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Apple’s “monopsony” power, and the woman who named it

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Re: Apple’s “monopsony” power, and the woman who named it

#111

Post by swebs »

joefourier wrote: post #94
hkhanna wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They aren’t Facebook. Nobody has to buy an iPhone to keep in touch with all their friends who have iPhones. I have a different perspective. Many of my different friend groups use the "group messaging" feature on their phones. If everyone is using an iPhone in that group, it defaults to using iMessage. I switched to Android about 18 months ago, and it broke all of the group text message chains I had because some of…

I've only heard of this happening in the US and Canada. Outside of North America, everyone uses Whatsapp, which supports group messaging on every platform. I'd be curious to know why it hasn't penetrated into those countries.

I don't really know anyone that uses Whatsapp in Finland. Most of my friends use Telegram these days.

Re: Apple’s “monopsony” power, and the woman who named it

#112

Post by simonh »

pjc50 wrote: post #106
simonh wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just can't get my head around this argument. To write software for a computer platform, shock horror, you need to develop and test it on that platform. To develop software using Apple's OS, services and libraries, you need to buy that OS, those services and those libraries that Apple sells. I don't get why that is a contentious issue, or even a question.

You can do Android development for free on a Windows or even Linux machine and run the app in an emulator. Apple are in the process of squashing a third-party emulator.

Of course you can because Android is open source and has portable code. That's a great competitive advantage for Android. Cool.

There is no requirement on Apple to make their code open source or cross platform. It's their code and their choice what they do with it, and what features they pay their employees to develop for it.

Re: Apple’s “monopsony” power, and the woman who named it

#113

Post by ernesth »

Razengan wrote: post #44
stuaxo wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not arbitrary, the appstore is a de-facto monopsony, the ordinary user doesn't install apps from anywhere. Most Android phones come with an alternate appstore installed (e.g. Samsung come with their own one as well as google play) and you can easily install others. To install alternates on the iPhone you have to root it.

That applies to game consoles too, since the 1980s.

In the 80s, the game console makers did not operate the store where you were buying games. Even, you could buy second-hand games without Atari or Nintendo receiving any part of the fee!

Re: Apple’s “monopsony” power, and the woman who named it

#114

Post by simonh »

keawade wrote: post #91
simonh wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just can't get my head around this argument. To write software for a computer platform, shock horror, you need to develop and test it on that platform. To develop software using Apple's OS, services and libraries, you need to buy that OS, those services and those libraries that Apple sells. I don't get why that is a contentious issue, or even a question.

The platform in this case would be iOS, not Mac OS. But you can't work with iOS without a Mac OS machine which are particularly expensive. In comparison, Android allows a lot more flexibility of cost when picking a development machine by allowing you to develop from Linux, Windows, or Mac OS.

They're both Apple products running Apple code, which you are free to buy if you so wish.

Re: Apple’s “monopsony” power, and the woman who named it

#115

Post by asutekku »

swebs wrote: post #111
joefourier wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've only heard of this happening in the US and Canada. Outside of North America, everyone uses Whatsapp, which supports group messaging on every platform. I'd be curious to know why it hasn't penetrated into those countries.

I don't really know anyone that uses Whatsapp in Finland. Most of my friends use Telegram these days.

Literally everyone outside of tech bubble.

In the university i’m affiliated with and the companies i’ve worked with, only IT people use Telegram. Everyone else still defaults to whatsapp.

Re: Apple’s “monopsony” power, and the woman who named it

#116

Post by Aozi »

lilyball wrote: post #9

Something odd about this argument is the fact that 30% is pretty much an industry standard. Apple isn't jacking up the price.

The argument here is that if you want to produce an app for iOS you have to provide it through the App Store and thus succumb to the 30% fee. The same applies if you're using Apples payment processing, which you actually have to use if you want to offer any in-app purchases on iOS. In addition Apple is the sole authority on what is and is not allowed on their storefront. If they deem your app is not acceptable, you have no alternative ways to distribute it to users. They can also kick you out if they think it's necessary, again leaving you with no alternatives.

Google does the same thing with Play Store. If you sell an app in Play Store, Google takes 30%. If you use Goolges payment processing, Google takes 30%. They can kick you out, not permit you in the store, etc. The difference is that a developer isn't forced to use the play Store or Googles payment processing.

You can distribute your APK in any way you want to and users can install any APK from any location they want to. You can absolutely sell your Android games on your own website and just provide an APK to a paying user and now you don't have to pay 30% out of every purchase. If you want to provide in-app purchases the user can provide their CC information and you're free to process the payment in any way you want to, again, circumventing Goolges cut.

