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Apple apologizes to WordPress, won’t force the free app to add purchases

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Re: Apple apologizes to WordPress, won’t force the free app to add purchases

#161

Post by scarface74 »

klyrs wrote: post #157
scarface74 wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You see the part about “collusion”? That’s why random HN posters make horrible lawyers. As far as IBM (the case was dropped after 13 years and nothing came of it) and MS, they clearly had more than 50%.

You're conveniently ducking that they 100% control the market of software for their phones. And anyway, I didn't say that case was equivalent. You asked for a case where a company with less than 50% was subject to an antitrust ruling and I provided one. And I'll remind you, I'm not a lawyer. Technically, zero lawyers is a good number of lawyers, so I must insist that makes me a good lawyer. Just, I'd suck in court.

A company that was subject to antitrust because it colluded with other companies in the market has nothing to do with what’s going on in the app market. Collusion is always illegal -except for the sports leagues.

Yes and consoles makers have control of their consoles, Roku has control of their platform, as does LG with their WebOS based TVs.

Yet and still when you were challenged to come up with an analogous example, the best you could come up with is multiple companies colluding.

Re: Apple apologizes to WordPress, won’t force the free app to add purchases

#163

Post by cgriswald »

mindslight wrote: post #136
sebmellen wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Libertarianism is d̵e̵a̵d̵ * slowly dying , because it fails to recognize that corporations can exert a similar amount of oppressive force as governments. Your platform of choice is now your country, and the software that platform runs is your government.

I wouldn't say libertarianism is "dead" but rather is quick to fall prey to logical contradictions justifying totalitarianism, similar to the two prime time political teams. You're right that there is little difference between a corporation that one is de facto forced to interact with, and a bona fide government. For example, one can easily reframe USG as a corporation that you form a contract with by owning land, re…

Libertarian thought is complex, non-static, and (importantly), non-monolithic. This is especially true for the relationship between people, government, and corporations. The generalizing statements in this thread reject vast swaths of ideas for no reason at all; even ideas that generally agree with the ideas in the thread. My guess is most people hold in their minds a caricature of libertarianism informed either by "that one libertarian guy from college" or social media postings. That's somewhat deserved, but also a shame.

Re: Apple apologizes to WordPress, won’t force the free app to add purchases

#164

Post by scarface74 »

apatters wrote: post #159
scarface74 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So can I define Epic having a monopoly on being able to buy things in Fortnite? What if I want to sell my cool “Scarface dance” next to the “Carlton dance” within Fortnite without paying the “Epic Tax”?

I upvoted your comments based on a good faith belief that you're open to learning more about how antitrust law works. It has little to do with market share, and everything to do with a concept called "market power." Market power is the ability to coerce people into paying more for something via a mechanism other than actually offering a better product or service. A textbook example which most people would agree is ba…

A textbook example which most people would agree is bad is a trust/cartel situation where a few players artificially limit supply, and then can raise the price on consumers because there are no competitors.

A cartel implies collusion and unless you have evidence that Apple is colluding with Google and all of the console makers this is irrelevant.

But if a firm is able to drive up prices with impunity for any reason, it's likely they possess market power.

Every company that has a differentiate product is able to charge more than commodity prices. Nike is able to charge more shoes. Apple is able to charge more for the AppleTV than Roku. Does Apple now have a “monopoly” on set top boxes even though it’s share is a nothing? Apple charges more for Macs than the equivalent PC. Should Apple also be investigated for having a “monopoly” on computers?

The antitrust problem isn't limited to tech however, anti-competitive behaviors of questionable legality have proliferated all over the US since the 80s due to a lax regulatory environment.

If that’s the case, where are all the lawsuits? HN users can’t imagine that they might not be legal experts.

Re: Apple apologizes to WordPress, won’t force the free app to add purchases

#165

Post by donmcronald »

rubber_duck wrote: post #5

Really at this point Apple control over app store is anti-competitive (and Google over play store), having to rely on community outrage to get stuff like this turned is ridiculous. They should create legislation to control access to all app stores to prevent this rent seeking - force app stores to treat all apps equally according to store defined guidelines (including store owners apps) - any submissions have to be r…

> any submissions have to be reviewed in a reasonable amount of time and if declined must receive specific violations of the guidelines on which the denial is based

Competing app stores solves this 100% because there would definitely be a market for a developer friendly app store.

