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EU sends Apple first DMA interoperability instructions for apps and devices

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Re: EU sends Apple first DMA interoperability instructions for apps and devices

#81

Post by cynicalsecurity »

twoodfin wrote: post #2

I expect Apple will react to this by scaling down the sophistication and breadth of features they make available to EU users. That most of these capabilities exist at all reflects Apple’s belief that they’re a way to differentiate their (closed) ecosystem through vertical integration. If the EU takes that away, Apple’s motivation to invest in these areas for EU customers goes away, too.

Yes, please, I'd be glad if Apple began removing their new "sophisticated" features from the phones of EU users. Especially their AI spying agent and endless non-consensual and intrusive telemetry.

Re: EU sends Apple first DMA interoperability instructions for apps and devices

#82

Post by zoobab »

intrasight wrote: post #44
zoobab wrote: post #31

DMA does not provide any means to run Linux on Apple devices. I don't want their shitty OS, but I like their hardware. Unfortunately, the law makers prefer to cement oligopolies (Android-iPhone), instead of installing fines for not documentating how their hardware works.

Regulating the requirement that Apple support Linux on Macs makes no sense. What does make sense - to me anyway - is for Apple to embrace Linux because they'd sell a lot more Macs. I assume there are many thousands of developers like me that detest macOS and won't even consider a Mac. But like you said, Apple is making some amazing hardware these days. I would buy a Mac if Linux was well supported. Apple did just fin…

"Regulating the requirement that Apple support Linux on Macs makes no sense."

Not Linux, but any Operating System. They just have to publish the documentation of how the hardware works.

Re: EU sends Apple first DMA interoperability instructions for apps and devices

#83

Post by rickdeckard »

ChocolateGod wrote: post #3

As cool how unified the Apple ecosystem is, I do think the EU is right that it's extremely unfair for Apple to give its own smartwatches access to the phone that other smartwatches have zero chance of getting access to.

Nothing restricts Apple from continuing to be this unified in their ecosystem. What the EU DMA tries to break, is Apple's "weaponization" of iOS to gain an unfair advantage in sales of accessories.

So if Apple (the product-company) requires changes in iOS to realize a new feature in an accessory product, the changes in iOS will have to be opened to accessory-competitors as well.

They would still be first-to-market with such new features (because they had a head-start in implementing and launching them with their accessory), they would just be facing competitors catching up over time like in every other balanced market.

Re: EU sends Apple first DMA interoperability instructions for apps and devices

#84

Post by monooso »

intrasight wrote: post #35
piva00 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Losing 20% of global revenue is not really an option.

How would disabling certain features in certain markets hostile to their business model result in 20% revenue loss?

I realise this wasn't your point, but there is something deeply dystopian about referring to the EU's attempt to act in the best interests of its citizens as "hostile to [Apple's] business model."

Re: EU sends Apple first DMA interoperability instructions for apps and devices

#85

Post by roblabla »

tpmoney wrote: post #71
ChocolateGod wrote: post #3

As cool how unified the Apple ecosystem is, I do think the EU is right that it's extremely unfair for Apple to give its own smartwatches access to the phone that other smartwatches have zero chance of getting access to.

I feel like it would be easier to believe that Apple locking down access to things is the problem if anything at all comparable to their experiences existed outside. Yet whenever this discussion comes up, the answer to “why not just use Android’s ecosystem” largely seems to be that no such similar experience exists for Android. But why would that be the case if this was about Apple locking stuff down? Surely if a lac…

> Surely if a lack of open phone OS and feature access was the problem, we’d see a rich ecosystem of integrations that exist on Android devices that are just impossible to achieve on iOS right?

It's entirely possible on Android? Pebble used to have decent integration with Android, from notifications/calls, to music controls, to sports tracking/health data. You could even get navigation integration! And that was a decade ago. That's what makes it so painful: the pebble android experience is really nice and integrates very well, while the iOS one is terrible due to the Apple lockdowns.

Re: EU sends Apple first DMA interoperability instructions for apps and devices

#86

Post by dividedbyzero »

ohgr wrote: post #51
ChocolateGod wrote: post #3

As cool how unified the Apple ecosystem is, I do think the EU is right that it's extremely unfair for Apple to give its own smartwatches access to the phone that other smartwatches have zero chance of getting access to.

I think it’ll be good for Apple. Everyone will go “yay” and buy another brand of crap smart watch, realise it’s total garbage and buy an Apple watch anyway.

