[tehbeard]

Banning the unreal dev account makes sense when you take it as setting/following precedent of removing access to the legal entity responsible for the breach of contract?

It also follows that Apple could claim that Epic used this unreal dev tooling to break the contract and thus the tooling is "illegal" and subsequently must bear the consequences as well.

I don't think there's anything overtly malicious to the unreal part save for usual corporate lawyering of go big and then back off rather than not reaching far enough and losing.

[reissbaker]

The Unreal account was a separate dev account held by a different legal entity: "Epic Games, Inc." (Fortnite) vs "Epic Games International, S.a.r.l." (Unreal). (Props to @scq who noticed this elsewhere in the discussion.)

It's somewhat unusual for corporate lawyering to go big like this against a well-funded opponent. Apple didn't actually have the legal standing to do it — as evidenced by the court issuing the emergency injunction so quickly — and now there's precedent on the books that this kind of threat won't be enforceable against others. Usually, sadly, corporate lawyering tactics are to go nuclear against someone who can't afford to fight you, and tread more carefully when someone can — lest the court take away your nuclear weapons when the big player lawyers back.