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Apple vs the Law

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Re: Apple vs the Law

#151

Post by grishka »

itopaloglu83 wrote: post #142
grishka wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How and why is that somehow fundamentally different from someone gaining complete access to your computer, which allows you to run anything freely? Both are your personal devices that store your sensitive personal information.

That’s a very good and valid question but did they sell the device with the premise that anyone can run any app they want or only the apps Apple approved can run? We believe in the same thing, our devices should be free like speech. But the whole thing turned into a show because some rich software companies don’t want to pay Apple 30% while they have no problem with other platforms like gaming consoles.

Apple does market the iPhone as a general-purpose communication and computing device. Not an appliance like a game console. Most iPhone users don't know what making an app is like, how asinine the app store review process is, and what kinds of bonkers rules developers have to follow.

Apple initially did that to protect the ecosystem from malware and make sure all apps meet their quality standards. Also to make distribution easy for indie developers. All commendable goals. But as the iOS market share grew, this turned into a very convenient revenue source that they can't let go now.

Re: Apple vs the Law

#152

Post by Tainnor »

Y-bar wrote: post #122
FinnLobsien wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The EU has basically said that it's better to have a handful medium-sized companies in competition for customers than one or two mega-corps owning and dictating the market. And to resolve that they employ two things, one is the DMA/DSA and similar laws which mostly takes effect when your company reaches a certain large market penetration, the other is standardisations such as the Radio Equipment Directive (think "U…

> Then show me the handful of European, medium-sized companies competing for customers. Competing in category chemicals: BASF, Akzo Nobel, Lanxess, Air Liquide, and a bunch others Competing in category engineering: Siemens, Bosch, ABB, Alstom, ThyssenKrupp, Airbus and a bunch others Competing in category metals: Aurubis, Umicore, Norsk Hydro, Gruppo Riva, ThyssenKrupp, and a bunch others Competing in category pharma:…

These are all huge companies in my view.

In addition to them there are also countless small to medium sized companies that nobody's ever heard of, that don't experience hypergrowth but have slow and steady growth - especially in the B2B sector. I've worked at some such companies.

Re: Apple vs the Law

#153

Post by isodev »

FinnLobsien wrote: post #68
simonask wrote: post #46

As a European, I have to say I am generally impressed with the EU in these cases. I'm from a country that's rich and capable, but with a GDP a fraction of Apple's market cap. There is no chance that national laws and entities would be sufficient to protect my consumer rights from corporations this size. The EU is fundamentally a centre-right, liberalist, pro-business coalition, but what that means is that it is pro-c…

I would argue the opposite: It actually makes European businesses worth off by continuing to make its regulatory environment so complex only massive companies like big tech or Europe's legacy players have the resources to comply. Add to that feel-good green initiatives like a packaging initiative that might lower packaging waste from European companies, but more likely will just make European goods more expensive and…

> regulatory environment so complex only massive companies like big tech or Europe's legacy players have the resources to comply

This is a very inaccurate view. I’ve worked with multiple SMEs and no such “complexities” ever become operational challenges. Even as a indie developer, my compliance is a default provided I’m not trying to do something shady.

Looking into the EU regulations, in most cases what they want you to do (or not do) is common sense.

Re: Apple vs the Law

#154

Post by mentalgear »

" I called this article "Apple Vs The Law" primarily in reference to the rule of law, about how it should be applied equally and fairly against all, no matter the size and influence of your company. I think some of these gatekeepers - above all Apple, do a lot to undermine this process, in some places genuinely damaging trust in democracy. Going out of their way to paint the DMA law and the EU as overstepping and extreme hurts its reputation, as does the invented rhetoric about it being the "great risk to privacy ever imposed to government" (China?), or that they're "acting without experts in the field". Similarly for the number of covertly funded and supported lobbying groups that they bring to regulators all around the world."

Re: Apple vs the Law

#155

Post by twoodfin »

moontear wrote: post #111

I get the spirit of the DMA. I get the whole designation of gatekeepers and do agree Apple is a closed ecosystem. What I don't understand are the implementation details and I always hear "it is complex". Let's stick with earbuds or watches, where the argument (e.g. Garmin) is that they can't create functionally equal devices to AirPod / Apple Watch, because not all APIs are open. I understand this point, since yes, A…

You put your finger on it.

And Apple is responding by not shipping features into the EU that it believes it will be forced to “standardize” and document for others’ use, like iPhone mirroring to Mac.

Re: Apple vs the Law

#156

Post by Tainnor »

FinnLobsien wrote: post #108
zarzavat wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is the western European way though. It's supposed to be a nice place to live, not a nice place to do business. If that leads to Chaebolification of the economy then so be it. There are other parts of the world that specialise in deregulation at the expense of living standards.