I'd love to use a Garmin or a Suunto, but they aren't integrated very well on iOS and I like the convenience of my iPhone and Macbook too much to switch to an Android. I think there are a lot of people who're not very satisfied with Apple Watches for sports tracking or who'd just like something that lasts a week at least. There are quality options outside of Apple Watches if you don't need it to feel like a tiny iPhone. Most of the UX I need was available on a Chinese smartwatch almost ten years ago (though super buggy back then), the basics aren't that hard and seeing how a fair lot of iOS apps have dropped their WatchOS apps for lack of usage I don't seem to be so singular in that.

But I don't think it'll hurt the Apple Watch sales all that much either, they still work very well as a fashionable accessory.

Re: EU sends Apple first DMA interoperability instructions for apps and devices

#87

Post by mrtksn »

DaveMcMartin wrote: post #67
mrtksn wrote: post #56

EU is still surprisingly naive and open for business. After TikTok getting banned(postponed for now) in US for national security reasons, and after US cutting military support and intelligence in Ukraine I was expecting for things to start rolling by now. They already start doing things on the military side of things with restricting the military equipment purchases to EU only with exceptions granted on the basis tha…

I’m not enjoying this either. I get that it’s necessary for the EU, but I’m still in favor of free trade.

Me too but the USA decided to do something else. EU will be forced to follow suit, can’t be the only free market when everyone else is favoring their own companies.

Re: EU sends Apple first DMA interoperability instructions for apps and devices

#88

Post by rickdeckard »

milesrout wrote: post #41
radicalbyte wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was a time, long long ago, when the US had regulators with balls, they regulated Microsoft to stop them pulling this anti-competitive shit.

They famously did basically nothing to Microsoft and Microsoft continued to maintain a near monopoly for many years and do all the same things it had always done to keep its monopoly.

Some people apparently don't remember Windows 98 and how Microsoft tried to demonstrate that Internet Explorer is suddenly such an integral part of the OS that it's technically impossible to separate it.

It didn't work, they were forced to decouple it again (which was susprisingly simple), and despite the somewhat weak result for Win98 I think we can be thankful for that.

I don't want to imagine how Windows 2000 would have looked if they would have continued cementing IE6 into the frontend...

Re: EU sends Apple first DMA interoperability instructions for apps and devices

#89

Post by FeepingCreature »

xvokcarts wrote: post #79
FeepingCreature wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

EU buyer here, I am extremely hype for forced interop and think it almost justifies the existence of the EU on its own. Sure, most people don't care. That's the case for every regulation - policy is made by activists. Better than by corporations any day.

>EU buyer here, I am extremely hype for forced interop and think it almost justifies the existence of the EU on its own. That was my point. There is no "we". >That's the case for every regulation - policy is made by activists. Maybe, but when regulation made by activists starts touching the lives of people that don't care about the thing activists want, they may not like the idea of activists deciding for them. So fa…

> Maybe, but when regulation made by activists starts touching the lives of people that don't care about the thing activists want, they may not like the idea of activists deciding for them.

That's not just any regulation, that's any act of government.

> we don't know how most people will react if suddenly something they want is not available to them because of a minority that think their expertise is above their wants.

My best guess, tbh, is apathy. That's rather why they're not activists in the first place.

Re: EU sends Apple first DMA interoperability instructions for apps and devices

#90

Post by roblabla »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #80
ChocolateGod wrote: post #3

As cool how unified the Apple ecosystem is, I do think the EU is right that it's extremely unfair for Apple to give its own smartwatches access to the phone that other smartwatches have zero chance of getting access to.

I play an Apple apologist online (sometimes). Most here would agree that a public API is a liability regardless. Anything you can keep private (SPI) you should. Opening up an API that has all manner of hooks into your Apple device is going to be (obviously, I think) one of the most challenging of API to expose. While a 3rd party watch might needs these API, a whole lot of n'r-do-wells (looking at you, Meta) will like…

Apple has many, many tools to prevent this from being a problem. To name a few:

- They can lock the API behind entitlements that must be manually requested and reviewed by Apple

- They can lock the API behind a user approval

- They can regularly prompt the user if they still wish to share notification data with the watch (same way they do to keep giving an app localisation data)

- They could enforce that the notification is sent encrypted over bluetooth, without giving access to it to the app itself - forcing its handling to be done on-device - if they're so concerned about this.

It's also worth noting that this problem is a complete non-issue for Android, and nobody seems to believe it is an issue there...

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