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Comment by mythz | Hacker News Reader

iOS isn't considered to be a market so they don't have one to abuse. Unless the courts declare that iOS is a market then the App Store would be considered to have a monopoly on App Stores in iOS, but you can't have a monopoly on your own product/platform (then everyone would be a monopolist). A monopoly is measured against the overall market. If Android didn't have an App Store or it was the size of Windows App Store then iOS App Store could be considered a monopoly, but not at the fraction of the user base that iOS has now.

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The fraction doesn't matter at all in this case. Spotify is saying they're abusing the 30% to be able to push their own music application for cheaper.

It doesn't matter in this case because iOS isn't a Market and the iOS App Store doesn't have a monopoly on App Stores. They can appeal to the public about the unfairness of it all (which is likely what their open letter was designed for) but they don't have a legal case against Apple nor an inalienable right to be able to participate in their platform on their own terms.

If so, McDonalds is abusing its power even more. They don’t even let me sell my burgers in their stores.

Similarly, it wouldn’t surprise me if music festivals or cinemas charge suppliers selling on their grounds more than 30% of revenues.

I know app stores feel different, but as far as I know, that legally still is a reasonably apt comparison. That may eventually change, but if so, someone will have to specify what exactly the difference is. I’m not sure that is as simple as “physical vs digital”.

McDonald's doesn't host other food companies though.

In this case apple has a marketplace AppStore.

App stores feel different because they are different. You seem to have an incorrect definition of what a market is

McDonalds is not a market, McDonalds is a vendor in a Market.

Apples has a created a market on is the platform by virtue of the App Store, a case can be made for Anti-Trust due to to this, but it would be a hard one.

Defining what is and is not a market is always one of the largest challenges for Anti-Trust, take for example the Merger of Sirus and XM, there was a debate over if Sat Radio was a market separate and independent of Traditional Radio, in the end Sirus / XM won and was able to establish that Sat Radio was not an independent market because consumer could easily switch between Sat Radio and Traditional Radio

Given the Lockin, and increasing Costs associated with Changing Mobile Platforms it becomes more of a question on if iOS and Andriod should be separate markets or be considered a single market. I can see cases for both

I am not familiar with the legal history you cite but it is intriguing. Are there other antitrust cases that hinged on whether or not two things were their own markets or part of a larger one?

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