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U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly

nytimes.com

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Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly

#631

Post by babyshake »

segasaturn wrote: post #293
Fripplebubby wrote: post #287

For folks who don't have time to read a 90 page document, the case rests on specific claims, not just the general claim that iPhone is a monopoly because it's so big. Here are those claims: 1. "Super Apps" Apple has restrictions on what they allow on the App Store as far as "Super Apps", which are apps that might offer a wide variety of different services (specifically, an app which has several "mini programs" within…

The messaging interop point is probably DOA since Apple has stated that they will be adding RCS support to iMessage. The smartwatch point is interesting and not an argument I've seen made before, but it's a very good example of Apple's vendor lock-in.

To be fair, Apple has said a lot of things. Wasn't FaceTime supposed to be an open standard and that never happened? If they give a specific target date I'd feel more encouraged.

Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly

#632

Post by bobthepanda »

dmix wrote: post #493
ChuckMcM wrote: post #481

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This feels like it reflects similar actions taken against companies that are dominant in a market. The first one I heard about[1] was IBM versus Memorex which was making IBM 360 "compatible" disk drives. IBM lost and it generated some solid case law that has been relied on in this sort of prosecution. In the IBM case it opened up an entire industry of third party "compatible" peripherals and saved consumers a ton of…

> In the IBM case it opened up an entire industry of third party "compatible" peripherals and saved consumers a ton of money I’m curious what market opportunities the Apple suit could open up. - Xbox cloud game streaming - WeChat like super apps w e-commerce (X wanted to do this play but more likely Facebook Messenger and the like) - iMessage on android - a receipt tracking app or something directly tied into Apple P…

Facebook tried this with games and cash transfer within Messenger but it never really took off.

Personally, I don’t think Western (or at least American) consumers are all that interested in a super app. Asia has a ton of players in this space like WeChat, QQ, Line and Kaokao but those have never taken off in the West outside of diaspora communities.

Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly

#633

Post by Fgyu0909 »

Fripplebubby wrote: post #287

For folks who don't have time to read a 90 page document, the case rests on specific claims, not just the general claim that iPhone is a monopoly because it's so big. Here are those claims: 1. "Super Apps" Apple has restrictions on what they allow on the App Store as far as "Super Apps", which are apps that might offer a wide variety of different services (specifically, an app which has several "mini programs" within…

Thanks this simplifies things a lot.

Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly

#634

Post by jmholla »

photochemsyn wrote: post #75

One of the most annoying features of the iOS ecosystem is the great lengths they take to prevent easy export of data out of the iOS system to other non-Apple devices. E.g. ever tried exporting Safari bookmarks on iOS to a Linux system running Firefox? A simple JSON file is all it would take, but no, you have to sync with a MacOS computer or some such: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/254567613

While others are pointing out your specific case is supported, I do know for experience you need a Mac to be able to smoothly move to a different password manager. Otherwise, it requires you to unlock your passwords at least twice (really like three or four times to do it properly) to copy and paste passwords to a different app.

Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly

#635

Post by tssge »

toast0 wrote: post #262
inasio wrote: post #192

I'm sure there's an argument to justify making it super complicated to move your Whatsapp content from IPhone to Android, but at the time I was having to dump the Whatsapp DB to recover the last messages from a dead relative it sure seemed like a convenient way to encourage people to stick around.

Edit: Actually looks you can do iPhone to Android transfer now: https://faq.whatsapp.com/1295296267926284 or Android to iPhone https://faq.whatsapp.com/686469079565350 Original response below: That's really a WhatsApp product issue, not an OS issue. There's some hints of an OS issue, because Android lets WA put a backup file on the 'sd card' that you can transfer across to a new (Android) phone, and iOS doesn't (or d…

Yeah the feature exists on paper at least, but not in principle from my experience.

I switched to iPhone 15 Pro recently from Android and after trying to import my data from Android couple of times and iOS failing to import WhatsApp specifically, I had to resort to buying third party software to perform the message transfer via a Windows laptop.

Bear in mind the import process took like 3 hours each time and I had to keep both phones close to each other, couldn't use them while importing and had to keep power supplied to them.

