Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Apple: Person-to-person experiences do not have to use in-app purchase

developer.apple.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 492 posts

Re: Apple: Person-to-person experiences do not have to use in-app purchase

#51

Post by toast0 »

1f60c wrote: post #25
mtgx wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. Apple takes a lot from you, then gives you some crumbs back, and everyone praises it for how "generous" it is. Imagine if Microsoft decided to take 30% of all online transactions that happen on Windows PCs...Pretty ridiculous thought, right? That stuff Apple has gotten away with and continues to get away with is beyond absurd.

> Pretty ridiculous thought, right? Yeah, because Apple isn't doing that at all. What's more, it seems like the fee Microsoft charges for every sale in their Microsoft Store is also either 15% or 30%. (Source: the App Developer Agreement, https://query.prod.cms.rt.microsoft.com/cms/api/am/binary/RE... )

Using the Microsoft Store is totally optional. Selling software for Windows has rarely required any coordination with Microsoft other than maybe code signing with a cert from an approved CA. Exceptions include drivers, and Windows Phone/Windows Mobile 10

Re: Apple: Person-to-person experiences do not have to use in-app purchase

#52

Post by itake »

zaphar wrote: post #49

Here is a question I have not seen a satisfactory answer for. Why is having an App on iOS a must have? It seems like any discussion about the market fairness of Apples policies requires a shared understanding of how necessary the ecosystem actually is. If you can freely choose not to deploy to that ecosystem then you can vote with your "wallet" so to speak. If you can't freely choose however then there is an argument…

I own a small app and iOS's free organic app search results drive 98% of my user base right now. I could see it being much more challenging to build an app if you have to develop alternative marketing channels.

Personally, alternative marketing channels have yet to work for me.

Re: Apple: Person-to-person experiences do not have to use in-app purchase

#53

Post by _qulr »

ancorevard wrote: post #16
chinathrow wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course it's arbitrary - the whole fee structure of the app store (stores, to be fair) is arbitrary. 5% could be more than enough for everyone, but no, it has to be 30%...

Just wait until you learn what % retail used to charge developers for promoting, distributing, and selling software. People quickly forget what a tremendous liberation the App Store created for developers. It's also not about the developers, the success of the App Store comes from Apple's users. They trust the App Store because they trust Apple's curation/privacy/security. That's what has caused this flood of softwar…

> People quickly forget what a tremendous liberation the App Store created for developers.

People quickly forget that software was distributed on the web long before the App Store existed.

>That's what has caused this flood of software purchases from consumers.

No, that was caused by a billion people buying shiny new mobile computers. They would have bought a lot of software in any case, even without an App Store. New platform, new software.

Re: Apple: Person-to-person experiences do not have to use in-app purchase

#54

Post by konschubert »

Razengan wrote: post #39
konschubert wrote: post #29

Apple should just be forced to allow alternative app stores. Yes, they will loose out on money and yes, this will dilute the iPhone experience. But come on - That company is worth 2 trillion and it’s holding a whole economy hostage.

> a whole economy hostage. iOS is not even near to the "whole economy" of mobile software. Companies should just stop being based in the US. With what’s happening to TikTok and this ridiculous push for a Communist-style reappropriation of Apple’s platform, it seems that the US may no longer be a safe place for businesses to become too big in (except of course, the ancient titans of oil, guns, pharmaceuticals etc. tha…

If a single company was putting up toll booths on every intersection AFTER selling those roads to the public, then yea, call me a communist but I don’t think that’s good for the economy.

And I don’t care if that company single-handedly invented roads - there should a limit to how far you can milk the society you operate in.

Re: Apple: Person-to-person experiences do not have to use in-app purchase

#55

Post by Razengan »

konschubert wrote: post #54
Razengan wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a whole economy hostage. iOS is not even near to the "whole economy" of mobile software. Companies should just stop being based in the US. With what’s happening to TikTok and this ridiculous push for a Communist-style reappropriation of Apple’s platform, it seems that the US may no longer be a safe place for businesses to become too big in (except of course, the ancient titans of oil, guns, pharmaceuticals etc. tha…

If a single company was putting up toll booths on every intersection AFTER selling those roads to the public, then yea, call me a communist but I don’t think that’s good for the economy. And I don’t care if that company single-handedly invented roads - there should a limit to how far you can milk the society you operate in.