Re: Apple apologizes to WordPress, won’t force the free app to add purchases

#166

Post by millstone »

scarface74 wrote: post #101
mortenjorck wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have an allergy to tech analogies in general, but Apple's brick-and-mortar retail analogy is one of the worst. In any locality other than rural towns served by a single Dollar General, consumers have a choice between multiple retail outlets. If they don't like the choices at one store, they're free to shop at another. "But Android!" one might say, and once again, the analogy falls completely flat. The switching cos…

Name one app that is of any importance on iOS that there isn’t available on Android or that would cause you to have to buy again? I have exactly one - Overcast. Even with that I can export to OPML (?).

I would miss all the games. Slay the Spire, Darkest Dungeon, Bastion, FTL...

Re: Apple apologizes to WordPress, won’t force the free app to add purchases

#167

Post by Sargos »

scarface74 wrote: post #117
dragonwriter wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So tell me again when an “antitrust” ruling has ever been applied to a company with less than 50%? 50% of what is the issue, though. Some arbitrary descriptive market the target company preferred to be used for the antitrust analysis, or the actual market in which substitution, and thus actual competition, occurs as found by the court hearing the case? Because defining the relevant market is not infrequently a cont…

So can I define Epic having a monopoly on being able to buy things in Fortnite? What if I want to sell my cool “Scarface dance” next to the “Carlton dance” within Fortnite without paying the “Epic Tax”?

You might be able to do just that after this Apple/Epic ruling. That's kind of why NFTs/digital ownership is so exciting. You might be able to buy or sell your dances on any store you want to and use them in the game.

Re: Apple apologizes to WordPress, won’t force the free app to add purchases

#168

Post by scarface74 »

Sargos wrote: post #167
scarface74 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So can I define Epic having a monopoly on being able to buy things in Fortnite? What if I want to sell my cool “Scarface dance” next to the “Carlton dance” within Fortnite without paying the “Epic Tax”?

You might be able to do just that after this Apple/Epic ruling. That's kind of why NFTs/digital ownership is so exciting. You might be able to buy or sell your dances on any store you want to and use them in the game.

I wish I could be on the other side of a bet against most of HN, betting against all of the wannabe lawyers who don’t understand what a “monopoly” is and posting examples of market collusion showing how Apple/Google could be charged based on the App stores.

Re: Apple apologizes to WordPress, won’t force the free app to add purchases

#169

Post by donmcronald »

pb7 wrote: post #104
flir wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You call it their platform, I call it my computer.

It is your computer; you have a right to that hardware. But they only licensed you the OS and the hardware only supports that OS (which you acknowledged and agreed to when you bought it) so you can call it what you want, but you can’t force another entity to do what pleases you. The courts will decide that and it will set a pretty significant precedent.

You're arguing for a future where you own nothing and rent everything. Look at how many industries are using the idea of software licenses to retain control over your devices after you buy them so they can render them useless, or at least less useful, unless you pay for a subscription of some type.

Re: Apple apologizes to WordPress, won’t force the free app to add purchases

#170

Post by nodamage »

mortenjorck wrote: post #73
makecheck wrote: post #55

What ultimately made me pull out of the Mac App Store was the fact that publishing with Apple meant “app with customizations to accommodate stupid rules”, and $EVERYWHERE_ELSE meant “upload and be done with it”. If you haven’t checked lately, the Mac App Store is a pathetic ghost town for the most part. On iOS I guarantee that if the App Store had even one alternative, many apps would do the same and bail on Apple, a…

I have an allergy to tech analogies in general, but Apple's brick-and-mortar retail analogy is one of the worst. In any locality other than rural towns served by a single Dollar General, consumers have a choice between multiple retail outlets. If they don't like the choices at one store, they're free to shop at another. "But Android!" one might say, and once again, the analogy falls completely flat. The switching cos…

Except if having the choice of more than one app store was important to you, why did you buy an iPhone in the first place? You could have bought something else and and avoided the problem entirely.
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