Hacker News Reader

Comment by mullingitover | Hacker News Reader

I have a feeling this was a calculated move for Epic to save face while abandoning MacOS development of the Unreal dev tools. If it really mattered to them, they could remove their TOS-violating hacks from Fortnite and get their developer license reinstated at any time.

Keep in mind that everything here has been gamed out ahead of time by Epic. They knew they would get their app removed for the brazen TOS violation. They knew that it would result in their developer account being suspended, and they knew that it meant their other apps tied to that account would also be locked out.

View on HN

To sue they need to have standing, simply asking and getting a no and then carrying on accepting the old standard won't get you anywhere.

They already had standing from the $300 million Apple collected in IAP fees, so they didn't need to actually break the contract to file their lawsuit.

I really don't understand why people keep saying this. They had standing because they were a party to the Developer Program License Agreement. They would have had standing even if they weren't because they allege they're being denied use of an "essential facility".

Prefacing this with that I'm just a layman so this is just an interesting discussion for me.

Looking at the Wikipedia page and the requirements for standing the way Epic is doing this looks at least for me much more in line with the given requirements.

Though I guess the Wikipedia page is a simplification of the reality.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standing_(law)

They might have had standing for some of their claims, but many others would have had a reasonable chance of being dismissed for lack of standing. Better to make it explicit.

They had standing yeah. I think it's about showing reduction in consumer welfare - Apple delisted an app that lowered prices for consumers.

Their stunt doesn't actually demonstrate that Apple's commission harms consumer welfare. If it did any retailer with a margin over the price of a manufacturer's goods would also be harming consumer welfare.

Yes, I agree, margin over the price of a manufactured good does harm consumer welfare. I didn't write the legal opinions, but it's much more interesting to talk about them this way!

The consumer welfare thing is just one factor of many to make a status-quo antitrust law case a real battle. There hasn't been antitrust victories for consumers in a very, very long time.

Then we're in agreement that Epic's breach of the developer agreement wasn't actually required to have standing or to bolster their antitrust claims.

Then it should be obvious that, Apple could write whatever it wants in its god damned agreements, it doesn't actually matter w.r.t. anti-trust claims.

Epic had to get Apple to go do an anti-trust thing - in their opinion. So it's definitely required to bolster the claim.

When I refer to consumer welfare I'm referring to the "consumer welfare standard" that is relevant to antitrust cases. Epic's breach doesn't actually aid them in demonstrating that Apple has harmed consumer welfare. The same holds true for Spotify when they charged more on iOS to cover Apple's commission.

It will be interesting to see how consumer welfare standard will evolve to accommodate people paying more for IAP because of app store fees. It's likely that it will.

Probably 100% of congress uses an iPhone. 100% of judges. Every lawyer. It's right in their face. 100% of them use Google, 0% use Bing. I don't think I know a single non-engineering professional, English as a first language adult who uses an Android device.

It's not some abstract situation the consumer welfare standard didn't anticipate; it's the now. Nobody is going to sympathize with arguments about choice because that hasn't been true for a while - nobody makes the choice, not among these people, for alternatives, so is there really a choice?

Sure, but let's be honest, their lawsuit probably doesn't have any chance of success. Apple's terms are the same as Playstation/Xbox/Nintendo and they're not crying about those platforms not allowing them to open up their own app store there. The courts are going to tell them the obvious, that you can't call a monopoly on your own products a true Monopoly for antitrust purposes.

I have a feeling their money on iOS is a rounding error compared to the serious gaming platforms, and this whole thing is basically a marketing activity that they calculated would pay off better than the revenues they'd lose from losing access to iOS/Mac.

Did you consider that Epic gets a deal from Playstation, Xbox and Nintendo?

I would call those platforms much more symbiotic in their existance.

Also considering if they win this much more clear cut case, then they or someone else would try to apply it to those markets.

> Also considering if they win this much more clear cut case, then they or someone else would try to apply it to those markets.

The case is definitely clear cut, but not to Epic's advantage.

I have no love for Apple, but at the same time Epic doesn't have a leg to stand on here. This is two extremely wealthy parties fighting over a giant pile of money, and Epic is cynically trying to claim they're fighting for the consumer.

So reducing the commission from 30% to something more reasonable by having competing app stores would harm the consumer?

If the underlying structures wouldn't change it would be a smaller pile of cash more parties share. On the other hand, if it opens up for innovation the pile would grow allowing better products for all. Though I guess the innovation angle is hard to prove in court.

>So reducing the commission from 30% to something more reasonable by having competing app stores would harm the consumer?

Wait until Epic gets their app store entrenched and raises their prices for Fortnite content 30% because they know people are willing to pay that already, and no matter how much they raise the price, it's always the cheapest option.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com