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Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

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Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#461

Post by zepto »

colinmhayes wrote: post #441
zepto wrote: post #377

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Epic is part of TenCent which is close to having a monopoly on games these days. But separately, the only reason to root for ‘the little guy’ is if the little guy is somehow hard done by. We dislike the fact that Apple makes some money by charging developers 30% for payment services, software delivery, and operating a storefront that users feel safe to buy from. We say 30% is too much to change for that, because the…

Why shouldn't you be able to sell toys to children? Fortnite clearly provides a lot of utility to a lot of people.

In game currency is not toys.

It’s a way to monetize addictive videogames without providing any additional value.

Do you think we should sell cigarettes to children? If not, why not?

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#462

Post by enos_feedler »

ROARosen wrote: post #426
enos_feedler wrote: post #418

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Solidly? Not really. Still believe the Epic and Apple fight is all about Tim Sweeney being a greedy business man. Zero proof this 15% reduction has anything to do with pressure from that legal battle. Apple has made rev share changes in the past unprovoked (like 15% for sustained subs). How long do you think this change was in the works for? If this change was a response that’s great. But I would bet in that case App…

> Apple just showed they cared about them in a single change. Apple just showed they care about their image. If they really cared about small devs, they can allow third-party app stores or platforms like Epic's, which would really help developers by bringing down processing costs.

I agree that the concept of a store within a store should exist for Epic and for users. I think “processing costs” is not really the issue. Apple’s revenue sharing business agreements just happen to be collected at processing time. They could easily invoice later. The core issue is: how much should Epic pay to have their own store on the iPhone?

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#463

Post by colinmhayes »

zepto wrote: post #461
colinmhayes wrote: post #441

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why shouldn't you be able to sell toys to children? Fortnite clearly provides a lot of utility to a lot of people.

In game currency is not toys. It’s a way to monetize addictive videogames without providing any additional value. Do you think we should sell cigarettes to children? If not, why not?

Fortnite is absolutely a toy. It's no different than buying different outfits for your doll.

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#464

Post by enos_feedler »

whywhywhywhy wrote: post #432
enos_feedler wrote: post #418

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Solidly? Not really. Still believe the Epic and Apple fight is all about Tim Sweeney being a greedy business man. Zero proof this 15% reduction has anything to do with pressure from that legal battle. Apple has made rev share changes in the past unprovoked (like 15% for sustained subs). How long do you think this change was in the works for? If this change was a response that’s great. But I would bet in that case App…

>is all about Tim Sweeney being a greedy business man Tim Sweeney provides one of the most advanced game engine technologies in the world completely for free for all revenue under 1 million. After 1 million you pay 5% on revenue over that, if your game makes $1,200,000 you pay Tim Sweeney $10,000. If you make 2 games and both games equally make 600K you pay Sweeney nothing. It's definitely a business but not sure "gr…

The greed comes from how he puts his users and shareholders in harm’s way in an effort to reduce his bill with Apple.

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#465

Post by RonanTheGrey »

zaroth wrote: post #456
ethbr0 wrote: post #404

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would be the hypothetical characteristics of an anti-competitive app store market, to you? I.e. what would you look at and say "That's anti-competitive"?

There's almost a infinite number of things they could do that would be illegal that you might also call 'anti-competitive'. IMO, as long as there are viable competitors to Apple, and as long as Apple is not colluding with its competitors, Apple should be able to implement any lawful policy on its own device that it chooses. Apple can't violate its existing contracts with its customers or developers (e.g. threatening…

You haven't answered the question and I was interested in the answer too.

What would one or both of these stores need to do, to qualify as 'anti-competitive' to you?

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#466

Post by zepto »

whywhywhywhy wrote: post #432
enos_feedler wrote: post #418

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Solidly? Not really. Still believe the Epic and Apple fight is all about Tim Sweeney being a greedy business man. Zero proof this 15% reduction has anything to do with pressure from that legal battle. Apple has made rev share changes in the past unprovoked (like 15% for sustained subs). How long do you think this change was in the works for? If this change was a response that’s great. But I would bet in that case App…

>is all about Tim Sweeney being a greedy business man Tim Sweeney provides one of the most advanced game engine technologies in the world completely for free for all revenue under 1 million. After 1 million you pay 5% on revenue over that, if your game makes $1,200,000 you pay Tim Sweeney $10,000. If you make 2 games and both games equally make 600K you pay Sweeney nothing. It's definitely a business but not sure "gr…

Sweeney has a net worth north of 5 billion dollars.

Most of that comes from selling in-game currency to children.

He wants a higher cut.

Does that make him greedy?

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#467

Post by pja »

valuearb wrote: post #409
pja wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would actually be a substantive change that would genuinely change the App market dynamics. This ... is not that.

Spoken by someone who is clearly not an Apple App Store developer. If you were an App developer like myself, you'd realize what a huge change this was. First, most Apple devs don't care about alternate app stores. Those provide nearly zero additional revenues to devs on every platform they are available. Second, most Apple devs don't want the Apple App Store to lose it's primacy, they realize that it's hugely benefic…

Apple has bought off small App vendors in order to protect the 30% rake they take from the big sellers: That you’re happy with the change is not exactly surprising is it? Who wouldn’t be happy being told they’re getting a 21% revenue increase for nothing!

Meanwhile, Apple continues to use their dominant position to extract 30% of the revenue of the most profitable Apps, whilst people like you go out to bat for them. Must be great to be in Apple PR :)

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#468

Post by dan1234 »

ryanschneider wrote: post #407

I really wish they had just said that the tax is 15% on your first $1m in sales and 30% on all sales after each year. Correct me if I’m wrong, but with the current plan I can actually _lose_ money year over year around the $1m mark. For example if I make $1.01m in year one and then my sales tick up to $1.1m in year two my Apple tax is ~150k in year 1 but balloons to 330k in year 2, leading to a net loss in profits de…

Unity is a bit like this too, they force you to upgrade from Plus to Pro if your previous year's revenue exceeded $200k.

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#469

Post by andybak »

dan1234 wrote: post #452
andybak wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Fortnite was also banned by Google. I think the main reason this wasn't as newsworthy is that sideloading it was trivial for Android users. Untick a warning and install it yourself.

Obviously not that trivial considering Epic added Fortnite back to the Playstore after seemingly giving up on getting people to side load it. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/apr/22/fortnite-...

It's not a contradiction to say both "sideloading makes banning from the the Play Store less of an issue" and "it's better to be on the Play Store".

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#470

Post by enos_feedler »

carlosdp wrote: post #442
whywhywhywhy wrote: post #432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>is all about Tim Sweeney being a greedy business man Tim Sweeney provides one of the most advanced game engine technologies in the world completely for free for all revenue under 1 million. After 1 million you pay 5% on revenue over that, if your game makes $1,200,000 you pay Tim Sweeney $10,000. If you make 2 games and both games equally make 600K you pay Sweeney nothing. It's definitely a business but not sure "gr…

The Unreal development fund also regularly funds competitor open source game engines, like Godot Engine. Tim Sweeney is definitely not someone I'd describe as "greedy."

Great. So if I kill someone on my walk to the public pool to save a drowning child I am not a murderer.
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