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Apple vs. the "Free Market"

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Re: Apple vs. the "Free Market"

#131

Post by chii »

AlexandrB wrote: post #34
brigadier132 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think you get it because you wouldn't have asked the question in the first place if you did. If there is actual competition in a market, the surplus generated by economic transactions is more fairly distributed by the participants in the transaction. When there is competition, businesses also need to compete and improve their products to drive efficiencies (for better margins) and to make the product more att…

At no point was I equating Apple and Amazon. I was asking why Apple doesn't collect 30% from Amazon (which Amazon would naturally pass on to consumers) when people buy goods from Amazon's iOS app. My entire point is that this distinction seems increasingly arbitrary on Apple's part and is perhaps driven by the expected outrage if they tried to pull the same stunt with retailers like Amazon or Temu.

> driven by the expected outrage if they tried to pull the same stunt with retailers

which is pretty good evidence that society should pass a law to disallow apple from doing it (rather than let them pick and choose to charge a subset small enough to bypass public outrage, but still rake in an undeserved tax on apple device users)!

Re: Apple vs. the "Free Market"

#132

Post by rchaud »

tazu wrote: post #84
rchaud wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While the examples are all valid, the restrictions don't apply on mobile Safari. Why do corporations and devs continue to accept a share cropper role by paying Apple to host native apps? FirefoxOS had the right idea, make the browser the principal gateway for applications. It was a decade ahead of its time, but the mobile web is now at a level where native apps aren't needed for the most part.

> Why do corporations and devs continue to accept a share cropper role by paying Apple to host native apps? Push notifications. That's it, and presumably why Apple waited 8 years[1] before allowing them on iOS PWAs. [1]: https://developer.chrome.com/blog/push-notifications-on-the-...

I can understand engagement/spam-hungry apps like Uber nd Facebook needing notifications for business reasons. For all other apps, notifications are either a lot less important, or can be sent via email.

Re: Apple vs. the "Free Market"

#133

Post by saurik »

knowriju wrote: post #64
AlexandrB wrote: post #2

What's the conceptual difference between Apple charging 30% for Patreon subcribers vs. charging 30% for purchases on Temu or the Amazon app? This distinction seems completely arbitrary to me. I suspect the only reason it exists is that adding a 30% Apple surcharge to every Amazon purchase would cause too much outrage. Disclaimer: I've never used Temu or the Amazon app, but I'm assuming they don't apply a 30% surcharg…

Playing the devil's advocate here, I believe the rational to take 30% cut for only digital goods is that, usually digital goods have zero marginal cost. To 'manufacture' an additional digital asset, the company doesn't need to spend anything extra. This assumption starts breaking as internet becomes more ubiquitous and for anything really outside gaming coins. Example, for every additional Spotify subscriber, Spotify…

This doesn't work for Patreon, which often isn't merely about "digital assets": while some people on Patreon might be using it to merely sell access to some digital portfolio, many (I'd even say "most") use it as a form of VIP club system, with direct access to the artist, custom work products, physical swag that you receive in the mail, shoutouts during live shows... Patreon isn't a system that inherently scales with anything close to zero marginal cost, at least for most of the tiers of most of the artists I've seen on the platform.

Re: Apple vs. the "Free Market"

#134

Post by Timber-6539 »

2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote: post #122
Timber-6539 wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did.

> Apple's pristine execution of stage one of enshittification – luring in users, then locking those users in – mean that businesses can't survive without reaching Apple customers

Sensational nonsense.

Re: Apple vs. the "Free Market"

#135

Post by zem »

a_c_s wrote: post #50
AlexandrB wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It can certainly be obnoxious (I remember everyone calling Microsoft, M$ in the early 2000s), but if the goal is communicating an idea to an audience spelling it iPhone vs IPhone vs iphone vs Iphone doesn't make a difference. What I don't get is advocating for radical civil obedience to a company's preferred trademark names.

Calling any of this "radical" is rather dramatic and framing it as "obedience" misses the point. If someone says "My name is spelled e. e. cummings" then writing it "E. E. Cummings" is weird. It feels either uninformed or a deliberate, though tiny, mark of disrespect. It would also be weird to spell the Motorola "Razr" phone's name as "Razor" as that's not the spelling Motorola gave it. It isn't about "obeying" the p…

just as a side note, cummings spelt his name in uppercase

https://faculty.gvsu.edu/websterm/cummings/caps.htm

Re: Apple vs. the "Free Market"

#136

Post by KetoManx64 »

blackeyeblitzar wrote: post #26

General computing devices like smartphones should allow users to install whatever they want without any cost or restrictions.

There are options for that, Users don't choose them. You can sideload apps very easily on Android, it's 1 toggle in the settings to activate the ability and then you can install apps from F-Droid or anywhere else you want

Re: Apple vs. the "Free Market"

#137

Post by 2OEH8eoCRo0 »

Timber-6539 wrote: post #134
2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Apple's pristine execution of stage one of enshittification – luring in users, then locking those users in – mean that businesses can't survive without reaching Apple customers

Sensational nonsense.

Tell me how

Re: Apple vs. the "Free Market"

#138

Post by chuckadams »

dhosek wrote: post #106
lbwtaylor wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I like it. If I didn’t, I just wouldn’t buy Apple products. I’m not sure why that’s so hard for people. Because Apple is so aggressive about lock-in that it excludes reasonable interaction between people with Apple and people without. The texting situation with pictures and videos is the most glaring example. You are not forced to purchase Apple products, except that you are.

Pictures text just fine to non-Apple users. Videos don’t go through, but that’s because of a limitation of the text protocol (and Apple is finally providing support for the extended text format that allows videos to be sent via text)¹. Claiming that iMessage should be opened up is kind of like saying that you should be forced to allow people to park their cars on your front lawn. iMessage is a non-zero-cost service t…

Pictures going through MMS are horribly low-res though. Luckily IOS finally supports RCS now.

Re: Apple vs. the "Free Market"

#139

Post by philistine »

n4r9 wrote: post #10
Doches wrote: post #3

This article reads like an uneducated rant in so, so many ways. Apple rolling over its sleep and squashing Patreon isn't 'enshittification', it's just textbook monopoly abuse. And if you want to rail about the nuance of Apple's business practices you can at least not typo the name of two of their flagship products ("Iphone and Ipad"). > The fact that it's a felony to get your Iphone apps from anyone except Apple mean…

> Apple rolling over its sleep and squashing Patreon isn't 'enshittification', it's just textbook monopoly abuse. Isn't it both? Enshittification is a form of monopoly abuse in my mind. Also note that you're arguing against the person who coined the term "enshittification".

Enshittification does not require a monopoly; merely captive consumers. You can enshittify cereal boxes, even though you don't have a monopoly.

Re: Apple vs. the "Free Market"

#140

Post by mensetmanusman »

AlexandrB wrote: post #2

What's the conceptual difference between Apple charging 30% for Patreon subcribers vs. charging 30% for purchases on Temu or the Amazon app? This distinction seems completely arbitrary to me. I suspect the only reason it exists is that adding a 30% Apple surcharge to every Amazon purchase would cause too much outrage. Disclaimer: I've never used Temu or the Amazon app, but I'm assuming they don't apply a 30% surcharg…

So it sounds like someone should make a Patreon page that renders a video of someone ordering what you want on Amazon, that will help Apple get a 30% markup on Amazon purchases.
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