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Comment by themagician | Hacker News Reader

You can choose android. Or use the browser. If you want to sell in the Apple store, to Apple customers, you play by Apple’s rules. Same for Walmart or Amazon. The house always has the upper hand.

If you don’t want to sell to Apple customers, you can sell direct.

There is really nothing unique about this. Anyone who has a business in retail is familiar with this problem.

Want to sell on Amazon to Amazon customers? 8-20%. Want to sell in Walmart to Walmart customers? 12-17%.

I wish it weren’t so, I really do. I’d be 15% richer overnight (probably more, as I’d be more cost competitive). If we decide that these sort of platform fees are illegal that would actually be HUGE and redistribute massive amounts of wealth from gatekeepers to smaller businesses.

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> You can choose android.

That's a false choice. That's like saying "don't like Walmart? Then leave the US and move to Europe!" The choices aren't equivalent. Each have their pluses and minuses, but the choice of Android or Apple should not dictate which retail outlet you get to use.

In the real world, the consumer can chose the easy retail outlet (Walmart, Amazon) or they can choose a harder to use/access outlet, but at least they get the choice. With Apple, you can't choose your retail outlet, and that is by Apple's design.

There is really no consumer issue here. If you want to use Spotify you can. You can download it and use it all you want on your Apple device. You can use it on the web, and you can even download an app. If you want to buy Spotify premium, you can! You can buy it directly from Spotify.

If you want to buy it from the App Store you can! But Spotify has decided they don’t want to sell it on the App Store because Apple’s entitlements/platform fee/referral fee/whatever you want to call it is too high.

> If you want to buy Spotify premium, you can! You can buy it directly from Spotify.

Only if you independently know that it exists. They can't link out to their web store. Apple can though.

They can let people know it exists through any number of ways. They just can’t bundle that advertisement explicitly into product they sell on the App Store. But they actually do (in the radio spots). They just can’t do it in plain text.

Again, this is can be true in other places in retail as well. Walmart may not be happy if I slap a giant sticker on my box that says, “Buy direct from us for less!” Sometimes the stores don’t care. Sometimes they do. If they don’t like it they reserve the right to kick you off the shelf or ask you to remove it.

You keep conflating Apple's store with Apple's hardware. All of Apple's policies would be fine if they allowed any store on their hardware, because then other stores could have other policies.

But since Apple doesn't allow other stores, it's not the same as regular retail, because the consumer can't choose another store with better policies.

No, you're conflating "Apple has a monopoly on app stores in general" with "Apple has a monopoly on what they sell to their customers." The former is an anti-trust concern; the latter is just the basics of how a retail operation works. Which themagician has been patiently trying to explain.

I understand that a lot of people really want to use Apple phones, because they feel that they are superior to Android phones. But this is not a monopoly, it's literally how the market is supposed to work.

You can't walk into a Walmart physical store and ask to see their embedded Target store. Hardware, software, and inventory are bundled into an experience by every retailer in existence.

>No, you're conflating "Apple has a monopoly on app stores in general" with "Apple has a monopoly on what they sell to their customers." The former is an anti-trust concern; the latter is just the basics of how a retail operation works. Which themagician has been patiently trying to explain.

Apple is using its position in one market (phone hardware sales) to exclude competition in another (app sales). It's a text book example of an antitrust violation.

>Hardware, software, and inventory are bundled into an experience by every retailer in existence.

No, they aren't. You don't have to buy software to run on a Mac exclusively from Apple, for example.

> Apple is using its position in one market (phone hardware sales) to exclude competition in another (app sales). It's a text book example of an antitrust violation.

Antitrust law considers the entire market, not just how one company treats their own customers. Apple's policies have no effect on your ability to sell apps on Android.

Here's an example of what would be potentially anti-competitive behavior by Apple: if they made 3rd party developers sign exclusivity contracts that said in order to sell in the Apple App Store, they have to agree to NOT sell a version of the same app in the Google Play store. That would be Apple using its position in the market to exclude competition.

But Apple does not do this. Developers are free to release the same app on Apple and Android, and customers are free to buy into the Apple system or the Android system. Competition exists and is robust. In fact, as measured by unit sales and installed base, Android is arguably ahead of Apple.

> You don't have to buy software to run on a Mac exclusively from Apple, for example.

This is Apple's choice in how they configure those computers; it's not legally mandated.

>Antitrust law considers the entire market not just how one company treats their own customers. Apple's policies have no effect on your ability to sell apps on Android

Android and iOS are separate markets. Let's say I have a hugely popular app on iOS that I make millions a month selling. Some company comes out with an exact replica for Android and begins giving it away for free. The impact on my sales will basically be zero. There are few people out there that own an Android and iOS device and even fewer that will switch based on one app.

>Developers are free to release the same app on Apple and Android, and customers are free to buy into the Apple system or the Android system.

Again, you can't use your position in one market (phone hardware sales) to exclude competition in another (app sales). The existence of a competitor or competitors in phone sales doesn't change that.

