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Comment by blackeyeblitzar | Hacker News Reader

Apple needs to be heavily taxed and regulated into operating their devices like general computers free of their authoritarianism

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Why bother with the fines and taxes and regulations? Stop beating around the bush here and do what you want directly—nationalize it.

Yes, let's nationalize Android as well. Windows too. Azure. AWS. Google. Nationalize everything. Let politicians build our tech products. I hear many congress and senate people write great product specs and are great at UX design.

That's exactly my point.

We're all "yeah, the government's shit at this stay out of tech" but then turn around and "I don't like the way these guys are doing things, the government needs to force them to build and run their platform differently."

Which is it? You want the government telling tech companies how to run things or not?

Who's going to nationalize it?

Why? You can buy an Android, or one of its derivatives, or a Huawei.

Funny how people here are “anti communism” but suggest communism core principles all the time.

Socialism for me. Capitalism for thee.

"people here" are inflamed pundits from social media that wouldn't know the difference between authoritarianism and common-sense regulation if they were being hunted by Chiquita's 'Death Squad'.

I wouldn't take HN's cognitive dissonance personally. Half this website has to fellate their favorite CEO on a daily basis or they dematerialize into insecurity.

That argument didn't work for Microsoft in the 90's (just install BSD or buy a mac if you don't like IE), I don't know why it should work for Apple who's gotten much bigger than 90's MS.

Microsoft had something like 90% of the PC market. That’s why the argument should work for Apple today.

Microsoft was actually abusing their dominance in a criminal way to stop competition. The situation is far from comparable.

Hmm. So can I publish and let users download my iOS application without being harassed by Apple? Because on Windows and MacOS I can do that.

Microsoft was demanding from PC sellers that they do not offer customers other operating systems if they wanted to keep their business with Microsoft. Which is blatantly anti-competitive and an abuse. The equivalent would be Apple demanding that software makers do not offer their apps on Android or PC devices if they want to sell on the App Store.

Any software maker is free to sell on any non-Apple device without Apple saying a word.

I did not write anything about selling, just publishing without Apple being involved.

Because the situations are different? Apple has at best, 50% of the market. They sell their own hardware, and the OS is only available on that hardware. They don't force other phone manufacturers to buy iOS licenses even though they're shipping phones without iOS. You can't even buy a license for iOS except to buy the actual hardware from Apple. All the same software, with the singular exception of Apple's own first party software and perhaps some small indie softare, is available on the competing platform. The competing platform is sold by multiple vendors, comes in multiple different options and is just as well supported by 3rd party developers and businesses. The terms and conditions of the Apple store, and the associated fees are as bad or better than they have ever been. There has been no bait and switch, no undercutting the market to oust competitors. In fact, iOS devices as a rule are some of the most expensive devices in their respective classes. They offer access to all of your data in industry standard formats if you decide you want to switch, and Google themselves offer an automatic switching application that will transfer that data for you. If Apple dominates, it is because consumers overwhelming choose that. There is nothing that stops people from buying from any number of vendors that sell fully comparable alternatives, and no reason other than preferring the locked down experience that Apple sells to buy an iOS device.

> All the same software, with the singular exception of Apple's own first party software and perhaps some small indie softare, is available on the competing platform.

But what about the other way around; how does Apple ensure that third-parties can compete with their private entitlements?

Is it even realistic for an indie business to compete against any of Apple's provided services if they're forced to serve that business through the App Store? Apple's progressive pricing scheme seems to punish them for posing a threat to any first-party services.

It’s not very different on Android, and anyone big enough distorts the market. There is no real competition or choice here for the market to work. That’s why regulation is needed. To be clear I want Google and Microsoft regulated similarly on both mobile devices and regular computers.

Android is far less pleasant to use and much of my app ecosystem lives on iOS.

iOS is far less pleasant to use and much of my app ecosystem lives on Android.

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