331–340 of 1001 posts
This forcing apps to use your payment platform through extortion is anti-competitive. Full stop.
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while they are giving "gifts" and "gratuities" to the relevant judges There is a lot of corruption in the US. So yes, at times, they will allow that too. But in this case, the commenter was correct. We can't be going into courts of law making poop up. Going into a court of law and saying that a company with 27% market share in phones and 13% market share in PCs is a "monopoly" is almost on the level of being insultin…
The Brown Shoe Company merger in the 1960s was shot down, even though it would only control around 7% of the nation’s shoe supply. It’s important to not just consider the quantitative impact of the monopolist (percent of market share) but also the qualitative components (is it vertically integrated? is it hurting consumers?). I’m not sure whether or not Apple is a monopolist, but I certainly think there are some argu…
I'm surprised there haven't been more attempts at a "tying" argument against Apple's App Store and their platforms, but I'm also not a lawyer. It has what looks like a pretty clear, long history of being considered an anti-competitive practice by the courts. You can buy a Brother printer and not have to buy paper or toner from them, why should I have to buy my apps from Apple? And to be clear, that is precisely how Apple thinks of the relationship between the user and the app. Apple owns that relationship. They mediate. They manage. They facilitate. No one else. Users don't buy apps. Users pay Apple. Apple pays the app developers.
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Take Apple out of the loop entirely. Why does Patreon need an app? Have users go through the website. Send them updates when people post new content. I've never used the Patreon app on either Android or iOS. I support a number of creators and I have no idea why I'd want an app. Money is taken from my account. Receipts are sent to my email. Articles from creators are sent to my email, and if they're long enough I clic…
The app's useful for audio posts. But mostly it's just an extra chance for them to make money. Push notifications, the home screen icon, etc. Most people I know, their inbox is barely functional due to the marketing emails, and they're reliant on features like Gmail's "Important" which only highlights real people, not Patreon content. You're not the average user, and if the average user gets a billing email and hasn'…
There's another erm... "creator oriented" Patreon-like service that works entirely through the web. Specifically to avoid Apple and Google's cut. And they seem wildly successful, although perhaps the type of content may influence user's decisions.
I like being able to cancel subscriptions from the App Store, it’s a huge advantage because companies will usually try to make it difficult to cancel.
As a longtime YouTube creator who uses Patreon for financial support, the news is terrible: Patreon informed me that all creators must switch to a monthly subscription schedule instead of the per-creation schedule that I and many other currently use. The whole point of per-creation is that it allows me to take time off, and only charge people when I release something, thus incentivizing me, and being fair to my suppo…
The only way to put an end to this is if more people stop installing apps that are just website skins, and just use the open web instead.
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Will you still like it enough that you're willing to pay a 30% premium as more and more services start passing the Apple Tax on to the consumer? This is why I love capitalism!
The beauty of capitalism is that you can choose. You don't even have to have a smartphone at all and if you decide to have one, you don't HAVE to have an Apple device. There are countless other brands to pick. If you truly hate the 30% thing, then don't buy an iPhone.
The beauty of capitalism is that you can choose the color of your car as long as it's black.
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Customers leave when prices rise above their willingness to pay. Some customers will realize on their own that they can bypass Apple's fee by subscribing through the browser, but most won't (since Apple forbids even mentioning this trick).
This, imo is a solid argument for "fine then, we're just gonna pull our app and use mobile web exclusively."
This, TBH, is why I've never supported a creator via Patreon, as I have no idea how I'd access a creator's supporter-only content in a way that was convenient for me.
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The reason sales prices are quoted without tax in North America is because there's a million different permutations governing what the sales tax is going to be in different situations (who's buying what, from whom, where, when), and this changes all the time. Local governments can shift their taxes at any time to encourage or discourage certain things. I'd argue this flexibility is very good, but the downside is calc…
If we only had databases and computers which can track and calculate those advanced math stuff.
To show each customer the right post-tax price, you'd have to know where they live and where they will buy your product. It would be impossible to advertise a price en masse on your website / in a brochure.