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Comment by rkangel | Hacker News Reader

This is an interesting result of the collision of device sales, and a digital distribution channel. The normal free market economic push back against Apple on this would go something like:

* Apple charges too much

* It's not worth it for apps to be in the App Store

* App Store selection drops

* Consumers stop buying iPhones

In practice though, Apple has such a foothold, and device purchase is so separate from App purchase, that most apps don't see a choice about being in the AppStore. Does that mean that Apple has a monopoly on iOS app distribution, and so should be regulated using anti-trust?

As an aside, the anti-trust section in this Money Stuff article is really interest: https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-02-28/bank-s...

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As Apple says in the article, they put quite a few resources into making the whole App store platform, including in-app payments. The issue is that there is no opt-out for the end user - you cannot use a different app store to install applications for your phone, and jailbreaking is getting harder while at the same time border-line illegal in some jurisdictions, not to mention being quite technically challenging.

Imagine buying a car sold by a gas station chain saying "We made the BEST gas stations you can imagine, but you can ONLY buy gas here. It's a fair marketplace, everyone who wants to sell gas at our stations can do so equally, and we'll take the same cut from everyone!".

Apple has a monopoly on iOS app distribution the same way Sony has it for PlayStation distribution and Microsoft for Xbox: nothing gets on the platform without their permission. It is their platform.

It is quite different in terms of market share (which matters for anti trust issues).

Sony owns approximately 50% of the console market.

How much of the smartphone market does Apple control?

If you're a journalist, NGO worker, or government official, there is no alternative to apple.

What? Why?

Security/exploit resistence.

Marketshare matters less than whether consumers empirically switch to competitors in response to price shifts.

I think iOS app distribution is a bit too narrowly drawn a market. What if Apple had 5% of the smartphone market, they'd still have 100% of the iOS app distribution market.

No, I'd say the right word here isn't monopoly, but rather duopoly. That doesn't mean that antitrust law shouldn't apply, duopoly is definitely not the same thing as a fully competitive market.

Apple has a monopoly on selling phone apps to the percentage of smartphone users that have an iPhone in their pocket.

It should thus be regarded as a monopoly regardless of how many people are affected, and forbidden.

If we accept this definition of a monopoly, then the term becomes worthless. Every single device where the user can add third party software but it has to be approved by the manufacturer becomes a monopoly. Stuff like Garmin watches, "smart" fridges and other appliances, "apps" on car's dashboards (like Spotify on Tesla etc).

And why should this only apply to hardware, is it not comparable to Facebook having a monopoly on allowing games on their plattform, or the (now defunct) way of developing apps for the Spotify desktop client?

Surely, this broad definition of "monopoly" is not meaningful, and should definitely not be made illegal.

The same reasoning does indeed apply to Garmin watches, smart fridges and car dashboards since people are only going to wear one watch and own one fridge and one car.

I don't see the downside of requiring everyone in your examples that already allows third party apps to do so for free (other than passing through payment processing fees) and without delay and censorship: the costs are minor or insignificant and can be included in the purchase price of the device.

The advantage is that it leads to a fair playing field for app makers, lower prices for consumers (since the money that goes to the platform maker is all visible upfront in the device price and thus easier to compete on) and doesn't stifle niches that the platform owner doesn't like for whatever reason.

Sounds good to me?

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