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Comment by jijji | Hacker News Reader

their target price is $99, so if apple wants their 30% cut to be on the app store, just increase the target price to $150 for ios version, no?

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As an iOS user, I don't want this to be the default option. iOS devices are expensive enough as it is, there doesn't need to be an extra tax on apps I buy after getting one.

Directly answered here: https://hey.com/apple/iap/

DHH has explained that it's not ultimately about the price. There is another factor: divergence of customer billing experience across platforms. Hey has it's own cross-platform billing solution.

:shrug:

In that case. That’s not a hill he should want to die on. It’s just like selling any physical good through a retailer. I pay for Netflix for instance through T-mobile since I get a discount. I pay for Hulu Live TV for myself and my wife differently than I pay for Hulu+Disney+ for my kids.

Not having my information across random app developers and having it centralized with Apple is an argument for the App Store. I would much rather have all of my subscriptions in one place. Of course it isn’t worth a 43% premium.

The thing is, is that in all those situations, the businesses have a choice.

T-Mobile doesn’t go to Netflix and say "you can run your site over our wires to our customers unless you bill through us and give us a cut".

Neither does a Apple. They are saying you have to provide in app subscriptions as an option, not the only option.

No, they are not giving developers a choice in reality. They’re forcing developers to offer subscriptions on their platforms where they take a 30% cut. That’s not a choice.

And developers can charge 43% when you buy in app as opposed to outside of the App Store to make up the difference.

I guess the argument is that Netflix and others are given a pass.

As a customer, I agree with you. I am happy to have all of my subscriptions through Apple.

I'm content to watch from the sidelines as the moneymen argue for their pieces of the pie.

For me, the emerging global civil rights movement is of greater import.

It’s not just Netflix. It’s the class of apps. Even no name apps like ACloudGuru where you subscribe to get access to training classes do this.

I think there’s also some rules in place that say you can’t discourage people from using IAP vs. other payment methods. So a price disparity would probably not be allowed either.

YouTube apparently does this, and Apple also suggested it in their letter to Hey.

Couldn't they just charge people coming from the app store MAXINT dollars to be technically compliant (the best kind of compliant)?

They could, and I might be wrong here but Apple also disallows you to mention that a cheaper version of the service is available elsewhere on the app. So the user has no idea what the actual price is or where they could avail the price. All they see is a button that unlocks an ad-free version for $2,147,483,647 (Assuming you're using a 32bit signed int).

No there aren’t. Spotify use to offer in app subscriptions at a higher price.

How does the price increase effect sales?

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