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Apple Terminates Epic Games' Developer Account

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Re: Apple Terminates Epic Games' Developer Account

#231

Post by coliveira »

013a wrote: post #92
coliveira wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if you remember the 90s, but at the time MS was the ONLY monopoly in personal computing. Intel was the other big force, but even they had competition on AMD. All other companies had not even a slim of hope of controlling the ecosystem like MS had. Now we have Apple, but you still can buy Google devices and do whatever you want outside their walled garden.

I think its really important the narrative stays clear concerning this: Its never been about users having choice (because users do have choice): Its about Developers not having a choice. Refusing to release an iOS app for your web application/game/etc is generally a death sentence, so much so that oftentimes you see new services release as "Get it on the iOS app store, Android coming soon."

I don't think this line of argument would fly, because developers have actually a choice in developing for Android. If they don't make as much money that is not Google or Apple's fault.

What I think is an argument against Apple is that users want to have access to apps that Apple doesn't want to release on its store. In that case, they may be forced to relax their rules on the Appstore.

Re: Apple Terminates Epic Games' Developer Account

#232

Post by scarface74 »

coliveira wrote: post #218
grumple wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How were they a monopoly if Apple had their own OS? As did many others? Microsoft got hit for antitrust because of bundled software. What Apple does is far worse imo, not just bundling software, but the control over the store/devices is nuts.

Apple had less than 5% of the desktop market. At some point in the 90s Apple was going bankrupt quickly! MS had to step in and invest in Apple so that it wouldn't close down leaving MS as the only company in the personal computer OS market.

This is not what happened.

Microsoft “invested” a token $250 million in Apple. The same quarter, Apple spent $100 million to buy PoweComputings Mac license. The $150 net did not save Apple. Apple lost far more money than that before it became profitable.

What MS did was promise to continue releasing both Office and IE for the Mac.

Re: Apple Terminates Epic Games' Developer Account

#233

Post by jpambrun »

IMO, Apple is acting like a bully. It's using its position of power to coerce other into giving up a substantial amount of revenue for very little effort.

If they want to keep this monopoly, they should make their cost transparent and apply a reasonable markup. Otherwise they should be forced to allow competing stores. Anything else is ripe for abuse, as we can plainly see now.

Re: Apple Terminates Epic Games' Developer Account

#234

Post by bitxbit »

pier25 wrote: post #130
bitxbit wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Might be an unpopular opinion but I don’t think they are acting to the level of MSFT in the 90s. What MSFT did would be equivalent to Apple forcing everyone to use its apps and not allow any competing apps. Also recall that Jobs was pretty adamant about allowing third-party apps in the beginning. Now, do I think 30% is ridiculous in 2020? Yes. But it made sense a decade ago when having a half decent working app almos…

You can't uninstall Safari from iOS. In fact you can't even browse the web without it as Apple prohibits any other browsing engine (Chrome, FF, etc, are using WKWebView). I don't know the numbers but I imagine there are more iOS devices now than there were Windows PCs back in the 90s.

Fair point but that’s largely due to security not Apple’s desire to lockout other browsers.

Re: Apple Terminates Epic Games' Developer Account

#235

Post by Gwypaas »

microtherion wrote: post #199
MaximumMadness wrote: post #21

Apple is truly doing themselves a disservice here, if Epic wins this battle Apple will undoubtedly be painted as the bad guy, and other major companies will smell blood in the water when it comes taking down a competitor. Case in point; Tinder, Microsoft, Facebook, Spotify have all openly backed Epic and started to call attention to features that are impacted by this 30% fee. Status quo isn't going to cut it, and it…

> Tinder, Microsoft, Facebook, Spotify have all openly backed Epic Oh, it's going to be so much fun when Epic wins and Taylor Swift decides to apply the same legal reasoning to the cut she pays Spotify for her music…

The difference would be that the same iPhone has access to Taylor Swift through Spotify, Apple Music, Play Music (does that even exist anymore?) and so on.

Put the app store on the same level of competition and level the playing field of Spotify vs Apple Music in regards to the 30% subscription fee.