True! And I generally empathize with this. The core point of the EU and its member states' governments should be to enable high quality of life. But that model you describe is cracking: Cost of living is going through the roof in Europe, taxes/social contributions going up every year, etc. The problem is that Europe is like an old, rich person who now lives off of the principal of their wealth. For a person that's fi…

> But that model you describe is cracking: Cost of living is going through the roof in Europe, taxes/social contributions going up every year, etc.

Cost of living is increasing in the US too (in large part due to geopolitical reasons), and social contributions are rising because of demographic factors. I'm not sure how market liberalism is magically going to fix that latter issue.

Re: Apple vs the Law

#157

Post by madeofpalk »

bzzzt wrote: post #104
jjcob wrote: post #57

I think at this point we should change the law so that Gatekeepers aren't just required to enable competition, but are somehow forced to actually support competition. I'm not sure how we could enforce that, but maybe the law could stipulate that a certain minimum percentage of users must use 3rd party app stores, or use web apps. They should pay a fine if less than say 5% of apps are distributed outside the app store…

First they have to enable competition, you're saying they have to support it but seemingly you want to enforce it. Where does it stop? Should Apple just pay out a part of their profits to their competitors? If a competitor wants market share they have to build a better service. Forcing users to go with a bad deal gets the incentives all wrong and is actually bad for consumer choice.

> If a competitor wants market share they have to build a better service.

Except when Apple ensures that it always comes out ahead when competing. It's not a level playing field.

Look at Apple Music vs Spotify - ignoring the self-preferencing iOS does to Appke Music, the App Store ensures that Spotify will always make less money than Apple Music. Spotify either has to hand over 30% to its competitor, raise its prices (and lose customers, while still paying its competitor), or just not offer in-app signups. Do you reckon Apple Music has to give away 30% of it's subscriptions?

It seems bonkers that the only option to have a competitive music streaming service is to make your own operating system or mobile phone. That's unhealthy.

Re: Apple vs the Law

#158

Post by Loic »

isodev wrote: post #153
FinnLobsien wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would argue the opposite: It actually makes European businesses worth off by continuing to make its regulatory environment so complex only massive companies like big tech or Europe's legacy players have the resources to comply. Add to that feel-good green initiatives like a packaging initiative that might lower packaging waste from European companies, but more likely will just make European goods more expensive and…

> regulatory environment so complex only massive companies like big tech or Europe's legacy players have the resources to comply This is a very inaccurate view. I’ve worked with multiple SMEs and no such “complexities” ever become operational challenges. Even as a indie developer, my compliance is a default provided I’m not trying to do something shady. Looking into the EU regulations, in most cases what they want yo…

Same experience, from startup to large multinational EU companies.

The biggest headaches/issues are normally local regulations (country specific or even more local). The EU directives are more frameworks with a lot of flexibility and well grounded on common sense + expertise. How the different countries implement them in their own laws (with their own historical laws) is a different story.

Re: Apple vs the Law

#159

Post by drexlspivey »

isodev wrote: post #153
FinnLobsien wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would argue the opposite: It actually makes European businesses worth off by continuing to make its regulatory environment so complex only massive companies like big tech or Europe's legacy players have the resources to comply. Add to that feel-good green initiatives like a packaging initiative that might lower packaging waste from European companies, but more likely will just make European goods more expensive and…

> regulatory environment so complex only massive companies like big tech or Europe's legacy players have the resources to comply This is a very inaccurate view. I’ve worked with multiple SMEs and no such “complexities” ever become operational challenges. Even as a indie developer, my compliance is a default provided I’m not trying to do something shady. Looking into the EU regulations, in most cases what they want yo…

This indie dev begs to differ https://x.com/levelsio/status/1833126426142179653

Re: Apple vs the Law

#160

Post by dan-robertson »

I’m a bit conflicted: when I used to care more about this freedom stuff say 10 years ago, I would have been more in favour of these regulations. Today I care less about that and more about security and I mostly think that Apple’s preferred approach is better for security than what the EU proposes. That said, I am not super happy about the rate of scams or junk in the App Store.

I think even for Americans who like the anti-gatekeeper regulations, you might worry about the precedent for the powers European governments get over these tech companies as the other thing they want is removing as much encryption as reasonably possible, which you may not want. Those changes seem quite unavoidable though so maybe it’s not worth thinking about them together.

The more damning thing IMO is the whole ‘America innovates Europe regulates’ trend. I think it seems pretty important that the EU (and U.K.) work out how to escape the anti-innovation troughs they have found themselves in. Or perhaps by 2050 the EU will largely be a tourist destination where citizens watch ads for the American tech companies to make profits to be highly taxed by the EU to fund subsidies for the German auto industry to sell cars to Americans and Chinese.

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