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

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

#131

Post by yossarian1408 »

echelon wrote: post #108
gonehome wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree - Apple needs the control to have the leverage that makes their ecosystem better. It's in the interest of their customers for them to have this leverage and it requires that their 'store' is the only available store so app devs can't bypass their requirements. I like Apple forcing use of in-app-payments, I like Apple giving me subscription control to make canceling easy. I like Apple blocking app tracking and…

> Apple needs the control to have the leverage that makes their ecosystem better. It's in the interest of their customers for them to have this leverage and it requires that their 'store' is the only available store so app devs can't bypass their requirements. I don't understand this argument at all. You're almost certainly taking more risk driving in a car than downloading an app, yet you're probably willing to embr…

You don't have to do business on the App store. You don't have to launch a startup on the App store. You can buy any device you want, and if there isn't currently one sold that meets your specific criterion, society might be better off if someone takes the initiative to meet this demand rather than force a company to roll out the red carpet for it's competition.

Your liberty is not at stake here, nor any real detriment to your quality of life really. The more companies take, the more opportunity for disruption there will be.

A Department of Justice breakup is certainly the easiest and most immediately gratifying solution. It is hardly the only solution, and in my mind I am certain it is the wrong solution.

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

#132

Post by hugi »

thombles wrote: post #120

Incidentally, if you have a business registered for GST in Australia you have to submit a quarterly activity statement. The tax office website had bizarre authentication requirements but the browser plugin was at least cross-platform. They now require you to use the myGovID app, which is - you guessed it - available only on the App Store and Play Store. You can't even run a business without being part of the duopoly.…

How is that legal? Isn't that just incompetent government?

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

#133

Post by stale2002 »

Elidrake24 wrote: post #42
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.

As a user of iOS, this is precisely why I go with Apple, and why I push my family to do the same. Particularly for the more elderly in my family, Apple's setup (by and large) prevents them from doing anything that would screw themselves over. Removing Apple's control removes my desire to be apart of that ecosystem, and I know that is true for many others outside our insular little community here.

Fortunately, no one is going to force you to use other app stores.

Feel free to continue using the Apple app store. You can do that, and after these lawsuits other people will have the voluntary choice to choose a different app store as well.

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

#134

Post by meepmorp »

hu3 wrote: post #51
harry8 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They'll flip the nanosecond it suits them. Their commitment isn't valuable or enforceable or anything other than a dodgy sales pitch. Really. They can encode it in contact in a second and choose not to.

> They'll flip the nanosecond it suits them. Like when Apple dropped end-to-end encryption on iCloud because FBI asked them politely. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-apple-fbi-icloud-exclusiv...

https://blog.elcomsoft.com/2021/01/apple-fbi-and-iphone-back...

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

#135

Post by havernator »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #119
havernator wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right now, ~100% of the software available for iOS has to follow Apple's rules, offer a consistent and safe payment method, and install through the App Store. I assume you think that would change, else why have other app stores. That's what I don't want. I want as close to 100% of the software for iOS as possible to have to follow the rules. That's part of why I chose iOS.

> Right now, ~100% of the software available for iOS has to follow Apple's rules, offer a consistent and safe payment method, and install through the App Store. The same would still be true of all the apps in the App Store. There would just be other stores. You wouldn't have to use them. Other people could. The issue here is that many people want the hardware or the OS without the App Store. If you give it to them, "…

I'd care about this a lot less if the government first outlawed most personal data collection & hoarding (by tech companies and others) before we go destroying the libertarian solution to this (outsource regulation to a company, which is what I'm choosing to do, given the alternatives)

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

#136

Post by jliptzin »

gonehome wrote: post #54
Elidrake24 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a user of iOS, this is precisely why I go with Apple, and why I push my family to do the same. Particularly for the more elderly in my family, Apple's setup (by and large) prevents them from doing anything that would screw themselves over. Removing Apple's control removes my desire to be apart of that ecosystem, and I know that is true for many others outside our insular little community here.

