and another one less featured however fully written in Java).
> But as far as $99, between my $300 a year Linux Academy subscription, $144 a year JetBrains Resharper subscription and the money I spend on Udemy, $99 a year is nothing.
Congratulations, so for you this is nothing. If I wanted to develop for iOS as a hobbyst I would need to pay ~R$400,00 (this is equivalent almost half of a minimum wage in Brazil) [1]. I am not even including the expenses of buying a iOS device and a Mac just to have the "privilege" to develop to an Apple device.
[1]: Or don't, because Apple Store search is terrible. [2]: Just to make clear, I could afford this too if I wanted. However just because you and I can afford it doesn't mean this tax is abusive.
Paying for courses and continuous learning is.
If I had a desire to be an iPhone developer, I would gladly pay $99 a year to publish an app to the store to show to potential employees/clients.
I wonder if Apple is letting this slide because it's enough money that Netflix would feel sufficiently motivated to spend lots of money to take Apple to court over it. Apple could lose a lot more than a billion a year if the law sides against them, which is a likely outcome. They would have to let everyone pick their payment provider. Everyone from Stripe to Paypal would rush in with better and better payment terms.
Better to keep anyone capable of winning a legal challenge against them happy.
Subscriptions that force you to subscribe out of the store: DirecTVNow, ACloudGuru, Amazon Prime Video, Sling, Spotify.
I doubt very seriously that Apple is stopping your app because of a fear of competition but not stopping dozens of other players.
https://www.theverge.com/2017/1/19/14323438/apple-audible-ex...
You still can. Safari still works does it not ?
Slow app store speed.
It doesn't matter what device I'm on - multiple macbooks, imacs, iphones, ipods, ipads, etc, all running through multiple cable and dsl providers in multiple states over the last decade.
Download speed is abysmal. 30meg app update - why does this take 2-3 minutes on a connection that can get 120Mbps from multiple other sources? I've just never been able to understand how they can stream live video around the world instantly, but grabbing an 8meg update is *ever a > 1 minute process.
12+ devices over a decade, from multiple carriers in multiple states, and always slow speeds. But no doubt other people here will have "all my updates are less than 8 seconds, all the time, for years" anecdotes. :/
Apart from Netflix Servers ( Fast.com, I really wish Netflix would make a CDN for others to use ), I think Apple now has one of the best CDN network.
Despite your dismissive last line I have to share my data. Here are my results for my currently updateable apps on residential Comcast in the Midwest from the moment “Update” is hit until “Open” appears:
- Strong 117.6MB 15 seconds
- Waze 100.6MB 20 seconds
- Keyforge 44.6MB 5 seconds
I just did an install last night of a 100meg app which took 'only' 1 minute - maybe things are improving in to 2019?
The article shows numbers based on a 30% fee when it explicitly says it is actually 15%.
"meaning Apple was making around $700,000 by doing nothing other than allowing Netflix to offer subscriptions in its app"
It seems a bit unfair also.
I have no horse in this race, but the author seems to have
Amazon Video - subscription outside of the app that lets you play prime movies or you can purchase or rent a movie from Amazon’s website and watch it on the app.
Amazon Kindle - you can buy a book on Amazon’s website and download it to the app.
Coxmixology - again, you can buy a comic on the website and use it on the app.
SlingTV - you buy a subscription on the website and stream video on the app.
DirecTVNow - same as above.
Google Play Video - same as Amazon Video.
Spotify - subscription you buy on the website and stream music on the app.
Should I continue?
Any app makers not happy should boycott the platform and just release Android apps. Of course, they’d also need to avoid the Google Play store as they have pretty similar rates to the App store[0]
[0]https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answ...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Cor....
On the Android side of things, Google doesn't have near the same level of control, so that is false equivalence. One can easily side load apps, and people do all the time (Fortnite for example, couldn't happen on iOS but did on Android). There's also competing app stores (F-Droid, Amazon App store), so a very different situation. You can also run any OS you want on your device if Google's Android flavor isn't to your liking. Google also doesn't make/sell most of the hardware.
Microsoft got in trouble for simply making it very easy for people to use IE instead of Netscape and Word instead of WordPerfect. Imagine if they had gone a step further and mandated that only apps that pass a Microsoft review process could even be installed at all?
iOS does not because there are more Android devices than iOS devices.
Regarding your first part about apple having a monopoly on what runs on an iPhone: so does Samsung on fridges/washing machines/ovens, or almost any other embedded system for that matter. My router-maker also does not allow me to put different software on my router, and I can’t run software that hasn’t been allowed explicitly by Microsoft/Sony on an Xbox/Playstation.
