Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Apple's bad faith 27% tax on web purchases

twitter.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

331–340 of 408 posts

Re: Apple's bad faith 27% tax on web purchases

#331

Post by robertlagrant »

MerManMaid wrote: post #308
tomrod wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I appreciate the time you put into your thought. Fundamentally, I disagree with the assertion that because a minor consumer purchase goes south and charges an unarguably illegal processing fee (for interchange) now deemed legal for hardware providers that the usual moral justification for this, consumer welfare, is harmed as the BATNA is simple - get a different maker's phone. Varying qualities of substitutes are eas…

I also appreciate the discourse (: >Fundamentally, I disagree with the assertion that because a minor consumer purchase goes south and charges an unarguably illegal processing fee (for interchange) now deemed legal for hardware providers that the usual moral justification for this, consumer welfare, is harmed as the BATNA is simple - get a different maker's phone. Varying qualities of substitutes are easily attainabl…

> millions of people are negatively impacted by this to the benefit of a small few.

Can you justify this? These sorts of phones were unthinkable only 20 years ago, even for a billionaire and now they're extremely affordable. That is a net positive impact all of this seems to be at best a tiny dip in.

> a huge majority of those people likely aren't aware that they're being taken advantage of

Let's wait until they are aware, and let them choose. We shouldn't assume other people's choices and "act in their best interests".

> What Apple is doing here is exactly the behavior I believe governments ought to be trying to prevent.

We have endless periods of time where the setup wasn't conducive to the sort of innovation that's happened over the last 20 years in phones. Governments are indeed great at that. It's just hard to notice until you see a country with a government that is conducive to innovation, and then they start creating entirely new industries, and you wonder what happened.

Re: Apple's bad faith 27% tax on web purchases

#332

Post by AnthonyMouse »

robertlagrant wrote: post #329
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is obviously that the app developer should be able to host the app themselves, or have some other third party do it who charges lower fees, not that Apple should have to do it for free. "Use Apple's store or those customers can't buy your app" is forcing people to sell on Apple.

No it's not. If Apple didn't exist, people wouldn't suddenly be freer. Developing for Apple, and the job of "mobile developer" they invented, are both choices.

Everything is a choice. If a mugger has a knife on you, you can choose to let them stab you instead of giving them your money, but we still say they forced you to give them your money.

Because the choice has to be a reasonable alternative. Which in this context is an alternate provider of the product or service that reasonably allows you to reach the same set of your customers.

Re: Apple's bad faith 27% tax on web purchases

#333

Post by danbruc »

hnfong wrote: post #277
johnnyanmac wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.…

> I don't care what a distributor takes as long as I have other options > 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 th…

Let's say Apple allows sideloading, but it is somewhat tedious and most users choose to stick to the official App Store [...]

There is no reason that sideloading is tedious. If it is, then that is a deliberierte choice, going from no sideloading to no sideloading that anybody will care to use. Just as Microsoft was forced to suggest alternative browsers to users instead of simply bundling Windows with Internet Explorer and Edge, one could even imagine to force Apple to let the user pick an alternative app store during setup.

Re: Apple's bad faith 27% tax on web purchases

#334

Post by nodamage »

asadotzler wrote: post #139
robertlagrant wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They do have competition. Most phones aren't iPhones.

The relevant market is iOS app distribution, not smartphones.

No, US antitrust law does not allow a single company's product to be considered a relevant market unless very specific criteria are met. Epic attempted to make this very argument in court and failed. "iOS app distribution" is not a valid relevant market for antitrust purposes.

Re: Apple's bad faith 27% tax on web purchases

#335

Post by robertlagrant »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #332
robertlagrant wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No it's not. If Apple didn't exist, people wouldn't suddenly be freer. Developing for Apple, and the job of "mobile developer" they invented, are both choices.

Everything is a choice. If a mugger has a knife on you, you can choose to let them stab you instead of giving them your money, but we still say they forced you to give them your money. Because the choice has to be a reasonable alternative. Which in this context is an alternate provider of the product or service that reasonably allows you to reach the same set of your customers.

There's no point making bad analogies. Thinking mobile developers have the choice of "being stabbed or robbed" is not going to help us understand this economic situation better. Those instincts will definitely result in bad conclusions.

> an alternate provider of the product or service that reasonably allows you to reach the same set of your customers

If you target one company's customers, you can't complain about a lack of competition. If I only service BMWs, I need to do whatever certifications BMW say I need to do, and get a diagnostic tool that talks to BMWs. If I service cars in general, I don't. But then I won't make as big a profit from an easier to target set of potential customers.

Re: Apple's bad faith 27% tax on web purchases

#336

Post by AnthonyMouse »

robertlagrant wrote: post #335
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everything is a choice. If a mugger has a knife on you, you can choose to let them stab you instead of giving them your money, but we still say they forced you to give them your money. Because the choice has to be a reasonable alternative. Which in this context is an alternate provider of the product or service that reasonably allows you to reach the same set of your customers.

There's no point making bad analogies. Thinking mobile developers have the choice of "being stabbed or robbed" is not going to help us understand this economic situation better. Those instincts will definitely result in bad conclusions. > an alternate provider of the product or service that reasonably allows you to reach the same set of your customers If you target one company's customers, you can't complain about a…

> There's no point making bad analogies.

The point is that "you have a choice" doesn't mean anything when the choice is between something you don't want and some impractical alternative which is even less of a solution than the thing you don't want.

