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Apple Music on Android requires its own payment details to avoid Google 30% cut

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Re: Apple Music on Android requires its own payment details to avoid Google 30% cut

#191

Post by evan_ »

mikestew wrote: post #169
wildfire wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those engineers enabled this outcome. It is perfectly reasonable to ask why they facilitated immoral actions. There is a code of ethics all computing professionals should use to consider their actions. https://www.acm.org/code-of-ethics#:~:text=The%20Code%20incl... .

It is perfectly reasonable to ask why they facilitated immoral actions. Are you seriously proposing to give the presenter for the Core Audio session grief over this? IMO, that's just being a jackass "because purity". Or something; I'm at a loss to truly categorize such behavior.

I think it's very relevant to ask the folks actually building the stuff what they think.

If Apple won't answer questions about the platform through the proper channels, might as well go through the wrong channels. We're not going to get less of an answer.

Re: Apple Music on Android requires its own payment details to avoid Google 30% cut

#192

Post by thebean11 »

Spivak wrote: post #86
mmastrac wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But Walmart isn't the only store to go to in meatspace. If you have an iOS device, you get the Walmart of apps and only the Walmart of apps. This is the problem.

But you're choosing a definition of the world that's too narrow -- "if you've already decided to go to Walmart then Walmart is the only store that can sell at Walmart." Why isn't "the world" the smartphone market where there are plenty of options?

There are essentially two options for smartphones, for tablets it's closer to one. Remember when Microsoft got in trouble for bundling Internet Explorer in Windows? Seems quaint compared to what Apple is doing now.

Re: Apple Music on Android requires its own payment details to avoid Google 30% cut

#193

Post by racl101 »

happytoexplain wrote: post #28
tracerbulletx wrote: post #13

People keep writing about businesses like they are surprised they aren't moral entities with consistent moral logic. Businesses take whatever action or position they can to maximize their results. The more power the business has, the more they can leverage that power to get what they want. This should just be the default assumption at this point and we should talk about if that is ok for society, not keep feigning su…

This faulty logic is deeply ironic, since it's an expression of irrational negative emotion, which is what it's accusing others of. It's so common and so unchanging, I can paste an old comment I wrote about it (just substitute "corporations" for "wealthy and powerful people"): The "why are people surprised" line is a huge red flag for me that a person is not arguing in good faith. Accusing people of being "surprised"…

Well put.

Just cause it's happened a 1000 times doesn't mean people are numb.

The protests out there are evidence of this.

Yes, some people know some cops in some places are gonna be huge dickheads, but it doesn't assuage our feelings, when a bad experience happens.

Nobody should get used to having to experience a shitty situation through no fault of their own.

Re: Apple Music on Android requires its own payment details to avoid Google 30% cut

#194

Post by yyyk »

Despegar wrote: post #176
pccole wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which Apple does not permit. It's literally Apple's way, plus a 30% cut for doing nothing, or you're not even allowed to play. And that's exactly what antitrust laws were intended to prevent. I wouldn't say Apple or Google do nothing. Their Argument is we provide the infrastructure and developer tools so we're going to take a slice off all your sells to keep this stuff up and running. Even the Amazon App Store takes…

If the antitrust laws were designed to prevent that (they weren't) then there's been a massive failure in enforcement because nothing has changed since Apple launched the App Store in 2008. In reality laws don't require platforms to be "open" or "closed" or dictate how you're supposed to make money. And that kind of regulation would be bad for dynamic markets and competition.

If you look at Spotify's allegations[0], than things did change in 2015 when Apple launched Apple Music, creating a conflict of interest for Apple. Anyhow, anti-trust moves slow. The trust cases against IBM took more than a decade, and the case against Microsoft also took a few years.

[0] https://timetoplayfair.com/timeline/

Re: Apple Music on Android requires its own payment details to avoid Google 30% cut

#195

Post by Phrodo_00 »

GeekyBear wrote: post #123
mkozlows wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple literally puts technical measures in place to ensure that it's 100% impossible to download outside software.

This has never been a secret. Google literally spent most of a decade preaching that the "freedom" their platform afforded to sideload software was a major competitive advantage, and then attacked a developer who was making use of that freedom to make a large profit without giving Google a cut.

Epic is obviously exaggerating. Android lets you enable local app installs in like 2 clicks including a safety message. Complaining about this is like complaining about windows UAT (I expect Epic will complain about that next).

