Apple to kill Epic’s accounts on Friday the 28th • Hacker News Board

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

#381

Post by gpm » Mon, Aug 17, 2020, 9:36 PM UTC

Despegar wrote: post #211

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…

>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.

> Epic could have sued Apple without the theatrics and they'd have been fine.

Without the "theatrics" epic would not have had standing to sue and the case would have been dismissed.

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

#382

Post by hapless » Mon, Aug 17, 2020, 9:37 PM UTC

yholio wrote: post #371

JohnTHaller wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Windows world, you can just pick a new certificate vendor. In Apple world, they have a monopoly and get to dictate who gets 'full access' to both their mobile devices and their desktops/laptops. They could still do unsigned MacOS apps from here out, but Apple has purposely made it difficult for end users to run them.

Lock-in was their business model back in the 80s, it still is to this day. It got them to the verge of bankruptcy then, it will be their downfall now.

One may hope, but I doubt it.

They make a majority of the money in mobile.

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

#383

Post by tpmx » Mon, Aug 17, 2020, 9:37 PM UTC

TheCoelacanth wrote: post #334

tpmx wrote: post #313

"Epic flagrantly disobeyed Apple's terms." I keep reading this all over the Internet and it makes me so irrationally angry that so many people are so ignorant. Seriously, it seems like a very large part of people online think this behavior from Apple is okay "because they set the rules".

A large part of the population are bootlickers who want nothing more than for a strong authority figure tell them how the world should work.

The same person then turns on a dime to protest Trump...

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

#384

Post by arcticbull » Mon, Aug 17, 2020, 9:37 PM UTC

baddox wrote: post #259

gridlockd wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

That's a very flimsy definition of the difference. Game consoles are generally much more powerful general-purpose PCs that can do everything an iPhone can do (except connecting to cell networks). They tend to be full multimedia consumption devices and can also manage other electronics in your home (lights, security cameras, etc.). Any supposed benefit iPhone owners would gain from being able to run unsigned code woul…

True, but your Tesla has a super-powerful general purpose computer in it that connects to cell networks, and is likely way more powerful. Nobody's going to argue a Tesla is a PC.

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

#385

Post by jrhurst » Mon, Aug 17, 2020, 9:38 PM UTC

pwinnski wrote: post #75

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.”

Some might see a difference between "a developer who went public about their frustrations with the App Store" and a developer who deliberately violated the policies and then filed a lawsuit and started an extensive PR campaign.

All that really will matter is how the government and courts see it. Those words will be used in court.

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

#386

Post by modeless » Mon, Aug 17, 2020, 9:38 PM UTC

pwinnski wrote: post #75

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.”

Some might see a difference between "a developer who went public about their frustrations with the App Store" and a developer who deliberately violated the policies and then filed a lawsuit and started an extensive PR campaign.

Epic needed to demonstrate that they and consumers were harmed in order to have standing to sue. If Apple's policies are illegal then Epic is not bound to follow them and retaliation is unjustified. It won't be known until it's decided in court. That's why Epic's motion should be granted to prevent retaliation until the court decides.

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

#387

Post by grishka » Mon, Aug 17, 2020, 9:39 PM UTC

enos_feedler wrote: post #338

grishka wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And so that's why I never liked nor trusted this whole idea of code signing with non-self-signed certificates, especially on desktop OSes. This notarization mechanism introduced a single point of failure: Apple. And now there is concrete evidence of how exactly this is bad. On a device I own, there should be no parties that are trusted more than myself. It's ridiculous I even have to write this.

I trust the device maker more than myself to keep my data safe and secure.

It's usually better to have a choice than to not have it. It's the same argumentation as with a headphone jack in phones.

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

#388

Post by bsder » Mon, Aug 17, 2020, 9:39 PM UTC

Joeri wrote: post #343

jerf wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The legal term you are looking for is "contract of adhesion": https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/adhesion_contract_%28contrac... However, a lot of the text around those contracts you'll find centers around a powerful entity like Apple adhering the contract to a nearly-powerless entity, like an individual consumer. I'm not up enough on the details of what case law has been created to know what happen to a contract of adh…

I hope Epic doesn’t have a strategy that hinges on a PR win forcing apple to back down, because (A) as this thread is showing there are still a lot of people on apple’s side and (B) apple is usually quite vengeful in these things and will not back down here until compelled by court or law. Just look at what happened to nvidia, for far minor offenses. They were blacklisted from apple’s platforms very thoroughly, and p…

Erm, people blame Nvidia because that one was Nvidia's fault?

Neither Apple nor the PCB manufacturers specified the failing solder balls that Nvidia used. Nvidia made and packaged those chips.

And then Nvidia failed to take responsibility when they failed because it was going to be so expensive.

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

#389

Post by baddox » Mon, Aug 17, 2020, 9:39 PM UTC

bryanlarsen wrote: post #330

baddox wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course. My point is that this doesn't seem to be related to any anticompetitive behavior on Apple's part. If Apple was using market power to force smartphone competitors out of the market to increase Apple's own market share, that would be one thing. But to accuse Apple of anticompetitive behavior because their small smartphone market share spends more money on apps than other smartphone owners does not seem reaso…

Epic is not suing Apple because Apple used nefarious means to achieve dominance. You, I and Epic would probably all agree they earned that dominance fair and square. But once you have dominance different rules apply.

That's fair enough. I'm actually pretty sympathetic to the subjective argument "Apple is really big and profitable now, and I don't like their App Store rules, so let's try to get them to change it." I find it less ridiculous than arguments that attempt to construct some supposedly objective principle like "iPhone are general-purpose devices and therefore they must allow running unsigned code."

Ideally, I'd prefer that this kind of back-and-forth between developers and Apple would happen strictly through negotiation, rather than invoking the court system, but I realize that not all markets are functioning well enough for this to be practical.

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

#390

Post by fermienrico » Mon, Aug 17, 2020, 9:39 PM UTC

rabidrat wrote: post #337

grishka wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And so that's why I never liked nor trusted this whole idea of code signing with non-self-signed certificates, especially on desktop OSes. This notarization mechanism introduced a single point of failure: Apple. And now there is concrete evidence of how exactly this is bad. On a device I own, there should be no parties that are trusted more than myself. It's ridiculous I even have to write this.

Richard Stallman founded the Free Software Foundation (FSF) for this very reason. You might think it's ridiculous but the fight for the right to modify the software running on devices you own has been raging for 35 years and is bigger than ever.

I am fine with this for most things except my phone.

I trust Apple more than any party in the world. Even the government. Fortnight devs, Epic, whatever are not even on the same radar. They'll sell your privacy in milliseconds if they can get 2.5 cents for it.

I would never ever own an open source phone. Not because the operating system is open source (probably good that it has eyes on it) but there is no way to control third-party apps. Even the os builds can get hacked and I cannot trust it. I have so much personal stuff on my phone on it that I cannot afford to entertain Richard Stallman and his righteousness.