Despegar

Websites are unregulated. iOS apps have to abide by Apple's terms. This is exactly why developers are mad about any number of things: paying Apple's commission, but also complying with their privacy dictates.

Unless Israel is selling this to Iran, Syria, China, Russia, Cuba or any other Official Enemy of the US, they absolutely aren't rocking the boat in anyway. The other "authoritarian" governments are the good kind, they're pro-US.

Cuba actually has 5 vaccine candidates, and 2 of them have greater than 90% effectiveness. A great showing for a small, socialist island nation under decades of embargo by hostile anti-communist forces.

https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Cubas-Soberana-02-COVID-...

Their current business model incentivizes Apple to make high quality products that last a long time. The larger Apple's installed base is, the more money they make from the App Store. You can tell from the used market prices for iPhones that they've been doing a great job of this.

This also happens to be more environmentally sustainable, so it's not in society's broader interest for Apple to change their business model.

A world in which Apple only earns profits from hardware sales removes those incentives. Not only would they try to get you to upgrade more often, they'd also invest less R&D in the hardware as well. Instead of doing the iPhone X redesign, with its higher component costs, they'd try to milk the iPhone 6 design for as long as possible.

>If Apple wishes to continue advancing bizarre corporate-accounting arguments, the massive profits from the hardware business are what therefore truly “pay the way” of the App Store, public APIs, developer tools, and other app-development resources, just as the hardware profits must fund the development of Apple’s own hardware, software, and services that make the iPhone appeal to customers.

You can ignore everything else from this post. The developer gripes with the App Store have always been a contractual dispute between businesses over terms. Marco would like Apple to have the Mac business model apply to the iPhone. He wants to be able to use the SDK and tools for free (or for the nominal developer program annual fee).

This is understandable from a business perspective; everyone wants lower costs and higher profits. But it's certainly not in Apple's customers' interests for their business model to change to accommodate developers.

That's exactly right. Apple is the users' union that protects them from developers.

>The IP argument seems a bit hollow to me, since Apple would've had to build probably upwards of 70% of the API surface for iOS just for their internal apps (and when they launched the iPhone SDK, they repeatedly pushed that developers were using the same tools they used to build the core apps).

Does Amazon build separate warehouses for third-party goods? All you're saying is that software is a good business, which everyone already knows.

No they get the billions from their intellectual property. There's a bunch of pro-user, pro-Apple, and pro-developer reasons why they are the single source for apps and payment processing, but that's not the source of the billions, as I just explained.

There's a bunch of reasons why it'd be a PITA for everyone involved if they were forced to do this, but no matter what happens the revenue sharing is never going to go away as long as Apple wants to keep that business model. All the frictional costs (more lawyers and accountants) to verify they collect the right royalties is exactly why courts are ultimately going to side with Apple, because the current system is the ideal one for all parties.

>For me, this is way over the line. If they want to charge developers to be on their store, fine. I don't have a problem with that. And charging for using them as a payment processor makes sense. Charging for using Apple services makes sense.

Developers have been so steeped in propaganda about "payment processing" that they have no idea what the 30% commission is for.

A court or regulator could force Apple to allow third-party payment processing, side-loading, and third-party app stores, and Apple could change their business model to directly charge for the tools and the SDKs that every developer uses to make native apps. The only way to avoid those costs is the way that already exists today: make a web app.

Right now the payment processing costs have been integrated into the commission, but they could charge whatever the market could bear to license their IP for a royalty, so in effect developers could end up paying more.

There's nothing in law that says Apple can't charge money for their software. That the use of developer tools and SDKs were free on other platforms like the Mac doesn't mean that it's legally required that it be given away for free.

Anyone can purchase currency outside of the App Store and use it in their iOS app, including Fortnite. Roblox doesn't bypass Apple's IAP requirement at all.

There's no reason to think that the cut would be any less than 30% even if they allowed side-loading. People just assume it would be like the Mac, but Apple isn't required to license its technology to anyone for free.

>And what is Apple going to do if they do identify apps in China using CAID in flagrant violation of the App Store rules, if those apps have the backing (implicit or explicit) of the Chinese government?

