[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2022/01/10/apple-implies-it-generated-r...
I hope some of these regulations spill over into the U.S. and the rest of the world.
"Allow users to install apps from third-party app stores and sideload directly from the internet"
I bet this is going to be a horrible user experience. "Are you really sure?", "Apple takes no responsibility not warranty" whatsoever.
What sound usually easy on paper...
Sounds good to me. As a techie who maintains several phones for several family members at a variety of tech-literate levels, I certainly hope this experience sucks and is difficult to figure out.
I want a foolproof thin client for myself and all the older people in my life
Complete FUD. Stop fearmongering.
Open up your browser's developer console while on Facebook and you'll see FB's desperate attempt to get you to not start typing in commands.
When Epic got up in arms about Google's fees, they published a sideload-able version of FortNite, and some users ended up installing a fake virus-laden version (https://www.theguardian.com/games/2018/aug/10/fortnite-on-an...).
How many Linux users run arbitrary shell commands they find online while trying to fix or install something? What about some curl command somewhere that downloads and executes whole scripts? And Linux users tend to be very technically oriented.
This is not FUD. We're there. This is happening today.
Just because something is possible doesn’t mean that making it harder isn’t worthwhile. Perfect is the enemy of good, after all.
The Android ecosystem is a bit of a cesspool, but surely even it isn't having major issues with swaths of people having their phone compromised, right? My parents aren't going to sideload an apk.
I have faith that there's a way to do this right.
For example, my dad, who has had decades of internet usage, tried to buy a USB drive that promised to speed up his computer for only $99.
These folks need an app store.
In reality Apple could just implement a dummy mode. I bet a lot of people would decide against that an be completely fine.
You can bet they'll start playing the same games with the EU once this goes into effect. Regulating big tech requires not just passing the law, but a heavy handed enforcement that doesn't put up with delays and antics.
(Basically, I am making a "if a tree falls in a forest" argument)
So what's the downside?
You're forgetting the "no creative geniuses"-clause, aka repeated fines of 10-20% of worldwide turnover.
The cookie banner thing is… unfortunate.
If all you associate with the GDPR is cookie consent dialogs then maybe these discussions are not for you?
> If all you associate with the GDPR is cookie consent dialogs then maybe these discussions are not for you?
You realize that you are the unique one? Most people don't care about abstract concepts of digital privacy and just hit whatever button on that dialog that makes it go away. Who knows what they're opting in to, and they don't really care.
These are definitely the sorts of things we should factor into regulation lest we continue to pave that road to hell with shiny good intentions.
It did not have to be this way.
They're misused by sites. You don't need to show cookie consent if your cookies are purely technical (e.g auth)
If the EU ever actually starts enforcing GDPR, I expect a quick reckoning.
If Apple moved voluntarily to 10% or 15% for all, there never would have been the industry pressure for this sort of regulation.
The EU would have been better to just mandate a maximum % commission for all digital marketplaces above a certain level of revenue. This new solution will get poked full of holes by Apple and lead to an inferior experience for consumers.
How to piss off the EU political system in one simple step.
This ruling is no surprise after such behaviour from Apple. They made their own bed.
I wonder what their endgame was? Did they hope that users would rise up and defend apple against their government over dating apps?
Did they think the government would blink first? (Why would it?)
Was this an attempt to hinder similar laws in other jurisdictions? (If so, how?)
Where they simply too stunned and inflexible to react quickly?
It made no sense to me and I fear we will never learn?
"So you think our fines are too puny to make you comply?"
"There fixed that for you."
20% for repeat offenders.
I can't imagine any company in the world that will shrug that off.
They have no conception of the craftsmanship that's required to take a good idea and turn it into a good product. And they really have no feeling in their hearts, usually, about wanting to really help the customers.
-Steve Jobs
The rich don’t become rich by being generous and giving money away.
There's no conspiracy, companies are there to make money, that's it.
If the barriers-to-entry are so high that you can't have real market competition, then regulation is the only option left.
No. It's not. "The market" is going to say: sorry users, fuck that, y'all can just magically research all this and provide your own security and privacy from here on out.
Which is impossible, of course.
Result: much poorer user experience for the vast majority of users. Which is why Apple did it their way in the first place. No, it was not because of revenue. Anyone who says that is either lying or is incredibly lazy and hasn't looked up where Apple actually makes its money.
From https://revenuesandprofits.com/how-apple-makes-money-underst...,
> The devices and platforms help Apple lock-in the consumer into its ecosystem. First, Apple achieves hardware lock-in with the devices. Then, it achieves software lock-in with operating system software, application software, and third-party software and apps. Then, iCloud helps Apple achieve the data lock-in.