Re: Apple Terminates Epic Games' Developer Account

#236

Post by AnthonyMouse »

scarface74 wrote: post #214
amelius wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But where is the equivalent of the browser-ballot screen? [1] Why don't we apply the same principle to the App store? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BrowserChoice.eu

From your article. Competing browsers saw their traffic increase,[16] suggesting that these smaller competing developers were gaining users. However, long-term trends show browsers such as Opera and Firefox losing market share in Europe, calling into question the usefulness of the browser choice screen.

> However, long-term trends show browsers such as Opera and Firefox losing market share in Europe

To Chrome, not IE/Edge, which benefits from the browser ballot as much as they do.

Re: Apple Terminates Epic Games' Developer Account

#237

Post by oneplane »

8note wrote: post #139
oneplane wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Microsoft went from open options to package deals with no options. iOS (and vendored Android) started out with nothing, then added a store. There is no precedent on the platforms to point to an "it got worse" scenario. The best (far-fetched) comparisons would be the inability to pick and choose TV packages from your local TV broadcast supplier. Or not having a choice on what firmware your car's infotainment system ru…

It got worse by moving from laptops to phones? I used to use a laptop for the things I use my phone for now The benefit of phones over laptops is the mobility, and I see no reason why the open options should go away for that mobility

From our perspective: yes. But legally and from the perspective or the mass-marketed users there really isn't much for them to think about or consider in terms of flexibility of application installation. (freedom is such a vague term to describe platform access - are you really free if you don't harvest your self-grown silicon chrystals, diffuse the chips yourself, write the firmware and OS yourself etc?)

Ironically, we could turn this on it's head: when the iPad came out people commented humorously "nobody asked for this" but apparently it was a device we didn't know we could use or enjoy. The same could be said for personal platform access. But what shape or benefit (and downsides) it gives to the mass market user eludes me so far.

Re: Apple Terminates Epic Games' Developer Account

#238

Post by scarface74 »

madeofpalk wrote: post #53
hnarayanan wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In what metric is Apple a monopoly?

Epic asserts that they maintain an illegal monopoly of iOS app distribution.

But surprisingly Epic didn’t go after the console makers..

Re: Apple Terminates Epic Games' Developer Account

#239

Post by fjdjsmsm »

jasonhansel wrote: post #104
system2 wrote: post #2

I wish every damn micro transaction app gets removed one day. Of course no one will do it but I simply hate everything about these apps forcing parents to pay small fees for stupid pixels because their kids begs them to do it. Sorry, nothing else new to add to the topic, just venting and have absolutely no sympathy to apps tricking kids to spend money on tiny cellphone games. My niece begged her mother to buy a roblo…

Ads are worse. Micro-transactions are the only viable funding model that preserves some amount of user privacy.

They could just charge a single upfront amount of money.

Re: Apple Terminates Epic Games' Developer Account

#240

Post by shajznnckfke »

dogma1138 wrote: post #57
MaximumMadness wrote: post #21

Apple is truly doing themselves a disservice here, if Epic wins this battle Apple will undoubtedly be painted as the bad guy, and other major companies will smell blood in the water when it comes taking down a competitor. Case in point; Tinder, Microsoft, Facebook, Spotify have all openly backed Epic and started to call attention to features that are impacted by this 30% fee. Status quo isn't going to cut it, and it…

Microsoft takes 30% on Xbox plus its much more expensive to develop and publish on that platform overall. Neither Tinder nor Spotify will transfer any savings to the end users. Spotify has been ramping their sub costs considerably my sub went up by like 150% in the UK over the past 3-4 years. Tinder employs discriminatory pricing by charging certain genders, age groups and sexual orientations more for their premium s…

If you’re claiming that Spotify would get all the benefit of a break in the fee, you’re implicitly claiming that it bears all the economic burden of the fee (ie. it doesn’t pass on the fee to users). Spotify currently charges $13 to sign up in iOS and $10 to sign up on the web. This is strong evidence that Spotify is currently passing through the fee to users. It seems much more likely that Spotify would give iOS users a price break if the fee was cut. Music streaming is a competitive market, so they don’t have much choice if everyone gets the same break.
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