Epic Games steps up Apple fight with EU antitrust complaint • Hacker News Board

Re: Epic Games steps up Apple fight with EU antitrust complaint

#221

Post by Wowfunhappy » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 4:22 PM UTC

drawkbox wrote: post #205

csunbird wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Delivery of physical goods and services are allowed to have other means of payment, I think.

Exactly, there are "Reader" apps that Apple has at 15%, these are video platforms, books and more which Amazon falls under. Amazon Prime Video, Netflix, Dropbox, Audible, Spotify and others also fall under this category. All of this is described clearly in their information. [1] "3.1.3(a) “Reader” Apps: Apps may allow a user to access previously purchased content or content subscriptions (specifically: magazines, new…

And yet video rental platforms from Google and Disney (Renting Mulan on Disney Plus cost extra) aren't allowed to bypass Apple, whereas Amazon can.

Even if there was something very specific about Amazon's implementation that allowed them to bypass the rule—at what point is it fair to acknowledge the rule was specially crafted for Amazon? What if the policy had an exemption for "Companies that begin with 'A' and end with 'zon'"?

Re: Epic Games steps up Apple fight with EU antitrust complaint

#222

Post by loceng » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 4:23 PM UTC

dubcanada wrote: post #184

I can hardly wait to use Amazon App Store to install Amazon and then open up the Epic Game Store to install random game and then open up EA Game Store to install random game and then open up Facebook App Store to install Facebook and then open up the Apple App Store to install the Blizzard App Store to install Hearthstone and then go back to the Apple App Store and update the Blizzard App Store so I can get the lates…

Where I want to also see this extending is for the platform that Epic Games has created with the Unreal Engine. Should we be able to load in any skins that we could sell on our own store [- the users could decide to not allow/block them], etc? This would help counter Epic's ability to simply make skins that copy higher detail versions or make them look enough like other mainstream-popular characters, e.g. the skin that by users is called the "John Wick" skin - but it's not called that by Epic, so instead that movie franchise could have created and sold the John Wick skin on all game platforms for users to integrate if they allow [e.g. moving towards the Ready Player One movie].

Re: Epic Games steps up Apple fight with EU antitrust complaint

#223

Post by FlownScepter » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 4:23 PM UTC

HideousKojima wrote: post #219

FlownScepter wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A quick Google says iOS' market share is 14%. I don't understand this position at all. Google is by far and away the market leader. Their ecosystem is free and you can do just about anything in it. Their Play store's standards are utterly bare bones. The devices are cheaper. If what you want is an open source (ish) platform that you can hack on, modify, install software yourself, whatever, all of that is available to…

14% is worldwide, in the US it's roughly 50%

That's still nothing close to a monopoly.

Re: Epic Games steps up Apple fight with EU antitrust complaint

#224

Post by reader_mode » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 4:23 PM UTC

BrianGragg wrote: post #214

SCHiM wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You install those yourself you know. I'd rather have a choice than not. I feel your pain in the sense that that I think user UX will take a hit, but I think that's less important than breaking the monopoly of the current app store. For example, I can't find apps with pornography or other types of things the high overlords at apple or Google have deemed inappropriate for me to have. That's bad. Apparently apps like Ma…

The problem is the choice is taken away from you though. Just like he said with the game market. If you want to play Game A, you go and download/install Game A's publishing app store. If you want to then play Game B, rinse and repeat. You will be forced to use so many different app stores and won't have a choice to NOT use their app store "IF" it progresses like it has on the desktop. No proof it will/won't either.

Meh - eventually things work out for the best of the consumers most of the time - for eg. epic game store just gave a bunch of titles free no strings attached a while ago, EA store used to have free stuff as well.

End of the day you have to have enough value to get people to inconvenience themselves - I'd rather that this value gets shelled out to users as enticement to install some app store than Apple capturing that money simply because their store is the only one allowed to exist on the platform.