>This is Apple's choice in how they configure those computers; it's not legally mandated.

Does that mean you no longer think this:

>Hardware, software, and inventory are bundled into an experience by every retailer in existence.

> Android and iOS are separate markets.

To federal antitrust law, they are not. This is a fundamental misunderstanding that is leading you to all sorts of other misunderstandings.

Who can argue with such a detailed refutation?

It's not a textbook example.

The textbook examples are Standard Oil, IBM, AT&T and Microsoft. It's closest to the Microsoft example, but when you actually READ the textbook you realize the Microsoft example really focuses on specific actions that Microsoft took to prevent companies from promoting Netscape. Much of the Microsoft example was about intent. Moreover, the case was settled and the government dropped the case.

But there isn't a duopoly of retailers. There are many to choose from.

As far as I know, duopolies are only illegal if the two companies collude to distort the market.

> That's a false choice. That's like saying "don't like Walmart? Then leave the US and move to Europe!"

No, it's like saying "don't like Walmart? Feel free to leave the store and look for a Costco."

Except that's where it breaks down, because your Apple hardware is the "country" you live in. There are no other stores in your "country".

Absolutely not. It is not nearly so restrictive as moving to a different country. Apple and the App Store is just one option in the massive free market - and a minority option at that.

Drawing a line between the hardware of the iPhone and the software of the App Store is arbitrary. From Apple's point of view, they are one. And there are other options out there if you do not want an iPhone with the App Store.

Complaining that an alternative App Store should be implemented is like complaining that iOS should also be optional. Why is Apple required to implement additional features and give up market share when the are not a monopoly in the first place?

So people choose which game console they want all of the time based on the available features and software. Each console maker also tightly controls what can be distributed either online or physically.

I fail to see how choosing Android is a false choice when 80%+ of smart phone users do exactly that.

The retail store analogy is really unhelpful and makes no sense.

There are significant security and privacy concerns in allowing third party App Stores and it opens Apple up to significant legal risk. For example if the other stores weren't as vigilant then you could have rampant piracy, apps with illegal content or apps that siphon user data.

> [...] you could have rampant piracy, apps with illegal content or apps that siphon user data.

That's already the case today in form of the Web, yet obviously Apple is not restricting which websites a user can browse to.

In general, this whole 'third-party stores are a security risk etc.' doesn't hold any water under inspection. Security and privacy come from the sandboxed nature of apps running on iOS, and of course Apple themselves determine what APIs are available and under what circumstances an app can access what data about a device or user.

This is all independent from wherever a user installs an app.

Well, how did sideloading FortNite work on Android. It exposed users to a vulnerability.

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/08/fortnites-android-vu...

How would Apple be open to any liability? They don't have any liability when they allow you to download whatever you want to your Mac laptop. It would be exactly the same.

>You can choose android

Pointing out that Apple is a duopoly and not a monopoly isn't a compelling argument. Especially so when the other half of the duopoly engages in the same sort of abusive behaviors.

Pointing out that the App Store is the only available app store in the iPhone is not a compelling argument either.

When you're in a Walmart, you can only buy from Walmart. Nothing is stopping you from going to Costco.

>When you're in a Walmart, you can only buy from Walmart. Nothing is stopping you from going to Costco.

The laws of physics are not anti-competitive. What would be an anti-trust issue is if Walmart took steps to prevent their customers from shopping at Costco.

Apple is stopping iPhone owners from going to the equivalent of Costco by banning competing app stores. That's a pretty clear violation of U.S. antitrust laws.

> What would be an anti-trust issue is if Walmart took steps to prevent their customers from shopping at Costco.

Apple is not preventing you from choosing to buy an Android phone.

Owning an iPhone is like being in a Walmart. You can either buy from the store or go somewhere else. Walmart-made products will be cheaper in the store. You can always go somewhere else. You can make the choice on whether you want to go to Walmart or Costco before, during, or after your stint in either.

>Apple is not preventing you from choosing to buy an Android phone.

They're preventing you from buying iOS apps from anyone but Apple.

>Owning an iPhone is like being in a Walmart. You can either buy from the store or go somewhere else.

It's not and you can't. There's nothing inherent that forces you to only buy software from Apple because you own an Apple device. And you can't go somewhere else to buy your software because Apple blocks that.

Apple is not preventing you from buying iOS apps from anyone but Apple. Spotify and other companies are preventing people from buying directly from iOS apps by not offering the option for users to purchase their product with in app purchase API. Spotify uses Apples resources to distribute their apps but then complain about it. Anyone who is distributing an app on behalf of someone else is going to charge for the service and why shouldn't they. IMO the question isn't should they charge it's how much is appropriate? And people already have a right to install whatever software they want on their device at their own risk as it should be.

“iOS apps” are not an industry. “Smartphone apps” are. You can always go to another store, e.g. get an Android phone. Spotify is not obligated to distribute on the iPhone. They are not being locked out of the industry by choosing not to distribute on the iPhone.

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