The CPC is on Apple's side when it comes to privacy.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-cac-personaldata-id...

Microsoft almost certainly would have preferred if no one had done game streaming through Safari on iOS, because they're a complainant about Apple's App Store policies [1]. That became untenable after Amazon went first.

[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-06-18/microsoft...

It was legally very shrewd for Apple to assist Amazon on getting their game streaming service playable over the web [1]:

>“We worked with the Safari team to ensure that some of the things that weren't there are there, and that allowed us to kind of get to where we are today,” Luna head of engineering and technology George Tsipolitis said.

All they needed was one of them to cave and the others would follow. This significantly undermines the antitrust cases against them, especially the "essential facilities" claims.

[1] https://www.engadget.com/luna-amazon-cloud-gaming-interview-...

America didn't stop giving aid to Israel despite 53 years of military occupation and apartheid. You think this is going to be the thing that changes the status quo on Israel?

It's a nothingburger if all they're doing is just backing up WhatsApp user data. It's not if the terms of the agreement allowed for anything else, which we don't really know because that part of the complaint has been redacted.

Ah a classic of American foreign policy.

Apple's ads never used the IDFA [1]. They've said this multiple times on the record already.

>Apple does not access or use the IDFA on a user’s device for any purpose.

The IDFA was only ever used by developers. This change (when users refuse to opt-in) effectively brings everyone up to their level.

[1] https://www.scribd.com/document/485006035/Apple-Privacy-Lett...

The most interesting thing is the allegation of coordination between Google and Facebook on page 5, paragraph 12.

It's in the press release:

>The FTC is issuing the orders under Section 6(b) of the FTC Act, which authorizes the Commission to conduct wide-ranging studies that do not have a specific law enforcement purpose.

It's absolutely not an "overreach." The FTC is actually starting to do their job after decades of letting industries consolidate. Congress should increase their budget so they can do more of it.

There's basically nothing new here. This is a similar aftermarket case to Kodak [1]. Like the Epic case, this too will fail.

A key element of Kodak was a bait and switch. If Apple had monopolized the aftermarket for iOS app distribution after customers were locked in, you may have a case against Apple (if you satisfy the other elements, like switching costs). But that was never true. From day one, the App Store was the only way to legally obtain iOS apps.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastman_Kodak_Co._v._Image_Tec....

Fortunately I have and they do have standing.

>The owners and operators of more than half a million diesel pickup trucks have been illegally disabling their vehicles’ emissions control technology over the past decade, allowing excess emissions equivalent to 9 million extra trucks on the road, a new federal report has concluded.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/25/climate/diesel-trucks-air...

>My layman understanding was Epic had to do this to be able to legally challenge Apple in court

This is obviously false because there are other antitrust cases against Apple pending.

I haven't gotten that popup. Are you sure that's actually a meaningful choice you can make and not just a test to see how many people are going to opt-in when this finally rolls out in iOS?

The "yearly fee" could pay for it, it'd just be several billion per year. Their existing business model is the one that's best for Apple, users, and small developers.

From page 30 of the DoJ filing:

>Over the years, Google has steadily increased its dominant position in general search services. In July 2007, Google estimated its general search services market share at 68 percent. By June 2013, Google estimated that its share in the United States had already increased to 77 percent on computers. By April 2018, Google estimated that its share was 79 percent on computers and 93.5 percent on mobile. More recently, Google has accounted for almost 90 percent of all general search engine queries in the United States, and almost 95 percent of queries on mobile devices. Recent share estimates are in Figures 7 and 8.

Subsequent decisions by circuit courts have used the lack of an explicit policy change to find against the plaintiff. This case is at the outer boundaries of antitrust law and lower courts have effectively taken the perspective of the dissent to limit its applicability.

Kodak monopolized the aftermarket for parts and service after their customers were "locked in." The primary market for their equipment was competitive and they didn't have monopoly power, but the Supreme Court still decided against them. This established that a single brand could be a "relevant market" for antitrust purposes under certain circumstances. This is the case that Epic is relying on against Apple. Unfortunately for them plaintiffs almost never win under Kodak antitrust theories.