I agree - Apple needs the control to have the leverage that makes their ecosystem better. It's in the interest of their customers for them to have this leverage and it requires that their 'store' is the only available store so app devs can't bypass their requirements. I like Apple forcing use of in-app-payments, I like Apple giving me subscription control to make canceling easy. I like Apple blocking app tracking and…

They could lower the fee to a much more reasonable 10% and still be the biggest company in the world.

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

#137

Post by FpUser »

emodendroket wrote: post #122
FpUser wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>"It's in the interest of their customers for them to have this leverage" Most likely it is in the interest of majority of consumers conditioned to this type of control. I realize that it is a benefit for older computer illiterate people. It completely sucks for people like myself. >"10 different game distributors all with their own shitty incentives" That's one classy way of describing business approach. Yes they're…

For people like yourself, there is Android and there is jailbreaking. But I suspect most people do not actually desire complete control over their phones more than they desire a curated experience.

Modern phone is a powerful computer but both Google and Apple along with the phone manufacturers do not really want me to use it as one. And I am not prepared do dance around their platforms doing some hacks.

The end result is that my current smartphone is mostly just a phone with couple of off-line apps like GPS and apps to install firmware to various gizmos like a drone. I do not even have data plan.

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

#138

Post by colinmhayes »

joshuamorton wrote: post #92
hugi wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is naive to think that any company at that scale has your best interests at heart. They will do whatever it takes to make more money, period. Exactly. And Apple makes money of privacy. It's their thing. Google's business model is based on abusing my privacy. Apple's business model is based on securing my privacy. That's why I use Apple stuff and won't touch Google with a 10 feet pole.

> Exactly. And Apple makes money of privacy. It's their thing. Apple makes money by (among other things) appealing to a certain set of privacy conscious consumers. That's different than "making money off of privacy".

only if you think consumers are idiots.

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

#139

Post by fredophile »

havernator wrote: post #114
efraim wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could very easily not install any other store or use any other payment system if you don't want them. You can keep your device 100 % Apple approved even if there exist alternatives. Why take that choice away from others?

It could fragment the Apple software ecosystem. Since a non-fragmented ecosystem is what I want, I don't like that. Add more stores and my choice to buy into a unified platform is at risk.

Why is fragmentation a problem? There's already fragmentation of the smartphone software ecosystem. How is an app that ships on iOS but not the apple store any different to you than an app that doesn't ship on iOS at all? Either way if you choose to only buy apps through apple you can't get it.

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

#140

Post by gonehome »

FpUser wrote: post #110
gonehome wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree - Apple needs the control to have the leverage that makes their ecosystem better. It's in the interest of their customers for them to have this leverage and it requires that their 'store' is the only available store so app devs can't bypass their requirements. I like Apple forcing use of in-app-payments, I like Apple giving me subscription control to make canceling easy. I like Apple blocking app tracking and…

>"It's in the interest of their customers for them to have this leverage" Most likely it is in the interest of majority of consumers conditioned to this type of control. I realize that it is a benefit for older computer illiterate people. It completely sucks for people like myself. >"10 different game distributors all with their own shitty incentives" That's one classy way of describing business approach. Yes they're…

> "I realize that it is a benefit for older computer illiterate people."

It's a benefit for computer literate people too.

- IAP allows easy tracking of subscriptions and cancellation. You don't have to call and argue with a retentions rep for an hour to cancel a service.

- Apple restrictions on tracking limit abuse from ad driven business models.

- Apple can require features like Apple ID to be implemented alongside FB connect or whatever. Apple ID has privacy friendly features for users like obscuring your email via a relay. This would never be implemented by app devs because hiding your email is counter to their incentives. If they could deploy outside of the store to avoid these constraints they would.

Apple's interests are aligned with their users. The reason they can get away with charging 30% is because Apple's users don't care about all the shitty anti-user things Apple blocks app devs from doing.

The reason I care about the 30% is because it worries me that they will be forced to allow side-loading or multiple stores and lose their leverage over app devs. If they lose that leverage we as Apple users will lose these benefits, and for what?

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