This is the primary reason you can't get Fortnite from the play store, instead you have to download an install an APK. Epic also uses their own payment processing systems, so they don't need to pay anything to Google for IAPs. They can't do that on their iOS apps, meaning they're losing on some hefty profits simply because no alternative exists.

So it's not that Apple is jacking up the profits, rather you could say that you need to pay a hefty tax to provide your app to iOS users.

Re: Apple’s “monopsony” power, and the woman who named it

#117

Post by ldoughty »

braythwayt wrote: post #67

Amusingly, there are two sets of people arguing about why Apple is bad, and each have their own argument: 1. Android sells more, and offers more variety of mobile and wearable devices than Apple. And here’s the data to prove it. 2. Apple is a monopoly/monopsony and should be forced to allow more user choice of apps, allow sideloading, lower their prices, lower their app store cut, &c. Which one is is? Apple is like T…

Kinda miss the point of the article, which focused on monopsony -- sole buyer.

If your want to sell on the east coast (Apple), you need to put your product in wooden boxes no larger than X and documentation must be written in French, and you must have 10 employees that speak French.

If you want to sell to the West coast, you put your product in plastic bags, and everything is in Spanish, and your employees need to speak Spanish.

Yes, you have two competitors, but reach had a unique customer pool, and each had the sole power to let you access them. You must build your product and hope they purchase it (and keep it around), otherwise your business doesn't exist... You can't sell your product to anyone!

You have no negotiation power, if you're not promoted in store you can't leverage your power as a seller (they have all power, as long as they do not violate any actual law)

Re: Apple’s “monopsony” power, and the woman who named it

#118

Post by julianozen »

braythwayt wrote: post #67

Amusingly, there are two sets of people arguing about why Apple is bad, and each have their own argument: 1. Android sells more, and offers more variety of mobile and wearable devices than Apple. And here’s the data to prove it. 2. Apple is a monopoly/monopsony and should be forced to allow more user choice of apps, allow sideloading, lower their prices, lower their app store cut, &c. Which one is is? Apple is like T…

While this is certainly true, computers and especially mobile ones need to allow consumers to run whatever software they want period. While in the US, it becomes a small inconvenience for us that companies like Netflix and Spotify are having their business sidelined by apple, Apples lock on phones becomes a human rights issue in places like Hong Kong, Russia and Saudi Arabia when Apple complies with local regulation. While consumers with money have the choice to leave iPhone and go with Android, we as a society need to push back on the idea that you as a consumer don’t have the final say of what software can and cannot be run on a device you own.

Plus long term, the technology industry would be healthier to push back against Big Tech keeping an iron grip on these platforms. In the last year that Apple has turned every default app on its phone into a $10 a month optional premium service. This marginal increase in service revenue will starve the news industry, compete unfairly against Netflix and HBO, eviscerate the remaining paid mobile game industry, and scare any fintech start up / vc playing anywhere near apples potential roadmap. And Apple isn’t even doing that good of a job at these new services - they just have the luxury of making the iPhone which is so good that it makes up for them doing everything else mediocrely

Re: Apple’s “monopsony” power, and the woman who named it

#119

Post by [deleted] »

braythwayt wrote: post #67

Amusingly, there are two sets of people arguing about why Apple is bad, and each have their own argument: 1. Android sells more, and offers more variety of mobile and wearable devices than Apple. And here’s the data to prove it. 2. Apple is a monopoly/monopsony and should be forced to allow more user choice of apps, allow sideloading, lower their prices, lower their app store cut, &c. Which one is is? Apple is like T…

[deleted]

Re: Apple’s “monopsony” power, and the woman who named it

#120

Post by BlueTemplar »

friendlybus wrote: post #72
BlueTemplar wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The non-standard features like Steam multiplayer and mods Workshop that lock out non-Steam users pretty much forever are IMHO even worse than the 1-year exclusivity (as long as it's not retroactive).

Steam multiplayer? You mean the friends list? Steam doesn't provide hosted mp servers for games. Mods are made by community members that can be released anywhere. Workshop is just a distribution channel. Battle.net and origin are lock in services. Nothing about them is open to the public or accessible. Steam is pretty open and reasonably successful at it.

Mods can be released anywhere, but in practice, usually aren't ! Steam might not provide hosted MP servers for non-Valve games (are you sure it doesn't ?), but we've even seen older games having Internet multiplayer removed to the exclusivity of Steam's own "VPN" : Dawn of War 1, Civilization 4 (for which they also managed to break most mods for no seemingly valid reason)...
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