Tim Cook’s Fortnite trial testimony was unexpectedly revealing • Hacker News Board

Re: Tim Cook’s Fortnite trial testimony was unexpectedly revealing

#231

Post by whimsicalism » Sun, May 23, 2021, 4:17 PM UTC

crazygringo wrote: post #173

Hamuko wrote: post #2

Tim Cook's line of argument seemed a bit weird to me. On one hand he's saying that he doesn't know if Apple's customers would be able to distinguish between Apple's good and holy curated store and Epic's filthy shitheap of porn and blackjack, but he's also saying that Apple's customers definitely want Apple's App Store as-is. > Lawyer says, “if people really value Apple’s curation and Apple’s App Store, even if there…

There's nothing weird about it. If there were no food regulations, I don't know if I'd be able to pick restaurants and grocery store brands that were safe to eat. But I definitely know I want safe food to eat. Most people want safe food but they want the government to figure out what that means. Same thing here -- most people just want a safe app store. They don't want the work of having to figure out which app store…

Apple isn't the govt

Re: Tim Cook’s Fortnite trial testimony was unexpectedly revealing

#232

Post by abecedarius » Sun, May 23, 2021, 4:18 PM UTC

Hamuko wrote: post #2

Tim Cook's line of argument seemed a bit weird to me. On one hand he's saying that he doesn't know if Apple's customers would be able to distinguish between Apple's good and holy curated store and Epic's filthy shitheap of porn and blackjack, but he's also saying that Apple's customers definitely want Apple's App Store as-is. > Lawyer says, “if people really value Apple’s curation and Apple’s App Store, even if there…

> Customers “uniformly” want it to “stay like it is."

I'm a customer and I don't.

Re: Tim Cook’s Fortnite trial testimony was unexpectedly revealing

#233

Post by mthoms » Sun, May 23, 2021, 4:18 PM UTC

smnrchrds wrote: post #128

wccrawford wrote: post #4

Other news on this has quotes from Tim Cook saying that they'd have to find a way to track purchases on IOS and bill developers so that Apple still gets their cut when using other payment processors. For me, this is way over the line. If they want to charge developers to be on their store, fine. I don't have a problem with that. And charging for using them as a payment processor makes sense. Charging for using Apple…

I have seen this time after time, that when the question of Apple store comes up, a top-rated comment always makes a comparison with game consoles to argue it is all fair. I don't personally believe the comparison makes sense, but many on HN do. So I am going to ask, how is this different from PS/Xbox/etc? If the game consoles still 'own' the device after you have bought it, e.g. when PS disabled Linux installation f…

One holds your saved games. The other connects you to local emergency services, the global economy, your financial assets, your government, your family, your education, and increasingly - your health care provider.

To suggest they should be treated the same is downright laughable.

Yes, the underlying technology is similar, but their importance and impact on society is orders of magnitude different.

Re: Tim Cook’s Fortnite trial testimony was unexpectedly revealing

#234

Post by spideymans » Sun, May 23, 2021, 4:18 PM UTC

konschubert wrote: post #142

smnrchrds wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have seen this time after time, that when the question of Apple store comes up, a top-rated comment always makes a comparison with game consoles to argue it is all fair. I don't personally believe the comparison makes sense, but many on HN do. So I am going to ask, how is this different from PS/Xbox/etc? If the game consoles still 'own' the device after you have bought it, e.g. when PS disabled Linux installation f…

Game consoles have negative margins, it’s their business model. If apple started selling iphones at negative margins maybe they would have a better moral stand in charging a tax.

Apple subsidizing the cost of iPhones with revenue from elsewhere in their walled-garden ecosystem would arguably be even more anticompetitive. Apple's competitors don't have the ecosystem advantage that would allow them to generate revenue from other parts of their business. Apple would be able to drive down their iPhone prices, while mainlining exceptional quality, which would be very difficult to compete against.

Re: Tim Cook’s Fortnite trial testimony was unexpectedly revealing

#235

Post by rdedev » Sun, May 23, 2021, 4:19 PM UTC

jodrellblank wrote: post #214

rdedev wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get this argument. How can an alternative app Store affect the quality of the Apple app Store ? The alternate app Store is not gonna come installed by default. No one is gonna mistake the alternative app Store for the apple one. Apple is gonna make sure of that. Apple can even put up loads of warnings and dark UI stuff when installing an alternate app Store to dissuade the "noob" users.

> " No one is gonna mistake the alternative app Store for the apple one " You've never heard any stories like "I put FireFox/Chrome on my parent's desktop and next time I went back they were using IE and said they didn't notice"? Or same with apps installed from an App store between real and imitation? > " Apple can even put up loads of warnings and dark UI stuff when installing an alternate app Store to dissuade the…

As I said in the next sentence, apple is going to make sure that no app Store looks like theirs. It's pretty easy to do it too. Make sure app stores are only available to install from the Apple app Store. That way apple can look for any possible imitations.

