Hacker News Reader

Comment by rgovostes | Hacker News Reader

Note that the Telegram messaging app is free, with no in-app purchases or premium membership. They are paying Apple only the annual developer program membership.

> Telegram said that in 2016 Apple restricted the messaging app from launching a gaming platform on the grounds that it went against App Store rules.

Ok, so they wanted to launch their own game store, basically? And what would their business model have been?

> In its complaint, Telegram took issue with Apple’s argument that the App Store commission keeps it running.

Why do I doubt that they were going to offer their gaming platform at-cost?

View on HN

You must be unfamiliar with telegram. They were going to offer their gaming platform for free.

Their "gaming platform" was on the same level as early Facebook Games, except a decade too late -- little dinky HTML5 games you could play in group chats. It was never going to be a major source of profit even if Apple hadn't blocked it.

The fact that something is free to you does not mean no one is paying.

Telegram is also open source.

I don’t know if you are seeking to counter my point, but open source seems orthogonal to expenses associated with maintaining infrastructure, ongoing development, reviewing massive amounts of UGC and so on.

I was under the impression you were trying to indicate that just because Telegram is free, that it's users are paying one way or another. However, agreed that Telegram does end up paying for backend costs but the app could be modified to utilize a different backend.

here is what article says:

> Telegram, which has been used by demonstrators—most notably in Hong Kong—and drawn attacks from governments including China, has previously accused Apple of blocking updates as it faced mounting pressure in Russia. A two-year ban in the country for Telegram has recently been lifted.

I guess they want easier access to application in countries that telegram is banned and apple is helping

Reply on news.ycombinator.com