Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by horsawlarway 2197 days ago
Some people are going to quibble with you over the costs paid for developers licenses, but I think that's missing the real problem.

Apple is welcome to provide a platform for developers to distribute apps on, on that platform I believe they should be able to charge whatever they determine is reasonable.

Apple SHOULD NOT be allowed to have a legal monopoly on making that platform.

It's not really a fair price (doesn't matter what it is) if there's no alternatives because you've literally blocked them from competing.

This is the problem.
2 comments
jw1224 2197 days ago
> Some people are going to quibble with you over the costs paid for developers licenses

Yeah, I thought I'd phrased it clearly enough saying "effectively" nothing was given in return, but obviously not!

I see a new perspective in the rest of your comment. Thanks for sharing.

link
jmisavage 2197 days ago
My Smart TV doesn't let just anyone deploy apps on it, is that an unfair monopoly? I can always buy a different TV or in this a different phone.
link
horsawlarway 2197 days ago
The issue is rarely that such a tactic exists, the issue is when a single player (or a few very large players) dominates the market and uses that tactic to stifle other entrants.

In 2001 when MS was sued by the government for this exact issue, it was the combination of market dominance and tactics around vendor lock in that got them in trouble.

I think in this case it's pretty clear that Apple is abusing their market position in a similar way (as simply noted by how many of the comments in this thread are "App store is good because of huge distribution channel")

So yes, in theory you could switch from Apple to Android, but honestly, Android has exactly the same problem.

I'll add, I'm in no way absolving Google of the same practice. I think it's well past time the government took them both to task for the app stores.

---

Finally - Your tv comes with several ports on the back explicitly designed to let it play signals from other vendors (like your cable box, fire tv, apple tv, or any other)

So that's a trash comparison.

link