Earlier quoted context omitted.
Vote with your dollars. If App A requires you to use their payment gateway and App B uses apple pay, use App B. I imagine this will cause a sort of race to the bottom where apple will lower its own fees to match.
It feels ironic to ask customers to bear the burden to make big companies behave, in a thread about a court ruling regulating anti-competitive behavior.
Court issues permanent injunction in Epic vs. Apple case
821–830 of 958 posts
Re: Court issues permanent injunction in Epic vs. Apple case
#822Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Even with a CC payment, wouldn't you be able to cancel the recurring payment by going through the account options on your bank website? No? I don't know where you're located, but I'm not aware of any North American banks that offer anything of the sort. Typically the only thing you could do through your bank is dispute a charge after the fact and request a chargeback. The end of that process may or may not see the…
In PayPal, any recurring payments and subscriptions can easily be cancelled on the centralized "Pre-approved payments" page: https://www.paypal.com/va/smarthelp/article/how-do-i-cancel-... The process can be done in the PayPal app, or on any web browser. It is just as easy as Apple's process, and PayPal doesn't charge 30%. PayPal is not a bank, however.
Re: Court issues permanent injunction in Epic vs. Apple case
#823Earlier quoted context omitted.
I agree this is confusing. Pages 149-150 of the ruling explicitly conclude that it is not illegal for Apple to require developers to use IAP for purchases of in-app content. On the other hand, the injuction on page 168 says Apple cannot prohibit developers from linking to other purchasing mechanisms besides IAP. The way I would interpret this is: 1. If you want to make a purchase inside the app itself, you still have…
That’s exactly how I’d interpret it. Which is not what many people here have been arguing. If this is the case, it’s not what Epic ultimately wanted and still lets Apple avoid allowing alternative In-App purchasing mechanisms. But it makes a lot of sense… protect people inside the garden, but still let people buy their VBucks anywhere else they want to. This also mirrors what happens on other game platforms - if you…
1. The court affirmed Apple's right to terminate Epic's developer account and ban them from the App Store which will have underlying consequences to their Unreal Engine business.
2. The court fully rejected Epic's monopolization claims which deals a huge blow to their goal of running their own app store.
3. It's not clear whether Apple is prohibited from charging commissions or licensing fees on purchases made outside of the IAP system. Everyone is assuming so, and the accounting would be much more complicated, but if you read through the ruling the judge repeatedly agrees that Apple is entitled to some sort of compensation for the use of their intellectual property. It may very well be that developers will be allowed to add external payment options but will still owe Apple some form of commission/licensing fee in exchange.
Re: Court issues permanent injunction in Epic vs. Apple case
#824I'm really happy to see this moving forward, but I loathe the potential future landscape. Every fortune 500 is going to immediately pivot to their own IAP options which will make my life harder compared to Apple Pay. I'm hoping with this movement, tools like Stripe/Paddle will develop some better IAP flows to make it as easy as possible. Adding my card information to 50 different in-app wallets does not sound appeali…
Then maybe Apple shouldn't have gotten greedy...
This is the problem with major companies that think they can just control everything. Then when the government steps in they say what they were doing is anti-competitive and suddenly the consumers now have to bear the brunt of the negative aspect of full on competition. Had Apple just been reasonable and not charged egregious fees from the get go, this wouldn't have been an issue.
Re: Court issues permanent injunction in Epic vs. Apple case
#825One thing that's bugged/occurred to me. People keep acting like Apple will no longer get to charge 30% to developers for in-app purchases, but it seems like they may still be entitled to their 30% and even in this ruling Epic still owes that 30% -- Developers will be able to use alternate payment providers, but may still owe a commission to Apple? Tim Cook alluded to this in his original testimony, and the judge does…
> Under all models, Apple would be entitled to a commission or licensing fee, even if IAP was optional.
> Turning to the intellectual property justification, the Court agrees with the general proposition that Apple is entitled to be paid for its intellectual property.
> As established in the prior sections, see supra Facts §§ II.C., V.A.2.b., V.B.2.c., Apple is entitled to license its intellectual property for a fee, and to further guard against the uncompensated use of its intellectual property.
> The Court also notes that in the but-for world where developers could use an alternative processor, Apple would still be contractually entitled to its commission on any purchase made within apps distributed on the App Store.
In other words, even if developers are allowed to link to alternative payment processors inside their app, Apple may very well still be entitled to some sort of commission/licensing fee for the use of their IP.
Re: Court issues permanent injunction in Epic vs. Apple case
#826Earlier quoted context omitted.
In PayPal, any recurring payments and subscriptions can easily be cancelled on the centralized "Pre-approved payments" page: https://www.paypal.com/va/smarthelp/article/how-do-i-cancel-... The process can be done in the PayPal app, or on any web browser. It is just as easy as Apple's process, and PayPal doesn't charge 30%. PayPal is not a bank, however.
looks like Paypal charges $0.49 + 3.49% for Paypal checkout. so seems like more expensive in some cases. https://www.paypal.com/us/webapps/mpp/merchant-fees
Re: Court issues permanent injunction in Epic vs. Apple case
#827Earlier quoted context omitted.
My concern is less about random one-off purchases but more the management of on-going subscriptions. Having Apple handle that, is a blessing, from a user perspective. I have a single place to manage all the random $1 - $10 subscriptions that I have, making it easy to change/cancel at any moment's notice, and from any device.
I don't think there's anything in this injunction that stops Apple from building a mandatory subscription-cancelling API, which I wouldn't be surprised if they're actually already working on due to earlier rulings this month. In other words, you might be able to subscribe to FooCalendar using their Stripe API system, but FooCo has to make sure that your FooCalendar subscription shows up in your list of subscriptions,…
Re: Court issues permanent injunction in Epic vs. Apple case
#828Earlier quoted context omitted.
I just checked my NYT account I can cancel from the website? I only have a digital subscription however.
This might depend on the state in which you live: https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/companies-mu... This makes the practice even more egregious as you know the website has the ability to allow cancellations they just choose not to enable it for people living in other states.
Re: Court issues permanent injunction in Epic vs. Apple case
#829Earlier quoted context omitted.
The ability to simply cancel any subscription without clicking through increasingly desperate "Don't go!!!" nag screens is easily worth an extra 30% for me, too.
which means the apple IAP is going to have a competitive advantage compared to third party IAP. This means that competition is working, because you would choose apple's IAP, over the third party, even if it was more expensive.
Aren't you heavily assuming these developers would even bother integrating apple's IAP? This ruling will allow the developers to completely go around apple and never use apple's IAP at all.
Re: Court issues permanent injunction in Epic vs. Apple case
#830Earlier quoted context omitted.
It explicitly prohibits Apple from prohibiting any form of In-App purchasing, not merely links to external payments methods.
I disagree here. My read on it is that Apple is prohibited from prohibiting "calls to action that direct customers to purchasing mechanisms", not "purchasing mechanisms" themselves. So Apple can still say App Store IAP is the only allowed form of IAP, but they have to allow CTAs to other mechanisms.