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Apple has locked me out of my developer account

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Re: Apple has locked me out of my developer account

#451

Post by DagAgren »

akira2501 wrote: post #217
johndubchak wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I strongly support some government action to change the current state of affairs with regards to the App Store being the only way to get apps on iOS A very slippery slope that will not end well for anyone, i.e. Apple, end users, and developers included. This is something I wouldn't advocate for personally and I'm not an Apple fanboi. I don't particularly care for the closed ecosystem but it does create security adv…

> A very slippery slope that will not end well for anyone, An anti-trust case against an established monopoly is a slippery slope? I'm having trouble understanding the fear here. > I don't particularly care for the closed ecosystem but it does create security advantages Anyone can claim "security advantages" from their walled garden, there's nothing particular about their implementation that grants them any additiona…

> Anyone can claim "security advantages" from their walled garden, there's nothing particular about their implementation that grants them any additional security.

This is just not true. Apple does tons of stuff to keep users protected from third-party software distributed through their app store.

Sometimes those things are frustrating and get in the way of app developers, like me. But I see why they are doing them, and I see THAT they are doing them, and I am, in the end, happy they do. Because of that, the computing platform I use that I feel is the most secure is by far iOS. I can trust it far further than I can any desktop system on the market today.

Re: Apple has locked me out of my developer account

#452

Post by cmcd »

tomxor wrote: post #378
cmcd wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do not think you can say Apple has a monopoly over iOS as it is a product not a market. Would be equivalent to saying Tesla has a monopoly over Tesla infotainment software, ignoring that they are only a small part of the larger automobile market. Looking at the overall phone market Apple has around 50% share in the US but only 20% globally. This is not high enough to constitute a monopoly especially when there are…

> I do not think you can say Apple has a monopoly over iOS as it is a product not a market. Would be equivalent to saying Tesla has a monopoly over Tesla infotainment software That is an absurd comparison, Apple is one of a duopoly, there are only two mobile app marketplaces, thus, iOS is a market.

Tesla has a larger share of the electric car market in the US than Apple has of the mobile phone market. Claiming that Apple has a monopoly over the App Store is just as unreasonable as claiming Tesla has a monopoly over the Apps installed on their cars.

The App Store is a feature of iOS devices, if Apple decided they no longer wanted an App Store they could remove it entirely. It is not reasonable to require Hardware and Software vendors to support third party Applications to run on their systems. Vendors that do support this functionality sell it as a feature of their product, but this should not be a expectation.

Re: Apple has locked me out of my developer account

#453

Post by cmcd »

chipotle_coyote wrote: post #443
dmatech wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One might argue that forcing you to use their app store constitutes illegal tying. The iPhone could easily be made to run apps from competing stores (as is possible with Android). Don't think about competitors that do exist on other platforms (like Play Store), but instead think of competitors that were never allowed to exist on iOS.

It's not an implausible argument! It's already been successfully argued that "jailbreaking" is legal. I just don't know how easy the argument would be to make, and what the counterarguments would be; it's hard to think of any very good precedent for this. (Nintendo's old "lockout chips" are the closest I can think of, maybe?)

Jailbreaking is legal because you purchased the hardware and can use it as you please. This is very different from compelling companies to develop and support channels for installing third party software.

Re: Apple has locked me out of my developer account

#454

Post by saganus »

a1369209993 wrote: post #360
saganus wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the point is that there are other app stores in other platforms, so monopoly rules don't apply. Their app store is their monopoly, sure, but if you don't want to use Apple products you are not barred from using other cellphones and app stores. This is different than, e.g. saying that there is a monopoly with the electricity provider. If you don't want to use company A for that, you have absolutely no access t…

> the electricity provider I think the point is that there are other electricity providers in other areas, so monopoly rules don't apply. Their electric service is their monopoly, sure, but if you don't want to use company A electricity you are not barred from buying a house somewhere else, with a different electric service. This is different than, e.g. saying that there is a monopoly with the app store. If you don't…

For me at least, I think the effort and expense of buying a house and moving elsewhere is quite a bit higher than using another phone/app store.

However I do understand that for a lot of people, moving from Apple to Android (and vice versa) is not as easy or straightforward to do, and thus why perhaps the discussion should be about regulating those companies that hold so much power, as if they were a monopoly. That doesn't make them a monopoly by current definitions though.