> If you target one company's customers, you can't complain about a lack of competition.

But you're not -- you're doing the opposite. You want to sell your app to everyone no matter what platform they use. Which doesn't allow you to choose between Apple and Google or use them as leverage to get a better deal from the other, because you need both.

> If I only service BMWs, I need to do whatever certifications BMW say I need to do, and get a diagnostic tool that talks to BMWs.

If you want to make and sell brake pads for BMWs, you can just do it. You don't need BMW's permission, and shouldn't, and if they try to stop you, you have the right to complain about it.

> If I service cars in general, I don't.

How are you supposed to do that? If BMW is allowed to get away with it then so will Volkswagen and no matter what kind of car you want to work on, you're still getting held up by whoever made it.

This is why Right to Repair is a thing, and it's weird that your analogy to something you think should happen is a thing widely regarded as deserving of scorn and opposition.

Re: Apple's bad faith 27% tax on web purchases

#337

Post by robertlagrant »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #336
robertlagrant wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no point making bad analogies. Thinking mobile developers have the choice of "being stabbed or robbed" is not going to help us understand this economic situation better. Those instincts will definitely result in bad conclusions. > an alternate provider of the product or service that reasonably allows you to reach the same set of your customers If you target one company's customers, you can't complain about a…

> There's no point making bad analogies. The point is that "you have a choice" doesn't mean anything when the choice is between something you don't want and some impractical alternative which is even less of a solution than the thing you don't want. > If you target one company's customers, you can't complain about a lack of competition. But you're not -- you're doing the opposite. You want to sell your app to everyon…

> How are you supposed to do that?

By doing the tasks that don't require as much specialism, across more vendors. You can target who you like on a spectrum of niche but expensive jobs to mass-market but cheaper jobs. I would only object to people choosing niche but expensive, and then complaining about the niche.

> This is why Right to Repair is a thing, and it's weird that your analogy to something you think should happen is a thing widely regarded as deserving of scorn and opposition

Scornful people have always existed, but that doesn't mean they should be especially listened to. We aren't talking about right to repair. Anyone can repair a BMW, but they need more training and tools to do the harder jobs.

Re: Apple's bad faith 27% tax on web purchases

#338

Post by Jyaif »

robertlagrant wrote: post #330
jmole wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Considering this case is in the USA, iPhones have a >53% market share and iPads >55%. But regardless of that, they have no competition in iOS app distribution. Keeping my fingers crossed that the EU will help solve that problem.

I doubt the EU has the mindset or ability to cultivate companies that are able to compete with Apple.

The companies that offer alternative (and likely cheaper) appstores could be american or asian for all the EU cares. The point is to allow competition.

Re: Apple's bad faith 27% tax on web purchases

#339

Post by Jyaif »

aurareturn wrote: post #176
johnnyanmac wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>that they will happily charge 30% once they have more marketshare. I don't know. They haven't done as much with UE or any other tools, outside of actually charging for non-games (I'm honestly surprised that the Mandelorian was able to be made with no kick back to Epic at all). Historically Epic has been relatively lenient for how it taxes developers. Say what you want about Sweeny and Fortnite and the Games Store, b…

They're developer friendly because they're trying to get marketshare. They're competing with market leader in Steam which charges 30%. Don't think for a second that they wouldn't charge 30% once they get enough market power. In fact, in the Apple lawsuit, it was revealed that the Epic Game Store was operating on a $300-$400m loss in order to acquire marketshare. Epic has to increase commission fees in order to break…

> Epic has to increase commission fees in order to break even and make a profit eventually.

That's not true. I'd say it's virtually impossible to lose money if you are charging 10% of the price of games.

Their store is losing money because they are giving out a ton of free games, in the hope of attracting clients.

Re: Apple's bad faith 27% tax on web purchases

#340

Post by incrudible »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #250
incrudible wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 30% goes back to retail markup, i.e. the what the seller who buys and physically stocks your game could expect to keep for gross profit. Of course digital store fronts do not have many of the costs associated with physical retail, but there is still value in them bringing the customer to you.

> Of course digital store fronts do not have many of the costs associated with physical retail, but there is still value in them bringing the customer to you. This is inherently in conflict with having a single store for everything, because the everything store would then have all of your competitors in it too. It also doesn't explain why you still have to pay when you do your own marketing through some other means a…

You have to pay because Apple asks for a commission in exchange for you being allowed to sell your product in their store.

I think what you're really asking is: Where's the value if I want to (or have to) do my own marketing anyway? The answer is trust. I'm more likely to trust you with my money, with you executing code on my device, if Apple allows you on their store. Even the big brands like Epic get this value, because who is judge that whatever "I look for" isn't being hijacked by some impersonator? Perhaps that trust is misplaced, but the effect is real, thus the value is there.

Apple considers this worth a 30% commission, and 100% of developers on the App store agree, or they wouldn't be on there. The question whether you couldn't get more value by doing it all yourself doesn't even ask itself, because there is no alternative. Whether that is anti-competitive in the legally prosecutable way is a very interesting question that we're all eager to hear answered by the courts.

Personally, I do find that a 30% (or 27%) commission on out-of-band purchases is outrageous and that phone platforms should be cracked open, but I can also see the argument from the other side, comparing e.g. to video game consoles or set top boxes.

Post reply on HN