This is ‘whataboutism’ but why is it only an issue for Apple devices but A-OK and ‘normal’ for every other example?
technically it’s called “in-app purchase” [1]
Tax instead of a fee because it's unavoidable to do business on the platform. Akin to a sales tax to sell items in an area. Terms are fungible but it's a reasonable term.
> I have no horse in this race, but the author seems to have
Assuming the author has bias repeating a commonly used term indicates more about bias on the assumer than the one using common terms.
That said, Netflix is a company I've grown to trust. I have no reason to look at Netflix's app statistics in the app store. I have no incentive to make personal transactions with Netflix through a third party app store. I simply go to their website, enter my card information, and enjoy their service without thinking about it ever again.
Most of the reviews I've seen are obvious shills, or else useless "works ok" reviews with a 5 star rating
> 1-star
> Used to be awesome but has a bug I don't like now!
> This app used to be amazing but now I want some feature that it doesn't have. Rating this 1-star as a way to strong arm the developer into adding my favorite feature. By the way I'll forget to come back and update this review should I actually get what I want.
i wonder if apple has abandoned mac and it's ancillary products to cowboy coders. the "quality" that people talk about is completely missing from mac software
>publishers can sell digital subscriptions on their web sites, or can choose to provide free access to existing subscribers. Since Apple is not involved in these transactions, there is no revenue sharing or exchange of customer information with Apple.
https://mashable.com/2011/02/15/apple-subscription-model/
The sticking point in my eyes has been that the free app cannot provide a link to the website where you buy a subscription to the content.
>Apple does require that if a publisher chooses to sell a digital subscription separately outside of the app, that same subscription offer must be made available, at the same price or less, to customers who wish to subscribe from within the app. In addition, publishers may no longer provide links in their apps (to a web site, for example) which allow the customer to purchase content or subscriptions outside of the app.
“3.1.1 In-App Purchase: If you want to unlock features or functionality within your app, (by way of example: subscriptions, in-game currencies, game levels, access to premium content, or unlocking a full version), you must use in-app purchase. Apps may not use their own mechanisms to unlock content or functionality…”
My app was previously rejected because I had to built in In-App purchasing.
This is how other apps like e.g. Amazon Kindle work
I'm not sure where exactly the line is though, I remember some stories where apps were rejected because they said something in terms of "You can't subscribe in this app as that would mean Apple gets 30% of your subscription, but you can go to our website and register there".
Regardless of what is a 'fair' fee, what happens when the handful of apps that generate the vast majority of revenue move their transactions away from the marketplace?
What is Apple/Google's next move?
Innovate. Cannibalize existing products. Surprise us. Unless they want to attract more of the "business" types that will suck them dry until they end up, one day, a long time from now... like Sears.
30% is reasonable for an app from an unknown dev where the platform might have to eat a large refund after the dev disappears and the app turns out to have been a scam. charging that same rate to netflix for subscription payments is price gouging, plain and simple.
As the article says, apple was making somewhere on the order of $700k per day off Netflix's transaction fees. For doing basically nothing. Netflix is obviously willing to pay more than basic credit card processing fees for the convenience factor of having in-app billing on iOS, so all apple needs to do to keep that business is to be willing to negotiate.
tl;dr Go to http://reportaproblem.apple.com/, sign in and pick the app that you want a refund for. Then fill out the questionnaire.
- adjust the revenue share percentage to match the perceived value (convenience/UX mostly, but there are others such as marketing, chargeback protection, etc...)
- play hard ball by rejecting apps that "don't comply with our seamless guidelines on the user experience"
- make deals on a case by case basis (ie "if your rev is > $X millions, contact us") or have a volume discount on the revenue share percentage
It all boils down to the same "cost vs value" perception, and that isn't uniform across all apps/developers so it's not very surprising that the "one size fits all" is starting to show its limits.
Unless you consider ACloudGuru for instance “large”.
12/88 split for all revenue going through the store.
Maintain annual fee to have a developer account.
Charge a $500 'listing fee' to list your app, with a $100 annual payment per app unless certain revenue tiers are met (app is de-listed if not paid).
Allow for easier refund procedures (like Steam) and reduce the minimum price down to $0.50.
Its a mature platform now, time to go for a higher quality level with fewer, more professional apps.
1. They created the iPhone hardware and OS platform on which all apps stand on top of. Surely one who builds the most expensive infrastructure on which so many rely on deserve to tax the economic activity they've enabled.
