Apple Cloud gaming ban and mandatory WebKit usage both declared anticompetitive | Hacker News Reader

Apple Cloud gaming ban and mandatory WebKit usage both declared anticompetitive

9to5mac.com

84 pointschacham1534 comments

Truly, there are a large number of really fascinating and unresolved issues in the optimal regulation of platform markets like Apple's and Google's App stores.

In the best case, such decisions need a mixture of theory and data. Right now the theory is very, very hard and data is limited (though agencies can compel firms to release it for within-agency analyses). We are quite far behind in our analyses of these markets compared to where we are in the analysis of horizontal (or even vertical) merger policy.

These two decisions seem correct to me (and I teach antitrust/competition policy to undergrads and graduate students). This is an exciting area to watch and I would beware of any commenters who suggest that answers are obvious.

> Nintendo has blocked the emergence of competing cloud gaming services on its eShop. Like web apps, cloud gaming services are a developing innovation, providing access to high-quality games that can be streamed rather than individually downloaded.

> Games are a key source of revenue for Nintendo and cloud gaming could pose a real threat to Nintendo's strong position in game distribution.

> By preventing this sector from growing, Nintendo risks causing Switch users to miss out on the full benefits of cloud gaming.

TFTFY

> Mandatory use of WebKit limits competition

Exactly opposite! Right now we have 2 mobile browsers/engines. Without this we will have “Please use Chrome” on every website and soon there will be only one left. Google won. The reason is simple. Today web developers have to make websites work with WebKit, because of iOS users. Tomorrow they will have a simple way out - ask user to install Chrome.

Gecko (Firefox's native browser engine) is also a mobile browser engine, and Apple's anti-competitive WebKit requirement prevents browsers such as Gecko-based Firefox from being released on iOS. By forcing the use of WebKit, which is much more similar to Chrome's Blink than Gecko is, Apple is indeed limiting browser engine competition.

Have you read my comment? You’ll have 100% Chrome very soon if all engines were allowed.

The problem isn't having multiple engines, it's Webkit specifically, I'm fine coding for Firefox and Chrome.

whats wrong with it

I've experienced layout bugs, form bugs, core js language issues, background issues, svg issues, navigation issues, they break indexdb or localStorage every other version as well, the list is very long. It's just a buggy engine due to the lack of investment in it in my opinion.

And yeah on top of that they are also missing features.

But with 100% chrome users and zero Webkit users there will be zero investment and no bug reports very soon. I don't like having Google browser as my only choice, that will be death to any privacy and that was my point.

The gap between webkit and Gecko / Blink is widening every year though so that's pretty much what's happening.

> I've experienced layout bugs, form bugs, core js language issues, background issues

Was that codebase optimised for Chrome? Maybe these bugs are only bugs because the code works only in Chrome? Did you check the browser implementation against W3C or IETF or some independent authority? Or there is no authority but only Chrome as a gold standard?

No, usually it works totally fine on both Firefox and Chrome and Webkit is in the wrong.

As an example from this list, you have css background bugs in Safari mobile due to the way Apple implemented scroll snaping, this isn't a problem of a standard. The scroll can go further than a maximized full screen absolute div.

Another example could be this issue preventing to use ES2020 minification on safari https://bugs.webkit.org/show_bug.cgi?id=220517

Overall it works but the details are just not polished enough.

Hopefully I can get real Firefox on my iPad soon and finally be able to block ads

There's lots of adblock options for Safari on iOS

They work pretty well too.

In terms of lack of adblocking and customization in a stock browser, Chrome on Android is far more egregious. It doesn’t support any kind of extension, adblocking or otherwise. It boggles my mind that despite this, it’s the dominant browser on Android instead of Firefox (which supports uBlock Origin, the gold standard for blocking).

By comparison, Safari for iOS/iPadOS supports both content blocking extensions and “full fat” browser extensions, the latter with a caveat of maximum memory usage (which makes sense on a mobile device).

I use a combination of Brave + Blokada which seems to work well (I haven't seen an ad in over a year, I don't think). Turning off Blokada is horrifying.

That just means you have to choose between ad blocking and Firefox Sync.

I'm not so sure you should. Apple told all of us the Webkit restrictions are for our protection. How are they going to protect us from Mozilla's evil plans now?

I really hope that their lawyers "vigorously" come to all our rescue.

> Apple told all of us the Webkit restrictions are for our protection.

that is actually true

You can get some of the way towards Ad Blocking by switching DNS. An easy option is to use NextDNS, which has an App that creates a VPN setting so it works with mobile data as well!

No perfect - but it’s something!

There are other options to DNS as well!

Maybe I get an iPad for my Firefox actually ;)

I'd love to see the EU subsequently call out that Google's near monopoly over browsing (which is what will happen) should be broken up by the splitting off of the Blink engine as a reference standard that others can implement (a la Java) with its API managed by a suitable standards body.

Doesn’t the WebKit ruling give the rest of the mobile Internet over to Chromium, if it’s not paired with a ruling against Google? This ultimately isn’t a win for Firefox.

I think that's the most likely outcome. Google already pushes the current WebKit version of Chrome for iOS hard and that will only intensify once a Blink-based version is possible. Even if Mozilla goes on an all-out marketing blitz to try to boost usership a Gecko-based Firefox for iOS, I don't think they stand a chance. The number of eyeballs seeing Chrome promotions is simply too much greater than those seeing Firefox promotions.

It would be nice if Gecko were the only alternative engine available on iOS, because that'd be a huge boost for overall web engine diversity but it's hard to envision a scenario in which that happens.

Maybe. A lot of people use mobile Safari. If anything, this could be a good incentive for Apple to actually fix the numerous issues plaguing Safari.

Their money is made on the appstore, they benefit from the issues plaguing Safari

Only if Apple continues to make a buggy Safari. Apple retains the ability to set the default browser. Microsoft was able to increase market share with Edge.

Though isn't Edge just a MS skinned Chromium? It's only increased the consolidation onto Google's Blink engine.

Being forced to use a worse browser doesn’t make competition better. It just makes safari stagnate and not have to actually compete.

It's not about competition but about having anyone other than google have a say on web standards. As much as it pains me to say it, safari's stagnance and anticompetitiveness is the last bastion of resistance against a Google monopoly of web browsers, and one of the main reasons web developers bother testing anything other than Chrome.

Once the floodgates open, websites will see no reason to not use the latest Chrome features all the time, making it even more impossible to compete in this market.

What good is Apple's say if they're not going to provide anything worth using? With that justification, they might as well stop updating Safari at all.

> As much as it pains me to say it, safari's stagnance and anticompetitiveness is the last bastion of resistance against a Google monopoly of web browsers

true

Hopefully this will lead to global consequences, not just limited to the UK. I'd appreciate it if I could use a Chrome WebView in my apps - Safari just has some weird quirks sometimes.

How might this translate into policy action?

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