Apple Keeps Right On Approving Amazon & Netflix Updates Without In-App Payments | Hacker News Reader

Apple Keeps Right On Approving Amazon & Netflix Updates Without In-App Payments

techcrunch.com

27 pointsCWIZO30 comments

I think it comes down to: Amazon and Netflix have enough money to pursue legal action against Apple. You don't. Hence, the rules that apply to you are different from the rules that apply to Amazon.

Remember what happened to Microsoft for bundling IE with their OS in order to put Netscape out of business? Making competitors' ebooks cost 30% more than your own ebooks on your own dominant platform can look a lot like that to the right eyes.

(Who would have ever thought that Apple would be worried about anti-trust suits!)

  > Who would have ever thought that Apple would be worried
  > about anti-trust suits!

How do you know they are? Your baseless speculations does not mean it is true.

I'm not saying they currently are, but a world where they are is now imaginable.

Go back to the OS 7 days, and this was not a worry on anybody's mind.

>How do you know they are? Your baseless speculations does not mean it is true.

Because they are?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870465770457615...

I know I'm probably nitpicking, but there is a lot of difference between regulators probing the company and Apple being concerned about it. A lot of poking an probing is business as usual for companies as big as Apple.

Or perhaps they're approving these because the in-app payment rules don't take into effect until June?

I believe an update to Readability was rejected though for not having in-app purchase.

EDIT: Apparently it was new, not an update.

Readability (and Sony's book reader app) were both rejected as new apps, not as updates.

It sounds like nit-picking, but there is precedent for Apple allowing grace periods to existing apps with undesirable behavior while rejecting new ones, indeed, I think they even mentioned this after announcing the in-app purchase changes.

Oh, thanks. I had thought Readability had been on the store for a while before.

> is Apple playing favorites? The Kindle app and the Netflix app are both very popular. Apple forcing them to use the new rules could lead to them to pull their apps from the iOS platform

This is what everyone should have expected to happen. No doubt Amazon and Netflix got on the phone with Apple and got a special deal sorted out. Apple definitely doesn't want to pick a fight with someone its own size.

The purpose of these new rules is to ensure that the majority of companies who on Apple's platform conform to certain guidelines. Letting through a few important exceptions won't harm the user experience nearly as much as not letting them through at all.

Do we have examples of other apps being rejected because of out-of-apple in-app purchases? Actual examples of developers suffering because of the rules, while Amazon and Netflix are let through?

Readability was rejected on that ground.

the article explicitly points out Sony's ereader application, thats similar to the Kindle app

I can never tell if TechCrunch is being devious to get page views or just lacks journalistic integrity. Before this story was updated with the information about the June 30th grace period it was completely inaccurate. After the update the entire story is completely invalid. At best someone's opinion which is based on not knowing much about the situation. Is this really enough to pass as journalism? You can sum up the whole story as "Apple might be doing something different but maybe not. Oh wait I didn't know about this one important fact but I might be right anyway so I dunno. Thanks for the page views suckers"

>I can never tell if TechCrunch is being devious to get page views or just lacks journalistic integrity

While it's easy to blame Techcrunch, I think Apple's the one being capricious and totally inconsistent, just like with app approvals earlier.

Readability's App was rejected because it was a subscription without IAP. Then Jobs says SAAS apps are exempt, but no one knows what the difference is and Apple won't define it. Readability thinks it's a SAAS.Everyone is confused what rule applies since when and you're blaming Techcrunch for what, reporting on how confusing things are? Maybe you can tell us what Apple's policy is and what is being enforced now?

And now these App updates are approved. It looks like Apple's first picking on the small guys to try to shake 30% out of the big guys. I don't think that's because it's afraid of legal repurcussions. I think it's because it knows its users would be pissed if really popular apps go missing. Regardless of what Gruber or other people opine, iDevices need apps to get sold. There are a bunch of people who bought iPads and iPhones to read Kindle books and watch Netflix movies. If Amazon or Netflix call Apple's bluff, it would be interesting to see what happens. I think both sides are not going to make the first move though, it's blame-game time come June.

This isn't about Amazon or Netflix's size. It's about Apple's arbitrary interpretation of its policies. The App Store has had this problem since the beginning. Apple is purposely vague in it's definitions and chooses to apply them in whatever way makes the most sense in the moment.

It's this lack of clarity, arbitrary interpretation of the rules, and even changing interpretation of the same rules, that I have the biggest problem with. It's why Steve Jobs had to clarify that it was "intended" for subscriptions only not for SAAS offerings. That doesn't mean they won't apply it to things like Netflix in the future though; just that it wasn't originally intended that way.

The history of the iOS ecosystem has been about Apple interpreting the rules differently for different groups of people. I don't have a problem with them defining the rules and letting developers compete on quality of product, but when they're inconsistent about their interpretation of the rules all it does is piss off a bunch of hardworking entrepreneurs, developers, and companies.

$100 says they'll change the interpretation of these new rules by June.

>"is Apple playing favorites?"

Of course - last year they banned bikini apps. http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/playboy/id340150554?mt=8

"Apple CEO Steve Jobs supposedly responded to some emails sent his way saying that the in-app subscription policy was meant for 'publishing apps, not SaaS apps'....It’s certainly possible that even the App Store reviewers were confused by the rules at first and started rejecting some apps that should have been let through."

This explanation seems quite likely but I also think it's a case of Apple seeing how far they could push the envelope (like they did when they stopped allowing Flash based iOS apps).

If the public were relatively okay with it, then they may as well proceed and enjoy the extra profits. If however it means less people getting iOS devices and opting for Android/Windows devices then Apple are left with no choice but to retract from their strict stance.

A business is nothing if it doesn't have customers.

Kindle is a publishing app.

I think by 'publishing' Jobs meant magazines/newspapers not books. But you're right, the Kindle does offer magazine subscriptions...

I can certainly see the Kindle app hurting from this, because people are used to being able to buy books from their Kindle. However, I do think that most people are savvy enough to realize they can open Safari and browse to Amazon.com to order books.

I hardly think that Netflix will be effected, though. Sure, it means they cannot include a sign-up link for the Netflix service, but that's a one-time deal, and every other Netflix-ready device I own requires you to go on the web some other way to get a Netflix account. The iPad will be no different if Apple has their way.

I think that Apple understands this, and realizes that they have nothing to gain by strong-arming Netflix, Nook, and Kindle.

> they can open Safari and browse to Amazon.com to order > books.

It's the only way to buy books with Kindle app, be it OS X or iOS.

Yeah, but right new there is a link to the Kindle store in the Kindle app. That is what Apple has says is forbidden. A hyperlink.

Isn't the iTunes store incapable of handling inapp purchases from someone as big as Amazon? Also, wouldn't Apple's new privacy policy play serious havoc with Amazon and Netflix?

>It’s still wait-and-see, but this looks promising.

For whom, though?

Or maybe you could argue that Amazon/Netflix bring their own customers.

Apple's policy is, if they bring a customer to you, they get a cut. How many app store users haven't heard of Amazon?

Maybe I'm missing something obvious, but why would rules about subscriptions affect the Kindle store?

It applies to all in-app purchases, not just subscriptions. The rules also require all purchasable content that's available through the app to be purchasable within the app (so not going to an external site to buy it, as is done currently). Of course, as someone else pointed out, these rules doesn't go into effect until June, so this article is rather pointless.

Sword of Damocles...

Sure, but it has always been there it is not like Apple hasn't changed the rules arbitrarily before (section 36) so all they really did was point out that it was there all the time.

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