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Apple to kill Epic’s accounts on Friday the 28th

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Re: Apple to kill Epic’s accounts on Friday the 28th

#211

Post by Despegar »

ArchOversight wrote: post #103
0x402DF854 wrote: post #23

From a preliminary statement of Epic's motion: > Just over two weeks ago, Apple’s CEO Tim Cook was asked during a Congressional hearing whether Apple has “ever retaliated against or disadvantaged a developer who went public about their frustrations with the App Store”. Mr. Cook testified, “We do not retaliate or bully people. It’s strongly against our company culture.”

This isn't retaliation though for Epic going on Twitter and being angry about the App Store practices, or the situation like Hey where the was a lot of press and negativity. Epic breached the terms of the agreement for their app, so their app was removed from the App Store. Other than needing to fix their app to no longer be in violation of the guidelines, they could have cured that breach of the contract. Instead Ep…

>Instead Epic decided to sue Apple in court.

This gives the impression that suing them is what led to Apple terminating their relationship, but that isn't the case. Epic could have sued Apple without the theatrics and they'd have been fine. They didn't even need to violate the terms of the developer agreement to bring their antitrust lawsuit, which is largely about the developer agreement.

Re: Apple to kill Epic’s accounts on Friday the 28th

#212

Post by danudey »

woofie11 wrote: post #156
ArchOversight wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't retaliation though for Epic going on Twitter and being angry about the App Store practices, or the situation like Hey where the was a lot of press and negativity. Epic breached the terms of the agreement for their app, so their app was removed from the App Store. Other than needing to fix their app to no longer be in violation of the guidelines, they could have cured that breach of the contract. Instead Ep…

A one-sided agreement containing a retaliation clause, followed by exercising that clause, is retaliation. Say you're desperate and need water in a crisis, and I offer you some, but only if you sign an agreement which gives you water, but says I can punch you in the face whenever you say something I don't like. Say you say something I don't like, and I punch you in the face. Did I just retaliate? Or did the contract…

Apple said "Here are the terms, you can use our services if you agree to them, and if you break them we'll close your account."

Epic said "Okay, we agree.", then broke the terms they agreed to, so Apple is closing their account.

This seems like pretty straightforward break of the terms of use to me.

The reasonable way Epic could have proceeded is to have submitted an update with the "third party store" stuff added, gotten it rejected, and then rolled it back while suing Apple.

Instead, Epic pulled a publicity stunt by sneaking it in, specifically so that Apple and Google would remove their app, and then suing, in an attempt to make themselves look like the good guy (which, depending on your perspective, might be true).

It doesn't feel any more mature than goading someone into throwing a punch at you so you can claim to be "defending yourself" when really you were just being a douche and you got what you asked for.

Re: Apple to kill Epic’s accounts on Friday the 28th

#213

Post by paxys »

Jonnax wrote: post #62

I don't understand the comparisons to game consoles. You buy an Xbox or a playstation, and it's a game playing machine. It just plays video games. You buy a mobile phone. And it's a general computing device. It's very much arguable that it's necessary for modern life.

> It's very much arguable that it's necessary for modern life.

Not even arguable. You need a smartphone running iOS or Android + a cellular plan to maintain an acceptable standard of life in America or most other countries today, and the costs of switching from one to the other in the middle of the cycle are prohibitive for most.

Re: Apple to kill Epic’s accounts on Friday the 28th

#214

Post by m-p-3 »

TylerE wrote: post #28
chrisacky wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course they should. But, market dominance means agreement to such terms are not 'fair'.

Yes, total market dominance with 10% market share.

You don't need a monopoly to be struck with an antitrust lawsuit.

Re: Apple to kill Epic’s accounts on Friday the 28th

#215

Post by danudey »

mantap wrote: post #68
TylerE wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Companies shouldn't be allowed to fire customers that blatantly break rules the customer agreed to?

