Dominance of Apple and Google’s app stores impacting competition and consumers • Hacker News Board

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

#361

Post by syshum » Wed, Apr 28, 2021, 12:48 PM UTC

Abishek_Muthian wrote: post #206

hugi wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

> How is that legal? You are forgetting the number of democratic countries which forced their COVID app from Appstore/Playstore on their citizens. They came short of calling it mandatory download but mandated the app as entry pass for several services. You don't use a monopoly powered smartphone? You cannot afford a phone at all? Tough luck buddy(/s). Only reason these COVID pass apps didn't stick around in the democ…

I am not sure why people are shocked that this kind of thing would happen in democratic societies. People seem to have a rose colored view of democracy, and believe it is synonymous with freedom... it is not

Democracies can be just as tyrannical as any other forms of government, doubly true when the people in that democracy have replaced the desire for freedom, with the desire for safety which most societies in the world today have less desire to be free, and more of a desire to be safe; falsely believing they can actually trade freedom for safety.

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

#362

Post by ccouzens » Wed, Apr 28, 2021, 12:51 PM UTC

Gaelan wrote: post #257

encryptluks2 wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you lose out on an app because they decide to exclude themselves from the app store, couldn't you just find another app that doesn't exclude themselves that caters more towards your philosophy?

The top 10 free apps on the App Store, at time of writing, are TikTok, HBO Max, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, Messenger, Snapchat, Zoom, Gmail, and Google Maps. Until Gmail, every single one of those provides access to content that can't be accessed thorough another app—a more ethical Snapchat doesn't have any of my Snapchat-using friends, and a more ethical HBO Max doesn't have the movie I want to watch. So no, in p…

YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and Google Maps all have good enough experiences using a mobile web browser. You don't need their app to access their content.

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

#363

Post by joelthelion » Wed, Apr 28, 2021, 1:06 PM UTC

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.

> Android is open source

It is not. Android without the proprietary Google Play Services is utterly broken for non-technical end-users.

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

#364

Post by havernator » Wed, Apr 28, 2021, 1:23 PM UTC

berkes wrote: post #263

Gaelan wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the thing: Apple's exercising market power does bring all sorts of benefits to users. Obvious examples include the new privacy rules they're imposing, in-app purchases allowing any subscriptions to be cancelled with zero hassle. If Apple allowed other app stores, Facebook would almost certainly move to one that let them produce a far more invasive app. And the vast majority of the users will just download Face…

In essence that is arguing that an abusive monopoly (facebook) must be fought with another abusive monopoly (apple).

Absent government regulation? Yes, exactly. If Mecha-Godzilla shows up I'm very, very happy to have Godzilla around to fuck them up, even if Godzilla is a dangerous monster and it would be better to have no monsters.

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

#365

Post by frusciante19 » Wed, Apr 28, 2021, 1:29 PM UTC

Mindwipe wrote: post #329

gonehome wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "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…

> If they lose that leverage we as Apple users will lose these benefits, and for what? Because you literally don't get people in autocratic regimes killed because the single choke point of software that might enable them to escape detection is removed. Because you remove Apple's rampant discrimination against some kinds of speech and the people that effects. Because Apple attacks businesses with any involvement in se…

So you're ok with children being able to buy porn mags in the same store they can buy sweets, but you're not ok with Apple controlling what bad actors might sell in the app store?

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

#366

Post by amelius » Wed, Apr 28, 2021, 1:32 PM UTC

h0nd wrote: post #333

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.…

This is ridiculous. I start ignoring services and platforms that are limited to mobile OSes.

You can still submit paperwork manually.

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

#367

Post by havernator » Wed, Apr 28, 2021, 1:36 PM UTC

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #226

havernator wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I already don't use Facebook, but I take your more general point. The main thing I don't want is to feel network-effect pressure from some huge non-Apple platform to install from sources with worse privacy and security guarantees. iOS is so big that effectively no mass-market mobile software can afford to ignore it, and Apple's rules force them to play (somewhat) nice when they show up. Let's say I did like Facebook,…

> The main thing I don't want is to feel network-effect pressure from some huge non-Apple platform to install from sources with worse privacy and security guarantees. What you mean is that you do want app developers to feel network-effect pressure from the huge Apple platform which has those privacy and security requirements. Which you still have as long as a large number of people feel the same and refuse to install…

I just know that these things won't happen right now:

1) Job interview? The big corporate sales prospect I'm courting? "Company policy is that we do all our calls through [some corporate communication tool]. It's on [store that popped up to cater to enterprises, so they could ship more spyware to their employees]" So I cancel the calls, or install that store and their probably-spying app.

2) That chat app or social network your entire family & friend group is on? Crippled or absent on the App Store, full version only on an alternative store.

For #1: "So use a different phone for all business interactions" OK, but right now I don't need to. That is a solution, but right now it's not one I need, and I don't want to need it.

Maybe those wouldn't happen. Right now, they can't. I chose my mobile devices in part for that feature.

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

#368

Post by cortexio » Wed, Apr 28, 2021, 1:56 PM UTC

hroa wrote: post #299

I have worked on many mobile app development projects, and I am grateful that google and apple try to protect the consumer. App devs are in full control of the stack in the app, and it is very easy to unintentionally (or intentionally) handle your data insecurely. For example, app devs can disable https communication with their own external APIs, secretly transmit your data on their own servers, harvest your data fro…

Google and apple are not securing your data. Any app on your phone that uses the internet already talks to an external API. And they can sell your data to anyone at any time without google/apple ever knowing about it. And that's normal. https doesnt really do much to make your data secure. But google/apple arent even needed to force apps to use https. Your phone can just say it's required by default. Google/apple are just pretending they do something for you, it's just all about control, so they can have all the profit. It's basically the same as the government saying they do not allow any other foodstores other than storeX. Because other stores might sell you food that's poisoned or expired. So to protect u, we dont allow any other stores. And storeX can just decide what the price is, what food you're allowed to buy, etc etc. It's shit. You dont want this.

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

#369

Post by laurex » Wed, Apr 28, 2021, 2:04 PM UTC

nisegami wrote: post #353

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…

There's always been a trivial fix here in my opinion - allowing services to charge Google Play and App Store users more. Let users decide how much the safety and convenience of billing through Apple/Google is worth.

There are restrictions to even offering alternate payment methods set by Apple and Google.

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

#370

Post by therealmarv » Wed, Apr 28, 2021, 2:07 PM UTC

And they are doing that world wide. Why does the world need to adopt what Apple and Google think is appropriate? Like two companies defining basically what apps we can use according to the political correctness in USA!