However, I'm happy with the decision. Sure, they are not available right now. But it's worth it for the long term picture. Imagine if this would be yet another Apple/Google-only market.
The tradeoff is right IMO.
And the users here on HN saying "it's expensive/difficult to give the same access to competitors" are beyond naive if they think this isn't about protecting the margins on the airpods by giving their own products access to the system competitors don't have.
One consequence of the DMA is that you can't build certain products because there is no way to recoup the development cost.
Poor, poor Apple…
However:
1/ There are obvious downsides to the lack of competition.
2/ In this case, the proprietary protocol that AirPods use is not revolutionary R&D, to say the least! Any competent software engineer can create a new protocol superior to bluetooth if they can drop compatibility with bluetooth.
No, but that's how Apple continuously tries to frame it.
By the ruling of the DMA, Apple is not allowed to develop a free feature in iOS (!!!) in order to recoup the cost by restricting it to their own brands and crushing the competition with it in ANOTHER product-segment.
They could easily make this live translation feature a separate app using publicly available iOS-APIs. Every competitor would be able to develop and provide the same feature.
Ah, not integrated enough for them? Fair enough, then their integration needs to provide interoperability for competitors.
Instead they are trying to rally their userbase against the DMA in hopes to create a political climate in their favor.
Features like that can sell the phone, that's where you recoup the costs obviously, yet it seems like the only focus is keeping airpod margins lol.
You recoup the costs by *selling more iphones* because they have functionality the competition does not have.
Investing in your platform is not "giving it away for free", it's making sure consumers have reasons to buy your products and not competitors.
If tomorrow Samsung phones offer this out of the box, and any earbuds maker can access it Samsung will gain sales and users that would've looked at iPhones for this feature won't.
The lengths people will go to justify nonsensical margin-protecting walled garden business choices is insane.