The problem with this argument is that the enablement actually flows in both directions. Remember the last battle between Mac and Windows in the 90s? Mac was the losing horse because "Windows had all the important software". Office was the killer app back then and the Mac version was gimped. All the cool games were on Windows, and hell, during the days of peak Internet Explorer, Mac users could hardly browse the web properly. The tables have turned today, but the past tells a story of how much the software ecosystem contributes to the platform, not software as freeloaders on the platform.
2. The AppStore is much more secure. Apple's curation protects users from malware much more effectively than Google Play and overall app quality is higher
The issue I have with this argument is one of "who pays for this?" I'd argue the consumer should and has already paid for this via premium prices and the handsome hardware margins of iPhones. This is a benefit that goes directly to the users after all, so they should be (and already are) paying for it, not app developers.
I see a lot of Sellers whining, but the Customers love this arrangement. Take a look at iOS satisfaction rate among its users VS the other phone vendors.
Huh? But don’t the other phone vendors also offer worldwide product distribution (I.e. the Google Play Store)? How is the difference between iOS satisfaction vs other vendor satisfaction indicative that this is a cheap solution for world wide product distribution?
For Netflix, they are making the bet that they won’t lose much, if at all, by pushing subscribers to sign up directly with them. If that’s true, then by definition Apple isn’t providing any value.
This happened in many European countries where CC fees are less than 1%, where in USA it is 2-3%.
Same as electricity is natural monopoly with somewhat regulated prices, modern platform distort the economy power. It destroys competition and create winner take all market.
Apple fees should be determine be independent body, but I feel they should not be larger than 10% for one-time purchase and 5% for recurring charges.
meaning Apple was making around $700,000 by doing nothing
other than allowing Netflix to offer subscriptions
It's too bad their lock in effectively prevents alternate means of distribution.
Unless I’m mistaken, the Google Play Developer Policy allows you to use a different payments provider, such as Stripe, in a case like Netflix or Spotify’s:
> Developers […] must use Google Play In-app Billing as the method of payment, except for the following cases: […] Payment is for digital content that may be consumed outside of the app itself […]
Source: https://play.google.com/intl/en/about/monetization-ads/
At least in the past, Skype has been doing exactly that, for example.
Edit-My comment is on topic. I’m stating that the financial stakeholders literally are not hacker news. But disrupting a duopoly definitely is HN-worthy.
Sure, new consumers of the iOS app will have to subscribe in a different way, but this has a minimal impact on users.
there are android forks that arent google controlled. most of googles software thats useful has open source cores that dont have anything to do with googles ad machinery or other pet peeves people have with google.
there is no smartphone duopoly and you are extremely off base.
No phone manufacturer outside of China and developing countries can hope to sell a phone without Google Services.
Until earlier this year, Google would not license Google flavored Android to phone manufacturers unless they agreed not to sell phones based on Android forks.
A 30% fee generally translates into 30% higher prices for all customers.
You see this with credit cards: because there's a ~3% fee and merchants are generally not allowed to have a credit card surcharge, prices as a whole rise ~3%. If you pay cash you might get a questionably-permissible discount from some places. Others don't take cards. If you're not using a 2% cash back card or equivalent, you're losing 2% of your spending, in effect. That matters to consumers at least as much as a 2% sales tax increase would matter.
30% is huge. When two elephants fight, of course they're not paying attention to the mice—but the mice certainly care about knowing where the elephants are likely to step.
- Epic Games refused to release Fortnite via the Play Store
- Valve lowered it's cut from 30% for major publishers to keep them from leaving
- Epic Games then announced a store with a 12% cut for PC and Android (the latter coming in 2019)
- Discord followed by announcing a 10% cut
- Netflix has pulled out of paying Apple's 30% cut
- There's a pending antitrust case against Apple's Store that has, on procedural grounds, already made it to the Supreme Court
Sure, continue the tax for those using it for promotion purposes, but abolish the requirement to use it all together.
However, digital platforms like Apple's are a now a lot more mature and have reached a scale where the costs should be coming down. I've been wishing for decades that credit card fees would go down.
Wait, what? They want to make a point by calculating figures which are off by 50%?
Full disclosure: I found it when it was mentioned on another HN thread a couple weeks ago.
Apple adds ZERO value via the app store, both for devs and for the consumers.
I agree they add very minimal value for recurring subscriptions, and their fee should be dialled back to be inline with what card processors charge (because they're essentially offering payment processing and not much else).
I never give CC info if I can help it. Once you give out your CC info, you have to be eternally vigilant because they can charge you on their terms. And to cancel, you have to hop through whichever hoops the company demands of you, like requiring a phone call.