PS: In case I couldn't make it clear, my questions are not directed to parent comment.
All of us. The very same society that gave Apple exclusive control over their "intellectual property" in the first place which allows them to pocket that profit without having to compete for it. The same society that pays for enforcing that exclusivity. Corporations like Apple and their business models are only allowed to exist because we think that suits us - and we should continuously reevaluate that decision and correct it when corporations do more harm than good.
https://www.nbcnews.com/businessmain/apple-faces-5-year-ban-...
We already have rules about how much control a single company can have over a market and what defines a market. The app store is clearly a market. Apple has an aggressive chokehold on it that artificially inflates prices and prevents competition.
As an obvious check - Amazon can't sell me ebooks through it's kindle app without Apple being involved and taking a 30% cut. That is market control and abuse.
Let's say you want to build a direct competitor to an Apple product. You can't because Apple actually won't let you do the things it's apps do if you want to be listed in the store. That's called market abuse.
I don't know of such rules. Can you point me to them?
To the contrary, there's Epic Games v. Apple case in which definition of the market is pretty narrow (digital mobile gaming transactions) compared to what you suggest (App Store in general) [0].
> That is market control and abuse.
In the same case, judge decided that Apple is not a monopoly, saying “Success is not illegal.” [1]
> Apple has an aggressive chokehold on it that artificially inflates prices and prevents competition.
Almost all apps are free. What inflated prices are you talking about?
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epic_Games_v._Apple#Decision
[1] https://appleinsider.com/articles/20/08/23/apple-versus-epic...
Of course security screening is expensive, but it's also not that expensive (e.g. a typical software company might have a 10-30% profit margin, so in some cases apple accounts for roughly half the operational expenses of a company – i.e. the company pays as much, or more, money to apple as it does to its entire payroll)
Edit: downvoted for asking a question? Thanks HN.
Where is the other 26.5% coming from?
In 2020 Apple made $60bn from the AppStore.
Apple makes outrageous amounts of money from first mover advantage and a humongous moat but I guess we're ok with that.
They did[0], but the actual companies lobbying for this are the ones that don't benefit because they're making $x millions less due to iOS.
0: https://developer.apple.com/app-store/small-business-program...
Every single app creator out there will now want their own "app store" and it's going to be a mess. 30% fee initially to capture that market was what our company factored in and grew exponentially with. A 15% fee is nothing if the market is fragmented.
This is such an oft-repeated argument, yet overlooks that Android already allows sideloading and alternative app stores. If everyone-creating-their-own-app-store hasn't happened on Android, why would iOS be different?
Apple locks out so many useful kinds of software that there actually may be enough momentum for real alternate app stores to proliferate.
For someone who doesn't have a personal Android phone, what useful software is out there that I can get on an iPhone?
Related: What mass-market software is out there that isn't available on the iPhone? I don't mean *nix tools and niche game emulators. Things that would make many people actually care about alt stores?
- Game cloud streaming services (xCloud, Stadia, GeForce Now).
- Unofficial clients for websites such as YouTube that add features that official client doesn't have.
- Tools to disable advertisements in applications.
- Programs licensed under GPL as Apple App Store bans those.
I'm sure Google can send a cease-and-desist to all sorts of other stores instead of just Apple.
> Tools to disable advertisements in applications.
This would be breaking the sandbox model of the system, I don't think the regulation requires dismantling system security
> Programs licensed under GPL as Apple App Store bans those.
No such rule. VLC on App Store is the first example that comes to mind. There are also GPLv2 components (such as WebKit) shipping in iOS itself.
The FSF has said there are (IMHO bureaucratic) issues with GPL on an App Store, specifically that e.g. Apple takes on certain responsibilities, rather than the developer.
For that reason, it's possible a contributor may shoot down publication, which IIRC caused VLC to have to rewrite certain components before launch.
Google may dislike those applications and refuse to host them on Google Play, but they aren't doing anything illegal, so they cannot do anything about programs like https://f-droid.org/en/packages/org.schabi.newpipe/ on other stores.
> This would be breaking the sandbox model of the system, I don't think the regulation requires dismantling system security
I don't think it is breaking the sandbox, it could be implemented using NEAppProxyProvider, however this particular API is not available for App Store applications.
> Programs licensed under GPL as Apple App Store bans those.
iPhone version of VLC is licensed under MPL2 specifically for that reason. WebKit is LGPL2.1.
A web browser that isn't a hamstrung reskin of Safari, and that can run uBlock Origin.
And you want them to have full access to every URL that you visit ?