Re: Apple has locked me out of my developer account

#455

Post by pdonis »

Reelin wrote: post #438
pdonis wrote: post #427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> in many cases they won't have had a choice In the sense that they either do what Apple says they can, or they don't get to play in Apple's sandbox, yes, of course. That's because Apple owns the sandbox and therefore gets to make the rules for everyone that plays in it. And everybody who wants to build Apple apps knows that going in. > there is functionality that you simply cannot provide without a native app. If yo…

> your argument is "Apple should allow other businesses to use their infrastructure, which they have spent many years and many billions of dollars building, however those other businesses want" No. My argument is that companies which choose to place themselves as sole gatekeepers of their devices, and which also have such significant market share, should be subject to some minimal regulation that includes neutrality,…

> companies which choose to place themselves as sole gatekeepers of their devices

Are being "sole gatekeepers" of devices they manufacture and sell. Why shouldn't they be?

> Rail companies (in the US and Europe), telecoms, electric, gas, and other utilities all immediately come to mind.

All of whom have government granted monopolies, so they do not "own" the things they manage the way Apple owns its infrastructure. And of course the same applies to ISPs, as I have pointed out multiple times now. You are completely ignoring this crucial fact.

Re: Apple has locked me out of my developer account

#456

Post by pdonis »

Reelin wrote: post #444
pdonis wrote: post #430

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Any company possessing such unilateral control over effectively unrelated segments of the market Um, what? How is "mobile app developers" an unrelated segment of the market from "mobile phone manufacturers"? > is a completely unacceptable situation and needs to be remedied by lawmakers. No, remedy by lawmakers is exactly what you do not want. Basically, the situation is that a bunch of businesses made bad business…

I think my position can be succinctly summarized as mobile devices having become essential infrastructure. Access to essential infrastructure ought to be neutral and any regulation surrounding it transparent, regardless of who manufactured it; that's all I'm really arguing here. My impression is that your position is one of preventing over regulation and preserving a free marketplace. I generally agree, but think tha…

> I think my position can be succinctly summarized as mobile devices having become essential infrastructure.

For mobile phone service and mobile internet access, I think this is a reasonable position (though not everyone would agree with it).

But that's not what we're talking about. We're talking about a specific infrastructure for distributing mobile apps, which Apple built and which they own. Apple does not prevent anyone from operating a mobile website and having customers connect to it. To argue that Apple's app store should be considered "essential infrastructure" is to argue that access to particular bells and whistles in mobile apps (whichever ones require a native app as opposed to a mobile website to function acceptably) is "essential infrastructure". I don't think that's a valid claim; it is much, much too strong.

> My impression is that your position is one of preventing over regulation and preserving a free marketplace.

My position is what I just said above: that the government should not be brought in to regulate something just because certain app developers aren't being allowed to distribute native apps through Apple's app store. That's not "essential infrastructure".

> I'm pointing out that, for example, Tesla's car app is expected by consumers to work with both Android and iOS.

And Apple is not going to ban Tesla's car app from its app store, because Tesla is a large enough company that Apple can't ignore them.

> It seems silly to me to suggest that if Apple terminated business with Tesla that Tesla should simply roll their own infrastructure and expect consumers to switch away from iOS.

Knowing Elon Musk, I think that's exactly what they would do. (Or, equivalently, they would figure out how to put whatever functionality they needed into a mobile website and build the infrastructure to make it work acceptably.) And I don't see why they couldn't, if they had to. But I also don't see that Apple would try it in the first place; see above.

> It doesn't follow that either of them should be permitted to arbitrarily regulate how I engage with a third party.

When Apple bans an app from the app store, as I've already said, they are not regulating a third party. They are terminating a business relationship between them and the app developer. An ISP does not have a business relationship with a website that they (hypothetically) decide to prevent their users from reaching.

Yes, Apple terminating a business relationship with an app developer affects that app developer's customers. But that's true of any business relationship. If your ISP decided to terminate your Internet service (say because you kept sending child porn in your emails), that would affect everyone who wants to connect with you over the Internet. But the ISP would not be terminating a business relationship with them; it would be terminating a business relationship with you.