For example, I would never have taken up Youtube's 3-months-for-$1 trail last week if I had to insert my CC info. I was only open to the idea because it went through Apple's payment system and it's easy to see that I'll be billed in March if I don't trivially cancel the subscription from the iPhone interface.
Since the app store billing system is the reason I coughed up the money to Youtube, it certainly makes sense for Apple to get some of that money. And I could make a case that they deserve a cut for the entire lifetime of my subscription.
To me that's an equivalent service on the payment processing side
If you think your random app company is getting permission to do recurring billing, think again!
Let's not forget that, at least in theory, Apple curates the App Store. Neither Chrome nor AT&T does that in any substantial way.
Furthermore, Apple's business model is different from Google/Android's. Android can be a loss-leader as long as it draws users to revenue-generating Google services. Last I checked, iOS was one of Apple's primary sources of revenue. In principle (if not practice) Apple's model is based on offering a privacy and security-centric platform. For the privilege of accessing it, you pay developer subscription fees and give Apple a cut of the money you make through your app.
I think it's totally valid to argue what Apple offers is not worth the 15-30% cut. Either way, though, Apple is adding more than zero value.
It adds payment/fraud/refund etc only because providing that is cheaper than making sure developers pay their share after the fact. Benefits of a monopoly! Just think for one brief second how better the eco system would be by now if apple wasn't killing it via a monopoly. You are pretty much praising the mob that sells you protection because they gave you a point of sale that already subtracts their share.
That monopoly is so profitable that even TV manufacturers, kids toy manufacturers, etc now have a lock-in app store! Did you ever saw the marketing material for smart TVs development? I recommend you look it up. Their only 'feature' is 'captive users'.
Also, on your other over-simplified example, online gaming stores didn't solve any problem for the old consumers. Most of them still buy games despite the online systems like steam, while crying about lack of physical copies. What it did was unlock a huge market of non-gamers that didn't bothered to buy before.
Not 100% reliable, but they do effectively curate.
In the context of Netflix, I'm not sure that they're actually getting any value from any of those things from Apple, since they already have well-established pretty much everything in that area.
I mean, sure, maybe someone had never heard of Netflix until they saw it in the app store, but I'm going to guess that number of people is well below even a blip in Netflix's revenue (especially given the universal 30% cut). Likewise, Netflix is pumping more bits around the internet than most other companies; distributing apps is only a benefit for them because they literally don't have an alternative option for iOS.
For other, smaller companies, I would agree that it is non-zero, and I would also argue that 30% is way too much.
Even initial iterations of the iPhone limited video streaming to WiFi only. Apple blazed the trail enabling millions (billions?) of hours of Netflix viewing. Apple devices are a primary use case motivating my initial Netflix subscription for kids to watch in the car on the iPad.
Further, Apple iOS provides the SDK and APIs to enable Netflix to develop their app in the first place, securely stream their content, etc.
The App Store is the only mechanism that Apple uses to charge companies for exploiting the power of these devices for their own benefit.
It’s a lot more than just the seamless experience of installing and running the app. It’s the whole stack that forms a cornerstone of how Netflix customers experience the Netflix product.
When was the last time I consumed my Netflix on something that wasn't an Apple device?? I can’t even remember!
HBO made at least.7x$40 from me.
Granted, Netflix has always made it as easy to cancel as it is to sign up, so I don’t have an issue subscribing through them (and, in fact, I did).
If I thought I’d have to deal with HBO (now owned by AT&T), I’d definitely think twice before subscribing through them. I don’t know what their normal cancellation policy is, but I generally refuse to deal with service providers that force me to call a support line, wait on hold, and then deal with some customer retention rep.
Apart from Netflix, the only app where I’ll bypass Apple for purchases is Prime Video, and I’m put off enough by the process that I’ll only buy content through them that I can’t buy from iTunes.
As a consumer, so can go into my App Store account and instantly cancel any subscription. Try that with Angie’s List or any of the numerous newspapers (including The NY Times,) those places make you call in to cancel and it can be a big pain. Apple also ensures I don’t have to give my personal information to various companies, not to mention credit card information. When was the last time Apple’s credit card data has been breached? Compare that to many other companies. If Apple didn’t offer the subscription to various things, I’d be far less likely to subscribe. So at least in my anecdotal case, appStoreValue > 0.
As a customer, I don't want to punch my CC info into every website. Netflix can get away with it because they're a ubiquitous household staple.
But for almost every other service, being able to manage recurring payments from the app store interface is a big deal to me. Recurring charges are a nightmare otherwise. Being able to integrate with the app store is why I was willing to subscribe to most other apps at all.
I guess Netflix can sue them, but in the meantime will lose a lot of money.