The dissuading stuff was not needed. I was just frustrated with the line that some users are not tech savvy so all users must be equally restricted. It just seems unnecessarily black and white

Re: Tim Cook’s Fortnite trial testimony was unexpectedly revealing

#236

Post by [deleted] » Sun, May 23, 2021, 4:19 PM UTC

duped wrote: post #105

maxsilver wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If they did it with bank transactions, Apple Pay, Venmo, Robinhood, etc then people would be up in arms. Would they? Don't they literally already do this too? Isn't Apple Card https://www.apple.com/apple-card/ them literally skimming off the top of every financial transaction, despite them doing nothing but provide a branded whitelabeled Goldman Sachs Mastercard? (admittedly, a very pretty fancy card) I don't think…

A credit card with standard transaction fees and interest is very different than taking 30% of every transaction on the platform while also having the power to forbid venders on the platform from increasing their prices to make up the difference.

[deleted]

Re: Tim Cook’s Fortnite trial testimony was unexpectedly revealing

#237

Post by merrywhether » Sun, May 23, 2021, 4:20 PM UTC

lucasyvas wrote: post #137

There appear to be a lot of comments effectively saying that Apple's "altruism" is what keeps the app store advocating for user privacy and security. Let's say that's both true and a good quality of the app store that could be lost on another curator's store. This is still not a problem, because Apple can instead improve the iOS permission API system to achieve a similar result. The store that delivers you the app is…

Punting responsibility to users is well and good until (for example) their IoT devices start doing damage under the control of Mirai. I’m not saying that a patrician approach is the only solution, but we are not each our own perfectly isolated islands.

Re: Tim Cook’s Fortnite trial testimony was unexpectedly revealing

#238

Post by Nextgrid » Sun, May 23, 2021, 4:21 PM UTC

Sargos wrote: post #210

Nextgrid wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There could be an argument that allowing alternative stores would just mean every app would switch to those and be able to work around Apple's rules and act against consumers' best interests. However, the fact that Apple only enforces the rules when it benefits them as opposed to consumers (so they are happy to turn a blind eye to spyware, but will crack down immediately on alternative payment options) means that in…

>There could be an argument that allowing alternative stores would just mean every app would switch to those Which is a ridiculous argument as the network effects and default preference status of the App Store mean it'll still be pretty much a requirement to publish there if you want any users.

Not really.

Apple currently has the market power to keep Facebook and other similar scum at bay if they chose to (unfortunately, they're not doing anywhere near enough on this front).

Opening the floodgates to alternate stores would simply mean every mainstream service out there would require you to use that alternate store (isolated from Apple's enforcement) where all kinds of nastiness is permitted.

Re: Tim Cook’s Fortnite trial testimony was unexpectedly revealing

#239

Post by kmonsen » Sun, May 23, 2021, 4:21 PM UTC

crazygringo wrote: post #173

Hamuko wrote: post #2

Tim Cook's line of argument seemed a bit weird to me. On one hand he's saying that he doesn't know if Apple's customers would be able to distinguish between Apple's good and holy curated store and Epic's filthy shitheap of porn and blackjack, but he's also saying that Apple's customers definitely want Apple's App Store as-is. > Lawyer says, “if people really value Apple’s curation and Apple’s App Store, even if there…

There's nothing weird about it. If there were no food regulations, I don't know if I'd be able to pick restaurants and grocery store brands that were safe to eat. But I definitely know I want safe food to eat. Most people want safe food but they want the government to figure out what that means. Same thing here -- most people just want a safe app store. They don't want the work of having to figure out which app store…

It would more be like if food safety inspections were optional, but only restaurants that opt in would be allowed to show a sign they were inspected either physically or on their web page. It would be trivial to be able to check for this. Door dash would show a sign saying which restaurant is safe to avoid being sued after an incident.

If you think restaurants and food safety is a good analogy it’s not a good argument for Apple in my opinion.

Re: Tim Cook’s Fortnite trial testimony was unexpectedly revealing

#240

Post by remolacha » Sun, May 23, 2021, 4:23 PM UTC

crazygringo wrote: post #173

Hamuko wrote: post #2

Tim Cook's line of argument seemed a bit weird to me. On one hand he's saying that he doesn't know if Apple's customers would be able to distinguish between Apple's good and holy curated store and Epic's filthy shitheap of porn and blackjack, but he's also saying that Apple's customers definitely want Apple's App Store as-is. > Lawyer says, “if people really value Apple’s curation and Apple’s App Store, even if there…

There's nothing weird about it. If there were no food regulations, I don't know if I'd be able to pick restaurants and grocery store brands that were safe to eat. But I definitely know I want safe food to eat. Most people want safe food but they want the government to figure out what that means. Same thing here -- most people just want a safe app store. They don't want the work of having to figure out which app store…

If there were two, or ten, food safety inspection groups, we could figure out which ones had trustworthy ratings. No need for end consumers to inspect every restaurant (every app) individually. That's what Epic is asking for - to have its own app store on iOS.