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Comment by HunterWare | Hacker News Reader

There are already several different alternatives to iOS that a customer can get if they want a different app store. What he is really saying is that as a vendor he wants to force me as a customer to deal with a looser security model so that he can more easily sell to me. If I wanted that I would have chosen a different phone. But on the flip side, it’s helpful that now I know I never want a product of theirs... choice. =)

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So Microsoft should be able to kill off Steam/etc. and then and force all publishers to post to the Microsoft Store?

After all, you're free to install MacOS or BeOS if you don't like it.

That's ignoring the fact that forcing Apple to allow other App stores in NO WAY makes you less secure. Just because you CAN use another app store doesn't mean you HAVE TO.

That’s a bit extreme... Microsoft also shouldn’t start killing people, but that’s aside from the point. Let’s unpack some of the differences between Apple here and the MS example:

Apple always had this model. From the start... So people who bought into the ecosystem did it fully able to understand the system. This isn’t some creepy unexpected recent change... if someone doesn’t like this system then they should (past/present/future) put on their person pants and buy a different phone. I use Linux and Mac specifically because I didn’t like the way Microsoft was doing things. I didn’t start a movement to somehow legislate handcuffs to force Microsoft to address my whims, I just voted with my time, attention, and wallet.

And yes, do think others are free to chose too and should own their choices. If Apple stops providing me the best avenue to the things I want then I will switch. But right now I want ease of use, and the most confidence that things will just work and work well. I want this in the hardware, the OS, and the apps... and I think Apple provides that best. If my needs change, or their ability to meet those needs changes, then I will move to the place that does it best then...

Regarding the “don’t HAVE to use it” argument... I humbly suggest it’s irrelevant. They don’t have a monopoly so we don’t have a public overriding interest in messing with them. I’m saying that I don’t give a hoot about them having a side store: I want to quickly and confidently find the best apps to fill the needs I have. I will pay for the ability to do it as time has value. After that need is met, not much else has value and so I’m (personally) happy in the store. I’ll also suggest that Apple’s success says that a healthy number of people agree. This leads me to think that all the people who want to better sell crap to me that I don’t want are showing a bit of a case of “sour grapes”.

So your reasoning is: there's a duopoly, not a monopoly, so each of the players should be able to act like a monopoly?

That's maybe the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. And saying "well they've always done this bad thing so there's no reason they should stop" is ridiculous on its face. There are countless examples in history of a company taking an action that was permitted when they were a minor player that is banned as they grow.

The fact that the US government has become criminally complicit in their refusal to enforce the Sherman act doesn't suddenly make the behavior they're ignoring OK.

This is literally textbook violation: Every person who shall monopolize, or attempt to monopolize, or combine or conspire with any other person or persons, to monopolize any part of the trade or commerce among the several States, or with foreign nations, shall be deemed guilty of a felony

You don't have to strictly have a monopoly to break the law.

Every one talks about MONOpoly, not DUOpoly, for a reason. But lets back up and just use the more generally used “anti-trust”. The law (in the US) is basically if you either a) collude with competitors to price-fix or restrict trade, or b) own so much of the market that your price is price fixing and there is no/little unrestricted trade, then you a violating anti-trust law. There is a similar intent in other places and the bar is placed higher or lower.

If you have the choice to buy phones which use one of several app stores, then you have choice in app stores. You also can’t install a Corvette engine in a Toyota Corolla but I don’t see everyone screaming about that. If you want a Corvette engine I do know the car you can chose in order to get it.

And yes, two non-colluding choices is choice. People aren’t suggesting that Apple and Google are all buddy buddy so there is choice. I suggest we all make one we are happy with and move on. =)

For the Corolla vs Corvette example, Toyota allows you to open the hood and take the toyota engine out. The screws are all standards and tools are available to get parts you need to take the engine out. If you had the tools to fit the Corvette engine in place, you are allowed to do it. You could build your own custom engine as well and put it there. We can put a lot of after market stuff in our cars, replace tires, wheels or even engine if we want to. WE own the car fully.

With the App Store case, they don't allow you to open the hood, unscrew and take out the apple app store and put an alternate app store. While Jailbreaking is legal, you need to use a hack to open up your iPhone and Apple actively plugs those holes in the next versions.

I'm not seeing how a market with 2 choices is dramatically more competitive than one.

You say people don't talk about duopolies, but they certainly talk about oligopolies.

You are proving my point. I actually CAN install a Corvette engine in a Toyota Corolla (and it's been done), in fact I can install literally any engine I want. TOYOTA won't do it FOR me, but they'll let me do whatever I want because it's my car. I don't know why people such as yourself defend manufacturers from restricting what you can do with a device bought and paid for. It's not theirs, it's yours.

https://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/a30777891/ls1-v8-sw...

Since Apple devices are mostly only compatible with Apple devices and services they basically have a monopoly on an ecosystem.

Don't you see a slight power asymmetry here?