Rather than use AdGuard or any other ad-blocker that can't go and sell your data to third parties for money.
2) It's fully open-source so the above is verifiable
3) AdGuard and every single other (proprietary) adblocker for Mac and iOS includes content blockers, but also includes web extensions that request access to "all web page contents", including credit card numbers you type in, allegedly for the purposes of custom element blocking etc. (not open source, we can't check). Try installing it and see. Apple still allows web extensions that have complete access to all webpage contents (which is necessary for many legit extensions), they just block specific WebExtensions APIs that uBlock Origin requires. Literally zero benefit to privacy whatsoever, yet everyone buys the BS.
That's uBlock without Origin. Careful where you download your ad blockers from.
Edit: I'd also love a DaisyDisk that works on iOS. It will never get permission to get on the app store. Of course, that kind of app IS a huge security issue so I'd be very careful where I get it from.
(and before you mention an application you know of that doesn't have this problem, remember that Apple's enforcement and reading of the rules compares unfavorably with nuclear particle decay)
I'll take the current arrangement any day of the week, thank you.
For consumer apps, there doesn't seem to be much appetite to do this on Android at least, though Telegram can be installed outside of app stores. It rolls its own update system and that seems to work fine.
Steam has a regressive 20%/25%/30% tiered commission structure.
There are sweetheart deals we have no knowledge of, like Apple's deal with Amazon to get Prime Video onto their devices.
"...they would still have a monopoly on app distribution..." on the platform that they've created, supported and maintained over the years, in the market that already has alternatives.
"Steam isn't comparable..." ah, so Steam charging the same percentage is a whole different thing...i see.
"...competes against other distributors." on the Windows, Linux and MacOS operating systems, operating on a platform that is not exclusive to any manufacturer in partucular.
"...they just need to compete with other service providers to ensure they're providing a fair deal." They already do compete, look up alternative iOS stores.
Controlling app distribution solely within your own platform is not a monopoly. You might wish it were. You might not like it; you might want it changed. But that doesn't magically mean you can call it a monopoly. It's not a monopoly.
Thankfully the EU in their wisdom has decided that Apple has abused their dominant position and we don't need to agree with your definition.
I hope that the wise EU is also going to decide that European car manufacturers and their infotainment systems are "abusing" their dominant position in their respective markets of manufacturer and model specific systems! Or that non-European companies should be able to provide "alternative software" to multi-billion euro manufacturing lines of European mega-manufacturers with the same disregard for any potential consequences, just to avoid any sort of "anti-consumer" behaviour. I sure hope so!!!(couldn't care less)
You're aware of Android, right?
It's not "my definition". It's THE definition.
Apple came in as a "savior" for the publishers and said that the publishers can set their own prices and take as much profit as they wanted... just as long as Apple got 30%. This 30% originally came from the music publishing industry (where they did set the price themselves, remember $0.99 songs?), went through books and now has been legacy'd onto apps. If nothing changes here it'll probably exist for metaverse stuff if they go there.
(Of course, Steam still greatly benefits from first mover advantage and network effects that IMO mean they should also be subject to more regulation, including being required to support alternate clients for all Steam services as well as federation for their social network and communication channels.)
No they shouldn't. Steam wasn't the first in digital distribution of videogames as some consoles offered similar system way before Steam. An argument can be made that "on demand" gaming options of the past can be considered the Steam of the past. And enforcing regulations for no reasons other than regulating on companies that are widely recognized as pioneers of their respective industries is the very definition of "punishing success".
I don't know anyone who side loads onto Android, and even Epic gave up and put Fortnite back onto Google play[0].
I'm sure that any side loading will be hidden beneath layers of warnings designed to put off all but the most determined.
[0] https://www.polygon.com/2020/4/21/21229930/fortnite-availabl...
>A covered company that controls the operating system or operating system configuration on which its app store operates shall allow and provide readily accessible means for users of that operating system to choose third-party apps or app stores as defaults for categories appropriate to the app or app store
https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/271...
The numbers for 2021 are pretty much in line:
$89B - Apple sales in Europe (including some non-EU countries, most notably UK)
$85B - Apple AppStore revenue worldwide.
The question is: which one has more potential for growth.
Let's assume that 15% of App Store revenue is from the EU. That would leave an additional $12.7 billion hole in Apple's pocket.
Worse, it would mean Apple's third-party developers lose about $30 billion in revenue. (Apple takes a 30% cut, so the total App Store sales volume is about $283B). Those developers would also lose all access to their existing users in those countries. It would be a massive black stain on Apple's reputation.
It's the kind of drastic move that you simply can't do as a platform provider unless your hand is absolutely forced by something like international sanctions.
