Epic says Google paid $360M to keep Activision from launching an app store | Hacker News Reader

Epic says Google paid $360M to keep Activision from launching an app store

theverge.com

68 pointsastlouis4424 comments

Activision claims this is false and has submitted documents disproving these claims: https://twitter.com/lulumeservey/status/1593344663385153537?...

"Epic is accusing Activision Blizzard’s partner Google of paying us not to compete with them.

To be clear: that's false.

Google never asked us, pressured us, or made us agree not to compete with them - and we’ve already submitted documents and testimony disproving this nonsense."

At a glance to the doc from the google exec, there was at least some dialogue suggesting that activision would pursue a competing platform if Google didn't give them some sort of agreement. It's not a direct bribe. The money is going to purchase something else. But the topic seems to have been discussed.

It's very interesting to me how a company is able to prove a negative. We are just taking their word for it.

What kind of document proves that they never discussed a thing

This is interesting stuff to ponder. If Activision-Blizzard ends up being owned by Microsoft, then Microsoft will have significant leverage when it comes to launching their own mobile app store. They'll just pull all their content on Android and lock it behind their own platform. And users will migrate if it means that's the only way to access IP like COD mobile, Diablo mobile, Candy Crush, etc.

https://www.theverge.com/2022/10/19/23411972/microsoft-xbox-...

This is what Disney did to streaming media - bought out Marvel, locked all their content behind their own streaming service and locked in the choice of the service and content together into a single consolidated entity.

People now scream at Netflix for not having this content anymore and happily pay Disney for it.

Isn't market competition great?

You can probably watch any interesting content you find on Disney+ on a Saturday before having to wait a while for anything new. The catalog is not that much, but it is high quality, and I don't have a tv show about a soda company promotion on my front page like I do with the supposedly ad free version of the Netflix plan.

Without compulsory licensing for copyrighted works there will never be competition. And that’s by design.

The walled gardens from Google and Apple are clearly a duopoly, and these revealings from Epic show just how far these companies will go to prevent competition.

We need a third option for an app store that works on both iOS and Android, featuring lower rates, desperately. As another comment suggested, maybe Microsoft can be the new entrant here.

China has a large ecosystem of app stores. Does anyone know why? Government intervention? Can we replicate that in America?

The Google Play store is banned there, so there's no obvious "default" choice. Other than whatever your phone manufacturer preloads, which will probably be its own store, not necessarily a good store.

What are the alternative app stores available to Chinese iOS users?

It would be nice to have an App Store in China that didn't ban VPN apps.

There is wechat which is a 'superapp' that works almost like an OS with its own repository within the app.

You’d like your app stores controlled by the government?

To be clear, most of the alternative app stores here are so bad you’d never want them near your phone. They do things like slip spyware into apks and ask for broad permissions for extra stuff an App Store should never do, like “help you back up your text messages.” (This was in 2014 anyway, haven’t touched an android since)

Choice is good, but there’s something to be said for a locked-down ecosystem protecting consumers from bad actors. Not sure how to split the difference. I run linux on PC but have an iPhone because it needs to just work.

That sounds like yet another walled garden. Am I understanding correctly?

to be honest, why would we even need a app store. We don't need app stores for windows operating systems. Why should we require it for android phones?

I assume that Google Play is a big source of Android revenue for Google, and a major reason for them to keep developing it.

It's even simpler than that: Allowing others to dictate the terms of interacting with users would be very bad for Googles bottom line. What happens to Google Maps dominance without knowing who's going where (for new/closed shops) and how fast (for traffic information)? What about Chrome pushing users to install on desktop, Photos being built-in, and basically every other Google property being the built-in default? Android reports so much information it means Google will, IMO, always and forever have an edge over every other advertising company.

A large part of why iOS has a perception of quality is their handling of the app store.

For a frankly shocking length of time, basic actions like installing a well-rated flashlight app from the Play Store result in your lockscreen being replaced with ads.

Apple on the other hand was pretty ruthless about rejections.

Technically AOSP ("bare Android") has no reliance on an app store, but having someone vetting apps and providing ancillary services through it (Google Play Services) is so valuable that manufacturers are willing to give up a lot of control.

So that granny hasn't 5 toolbars on Internet Explorer and a couple of RAM compression tools and registry cleaners.

Love Windows store and S mode.

What we need is to have an app store as a public service. Why on hell would you want a for-profit company to decide what companies are allowed to exist?

If only someone like Amazon would create an alternative App Store for Android, people would undoubtedly flock to it... right?

The friction that amazon app store for installs and updates make it impractical to use.

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