Usually when you fire a customer they can go to one of your competitors. This just proves Epic's argument. There is no competing App Store on iOS because it's not allowed. If Apple "fires" you then your users can no longer install the app onto their own phones. Imagine if Microsoft "fired" Adobe and as a result nobody could install Photoshop on Windows anymore.

If Epic thinks that Apple's and Google's store conditions are onerous, just wait until they find out what it's like to ship a game on PS4 or XBox.

Re: Apple to kill Epic’s accounts on Friday the 28th

#216

Post by gridlockd »

baddox wrote: post #191
woofie11 wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Antitrust doesn't require a monopoly.

Okay, then since we've failed to argue that Apple is a monopoly, what's the next antitrust argument, and how does it apple to iPhones but not to game consoles (which have the same if not stricter restrictions to third-party software developers)?

Game consoles are toys, smartphones are an integral part of people's lives and livelihoods.

Re: Apple to kill Epic’s accounts on Friday the 28th

#217

Post by klmadfejno »

wwadvisory wrote: post #67
muska3 wrote: post #36

Is it bad that I hope they do kill Epic's account? Epic launches a preconceived plan with media attacks and the most ridiculous 1984 reference that actually doesn't make sense in the current context against Apple. If I'm Apple, even if this is a straight up attack on me, I just follow the rules in my TOS and block them like I do others who don't follow the TOS. If you don't like the TOS, fine you don't have to be on…

>the most ridiculous 1984 reference To be fair, it's a reference to Apple's own ad: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtvjbmoDx-I

That ad is incredibly dumb and incredibly awesome.

Re: Apple to kill Epic’s accounts on Friday the 28th

#218

Post by m-p-3 »

PeterStuer wrote: post #197
Bud wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the contrary, there is a very solid basis. Epic has access to Apple's platform and dev tools because it has (or had) an agreement with Apple whereby it paid a percentage of profits earned in exchange for said access. Epic, btw, has the exact same kind of agreement with Sony, Microsoft, and Google, for access to their gaming platforms. All three of those companies are extracting the same 30% fee that Apple is. But…

Isn't that extremely coincidental that they all just stumbled upon that same 30%? I'm sure there is no collusion whatsoever.

It's the status quo, the first one to make it lower will force everyone to go lower, and none of them want that.

There is no incentive to stay competitive by cutting down on your slice of the pie.

Re: Apple to kill Epic’s accounts on Friday the 28th

#219

Post by gowld »

woofie11 wrote: post #156
ArchOversight wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't retaliation though for Epic going on Twitter and being angry about the App Store practices, or the situation like Hey where the was a lot of press and negativity. Epic breached the terms of the agreement for their app, so their app was removed from the App Store. Other than needing to fix their app to no longer be in violation of the guidelines, they could have cured that breach of the contract. Instead Ep…

A one-sided agreement containing a retaliation clause, followed by exercising that clause, is retaliation. Say you're desperate and need water in a crisis, and I offer you some, but only if you sign an agreement which gives you water, but says I can punch you in the face whenever you say something I don't like. Say you say something I don't like, and I punch you in the face. Did I just retaliate? Or did the contract…

Clearly not retailation. It may be an unconscionable contract, but it's not retaliation.

Re: Apple to kill Epic’s accounts on Friday the 28th

#220

Post by dwild »

baddox wrote: post #199
josephcsible wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a misleading question, because on other platforms you can choose to avoid the store. A better question would be "what's the lowest cut you need to give up to distribute to users of these other platforms?". And the answer to that is zero on basically all of them except iOS.

> That's a misleading question, because on other platforms you can choose to avoid the store. That's definitely not true. You cannot run unsigned code on most video game consoles. And for PC game marketplaces, those platforms still have market power. Surely there's a big difference between being banned from Steam and being banned from the Discord Store.

> That's definitely not true. You cannot run unsigned code on most video game consoles.

And I'm pretty sure many people would be quite against this practice and believe this is an harmful monopolistic practice. The thing is though, no one had the balls and/or the cash to defends this like Epic does right now against Apple.

Let's hope this will bring a more open future on video game consoles too.

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