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Dominance of Apple and Google’s app stores impacting competition and consumers

accc.gov.au

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Re: Dominance of Apple and Google’s app stores impacting competition and consumers

#21

Post by wjdp »

mulmen wrote: post #9
ent101 wrote: post #6

I feel like we keep getting these inquiries/lawsuits/press releases every year but, literally, nothing gets any better at all. Every developer KNOWS that Google is extremely abusive towards them solely because of their position in the market yet nothing ever improves. If these are not illegal monopolies, what is?!

Well, the problem is that they aren't monopolies. They may be problematic but we don't have laws or regulations to deal with this specific situation. And when we call it a "monopoly" because that seems to be the closest thing then the defenders of these organizations can say "but it's not a monopoly!" and they are right. So if you think it is problematic to have two players in a market even when they are on equal foo…

Oh go on then, a duopoly with fairly entrenched user bases and no real chance of additional players.

Re: Dominance of Apple and Google’s app stores impacting competition and consumers

#22

Post by 1vuio0pswjnm7 »

kaiju0 wrote: post #10
jbverschoor wrote: post #8

Well I love my Apple App Store. It protects me for certain things with payments, and it’s another line of defense against some attacks.

Yep it neatly organizes everything with subscriptions and vetted apps into a single location. Can't ask for more. The only people that want out of it is people who want a bigger rev cut, to bypass app store rules and infect devices.

According to this reasoning Apple could make the app store optional and (except for "people who want a bigger rev cut, to bypass app store rules and infect devices") every user would continue to choose the app store. I suppose the reasoning further leads to the conclusion that there is no point in giving users a choice because they would all choose the app store anyway. I do not subscribe to this reasoning. If there was a non-app store option I would choose it and I doubt I am the only such user. Among many potential benefits, a non-app store repository might give me the ability to install/remove old versions of apps on older devices.

Re: Dominance of Apple and Google’s app stores impacting competition and consumers

#23

Post by encryptluks2 »

You can have third-party Android app stores. Can you say the same about Apple? While I agree that Google has market-dominance, they are not anti-competition or anti-consumer in the same sense as Apple. Android is open source, Chrome OS is open source, etc. Google is actually providing and contributing something back to the community. Apple intentionally locks people to specific hardware and to their app store.

Re: Dominance of Apple and Google’s app stores impacting competition and consumers

#24

Post by gfxgirl »

gumby wrote: post #12
jbverschoor wrote: post #8

Well I love my Apple App Store. It protects me for certain things with payments, and it’s another line of defense against some attacks.

We’ll me too but if there is an alternative I can still direcr my business to Apple’s store. On the Mac I avoid the store if it’s possible to download directly from the developer so that they don’t have to pay a cut. If there were an alternative Mac App Store I would avoid it too like the plague.

I avoid the Microsoft store on Windows but I use Steam all the time. I've also used Steam on MacOS for those few games that run on MacOS that I wanted to play.

I'd can see myself using other stores on iOS depending on the store. If Steam existed on iOS I'd certainly consider it, especially if buying a game that ran across platforms included the iOS version.

Re: Dominance of Apple and Google’s app stores impacting competition and consumers

#25

Post by SilverRed »

ent101 wrote: post #6

I feel like we keep getting these inquiries/lawsuits/press releases every year but, literally, nothing gets any better at all. Every developer KNOWS that Google is extremely abusive towards them solely because of their position in the market yet nothing ever improves. If these are not illegal monopolies, what is?!

They seem to be having some effect. Apple seems to have been opening up which may be in response to all the legal pressure.

In recent times they have added the ability to set default apps and opened up the find my network to non Apple devices. These seem like things that wouldn't have happened without the legal pressure.

Re: Dominance of Apple and Google’s app stores impacting competition and consumers

#26

Post by SilverRed »

jbverschoor wrote: post #8

Well I love my Apple App Store. It protects me for certain things with payments, and it’s another line of defense against some attacks.

These proposed changes don't prevent that. The Australian government just wants the stores to be more clear with developers about what is going on.

There is an endless stream of Android and iOS devs saying their app got dropped without warning and the support person refuses to explain or respond to them. That's just unacceptable when an app being removed has the ability to break a business.

Re: Dominance of Apple and Google’s app stores impacting competition and consumers

#27

Post by trollian »

dmagee wrote: post #13
dlgeek wrote: post #5

> The ACCC has put forward a series of potential measures in response to its findings, including that consumers be able to rate and review all apps, that consumers have the ability to change any pre-installed default app on their device, that app developers be allowed to provide consumers with information about alternative payment options and that information collected by Apple and Google in their capacity as app mar…

Fair bit of teeth on the ACCC. https://theconversation.com/accc-world-first-australias-fede...

God I miss living in a country with real consumer protection.

Re: Dominance of Apple and Google’s app stores impacting competition and consumers

#29

Post by paranoidrobot »

varispeed wrote: post #2

Do they have any teeth or is it just checkbox ticking exercise to make consumer feel something is being done? > There is a window of opportunity for Apple and Google themselves to take steps to improve outcomes for app developers and consumers by adopting the potential measures we have identified Why not just introduce new regulation? Companies will be dragging this as long as they can and reap profits, whereas such…

They have teeth, and they are the regulator.

This is basically an opening statement on their view of the world, and puts Apple and Google on notice that this is something the ACCC are interested in.

It is basically a standard way the ACCC announces what they're doing and putting industry on notice.

They did this for comparison sites that had secret sorting/recommendations that weren't in the best interest of the consumer.

They've done this for retailers who didn't abide by Australian Consumer Law on warranties and various disclaimers given in-store.

In most cases there's usually some kind of enforceable agreement reached, sometimes they go to court to enforce compliance.

Re: Dominance of Apple and Google’s app stores impacting competition and consumers

#30

Post by hugi »

encryptluks2 wrote: post #23

You can have third-party Android app stores. Can you say the same about Apple? While I agree that Google has market-dominance, they are not anti-competition or anti-consumer in the same sense as Apple. Android is open source, Chrome OS is open source, etc. Google is actually providing and contributing something back to the community. Apple intentionally locks people to specific hardware and to their app store.

Google is an ad company. I do not understand why people would choose to use an operating system created by an ad company, designed to harvest their personal information.

I'm happy to use an iPhone, knowing my personal information is safe and it reduces my chances of being Harvested by Google.

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