You could argue that your ISP should not be allowed to terminate your Internet service because Internet service is now "essential infrastructure"; but, as I noted above, access to Apple's app store is not the same thing.

> They ought to be legally required to do business with you unless they can provide documented justification that includes evidence of serious abuse on your part.

I think having the government do this would do far more harm than good.

Re: Apple has locked me out of my developer account

#457

Post by chipotle_coyote »

cmcd wrote: post #453
chipotle_coyote wrote: post #443

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not an implausible argument! It's already been successfully argued that "jailbreaking" is legal. I just don't know how easy the argument would be to make, and what the counterarguments would be; it's hard to think of any very good precedent for this. (Nintendo's old "lockout chips" are the closest I can think of, maybe?)

Jailbreaking is legal because you purchased the hardware and can use it as you please. This is very different from compelling companies to develop and support channels for installing third party software.

Well, that's the other side of the argument, right? Apple has developed most or all of the technical underpinnings for this already, as demonstrated by the ability to do enterprise provisioning and install apps through TestFlight. It wouldn't require an amazing engineering feat for them to bring a version of Gatekeeper to iOS that let you install signed applications from anywhere, not just their app store -- the plumbing is basically already in place. The question is really whether there's a legal case for that.

While I've generally come down more on your side of that argument in the past, I'm not longer quite so sure; Apple's control over the iOS app ecosystem as things are now has no precedent in the history of computing I'm aware of, and I could certainly see a plausible case made that this control does ultimately harm consumers by making it effectively impossible to install non-Apple-sanctioned software on iOS devices. Both "if you didn't want to accept that you shouldn't have bought an iOS device" and "but you can technically jailbreak the device if you find a way Apple hasn't cut off yet" are plausible defenses, too, but neither one seems to me like a legal slam-dunk.

Re: Apple has locked me out of my developer account

#458

Post by root_axis »

DaiPlusPlus wrote: post #397
root_axis wrote: post #367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nintendo is in complete control of the programs you can install on your Switch. Sony is in complete control of the programs you can install on your PS4. Using your logic every platform is a monopoly.

It can be argued having a smartphone today is essential to participating in modern life in this country right now - having a games console is not.

So what? There are many alternative smartphones besides an iPhone.

Re: Apple has locked me out of my developer account

#459

Post by tripzilch »

scarface74 wrote: post #362
bsder wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is not strictly true even in the law. However, if we define the "market" as "places that you can legally purchase and install iOS device apps from", the App Store is close to 95%+ of the market share.

So can you give any examples in the US or the EU where such a definition has ever been used? In that case are all of the console makers “monopolies” since they have to approve both digital and physical media distributed on their platform? Does Apple also have a “monopoly” in the smart speaker market since they control what runs on the HomePod even though they are a distance third to Amazon and Google? What about the…

In the EU the rules against anti-competitive behaviour are based on market dominance. Remember that term. That is how Google got fined even if they don't have a strict monopoly.

Even though it's technically incorrect to refer to these situations as "monopoly", that still happens in conversation.

But if you then correct someone for not using the strict meaning of monopoly properly, then really you're just showing that you are unaware of the regulations around anti-competitive behaviour. The actual rules don't mention "monopoly", they are centred all around market dominance.

It should be pretty clear what people mean in this context when they say "monopoly" and it doesn't really help to take that word literally, since all the actual regulations are about market dominance.

Re: Apple has locked me out of my developer account

#460

Post by tripzilch »

scarface74 wrote: post #406
bsder wrote: post #391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In that case are all of the console makers “monopolies” since they have to approve both digital and physical media distributed on their platform? Personally, I would say that they are monopolies. And people are starting to think about them that way because so many games now have an "always online" component. The problem is that even if I own a game disk, that game that I paid money for is suddenly worthless when So…

The laws weren't "changed" to make those monopolies. They were monopolies by the original definition of the law. And whether you "personally" think they are monopolies. They are in no sense of the word "monopolies" by any definition that has been used by the US or EU.

You really have no idea about the actual regulations do you?

You're just arguing against a strict definition of the word "monopoly, which is utterly besides the point.

Again, the regulations in the EU speak of the term "market dominance", in order to decide whether a case is anti-competitive or not. They do not (as far as I'm aware) mention the word "monopoly", except perhaps in a figurative sense.

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