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Apple ordered to not block Epic’s Unreal Engine, Fortnite to stay off App Store

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Re: Apple ordered to not block Epic’s Unreal Engine, Fortnite to stay off App Store

#101

Post by summerlight »

dgellow wrote: post #35
IvanK_net wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Each app or game, which runs on iOS devices, should pay Apple 30% of their revenue. These are billions of dollars each year. The Fortnite game wanted to avoid this fee of 30% by making the game free to download, but the users could pay directly inside the game (the payment mechanism did not go through Apple). If more apps or games do that, Apple would lose a lot of money. Also, Apple App store is the only way to get…

You're talking about the reason Apple had to remove Fortnite following Epic Game's decision to add their own payment option. That doesn't explain why they reacted so aggressively towards Epic's Unreal Engine by threatening to block it.

I'm pretty sure that Apple wanted to send an obvious signal to its developers. After Spotify, apparently Apple has decided not to like this kind of antitrust challenges from third party developers, which might be harder than those from users. The simplest option would be threatening developers with retaliation, something like "If you piss me off, I'll make your life miserable". I don't have a gut to fight against such thing, and I guess the same thing may apply to more than 99.9% of other developers as well. This also happened to their internal employees (lawsuit against Gerard Williams III), so I'm not very surprised.

Re: Apple ordered to not block Epic’s Unreal Engine, Fortnite to stay off App Store

#102

Post by klmadfejno »

Hamuko wrote: post #92
cwhiz wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you talking about the Xbox, PS4, and Nintendo Switch? Oh, the iPhone? Yeah people don’t care. Having Apple vet apps is a benefit, not a curse.

Out of those examples, the only ones properly vetting apps are Sony and Microsoft. Nintendo and Apple are notorious for peddling shitty apps to consumers.

What "shitty app" can you download in the Nintendo Switch shop?

Re: Apple ordered to not block Epic’s Unreal Engine, Fortnite to stay off App Store

#103

Post by msh »

badsectoracula wrote: post #65
msh wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its a security nightmare.

Ah oh, the "security" power word has been brought up, time to turn off our brains and accept everything i guess :-(

No, seriously, how would you build a computer platform that everybody, even computer iliterate people can use and install programs without constantly ending up with malware, scams and other nasty stuff that steals their money or information?

The apple iOS model seems to be the most promising here. It comes with huge tradeoffs in user control but for a large part of the worlds population I think its the right choice.

Re: Apple ordered to not block Epic’s Unreal Engine, Fortnite to stay off App Store

#104

Post by Broken_Hippo »

skohan wrote: post #38
Broken_Hippo wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lack of realistic choice. If you are the average consumer looking to buy a smartphone, you have the choice of either Android or Apple. You get more choice with a PC, to an extent - the average consumer is going to get to choose between Microsoft, something like a chromebook, or apple. (Most folks buy mainstream, widely available products that work out of the box). I'm not sure the market for non-standard products is…

Windows, Apple and Chromebooks are all proprietary platforms. With PC you also have the choice to install Linux, which is the categorical difference. With smartphones there's not really an open choice available.

I specifically didn't mention Linux because Linux isn't a realistic choice for the average consumer, though. Realistic choices come commonly pre-installed and works with a range of things without much work for the end consumer. Most folks don't have the choice to install it due to lack of technical competence anyway. Even folks with the technical know-how often enough don't due to, well, ease of use issues.

(Yes, I know you can buy computers without an OS and you can buy computes with Linux as well - but not enough to be realistic for most folks. I'm pretty sure you can buy phones with a different OS as well but again, not realistic choices).

Re: Apple ordered to not block Epic’s Unreal Engine, Fortnite to stay off App Store

#105

Post by mantap »

dep_b wrote: post #77
daveoc64 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Epic needs access to Apple's developer tools and documentation to continue developing the Unreal Engine software and libraries for macOS and iOS. Without access to those things, it would be difficult for Epic to produce new versions of the Unreal Engine, and game developers wouldn't want to use it any more.

Yes but any developer can have his or her own account that gives access to every tool, only for pushing software to the store it's vital to have that one particular account for Epic. Epic will lose perks like direct access to performance tuning teams at Apple, but that's not something you can't do without. So "difficult" would mean that you need to improvise a bit, but they're still able to develop just like any deve…

Legally Epic would lose access to all Apple developer IP including iOS SDKs and Xcode. You have to click through an EULA to access this stuff. And you can bet that Apple would have sought a court order to enforce it, had they prevailed.

Re: Apple ordered to not block Epic’s Unreal Engine, Fortnite to stay off App Store

#106

Post by msh »

protomyth wrote: post #83
ericmay wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, you just look at the PC ecosystem and you can see the nightmare. Like others,I prefer Apple to have a tightly controlled App Store and believe that the benefits far outweigh the ability to install software from a 3rd party App Store. For example, Apple requiring Sign In with Apple (when signin with Google/Facebook are implemented) where you can hide your email address. That’s not possible with multiple app stor…

You don’t buy a Corolla and get mad that you can’t off road with it, do you? No, but I would get mad if the manufacturer told me what brand of gas I could buy and what roads I could drive on.

Depends on what advantages it gave me. If it was impossible for the car to get into a accident where I hurt myself or others I would certainly consider it.

Re: Apple ordered to not block Epic’s Unreal Engine, Fortnite to stay off App Store

#107

Post by sjwright »

Waterfall wrote: post #78
ericmay wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No I don’t want any of that. I want the iPhone as-is.

You understand why others find it strange you don't and why they do though, right?

I think it's strange that you don't want me to have the product I want to have. Nobody is forcing you to buy an Apple product, and there are plenty of stellar alternative products from numerous other brands.

Re: Apple ordered to not block Epic’s Unreal Engine, Fortnite to stay off App Store

#108

Post by klmadfejno »

ericmay wrote: post #85
protomyth wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don’t buy a Corolla and get mad that you can’t off road with it, do you? No, but I would get mad if the manufacturer told me what brand of gas I could buy and what roads I could drive on.

Then you’d buy a different car. I’m happy to use the specific gas and roads. I buy it knowing that I’m getting the benefits of that specific gas and road with the trade off that I can’t use whatever gas and roads I want.

Even in this contrived example, you're still allowed to exclusively use your specific gas and roads if the car manufacturer is forbidden from demanding you do so.

Re: Apple ordered to not block Epic’s Unreal Engine, Fortnite to stay off App Store

#109

Post by sjwright »

jug wrote: post #62
IvanK_net wrote: post #20

I still wonder why so many people buy devices, where the only software you could run has to be approved by the manufacturer. I think we should speak more about this fact, so that people think twice before they buy some device. I only make websites, but I am worried, that at some point, Apple would want me to pay them, so that my website is openable on their devices.

So the only realistic alternative is Android and that one is funded by an advertising company eager to sell your habits at every opportunity.

Is that Apple's fault?

Re: Apple ordered to not block Epic’s Unreal Engine, Fortnite to stay off App Store

#110

Post by skc »

IvanK_net wrote: post #20

I still wonder why so many people buy devices, where the only software you could run has to be approved by the manufacturer. I think we should speak more about this fact, so that people think twice before they buy some device. I only make websites, but I am worried, that at some point, Apple would want me to pay them, so that my website is openable on their devices.

Heh, I'm at this point waiting patiently for Apple to wage war on PWAs as they start to gain in popularity.
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