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Epic vs. Google: Google Loses

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Re: Epic vs. Google: Google Loses

#181
post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Epic already lost the trial in the Apple case. Courts in the US and other countries have treated Google differently as an OS provider to OEMs than Apple as a single vendor. Would they also make Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft open up their platforms?

So Google is punished because they made their platform more open. Well, that certainly will bode well for the future.

Google was punished for making deals to limit competition on their ‘open’ platform.

Apple doesn’t really make these deals, so they weren’t punished for that.

Re: Epic vs. Google: Google Loses

#182
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't get it, so no company can provide a walled garden You can provide a walled garden. But that's not Apple does. Instead, Apple is a mafia that shakes down all the vendors for the right to sell in their semi-open market square. If Apple iOS were a walled garden, it would have contained only Apple applications.

I don't think stores have an obligation to carry your products, it isn't like supermarkets are breaking the law because they don't have an open-door policy on products. You don't have some intrinsic legal right to use someone else's infrastructure to sell your own stuff, on your terms. Framing this as a legal or ethical issue leaves me cold, when the reality is just... you'd PREFER higher margins. I get it! I'm not s…

> I don't get it, so no company can provide a walled garden

Apple doesn't have multiple competing stores. It has ONE store.

And if you are a software vendor that makes mobile apps, you HAVE to support Apple or you will go out of business.

Re: Epic vs. Google: Google Loses

#183
post #31

This is huge! I've had so many business ideas that I've killed at the idea stage because giving 30% of revenue to Apple or Google made it not viable. Might be time to revisit them...

> This is huge! > I've had so many business ideas that I've killed at the idea stage because giving 30% of revenue to Apple or Google made it not viable. > Might be time to revisit them... name 3?

Anywhere where you exist on top of someone else's service is basically killed by a 30% margin. To use an example I worked on a while back, dynamic Minecraft server hosting: Taking advantage of the fact that most small servers need much less than 100% uptime, you realize that if you dynamically spin up and down these servers, you can offer substantially better use-based pricing. You're basically an AWS reseller in this scenario, so there's a hard floor in what you how much you can charge, because VPSs cost money, but you're competing against "leave the server on 24/7", which is your upper cap. Unfortunately, unlike those "Up 24/7" servers, you need a good way for your customers to spin the server up and down. A phone app seems like a good way to do that, until you realize that 30% of that revenue potential would be forked over to the app stores.

100% AWS uptime, at cost -> your competitor's price

10-15% AWS uptime -> your marginal costs

50-60% AWS uptime -> maximum price you can really charge while differentiating yourself on price

25-32% AWS uptime -> subtract your costs and google's cut from that maximum price

When you start factoring costs like customer acquisition, it starts getting very, very tight. 30% profit can make for a pretty healthy business, especially in businesses where your prices and costs can be predictably coupled. But a business with a 30% profit margin that has to pay 30% is a failed business.

Re: Epic vs. Google: Google Loses

#184

Oh hey, will you look at that. I remember arguing with people for years about these cases. The thing with the app store situations is that Epic/app developers only need to win a single time vs the app stores, whereas the app stores need to win every battle. Either it will be through existing anti trust laws, or through new laws being created, or through the same thing happening in any major country in the world. Beca…

If I ran Apple or Google (and was running with the "customer safety" angle): If you want to run a third-party app store, okay. But you have to play by Apple/Google's rules and standards. Just like they have guidelines for their own store's apps, have the same guidelines for third-party stores. It puts the onus on third-party stores to make sure they're just as stringent as the parent store/platform. If you fail to be…

> If you want to run a third-party app store, okay. But you have to play by Apple/Google's rules and standards.

Defeats the purpose of third party app stores. The only reason I even have one installed (F-droid) is for apps that don't play by Google's rules and standards.

"Yes, you can have multiple app stores as long as they're all exactly the same."

Re: Epic vs. Google: Google Loses

#185

I wonder what the remedies will be -- sideloading is already allowed, so allowing third party in-app billing? That seems to be the actual thing the juries said -- that Google used their dominant position to do anticompetitive things, among which is taking their 30% cut on everything. Hope that this happens to Apple eventually too.

Hope it doesn't happen to Apple as I like and prefer that I can only buy stuff and most importantly have a single place to cancel all my subscriptions without dark patterns like having to talk to a person to cancel. I'll again make my argument that the developers should respect the choice of the users. If the user chose iOS maybe they chose it because they wanted the curated experience and the locked it product. I ce…

Just require that apps have to (non-exclusively) support Apple billing to be in the Apple store.

Then you can (personally) choose to never break the glass to install something from outside the store.

Re: Epic vs. Google: Google Loses

#186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple has global dominance on market profits

The government does not (and legally cannot) give a darn on "dominance in market profits." If it isn't hurting consumers or illegally propping up market share, that's just called good business. As it should be, otherwise you end up with very bad incentives. For example, what's stopping Samsung then from using the world's most inefficient and old manufacturing techniques, and then complaining Apple's more efficient (b…

Ok but apple is hurting consumers with their 30% fee. I would not have bought an iPhone if I knew about that. Now Im locked in.

Re: Epic vs. Google: Google Loses

#187
The lesson is loud and clear: if you want to destroy normal consumer protections, do it using technologic dictatorship like Apple and the gaming console companies, not through an open platform and then soft power with your vendors.

Feels like a "if you run somebody over with your car it's better to back up and kill them" moment of perverse legal incentives.

Re: Epic vs. Google: Google Loses

#188
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't get it, so no company can provide a walled garden You can provide a walled garden. But that's not Apple does. Instead, Apple is a mafia that shakes down all the vendors for the right to sell in their semi-open market square. If Apple iOS were a walled garden, it would have contained only Apple applications.

When someone comes to your store and says "I'll wreck your store unless you cut me 30% of your revenue" that's the mafia. When someone comes to your store and says "I made the streets and regulate the power, water supply, sewer, and everything else in this place, cut me 30% of your revenue in taxes" that's the government. And you'd do well to not confuse those so haphazardly. Apple didn't come to your app and with no…

> When someone comes to your store and says "I'll wreck your store unless you cut me 30% of your revenue" that's the mafia.

That's exactly what Apple does. If you make a mobile app (for example, a presentation manager) you _have_ to support iOS, or you will go out of business.

As a developer, you simply don't have a choice. You have to either support iOS, or get out of mobile apps entirely.

Re: Epic vs. Google: Google Loses

#189

Pardon me, didn’t Apple win the exact same suit by Epic? Apple’s app store is fine, but Google’s isn’t?

No, the cases were very different. Mainly because Google had a whole bunch of emails and contracts with other companies that Apple just doesn’t make.

Re: Epic vs. Google: Google Loses

#190
post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The would be the end of consoles. At this point consoles have very few advantages to PC. If they got "opened up" it would be zero.

It's just look a lot more like a standardized PC. Which they they probably should by this point.

Sure. But there would be zero incentive for Sony, Nintendo etc to build one.

Because Acer, Asus etc could simply come along and undercut them on price and still have access to the exact same game catalog. And then they would each decide to add more proprietary features or add more performance.

And so you've just recreated the PC gaming market again.

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