After about 10 hours of trying, I gave in and put 100$ towards proper third party software to transfer my messages. This is ridiculous, as I have Google Drive on my iPhone with my WhatsApp backups from my old phone, however for one reason or another these backups cannot be utilised by WhatsApp on iOS.

Moving between two Android phones "it just works".

Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly

#636

Post by bdavbdav »

ben7799 wrote: post #384
Fripplebubby wrote: post #287

For folks who don't have time to read a 90 page document, the case rests on specific claims, not just the general claim that iPhone is a monopoly because it's so big. Here are those claims: 1. "Super Apps" Apple has restrictions on what they allow on the App Store as far as "Super Apps", which are apps that might offer a wide variety of different services (specifically, an app which has several "mini programs" within…

Interesting, I've had 2 Garmin Smart Watches and never felt like Apple was restricting them. I am curious what things the iPhone does that others aren't allowed to do. Most of the differences between Garmin and Apple Watch seem like they were conscious decisions where they each decided to take a different direction. It's one of those weird things where it seems like the case has a bunch of holes. You can use an iPhon…

I’ve got an iPhone and an Apple Watch. Wife has an iPhone and a Garmin.

The Garmin sadly misses out on notification filtering, focus modes, replies, solid Bluetooth (it drops out from time to time and the app needs reopening).

Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly

#637

Post by mullingitover »

empath-nirvana wrote: post #556
Fripplebubby wrote: post #287

For folks who don't have time to read a 90 page document, the case rests on specific claims, not just the general claim that iPhone is a monopoly because it's so big. Here are those claims: 1. "Super Apps" Apple has restrictions on what they allow on the App Store as far as "Super Apps", which are apps that might offer a wide variety of different services (specifically, an app which has several "mini programs" within…

I like the app store, I like the restrictions, I don't want apple to change anything about it. I sort of think apple shouldn't try to comply with these sorts of potential lawsuits by making their app store worse, they should just let people jail break the phone and offer zero support for it. If people want to buy an iphone and shit it up, let them do it.

> they should just let people jail break the phone and offer zero support for it.

Just let people wipe the phone completely - no drivers, no kernel, nothing, and bring their own. That's the proper solution to people wanting to own their hardware and do whatever they want with it. Want to install a different app store/browser/etc? Go for it, start by installing the new kernel and drivers.

Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly

#638

Post by alt227 »

emodendroket wrote: post #471
Fripplebubby wrote: post #287

For folks who don't have time to read a 90 page document, the case rests on specific claims, not just the general claim that iPhone is a monopoly because it's so big. Here are those claims: 1. "Super Apps" Apple has restrictions on what they allow on the App Store as far as "Super Apps", which are apps that might offer a wide variety of different services (specifically, an app which has several "mini programs" within…

> Apple itself offers a "super app" of course, which is the Apple ecosystem of apps. Does Apple not let others offer a suite of apps?

Individually, yes. But each app has its own app store approoval process and fees. Also they are jailed privately so they cannot share information with each other. Only Apple Apps are the ones that can do that.

Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly

#639

Post by jagged-chisel »

> The government even has the right to ask for a breakup…

I really dislike statements like this. They could ask even without the “right to ask.”

Having the “right to ask” doesn’t guarantee the request will be honored.

How does this “right to ask for a breakup” actually affect the story?

Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly

#640

Post by paulddraper »

empath-nirvana wrote: post #556
Fripplebubby wrote: post #287

For folks who don't have time to read a 90 page document, the case rests on specific claims, not just the general claim that iPhone is a monopoly because it's so big. Here are those claims: 1. "Super Apps" Apple has restrictions on what they allow on the App Store as far as "Super Apps", which are apps that might offer a wide variety of different services (specifically, an app which has several "mini programs" within…

I like the app store, I like the restrictions, I don't want apple to change anything about it. I sort of think apple shouldn't try to comply with these sorts of potential lawsuits by making their app store worse, they should just let people jail break the phone and offer zero support for it. If people want to buy an iphone and shit it up, let them do it.

That is the right way to think about it.

If your walled garden (App Store) is really better, people will stay in it voluntarily.

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