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Epic Games steps up Apple fight with EU antitrust complaint

reuters.com

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

#891

Post by vladvasiliu »

herbst wrote: post #758
herecomestracer wrote: post #745

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I would trust Netflix. Other companies? Not so much. Missing the point. Sure, many users will trust the Netflix app, but we only need one trustworthy app (like Netflix) to open the gate for all other kinds of untrustworthy apps to also skip the check.

How so? Android is still asking every single time you install a non market app, spooky enough that nether my mum nor my gf consider clicking proceed without asking someone if they should.

Because it's a continuum. Say you trust Netflix "absolutely". So you go ahead and click through the "spooky warnings". This sets a precedent.

Now you're in the situation "I've already done this, nothing happened. But of course, I shouldn't do it all the time. There's a reason the warning is there."

Now you want to try out this other app. The company doesn't seem shady, but they're new, they don't yet have the reputation Netflix has. So you don't trust it "absolutely", but "pretty much". OK, you go ahead, just for this one app.

Now you're even more used to clicking through the warning. Repeat a few times. Now you're installing totally_not_malware.apk. What could go wrong? You've already installed a bunch of apps this way with no issue. Plus this one app clearly isn't malware, it says so in the title! Also, all your friends are using it and you don't want to be left out.

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

#892

Post by kingsleyopara »

egotripper wrote: post #867

This problem is not limited to Apple mobile devices, it is shared with every manufacturer curating all the software on their platforms. Apple, Nintendo, Sony, John Deere, and so on. Every manufacturer gatekeeping their platform for security, financial, community, repair, or quality standards. They should all instead bust the machines wide open, allow anyone's operating system software to be in control, and give up th…

This. I think a lot of people miss the bigger picture. If Epic win this, do you really think games consoles are safe? What about car infotainment systems etc.? An Epic win could effectively make all walled gardens illegal

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

#893

Post by judge2020 »

whywhywhywhy wrote: post #736
suifbwish wrote: post #662

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing is if I wanted or cared about that I would get one of those phones. The consumer gets to decide which phone they use and one of the reasons I like the iPhone is actually the difficulty in adding 3rd party crapware. If I needed a phone that I can install stuff on from unverified markets I would get an android and do it completely separately from my iPhone. I like that Apple is an appliance that is what it’s…

Would you care if they took the same approach for your laptop? I find it hard to ignore that the future of Apple is iOS and MacOS is eventually going to be deprecated. Imagine if you were an Apple exec living and breathing Apple for the past 10 years, surely the OS that you don't get a cut of all app sales on and makes up a fraction of the more profitable OS will feel like the odd one out and the wrong way to do thin…

> Would you care if they took the same approach for your laptop?

I don't ask for my laptop to be an appliance. The laptop is one type of product that can run arbitrary code if I want it to. The iPhone is not, and that's the type of product I am specifically looking for.

> Us, being HN posters obviously find such a statement absurd

HN is probably just as representative on the authoritative/libertarian scale as society as a whole - this is just a forum for anyone remotely associated with technology after all. Just because you're on a forum doesn't mean everyone will view it from the same viewpoint as you, even if it does dictate how much people downvote/upvote your posts.

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

#894

Post by wernercd »

enos_feedler wrote: post #828
judge2020 wrote: post #824

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plenty of companies can make phones too, but it takes extreme time, effort, and talent to do so. It all depends on where you put the fertilizer - is the fertilizer company saying they should be able to set up a stall in the walmart parking lot, or are they saying Walmart is preventing them from setting up a store on their own land a hundred feet away from Walmart?

I am saying Walmart is preventing the fertilizer stall on their own property. The iPhone hardware, OS and platform is the property of Apple, just like the parking lot is property of Walmart. But actually, I am not even saying Walmart is preventing this. I am just saying Walmart won't hand them this opportunity for free. The result is the fertilizer company suing Walmart.

"for free" and yet Apple will still make a profit due to physical phone sales, $99/year fees, etc. To imply that they aren't profitable outside of the 30% cut is laughable. Plenty of companies "research, develop, provide opportunities" that can't and don't resort to monopolistic and territorialistic practices to block competition.

There's no reason that EA can't accept payments outside of the Apple store other than monopolistic protectionism. "research and development" of something 100s of other companies can and do is a weak excuse - and one easily picked apart with relevant examples.

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

#895

Post by judge2020 »

tommilukkarinen wrote: post #218
asimpletune wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t know if this is a defense per se, but the reason they do this is to prevent app makers from using that to try and steer customers to out of band ways of subscribing. I guess the analogy would be if a brand forbade a retailers from revealing their margins, so customers don’t go to secondary markets and potentially/almost-certainly have a worse experience. Like counterfeit products or just in general to be subj…

30% is not just for apps but all digital content like Spotify. Now if we see a future where Apple wins and dominates: everyone creating digital content for a living will pay a 30% tax to Apple. Forever including your grandchildren. Now lets take it a step further and think a world where all services like cleaning are bought with Apple products. Everyone will pay a 30% tax to Apple, forever. The thing is, that we cant…

Netflix has shown that they can make bank[0] even after pulling their subscription from Apple's platform[1]. Your entire comment doesn't really add anything since it's all plain-as-day information - Apple's 30% cut is effectively revenue they get for creating the iOS devices, so yes, as long as they continue to sell product, they're going to continue to require 30% of digital content revenue is pocketed as profit.

0: https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/business/story/20...

1: https://techcrunch.com/2018/12/31/netflix-stops-paying-the-a...

