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Comment by SirensOfTitan | Hacker News Reader

Apple recently pushed 2 push notifications to my phone related to promotional pricing for Apple Music. Apple disallows Spotify to advertise promotions in-app.

Apple disallows Spotify access to full Watch APIs and Siri APIs they themselves leverage for Apple Music.

Apple also occasionally bullies Spotify by keeping app review in limbo.

Additionally, Spotify eats the 30% Apple tax, and I would imagine the costs for music licensing rights are fairly inelastic.

Apple is not playing fair. They don’t even follow their own App Store rules.

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I received those notifications like everyone and they were all sent purely by the app itself. Meaning you could turn them off just like any other app.

Seen no evidence that Apple is sending effectively system notifications masquerading as Apple Music.

Guidelines:

> Push Notifications must not be required for the app to function, and should not be used for advertising, promotions, or direct marketing purposes or to send sensitive personal or confidential information. Abuse of these services may result in revocation of your privileges.

Not sure if you own an iPhone but many apps ignore that rule.

But that's not what I am talking about. It's this alleged situation where Apple is sending Apple Music notifications not from the app but from the OS itself.

Yeah sorry, you’re right, I edited my comment and removed that part, thanks!

Dominos is the biggest offender of this of any app I have ever seen. Apple does not make any money from the in app purchases since it is physical goods, yet I see no push from Apple to revoke Dominos app. Again, rules are applied inconsistent based on company.

>> Push Notifications must not be required for the app to function, and should not be used for advertising, promotions, or direct marketing purposes or to send sensitive personal or confidential information.

Serious question: how do I report apps that violate this guideline?

Spotify can use the same API that Pandora and Overcast use to play audio.

Spotify doesn’t “eat” the 30% cut. You haven’t been able to sign up for Spotify through the App Store in years.

>Additionally, Spotify eats the 30% Apple tax, and I would imagine the costs for music licensing rights are fairly inelastic.

They don't because they disabled it years ago. Also it's not really Apple's problem that Spotify paying for distribution makes their business worse off. They should just eat the cost just like they do when all those wireless carriers that bundle Spotify take their cut.

The Spotify situation is basically the main reason I haven’t bought Watch yet.

I've really wanted a HomePod too but have held out because Apple requires the user to use Apple Music to stream music off of it.

Apple doesn't allow third party music services on HomePod?

Nope. You can use AirPlay to stream music from other services (like Spotify) through your iOS/macOS device to the HomePod (while using voice commands, if you wish, to that device), but Apple Music can be natively played by the HomePod by issuing voice commands directly to it.

So far, HomePod is looking like a Version 0 product from Apple. Given that it’s not even sold in many countries yet (compared to iPhone/iPad/Macs), it will be a while until it becomes a little more open. Looks like Apple hasn’t yet completely figured out the market and utility for it.

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