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Apple sends a letter to Hey: Change your app or get out of the App Store

protocol.com

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Re: Apple sends a letter to Hey: Change your app or get out of the App Store

#81

Post by bartread »

simion314 wrote: post #37

Would it be more fair that - developers paid a hosting subscription for their app - pay for bandwidth used by the app downloads - pay for each update review - optional pay for promotion - Apple would not block legal content, just put it under a new category of stuff Apple disaproves but is legal. This would fix a part for the issues with stores, Apple can't say that they are hosting your app for free anymore or that…

You understand that this would kill free apps, and strongly disincentivize many startups and other small shops from developing for the app store? This, in turn, would devalue the entire iOS ecosystem and likely hurt Apple's revenue.

Re: Apple sends a letter to Hey: Change your app or get out of the App Store

#82

Post by simonh »

drchaim wrote: post #51

I'm probably missing something, but can't Hey just make subscriptions in their page and let the App from free in the App Store? Is the same as gmail, I can pay for a Google Suite, but the app is freely distributed in stores. Basecamp should have great products (I've never used them), but it seems they are using this as a marketing strategy.

>I'm probably missing something, but can't Hey just make subscriptions in their page and let the App from free in the App Store?

That is exactly what they are doing at the moment. Apple has decided to invent a new requirement that this approach is only valid for business applications, and consumer client apps must offer in-app signup and purchase.

I'm generally pro-Apple on these issues. It's their store running on their products on their infrastructure. However in this case I don't believe Hey is violating the current stated and published app store rules. Apple's decision in this case seems capricious and arbitrary, and more than a little hypocritical.

Re: Apple sends a letter to Hey: Change your app or get out of the App Store

#83

Post by qeternity »

fierarul wrote: post #13

Maybe the pandemic finally offers enough motivation for EU and US to make a strong decision about this. The (smart)phone market, for many people the only computing device they own, is utterly dominated by 2 monopolies under Apple and Google. The CEOs should get a medal and all the honours for providing society this good platforms then promptly forced to allow separate AppStores on equal footing.

> 2 monopolies

Uh...

Also, monopoly has a very specific definition. It does not mean "company with large marketshare".

Re: Apple sends a letter to Hey: Change your app or get out of the App Store

#84

Post by intothemild »

propelol wrote: post #8
wereHamster wrote: post #2

Would it be allowed under the App Store guidelines to offer IAP, but then give customers who purchase the service through the website 30% cashback? The price would be the same in both places, you'd be purchasing the exact same service. But a certain group of customers would get a 'loyalty bonus'…

Or do as Tinder, and charge 30% more in the app compared to their prices on tinder.com

You can do this.. but you cannot say "we charge you 30% more here, but if you signup over there, it's regular price"

Apple saying "it's giving the users more options" is total BS.. it's all about getting their 30%, because if you play by their rules, and give the customer more knowledge that you're being forced to charge extra because of this payment option.. then Oh noes.

A great example outside the app store is some credit cards charge much more than the others, so some stores charge you that on top. "You want to use X card, sorry but there's a surcharge for that card.. you could use something else.

Re: Apple sends a letter to Hey: Change your app or get out of the App Store

#85

Post by horsawlarway »

corobo wrote: post #19
officemonkey wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"We didn't get our cut" should only apply if they add value. What value does the App Store provide Hey?

Access to 20 billion unjailbroken iPhones

Yes, list more abuse as a reason to justify this particular abuse.

Re: Apple sends a letter to Hey: Change your app or get out of the App Store

#86

Post by hyko »

kstenerud wrote: post #30
hyko wrote: post #10

Apple’s position is clear and legal, and it’s how the economy works including the proposed hey.com business model . There’s no antitrust violation here, so pay your fees or go somewhere else. Apple don’t owe hey.com a place in the App store, just like hey.com doesn’t owe me a free email address @hey.com.

Bell didn't owe rival companies use of their phone lines, either... Until the 1974 antitrust lawsuit [1]. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._AT%26T

But this case is not relevant, because Apple faces robust and significant competition from Android smartphones (though I would argue perhaps not in wearables).

Re: Apple sends a letter to Hey: Change your app or get out of the App Store

#87

Post by merb »

helsinkiandrew wrote: post #25
villgax wrote: post #3

> We understand that Basecamp has developed a number of apps and many subsequent versions for the App Store for many years, and that the App Store has distributed millions of these apps to iOS users. These apps do not offer in-app purchase — and, consequently, have not contributed any revenue to the App Store over the last eight years. They literally have paid 8 years of Developer Program fees for supporting the AppS…

It's a different matter whether 30% is a valid cut for Apple to make on Hey In App subscriptions. But $2,400 (8*$300/year?) for the delivery and update, notifications and Siri integration etc to millions of apps/devices sounds a pretty good deal.

actually you can't use an enterprise license for the app store. https://developer.apple.com/programs/enterprise/ it clearly says that:

> Please learn about the Apple Developer Program first. The Apple Developer Program is the right option for most organizations that want to distribute proprietary, internal-use apps. It allows you to use Apple Business Manager, Ad Hoc distribution, or redemption codes to privately distribute custom apps to employees, and TestFlight to test beta versions of your apps.

> The Apple Developer Enterprise Program is only for specific use cases that cannot be addressed using these methods. Before applying for the Apple Developer Enterprise Program, learn more about the Apple Developer Program to see if it addresses your use case. If not, you can start your application.

so it's only 99 USD

Re: Apple sends a letter to Hey: Change your app or get out of the App Store

#88

Post by jojobas »

jw1224 wrote: post #60

Honestly, Apple's response is actually pretty reasonable, all things considered. Read the full letter — it was clear, fair, and professional — despite coming off the back of a lot of bad press. I see plenty of comments are focussing on this quote, re their Basecamp apps: > These apps do not offer in-app purchase — and, consequently, have not contributed any revenue to the App Store over the last eight years Apple hav…

At Apple's expense? Does it work on Windows without paying MS a penny at Microsoft's expense?

Re: Apple sends a letter to Hey: Change your app or get out of the App Store

#89

Post by boudin »

kristianc wrote: post #62
m463 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't that a little like comcast charging websites for access to their customers? What if I bought an iphone, I am ONLY allowed to install apple apps on it, and I want the basecamp app?

> Isn't that a little like comcast charging websites for access to their customers? Not exactly, as Comcast don’t provide the infrastructure to Basecamp to host and deliver the binary of its app. Basecamp can’t be said to be ‘freeloading’ on Comcast. Basecamp would come back and say ‘well, we pay our developer fees’ but developer fees don’t differentiate whether Apple has to maintain app updates for hundreds of downl…

I'm pretty sure that Apple doesn't host basecamp...

Re: Apple sends a letter to Hey: Change your app or get out of the App Store

#90

Post by JimDabell »

helsinkiandrew wrote: post #57
stephenr wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where do you get $300 from? The developer program is $99/year regardless of how many apps you have.

Enterprise account is $300 https://developer.apple.com/programs/enterprise/

The enterprise account is for people deploying enterprise apps internally. You can't use it for publishing apps to the App Store. Basecamp will be using the standard developer account, not the enterprise account.
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