Re: Epic Games steps up Apple fight with EU antitrust complaint

#225

Post by fhood » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 4:24 PM UTC

adtac wrote: post #213

dubcanada wrote: post #184

I can hardly wait to use Amazon App Store to install Amazon and then open up the Epic Game Store to install random game and then open up EA Game Store to install random game and then open up Facebook App Store to install Facebook and then open up the Apple App Store to install the Blizzard App Store to install Hearthstone and then go back to the Apple App Store and update the Blizzard App Store so I can get the lates…

why would each of these companies bother creating a new store that requires eng resources, server costs, maintenance, etc. if the total cost was less than Apple's unreasonable fee? doesn't it simply mean that these companies perceive the value of Apple's App Store to be less than the cost?

Sure, but I the consumer could give a rats ass about how they perceive the value of the app store.

Re: Epic Games steps up Apple fight with EU antitrust complaint

#226

Post by simion314 » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 4:24 PM UTC

dubcanada wrote: post #184

I can hardly wait to use Amazon App Store to install Amazon and then open up the Epic Game Store to install random game and then open up EA Game Store to install random game and then open up Facebook App Store to install Facebook and then open up the Apple App Store to install the Blizzard App Store to install Hearthstone and then go back to the Apple App Store and update the Blizzard App Store so I can get the lates…

This sucks, but who is guilt for this, the giant publishers, why? because AppStores have a big tax , so competition that would lower the tax would solve the problem,

Is same with video streaming, the giants don't want other giants to get a big cut without working hard.

IMO , AppStore competition should be like web hosting, competition is large enough so you have enough choice to buy exactly what you want. Imagine if you want your web page to be visible on Apple stuff you need to pay 30% of your profits to Apple and only if Apple likes your page content.

Re: Epic Games steps up Apple fight with EU antitrust complaint

#227

Post by curiouser2 » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 4:24 PM UTC

pennaMan wrote: post #220

dubcanada wrote: post #184

I can hardly wait to use Amazon App Store to install Amazon and then open up the Epic Game Store to install random game and then open up EA Game Store to install random game and then open up Facebook App Store to install Facebook and then open up the Apple App Store to install the Blizzard App Store to install Hearthstone and then go back to the Apple App Store and update the Blizzard App Store so I can get the lates…

Before Apple blessed us with it's ground breaking technology to restrict the software you are allowed to have on your own device we did just fine getting software on our devices using a file system and the internet.

Yeah what the hell is this person talking about? How do they think software was installed prior to Steam?

Re: Epic Games steps up Apple fight with EU antitrust complaint

#228

Post by BrianGragg » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 4:25 PM UTC

adtac wrote: post #213

dubcanada wrote: post #184

I can hardly wait to use Amazon App Store to install Amazon and then open up the Epic Game Store to install random game and then open up EA Game Store to install random game and then open up Facebook App Store to install Facebook and then open up the Apple App Store to install the Blizzard App Store to install Hearthstone and then go back to the Apple App Store and update the Blizzard App Store so I can get the lates…

why would each of these companies bother creating a new store that requires eng resources, server costs, maintenance, etc. if the total cost was less than Apple's unreasonable fee? doesn't it simply mean that these companies perceive the value of Apple's App Store to be less than the cost?

Why does Facebook want to know what you had for breakfast and mad that Apple is wanting to limit their access to data and share that they are collecting that information?

Re: Epic Games steps up Apple fight with EU antitrust complaint

#229

Post by solveit » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 4:25 PM UTC

BrianGragg wrote: post #214

SCHiM wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You install those yourself you know. I'd rather have a choice than not. I feel your pain in the sense that that I think user UX will take a hit, but I think that's less important than breaking the monopoly of the current app store. For example, I can't find apps with pornography or other types of things the high overlords at apple or Google have deemed inappropriate for me to have. That's bad. Apparently apps like Ma…

The problem is the choice is taken away from you though. Just like he said with the game market. If you want to play Game A, you go and download/install Game A's publishing app store. If you want to then play Game B, rinse and repeat. You will be forced to use so many different app stores and won't have a choice to NOT use their app store "IF" it progresses like it has on the desktop. No proof it will/won't either.

We used to download almost every program on their own website until just a couple of years ago. It'll be fine.

Re: Epic Games steps up Apple fight with EU antitrust complaint

#230

Post by tremon » Wed, Feb 17, 2021, 4:25 PM UTC

I know this isn't the first time this happens, but it's a curious thing when a large US company has to resort to using the EU court system to resolve their beef with another US company.