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

#896

Post by nmfisher »

africanboy wrote: post #254
ben_w wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hm. Hypothetical: if you modify the software in a Tesla, and your modification allows a hacker to remote control it, and this power is used to commit vehicular homicide, how much of the burden of responsibility do you have? I’m not a lawyer, so while I can throw out phrases like “endangering others through negligence”, I don’t know what the threshold is or even if that’s the right concept in this case. With regards t…

> Hypothetical: if you modify the software in a Tesla, and your modification allows a hacker to remote control it, and this power is used to commit vehicular homicide, how much of the burden of responsibility do you have? Hypothetically: a friend borrows your car, but you didn't fix the break fluid leak, and he runs over someone. Who's at fault? > With regards to phones however, I explicitly want the devices heavily…

> Hypothetically: a friend borrows your car, but you didn't fix the break fluid leak, and he runs over someone.

> Who's at fault?

Legally the answer is crystal clear. If it was intentional? He is. Unintentional? You are.

I don't really see the comparison.

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

#897

Post by 2muchcoffeeman »

Dma54rhs wrote: post #677
thereddaikon wrote: post #658

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that you called it sideloading just shows how successful Apple has been in warping people's perception of it over the years. Installing the software you want on your compute device isn't sideloading. Its just installing software. Apple is aberration here not all of the users who just expect to actually own the products they buy.

It's depressing that even on hackernews where you expect people want to tinker and have control over their machines there's a probably a majority who are happy with the situation and use the think of my grandma (aka children) using iPhone situation. There could be numerous ways for Apple to let people run their own software or other stores without giving your grandma malware.

Maybe it makes sense? HN readers on average probably have a better idea of what they are getting into. And probably make more money than average so they can buy multiple devices and try them out.

I have iOS and Android devices. Nothing of worth is stuck on iOS (or MacOS). But iOS is my daily driver. Though I've switched back to Linux for daily work.

I'm happy to mess around with something, but it's definitely great to have a platform that is not so easy to mess up and has great support for the rest of the family. And I'm happy to stay compatible with them.

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

#898

Post by AttakBanana »

ntsplnkv2 wrote: post #566
AttakBanana wrote: post #531

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Um, the harm is 30% more expensive apps. If devs can't avoid the cut, its only going to get passed down to the user.

Ahh so harm now is spending any money. I was harmed by my grocery store for charging me 1.50 for milk! 30% is more than fair. People spend more money on the App Store than competitors. Developers want access to that. it shouldn't be free.

This is dumb. I never said "any" money, you're just trying to justify your own opinion.

Yes people spend more on the App Store and if the dev wants to use it to market their app they should go ahead and pay that 30%.

However if the devs dont want to access that, and/or consumers want to pay lesser, they should have the option to download from elsewhere.

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

#899

Post by 40four »

gretch wrote: post #660
40four wrote: post #593

These conversations always rapidly devolve into the same old generic iOS versus Android nonsense. But I'd like to try to keep a super narrow scope here. The specific problem Epic and others are fighting here is "App Store payment system and control over app downloads" Now to be fair, as far as 'App store payments' goes, both Google & Apple charge the 30% fee on all transactions. The reason Epic is battling Apple here…

There is no such principle in our free society of what is and isn’t a fair and equitable business transaction. The only tool we have for that is what the market (supply and demand) will yield. I can take a tiny piece of carbon, call it a diamond and sell it for 50,000. Is it fair and equitable? Should that be allowed? I can take a white T shirt and print a red Supreme logo on it and sell it for 100x cost of productio…

I mean sure, you’re getting really deep and philosophical on economics here. I’m happy to have that conversation too, but I think it’s a different conversation, and one we should have over some beers :)

I’m not sure how you took it as far as me arguing against free markets, but I was just trying to speak of my perception of this very specific example.

I don’t think it’s fair for them to take 3/10ths of every business on their app stores. That simple. I don’t think the markets think it’s fair either, but they don’t have much choice. At least not on Apple’s platform.

I don’t think the government should ever set the prices by default, but if the market and the government decide it’s not fair then they can step in. That’s the whole point of anti-trust laws.

Of course businesses have the right to make a profit. I did mention the system I proposed could cover their costs and make some profit.

Sorry if I wasn’t clear on that. They should make profit on the app stores. But the current model is particularly offensive to me. I don’t think there is a magic number. I think the idea that all monetary transactions have to go through them and they get a percentage at all is dumb. At it’s heart app stores are just a means of distributing software. Why should they get a cut of the businesses?

Maybe we could compare it to credit card transactions. The card reader networks take a 3% cut and we’re all ok with that. They provide the infrastructure to allow the transactions to happen, sure I guess they earned it. If you forced me to pick a ‘magic’ number then I would say it should be similar to that.

If Google and Apple took 3-5% none of this would even be a discussion. We probably wouldn’t even care enough to fight it, and they’d still be making money hand over fist on their app stores.

Which to be fair aren’t even the main part of their business. It’s just a side huddle for them. But 30% is the kind of cut title loans and pawn brokers take. No way in hell that’s reasonable for a service to distribute software.

I’ve got a lot more thoughts on this, especially about the differences between Google and Apple in this regard, but I’ll stop there. I’ve ranted enough tonight:)

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

#900

Post by AttakBanana »

nodamage wrote: post #623
AttakBanana wrote: post #531

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Um, the harm is 30% more expensive apps. If devs can't avoid the cut, its only going to get passed down to the user.

Except in the real world when we see games offered in multiple places (e.g. Steam and the Epic Game Store) they are usually the same price. In other words, any savings from the developer cut is simply kept by the developer, not passed onto the consumer.

As someone mentioned in another comment, this is the result of yet another monopolistic practice, this time by Steam who requires your game to be priced the same in all stores else it will be removed from Steam.

https://www.pcgamer.com/lawsuit-claims-valve-is-abusing-its-...

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