Meta would owe Apple 70M per year just for having Facebook on iOS
theverge.com
theverge.com
* Don't use Facebook or any other social networking apps
* Don't really use very many apps, period
* Have the deepest disdain for every company involved in this
Apple's pricing plan doesn't strike me as crazy. Given the value that being on the App Store brings to Facebook, even if they choose not to monetize through it. If you asked them: would you rather pay $70MM or not have your app listed on the App Store, it feels like they would rush to pay the money, knowing that if they disappeared from the App Store it would be catastrophic. My naive understanding of pricing makes this seem like a fair trade.
Those for whom I have more sympathy are small app developers who would be punished by success under this model, especially the vanishingly few who release free (unmonetized) apps and could become so successful they went bankrupt under Apple's model. That failure makes me dislike the proposal. At that point, you'd be insane to release a good and free app, and that's not the world I want to encourage.
Oh a secure well established capable platform? That's what users want & the mighty service you provide? Yeah, well, uh, the rest of the world has a standardized one of those, it kind of rocks.
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/64448312/use-the-web-sha...
Last two products we have built were PWA’s and platform risk is the biggest reason for that.
Their revenue last year was way over 100 BILLION. Paying 70M a year is a rounding error.
One of the chief complaints about the 15/30% fee has been that people like Meta pay nothing and are subsidized by everyone else.
Using dumb file hosting on Backblaze this would cost somewhere near $9M (public pricing). A full app store would have additional costs but $70M still seems high.
What you are describing is an unavoidable cost of doing business which Apple is entitled to charge developers for.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/263401/global-apple-ipho...
Apple will continue their anticompetitive a d abusive tactics als long as the market tells them that its OK (with their spending).
Keep in mind, we already pay them for dev tools each year, just like how we pay Microsof for visual studio.
If us devs were smart, we’d organize and have our apps go on a maintenance break until Apple and Google remember what a computing and platform is without 3rd party devs.
You’re already seeing that with car and headset though.
On the flip side, when’s the last time you’re seen a successful computing platform without 3rd party software?
Simply put, this should be a mutually beneficial relationship like it is on Mac and windows…but Apple and Google are trying to change the code of conduct for mobile so they can not only take their piece, but ours too.
Should you also have to pay each telco a fee to make your phone number reachable? Should Comcast be allowed to block traffic if you don’t pay them a toll?
Apple is large yes, but not remotely close to a monopoly. They have 25% smartphone marketshare, and there are numerous other major smartphone manufacturers.
If Apple abuses its power, there are plenty of alternatives that customers can switch to. They should otherwise be free to do with their products as they see fit no?
I presume you disagree with my last question, so I ask then where do we draw the line? Should Nike be forced to carry Adidas clothes? Should AWS be forced to allow customers to co-locate their own hardware? Should Tesla be forced to produce cars that can also be converted to internal combustion engines?
If I want the product to be different from the one being offered from vendor A, I simply go buy one from vendor B.
This is just not how the 3 party markets work. For there to be mobility, both the users and developers have to move. Good luck convincing users to move of their $1000+ purchase. Maybe developers should start a union and boycott the app stores
If Walmart doesn't carry Target products, I either buy a substitute or I shop at both stores.
Walmart doesn't own the distribution channel of a platform with a double digit percentage of the world population on it.
> unrealistic to expect
That’s true, but it changes nothing. Developers absolutely do not have to develop for iOS. That would still leave 75% of the market. It is not a monopoly.
If the iPhone market is too lucrative to ignore, that’s not a competition issue. In fact it’s more supportive that Apple’s approach is pretty valuable to a lot of valuable people that developers want to sell to.
Europe absolutely does not have to sell iPhones.
> It was rumored in February that Apple may be planning to limit charging speeds and other functionality of USB-C cables that are not certified under its "Made for iPhone" program. […] In response to this rumor, European Commissioner Thierry Breton has sent Apple a letter warning the company that limiting the functionality of USB-C cables would not be permitted and would prevent iPhones from being sold in the EU when the law goes into effect.
https://www.macrumors.com/2023/05/04/eu-warns-apple-about-li...
> The bureaucrats know better.
Than the corporations? Yes.
This exact line of logic is why we have arrived at legislation like the Digital Market Act. Apple goes out of their way to ensure reasonable substitutes don't exist, by controlling their own IP but also ruthlessly C&Ding reverse engineers, fan projects and security researchers. They operate an end-to-end plot that protects their bottom line, and certain jurisdictions should have the right to deny that behavior in their market.
There are plenty of alternatives. You and many other people saying the same things are ignoring the benefits of their walled garden. You might disagree and that’s fine. Vote with your wallet, not with regulation.
There are plenty of alternatives. You and many other people saying the same things are ignoring the benefits of international business. You might disagree and that’s fine. Get out and vote, don't assume the market is right any more than it was with Sackler or Shkreli.
There is no way to deliver native software to a users iPhone without the App Store…that’s the problem.
The judge cited switching cost in the epic v Google case and I slow clapped him by myself in my office like a weirdo…I was just so excited that the judicial system was picking up on where the control lies.
And by the way, we can go to google who use scare tactics for sideloading even when we are doing everything right.
Last I checked, you could only turn sideloading on or off…you should be able to whitelist sites like chrome does or support code signing like windows does.
In part, you’re right. It’s their product and they made the phone, but make no mistake, devs made it successful!
We have been moving away from native apps because the hassle just ain’t worth it. We have more control over our own destiny on the web so that’s where we are investing time.
I’ve been saying for years that Apple will regret treating us with such distain in the long run, and here we are where car makers don’t want their software, and devs are saying thanks but no thanks on their headset.
If enough devs move to pwa’s, that’s the ball game. May as well bring back the Firefox OS.
Here’s the thing that really bothers me about iOS. I’m forced to distribute through an App Store that doesn’t understand how to upgrade orgs, not individuals, doesn’t understand that org subscriptions don’t belong on an individuals Apple account, will deny updates even when you are completely compliant, sell ads on direct searches of our trademarked name…AND, we get borderline zero organic search traffic from App Store because it’s just not where our customers are looking for a solution. So, we spend money to send them to the iOS App Store!!! Not the other way around. With Mac, we quickly ditched the App Store and self distributed cause app review was such a pain.
With windows, which is much bigger than Mac for us, we self distribute with code signing.
And…if that’s not bad enough, we want to be able to deploy updates immediately when necessary. This is mission critical software for these businesses. Thankfully, we can roll out on desktop immediately but on phones, there was one time a couple years ago where we had to deny all Android access for 48 hours cause there was a bad bug over a public holiday weekend. So now, we won’t update the app around holidays. I will say, app review has gotten better over the years and most of ours go theough within 30 mins these days but every now and again it’ll take a couple days which keeps that spectre in the back of your mind.