271–280 of 408 posts
Epic says this is about protecting small developers... which, frankly, is BS. Epic charges $100 per game in their store, vs. Apple's $99/yr for access to the store, and the latest tools. This is pretty much a wash, unless you're not regularly releasing games. Epic charges 12% for their game store. For most developers, those earning less than $1M, Apple charges 15%. So again, pretty much a wash. Epic doesn't take a fe…
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>Apple must allow alternate payment modes without imposing a gatekeeper tax. And I want to put my product in Walmart for free while Walmart pays for the warehouse, staff, marketing, returns, and product inspection.
How is a phone that I pay for at all analagous to Walmart?
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No. They’re allowing alternate payment processing with a link from an an iOS app to a webpage, and reducing their commission to either 12 or 27% representing a 3% discount for not doing the payment processing themselves. They’re basically following the ruling based on some California law being applied nationally that the Supreme Court declined to hear on appeal. The judge said Apple would have to allow links out to a…
This is leading to awful, awful outcomes. If I owned a large payment registers company or similar type of capital that is hard to switch immediately, I'd be licking my predatory lips.
In fact increasing the switching cost either monetarily or in other ways (e.g., time sink) is a very common way of locking customers in.
That’s why cancellation fees are so common in many industries.
I think what’s missing here is sideloading. The new terms apple set are ridiculous, but it’s their App Store, so whatever. However, this iPhone is my device and I should be able to install whatever app I’d like on it. Without that freedom, Apple has no competition and can set their fees as high as they please.
Apple can’t legally stop you from doing whatever you want with your phone. However I don’t see any reason Apple should be compelled to help you in using it with your own software.
Apple collects the rent from the apps that exist withn their walled garden. Epic employs behavioural specialists tasked in making their games addictive and coerce user into spending with micro-transactions. I do not want to take a side in this fight.
>Epic employs behavioural specialists tasked in making their games addictive and coerce user into spending with micro-transactions. Epic also has their own game store that they will happily charge 30% once they have more marketshare. They also want to be able to put their own game store on iOS.
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Is 30% reasonable?
I think 30% is reasonable in a vacuum. But as a TLDR for a long winded rant: I don't care what a distributor takes as long as I have other options (even if it's economically inefficient. That just proves their rate is the best option) . And IOS gave none until this crumb of an olive branch popped up. But what's happening is that this 30% is more or less a lock-in cost for the only official way to do business on IOS.…
> this 30% is more or less a lock-in cost for the only official way to do business on IOS
As an app developer you're pretty much "screwed" TBH. You don't have a choice as to what platform your users choose (as long as you want to be in the market). Let's say Apple allows sideloading, but it is somewhat tedious and most users choose to stick to the official App Store -- then you're back to where you were, because you still want to sell your app/services to the users who stick to the official app store, and presumably your app is not so essential that users will actively switch if you dropped support for the official App Store.
If as an app developer you could influence the platform your users choose, then you would have asked them to move to Android and directly download your APK already, instead of bickering with the App Store (or even Google play store). The fact that you aren't proves that you're still at mercy to your users decisions, and whether they decide installing your app via sideloading is worth the trouble.
I'm not trying to denigrate you, but I suspect you might have unrealistically rosy expectations of the world where Apple is forced to allow sideloading.
Epic says this is about protecting small developers... which, frankly, is BS. Epic charges $100 per game in their store, vs. Apple's $99/yr for access to the store, and the latest tools. This is pretty much a wash, unless you're not regularly releasing games. Epic charges 12% for their game store. For most developers, those earning less than $1M, Apple charges 15%. So again, pretty much a wash. Epic doesn't take a fe…
Plus having to buy development hardware from Apple, which is a pretty significant cost for small developers.
> but one of the benefits Apple gives customers is that you don't give your payment details to everyone, decreasing the odds it gets mishandled.
If they think that's worth an extra 15%, they can compete for it on a level playing field.
> Does that make Apple evil? Epic would have you think so. But Epic also just needed to layoff a bunch of people, despite Fortnite being a money printing machine, despite their Engine royalties, and despite their own store's fees. Sure, Apple has cash to spare, but should we really be legally forcing Apple to adopt a business model that is failing Epic itself?
What kind of backwards logic is this? If company A is swimming in cash, and company B is running out of money, it's far more likely that company A is ripping off its customers than company B. Yes, we should be forcing Apple to compete for customers like everyone else has to. Given real competition the market will converge on a fair rate where a hardworking publisher/store maintainer can make a decent but not excessive profit, and we might see some better stores out of it as well.
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How is it not subject to market forces? That doesn't make sense. If Apple's platform doesn't work for their profit margins they are free to sell their software elsewhere, including a plethora of phones from a diverse set of manufacturers. But they don't want to do that because Apple's platform makes them a fuck load of money. They just want more of it. How about this: Apple can charge Epic the same outrageous* 12% th…
> How is it not subject to market forces? That doesn't make sense. 65% of domestic App Store revenue is on iOS, and the Apple app store is the only distribution channel. What market forces affect Apple's pricing power on commissions? > Can you provide a legal document or explicit law that states "vertical integration is illegal"? No, because like all things, it's about how you use it. Per the FTC - Exclusive dealing…
Raising the rev share they take makes the developers less incintivized to develop for the platform. Lowering the rev share makes developers more incentivized to develop for the platform. Apple is competing against other app platforms over developers of which there is a limited amount of.
So for Apple to lower the amount they take there would need to be another platform that is stealing developers from Apple's ecosystem. If developers stop developing apps for Apple's devices then that makes them less desirable for users so they would be incintivized to let developers keep a bigger portion of the revenue.
Epic says this is about protecting small developers... which, frankly, is BS. Epic charges $100 per game in their store, vs. Apple's $99/yr for access to the store, and the latest tools. This is pretty much a wash, unless you're not regularly releasing games. Epic charges 12% for their game store. For most developers, those earning less than $1M, Apple charges 15%. So again, pretty much a wash. Epic doesn't take a fe…
I have to build an Apple App Store app. Apple controls access to over half of US customers. Not just gamers. All customers of all types.