If it only were that simple. I wouldn't fully buy into the idea that security concerns are the only reason why Apple boots an app from its store. Retention of their own monopoly on certain spaces is just as plausible a reason. There are enough apps on the store that track the living shit out of their users or engage in other dark monetization patterns.

I would never suggest altruism as a defining motivation of a multinational corporation. grin What I’m suggesting as an owner of both since they were created is that iOS apps and devices have just been better curated

I chose iOS because the experience has been near uniformly better on iOS (in my opinion, for me) since inception. The motivations aside, their profit margins aside, and other externalities aside... The apps work better and are better on average and overall. This can only be consistently explained by the curation (directly, or indirectly with follow-on effects) because the other things are effectively equal. You can get a great piece of Samsung hardware, Android is a perfectly fine system sitting on a very robust OS (Linux), and the tooling is fine on both platforms... This leaves the curation: of both the apps in the app stores, and of the systems that are built in it’s name. I guess you could also make the case that Apple just made a better framework, but that’s easily addressable (if so, git gud google) and probably not really true.

The apps are just better curated, not perfect but better. And better is, well... better. Can you find a great Android app? sure. When you average across the store, however, the it will be lower. I don’t want or need even more worse choices. I want access to a couple good ones, to easily choose one, and then to move on.

The devices are (on average and almost across the board) also filled with less cruft. I remember picking up a top tier Android phone from Sprint several years back that had the newest processor, faster than any iPhone at that exact time. But the stuff that Sprint and HTC put on it slowed it to a crawl. The experience was just “less than”. Again, I want the most certainty that the device will just work and work well.

Competition is great, vital even. I sincerely hope all the different options keep the market on it’s toes for a long time. But legislating handcuffs seem counterproductive here. We don’t have a monopoly by any reasonable definition of the word. And without that this kind of idea is just overreach. I would be like me forcing your company to let me use their building just because it’s a lovely building. If your building is the ONLY building, then it’s in the public’s interest to enforce open access. But it’s not, so this is just me taking your nice private building (that people chose to pay to be in because it’s nice) and making it a public place so I can do whatever the heck I like because I want to.

To me it looks like financial interest packaged in vague claim of freedom, too. Yes, 30% is ridiculous, that's what you could really call an Apple tax, but arguments such as "Russian startups fail to make money by paying 30% to Apple" are equally ridiculous. It's just about his game platform, and the money it would have made.

It’s not cheap, but on the other hand you get a lot. They handle the billing, credit card fees, returns, reviews, the site, bandwidth, updates, uptime (reliability ain’t cheap), security, and 10 other things I’m not thinking of. Oh, and the full updated toolchain and dev environments... Let’s also recognize that effectively the devs are paying some for the platform, just like the users are when they buy the phones. We all are paying in because it’s better (for us), otherwise go elsewhere... I would.

You as a dev just create a simple parked webpage for your app and you are done. So many barriers to entry are just dissolved. At no upfront cost to the developer. That’s huge.

I think the many many business that prefer to be on this environment, and always have, speaks to the value of that 30%.

Maybe 30% is a little high, it’s really hard and subjective to say. But it’s not crazy... there is a lot of value provided for that 30%.

> They handle the billing, credit card fees, returns, reviews, the site, bandwidth, updates, uptime (reliability ain’t cheap), security, and 10 other things I’m not thinking of

Bandcamp does all of this and more, including selling physical merchandise, and only takes 15% of the sale price for digital goods, and 10% for physical merchandise.

> Oh, and the full updated toolchain and dev environments..

Developers have privilege of paying Apple $99 each year to develop and release iOS and macOS software.

Your points do stand, but if I may:

1) One certainly can do this cheaper. But I’m going to hazard a guess (sight unseen) that bandcamp doesn’t provide as much for that 15%. The original point wasn’t “can you do it cheaper”, it was “do you get a desirable amount of value for the 30%”. I’m a consultant, and there are cheaper options than me. I feel I provide good value for the money, and I guess the fact that I have customers says the market agrees, but that doesn’t mean that some less expensive competitor isn’t a perfectly fine option. It means that the market says I am worth X so I can charge X... Nothing more.

2) The $99 argument is interesting. From my persepective: Enterprise tools cost a lot and 99$ yearly is insanely reasonable. I’d guess that it basically just covers the cost to them of supporting the devs and maintaining the interface to the dev side of security infrastructure. What I can say with some confidence is that it can’t cover even a fraction of the cost of creating and maintaining Xcode. I think the $99 is a way to recover some cost, and create a barrier to entry that makes sure that people who join are at least a tiny bit somewhat serious.

(oh, and I love your username... awesomeness)

Sure, they provide all that, but it can be done for less than $15B. Apple has around 150,000 employees. That's $100k per employee, assuming all work on the iOS and iPad app stores, which is obviously not the case.

If you want to be more secure, there's nothing stopping you from avoiding third-party app stores.

Hey guess what.

You can always have self control and not install apps from outside the AppStore :)

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