Much more likely they'll go the route of malicious compliance. You can side load apps but you can't add them to your home screen. You can set a third party voice assistant but it can't launch apps. Etc.
Will be very interesting to see how this plays out!
Facebook and Google are going to love this.
They can build a voice assistant app which will provide them with all of the apps people use the most, people they contact, places they visit, searches they do etc.
It's going to be a privacy nightmare.
The question is, how far will Apple go to keep Americans from turning on "EU mode"? Will it just be the usual country toggle? Will sideloaded apps be geofenced to the EU with Location Services? Or will they start adding bootloader fuses for each jurisdiction so that you can't install the "EU sideloading firmware" on US-purchased iPads? Or all of the above? I hope the EU is ready to litigate whatever hoops Apple makes people jump through - because Apple loves inventing new hoops.
if your goal is more protectionism, then it’s great. but if you want to produce market leaders then it’s bad.
> Share data and metrics with developers and competitors, including marketing and advertising performance data.
with competitors? :))
> Allow developers to integrate their apps and digital services directly with those belonging to a gatekeeper. This includes making messaging, voice-calling, and video-calling services interoperable with third-party services upon request.
could have been solved easily if they proposed a working group to come up with the next video and messaging standard. right now i foresee the discussions we had back in mid 00s: we use our own video encoder. they use h263. and those other guys use vp9. good luck to the team writing a transcoder that works real time :))
> The Digital Services Act (DSA), which requires platforms to do more to police the internet for illegal content, has also been approved.
“think of the children” legislation.
Besides, the DMA has specific exemptions for small companies. Once a company reaches the "gatekeeper" level, they will have had all the necessary time to figure out how to comply with the law.
As long as Apple keeps selling iPhones, there's still profit to be made, App Store be damned.
Apple will barely see a dent from it. Their profit juggernaut will keep rolling on almost exactly the same.
The parent comment in question - "and eat pretty heavily into their revenues" - is confusing their personal projected wishful thinking (obviously desperately wanting big tech to falter) with actual reality (the one where Apple has no serious competitive threats in smartphones for what they do, and as such they'll keep marching on just the same).
Second time they're out of compliance, the fine doubles.
If they still breach compliance, they get investigated for systematic non-compliance. The Commission can then impose structural and behavioral changes.
Or Apple can stop providing service in the EU. But they're not going to say goodbye to a fourth of their global revenue. They will comply.
I agree it seems unlikely but the math checks out.
Now, as to what’s reasonable there? That will be a separate discussion. So far, Apple has put the bar at over 20% for countries that have passed similar legislation, likely on the argument that payment processing need not cost more than credit card companies charge (a few percent, in the EU)
Super markets charge for use of shelf space and logistics. The customers don't belong to anyone. The super market can't prevent you from opening a store next door to sell to the same customers directly. Similarly, I don't see any problem with Apple charching for hosting, downloads, payment, curation etc. but it should not be their place to sell permission fro what you are allowed to install on your own device just as it would be ridiculous for Ikea to control what you can put on your shelf.
[1] https://www.theverge.com/2022/2/4/22917582/apple-netherlands...
[2] Yes, APIs themselves are not copyrightable, but what developer is going to spend the resources to reimplement all of iOS' APIs, with no documentation of how the underlying hardware works?
They’re all waiting for the day developers switch to their apis. And developers usually work with them over the web, they just didn’t do so on ios because of apple policy
yes, it is exactly like that. Millions of people who download .exe to their compuyters every day are doing chemical warfare
It used to be normal in the past that people would OWN a computer and they would run ANY software on it. Why should we allow a greedy company like Apple to change that? Both android and ios implement sandboxes and apps can't gain complete access over the device in most cases so I don't see any security benefit.
As an iOS developer, hardening the 10k-ish apis that exist in iOS will be mostly impossible to do in a short term given the attack vectors would now be outside of Apple's control, probably resulting in incompatibilities and bugs. Android is a horrible platform already given the myriad of different OS versions that exist (and often are not updated by the users) that you have to support.
I also wonder what the law requires as to switchover to the new rules, new OS releases or going back X versions or something? Is there are time frame?
Imagine also being an app developer and having to build/test releases for multiple app stores that include different payment gateways. Without a solid and secure API environment in the OS, how do you manage that with screwing up? iOS has always been easy to do since you only have to support one major OS back. A couple jobs (like 7 years) back our Android app was a nightmare to manage, as we had multiple OS release/phone suppliers that rarely got bug fixes in at all and never at the same time, making fixing/testing some things a nightmare. Might be better today, but I remember how much of a pain it was.