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Comment by jacobsimon | Hacker News Reader

Yeah I see what you mean, I just think these regulatory frameworks are themselves somewhat draconian, indirect, and lead to obnoxious and bad user experiences despite their good intentions, like cookie consent popups.

Obviously my opinion doesn’t matter, but wouldn’t it be easier if the EU simply said, “We have the power to regulate commerce in the EU, including software marketplaces. We have decided X.” That would be pretty similar to how many governments set maximum credit card interest rates (as someone mentioned below) as well as other transaction fees in industries that are vulnerable to cartel-like behavior like real estate.

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In fact, I’m almost convinced that this regulatory framework was suggested by Apple themselves, because it doesn’t really accomplish anything. No one wanted to use third party app stores, they just want Apple to stop charging them so much. It’s fundamentally a payment processing issue, and they’ve spun it into a user freedom issue.

It’s always a cat and mouse thing but being overly obtuse runs the risk of irritating the regulator. The reality is there’s a clear intention and spirit behind the regulation. It’s also purposefully vague to capture more than this one case and allow for creative compliance that meets the spirit. Often regulators fail to grok the specific details of a business and the point isn’t to crush companies it’s to elicit a behavior.

But being evasive or a general asshat with a regulator leaves you open to the fact it was vague and the judge of compliance isn’t you, it’s the regulator. And if you’re too far in the wrong direction criminal consequences can kick in. Creating ill will makes all future interactions worse. So it’s really in your best interest to engage constructively with your regulators to achieve a best outcome possible.

There are exceptions - Uber has made willful non compliance a business model requiring that TLC regulation is pretty toothless. I don’t think Apple will find a similar situation here.

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