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Comment by xwowsersx | Hacker News Reader

Why do/should I, as a Spotify subscriber, care about this at all? I don't understand why there's so much fanfare around this. I feel like I'm missing something basic here...

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I actually don't think of this as a consumer issue at all. You probably shouldn't care, but I can see why some consumers might care (e.g. how many entities have their credit card on file, concerns about privacy, a desire to allocate as much money as possible to artists...).

I think of this as a developer issue. There's good money being the middle man for transactions. Did consumers really care about the Epic/Apple IAP issue? Were there iOS users clamoring to use Epic's payment platform? I never really heard the consumer voice in that discussion. I did hear a lot of developer voices that cared about their right to charge consumers without Apple's 30% transaction cut.

I see, thanks. So why would Spotify agree to this if they were able to handle premium subscriptions outside of Google? They expect they will make more money this way even after having to give a cut to Google?

I don't think there is much fanfare. Obviously Google and Spotify want to make a big deal out of this for when regulators come knocking, but as a Spotify user who pays directly to Spotify outside of Play Store, this news is nothing more at a mild irritation at them both patting each other's backs over nothing.

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