Epic Games Began Planning 'Project Liberty' Lawsuit Against Apple Two Years Ago
macrumors.com
macrumors.com
Not just that, they go to great effort to lock you into their ecosystem so that the difficulty of changing becomes a big part of the calculation.
If I had to make a comparison, instead of a restaurant, I'd suggest a company town. When you buy a Company X phone, you're moving to Xville, where everything is sold with predatory prices and low variety by the company store.
Is there anything you couldn’t replace switching from your platform of choice to a different one? I have a lot of 3rd party software it would be difficult to replace and it would be a quality of life hit, but software is software, I could replace what they do with something else if I was forced to.
iMessage is a good example for me. It replaces a federated, universally-compatible service with a centralized service that works only on Apple devices. The upgraded features are nice enough to be alluring, and now a significant portion of American smartphone users feel compelled to remain with Apple so that they don't experience any difficulties communicating. This is a sticking point for me in particular; I used to be a heavy user of multi-protocol messengers like Trillian, during the time when multiple providers offered mutually incompatible messaging services.
Actually I said it would be a quality of life hit. I’m convinced that what I use are already the best choices, so switching to something else would feel like a quality of life hit. Bet you I’m not the only one that uses something just because I like it the most.
It would also be a complication, but for me, personally? Somewhere between a day and a weekend to bootstrap and I would replace things as I go. Actually I’ve done this at a few points in my life.
I feel your pain on the multi-protocol front. I used to be a heavy user of Adium, but at some point that wasn’t sustainable. Sticking mostly with iMessage does feel like a quality of life downgrade in many ways, but it’s also an upgrade in a few other ways, so call it it a wash? Sidegrade maybe?
It’s some work, it isn’t that much work. You would be surprised at all the things people don’t care if they lose.
I think a lot of people don't care once they switch, but thinking about switching, the costs etc. makes it seem daunting and not worth it.
Still sounds like the lock-in is “be more appealing in some ways”.
Everything is a trade off. Life is tough that way, always forcing you to make decisions, or wait until you can afford to do things before you do them, but at this point we’re talking about luxury goods.
Mobile platforms specifically iOS and Android have moved beyond luxury goods. Way too much shit relies on an iOS or Android app. They are even talking about making vaccine "passports" digital only.
In mobile phones it's basically iOS-Android duopoly. The barrier to entry was too high even for Microsoft. To compete you need to write a compelling OS, attract millions of app developers, and survive against competitors who subsidize their OS development with their bigger businesses.
So it's more like complaining that "Panda Corp." and "Chopstick Inc." control the entire food supply chain, block sales of food for dishes they don't like, and force all restaurants to pay them 15%-30% of all their revenue.
The idea that Apple should have app store monopolization written into law (their words) because of the tactics Epic used is ridiculous.
How about Mickey Mouse? One could say that market is well established by the creator by now. Yet the law protects this monopoly.
Where do I sign?
Apple is also very good at PR. I don't think it's particularly malicious to try to get out ahead of Apple's PR department. The "Small Business Program" was a brilliant bit of PR on Apple's part, that does indeed try to undermine Epic's case from a public perception standpoint.
I'm not enthused that this is how things get done, but I take Epic's actions as a symptom of a flawed system rather than some kind of character flaw in the company.
I've defended Epic's actions in the past; and that evidence does exist in my comment history. I've come around though: they should have filed a lawsuit instead of breaching contract. Apple is now using their breach of contract to justify codifying their blatant monopoly.
Apple's retaliation was infinitely worse and extremely telling about the company. Make no mistake: privacy is a feature that sells. If circumstances change, Apple has shown capacity to turn on a dime (in the form of banning Unreal Engine apps). They aren't the good guys, not by a long shot.