Re: Apple Music on Android requires its own payment details to avoid Google 30% cut

#196

Post by mrep »

spideymans wrote: post #152
echelon wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you don't like Apple's platform or business practices, don't use it. This isn't an option! There are no alternatives. Most people do computing on their smartphones today. Apple has prevented web from being a first-class native construct on their devices. There's no technical reason web couldn't have a native-like experience with native windowing, sensor access, persistence, multithreading, and WASM speed. Google…

> All the users and developers are there by choice. > I strongly beg to differ. How? Which users are being forced to use an iPhone? This is a bizarre statement when fully eighty five percent of smartphone users are not on the iPhone.

Apples market share in the US is 58% [0] which only leaves you with 42% of the market if you are a developer and don't want to follow apples rules. That's not a good choice.

[0]: https://gs.statcounter.com/vendor-market-share/mobile/united...

Re: Apple Music on Android requires its own payment details to avoid Google 30% cut

#197

Post by cwhiz »

zachruss92 wrote: post #125
mmcclure wrote: post #54

It's very relevant to note that Google Play's terms around in-app billing[1] are far more liberal than Apple's. > Developers offering products within a game downloaded on Google Play or providing access to game content must use Google Play In-app Billing as the method of payment. Developers offering products within another category of app downloaded on Google Play must use Google Play In-app Billing as the method of…

First of all, my stance here is that Google is pretty reasonable with their guidelines compared to Apple. My biggest issue in the iOS vs Android debate is that apple is behaving monopolistically and Google isn't. Using the respective app stores give publishers an inherent audience to distribute/sell content through. I don't think it's unreasonable for Apple/Google to try to profit off of the audience they've built. W…

Apple is a minority player in every single market in the world, including the US. You can't have monopolistic behavior without a monopoly. You can't be a monopoly if you are not the market leader.

People want this to be a legal issue but it's just a market issue. If people don't like these policies they shouldn't buy Apple products or release apps on Apple devices.

Re: Apple Music on Android requires its own payment details to avoid Google 30% cut

#198

Post by naravara »

Despegar wrote: post #176
pccole wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which Apple does not permit. It's literally Apple's way, plus a 30% cut for doing nothing, or you're not even allowed to play. And that's exactly what antitrust laws were intended to prevent. I wouldn't say Apple or Google do nothing. Their Argument is we provide the infrastructure and developer tools so we're going to take a slice off all your sells to keep this stuff up and running. Even the Amazon App Store takes…

If the antitrust laws were designed to prevent that (they weren't) then there's been a massive failure in enforcement because nothing has changed since Apple launched the App Store in 2008. In reality laws don't require platforms to be "open" or "closed" or dictate how you're supposed to make money. And that kind of regulation would be bad for dynamic markets and competition.

> then there's been a massive failure in enforcement

I think basically everyone who works on anti-trust issues would agree that this has indeed been the case. Not just with Apple, but with anti-trust law in general.

Re: Apple Music on Android requires its own payment details to avoid Google 30% cut

#199

Post by mackey »

oillio wrote: post #181
gamblor956 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Analogous != same. It means its very similar factually. The law does not require that Google and Apple run their online stores the same way, or that Apple interact with Google's store the same way they choose to run their own store. That's correct. But the law does require them to run the stores in a way that does not violate antitrust laws. Apple is violating antitrust laws by forcing companies to use Apple Pay as a…

> plus a 30% cut for doing nothing It's not nothing. Maybe not worth 30% but it is worth something. They run the store, buy the servers and pay for the bandwidth. Pay the engineers to develop and manage the infrastructure. Run the app certification process. Maintain the security of the platform. etc. If they can't charge their 30% cut, they will need a different business plan. Possibly charging app developers directl…

They already charge developers to access the App Store. And I think any iOS/Mac developer will tell you that the cut they are taking is not being re-invested into making the developer or the App Store experience better for developers or users.

Re: Apple Music on Android requires its own payment details to avoid Google 30% cut

#200

Post by kevincox »

chongli wrote: post #178
kevincox wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be honest this seems perfectly reasonable. I think we should pass on costs to the consumer more often. In North America you can make up to 5% back on purchases by using credit card. This is because the store pays a fee. I don't see why this shouldn't be paid by the consumer. This is effectively overcharging cash customers for the availability of a service that they don't use. I think the long term effects would be…

This is effectively overcharging cash customers for the availability of a service that they don't use. Cash isn't free for stores to handle either. They need to pay employees to count up the cash at closing time, put it in the safe, and periodically distribute cash to registers so they don't run out of change. Additionally, stores typically contract with security companies to pickup and deliver cash to/from the store…

Those are good points, and maybe I picked a bad example.

But my point is if that Apple claims that the security and convince is worth 30% we should let the market decide. This is to an extent what Google Music is doing and I think it would be healthy if more companies did this.

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