> If a single company was putting up toll booths on every intersection

Again, Apple is not the only company in this space and iOS is not the only intersection/road/whatever analogy you want.

There are alternatives and companies like Epic are absolutely free to start their own platform.

Honestly, all of this becomes much less complicated if you think of the iPhone as an Xbox, PlayStation or Switch. iPhone is not the entire mobile industry, it is one phone among hundreds.

Will you move for a forced break up of their exclusive stores too if MS/Sony/Nintendo started allowing general-purpose apps on those consoles? (They already have YouTube, Netflix, etc.)

iPads on the other hand may be a different story, given how Apple likes to market them as general purpose computers, and the reason why they forked iOS into iPadOS I think.

Re: Apple: Person-to-person experiences do not have to use in-app purchase

#56

Post by setpatchaddress »

dragonwriter wrote: post #38
dmitriid wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They may have meant mobile marketplaces before AppStore. Those charged anywhere up to 90%. And retail doesn't charge "0%" on boxed products, or they would go out of business. Logistics, distribution, and store markup all add up to the final price of the product on the shelf.

> And retail doesn't charge "0%" on boxed products Yes, they do, unless it's consignment model, which wasn't usually the case for boxed software. The retail sale happens after retail has made the purchase. It’s obviously usually at a higher price than the retailer paid, but they don't take a cut of what the vendor is asking for the software. They pay whatever the vendor (or, often in real retail, a distributor that s…

You seem to be getting stuck on the word "retail" referring to point-of-sale-to-end-user, where other people are using it to refer to the cost of the entire retail model, which is the comparable thing in this discussion.

Re: Apple: Person-to-person experiences do not have to use in-app purchase

#57

Post by thewebcount »

onion2k wrote: post #40
dmitriid wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They may have meant mobile marketplaces before AppStore. Those charged anywhere up to 90%. And retail doesn't charge "0%" on boxed products, or they would go out of business. Logistics, distribution, and store markup all add up to the final price of the product on the shelf.

Stores buy products wholesale and sell them on, and accept the risk of the products not selling. Apple act as a middleman and and add on their fees, with absolutely no risk to themselves. They're very different business models.

Right, but stores buy from distributors who take 50%+ of the amount they make. So the developer is still getting less than the App Store.

Re: Apple: Person-to-person experiences do not have to use in-app purchase

#58

Post by Razengan »

zaphar wrote: post #49

Here is a question I have not seen a satisfactory answer for. Why is having an App on iOS a must have? It seems like any discussion about the market fairness of Apples policies requires a shared understanding of how necessary the ecosystem actually is. If you can freely choose not to deploy to that ecosystem then you can vote with your "wallet" so to speak. If you can't freely choose however then there is an argument…

> Why is having an App on iOS a must have?

This may be one possible reason: https://i.imgur.com/kPXs9NO.png

Re: Apple: Person-to-person experiences do not have to use in-app purchase

#59

Post by reaperducer »

jarjoura wrote: post #5
eadan wrote: post #2

Relevant section: 3.1.3(d) Person-to-Person Experiences: If your app enables the purchase of realtime person-to-person experiences between two individuals (for example tutoring students, medical consultations, real estate tours, or fitness training), you may use purchase methods other than in-app purchase to collect those payments. One-to-few and one-to-many realtime experiences must use in-app purchase. This is huge…

> One-to-few and one-to-many realtime experiences must use in-app purchase. WUT?! This is so arbitrary and petty. So we're supposed to feel thankful that the all mighty Apple is allowing 1 on 1 personal fitness trainers and tutors but not build something that is scalable?

This is so arbitrary and petty

It sounds like Apple is trying to keep from becoming the new backpage.com.

Re: Apple: Person-to-person experiences do not have to use in-app purchase

#60

Post by thewebcount »

lostlogin wrote: post #20
ancorevard wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just wait until you learn what % retail used to charge developers for promoting, distributing, and selling software. People quickly forget what a tremendous liberation the App Store created for developers. It's also not about the developers, the success of the App Store comes from Apple's users. They trust the App Store because they trust Apple's curation/privacy/security. That's what has caused this flood of softwar…

> People quickly forget what a tremendous liberation the App Store created for developers. We do, but at the same time, physical stores selling software are now rare or non-existent. Apple is not competing with them.

Right and that’s partly because online store like Apple's out-competed then on price by taking less than traditional distributors.
Post reply on HN