[shados]

> the Court doubts that an expert would suggest a zero percent alternative

It's unfortunate that the percentage cut ends up overshadowing the real antitrust issue, which is that Apple (and Google) essentially has the power to make or break any arbitrary business that relies on their platform. They base it on vague and loosely enforced rules, which means companies never know if tomorrow is the end. Having a locked platform in itself isn't an issue. Having an expensive locked platform isn't an issue either.

Having an oligopoly of locked platforms (that are important enough that companies can't ignore) with rules that can change or be selectively enforced and have the power to destroy your business model overnight, is a big problem.

Reducing the cut to 0% still wouldn't change that.

[Thorentis]

Nobody is forcing Epic to use Apple's platform though. It never used to be the case, that every device you own must be able to play every game you want. You can already play Fortnite on your PC. Apple cannot stop you from owning a PC, so Apple cannot stop you from playing Fortnite. Yes, Apple is a gatekeeper for its platform. But we've known this forever. Sony is a gatekeeper for the playstation, and Microsoft is a gatekeeper for the Xbox. If developers want the lowest friction possible when releasing games, use a platform where you can release your own store (which Epic already has).

[mrich]

At some point the platform has to be considered common infrastructure, similar to power transmission lines, the railroad or the Windows OS. Just because you happened to build a successful platform should not imply that you can hold everyone hostage - that is why antitrust is a thing.

[unknown2374]

There are open platforms, and due to convenience of distribution developers have reluctantly chosen these platforms over open ones. Now while I am not defending Apple's position here, developers who have chosen to distribute only on such platforms for the past few decades are partly to blame too.

The success of Apple (etc.) are due to choices that developers have made, closing themselves in and then citing anti-trust when they themselves locked the doors and gave away the keys.

[ece]

While this is even more true for consoles, the difference is in a specific purpose vs a general purpose.

General purpose platforms that become overly closed have roundly been rejected or been forced to open up: Carterfone, AOL, Windows, carrier locked phones, etc.. even iOS itself didn't allow apps at first and now does.

Closed platforms for a specific purpose like consoles, kindles, rokus, etc.. do a bit better because they are 1) more likely to have competitors, and 2) have more limited impact from being specific purpose platforms, though are still capable of maintaining monopolies/duopolies.

The phone market is a iOS/Android duopoly, and both are being forced to open up more. Hardly surprising.

[Thorentis]

Exactly. Developers loved the gravy train while it lasted. 30% cut for being put into the hands of millions of people instantly was pocket change in the 2010s. Now that the market is saturated and developers have tougher competition, they're turning on Apple. Take your money, smile that it happened, and go work on open platforms from now on.

[notSupplied]

What if the phone is in the hands of millions of people in the first place because it is full of apps? Didn’t the Mac cede it’s place in PC history because Windows had more software?

[Thorentis]

I am on board with the internet being common infrastructure, since you cannot own your own fibre cable that goes to the ISP (at least not easily and cheaply).

With hardware it is different. Nobody forced you to buy an iPhone. Nobody forced you to buy an Android, Windows, Nokia, whatever phone. Same with laptops. If you want an open platform, buy one. If you want an open OS, install one. Don't buy an iPhone, complain about the platform not being open enough for you, and then demand that all platforms be made common infrastructure so that you're absolved of making decisions about the hardware you use.

[stale2002]

Would you make the same claim about Internet Explorer?

Imagine if Microsoft required a 30 percent cut for any transaction that is done on a windows PC.

The same exact arguments you are using could justify this. But, obviously, this is illegal, and similar behavior was proven as such, by the courts.

[Thorentis]

Internet Explorer was already ubiquitous at that point. The iPhone was not ubiquitous when the App Store was released. The iPhone become so widely used because of the popularity of the App Store. The 30% cut was there from the very start, and people were fine with it. It's only now that people are turning around and complaining that a platform that was never open to begin with, is not open enough.

[stale2002]

> The iPhone was not ubiquitous when the App Store was released.

But it is ubiquitous now. As of last month, the iphone now has 52.4% of the US market.

> The 30% cut was there from the very start, and people were fine with it.

Anticompetitive behavior become illegal when a company has enough market power.

> It's only now that people are turning around and complaining

Well yes, that is how anti-competitive laws work. If a company has enough market power, previously legal practices can become illegal.

[nick_kline]

The ability to buy other hardware devices to avoid one company's control is not a real solution. Besides that, all the major vendors are trying to push you to buy things in their controlled gardens/app stores. Instead of buying more devices (practical maybe for rich computer programmers) how about we just prevent vendor purchase lock-in. I should be able to run or buy or sell to end-users whatever software I want on my devices.

[ALittleLight]

Why doesn't Windows take 30% whenever you try to play a game there?

I don't know about legality, but philosophically it's offensive to me that Apple and Google get to be landlords leeching off app developers. I paid for my phone. It should run the software I want it to, and if I want to buy an app for it I shouldn't need to pay Apple for the privilege.

[swinglock]

I'm sure they take a cut if you use the Microsoft Store.

You know why Windows runs code not from the Microsoft Store. It's legacy. There wasn't always a Microsoft Store, running executable straight from floppy, CD-ROM or the Internet was the norm. Changing it now would be changing the product people already bought and break workflows.

iPhone never had that legacy. From day 0 it only ran Apple code. Then it ran 3rd party code via the App Store. There was no such legacy. But there are older products with such a legacy. Didn't your old Nintendo have precisely the same rules from day 0 and so do modern consoles?

[shados]

iOS + Android is at least as big of a deal as Windows was back in the IE vs Netscape days. The bar for antitrust isn't "you literally cannot live without the thing".

Even if you make a case that for Epic it doesn't matter that much, the Hey mail case was another big one: if you try to make a new email service and ignore Apple/Google, you're dead on arrival. That's a problem.

[WWLink]

I wish there was a law saying something like "If you sell a machine that claims to do X, it does X, no exceptions."

This "We'll let you develop software for OUR X out of the goodness of our heart as long as you promise not to do Y and pay us Z" BS really gets under my skin.

lol I have a feeling everyone here will hate me for saying that though.

[himinlomax]

> It's unfortunate that the percentage cut ends up overshadowing the real antitrust issue

The merits of the antitrust part are not supposed to be handled in a TRO. Its purpose is to maintain the status quo and limit possibly irreparable damages while the complex issues are debated in court. Here the 30% cut is important because it's a matter of deciding what a reasonable number would be.

In the case most favorable to Epic, it could be reduced to a lower value after a lengthy court process, but it would not necessarily change the nature of the market / economy. In other antitrust cases, you could have situations where the continued infringement by a near monopolistic entity would indeed qualify for a restraining order as the final judgment would arrive after the smaller competitor would be long dead.

[panpanna]

> In the case most favorable to Epic, it could be reduced to a lower value

No.

The most favourable outcome would be allowing Epic and others who already have their own sales and payment channels to use them alongside the app store payment system.

I think that's the main reason this lawsuit exists. I don't think Epic or Spotify really want to creat their own iOS app store.

[the_lucifer]

Epic (Tim Sweeney) explicitly says that if not for App Store policies, they would launch an alternate App Store on iOS in the set of emails to Tim Cook that Apple submitted to the court:

> 2. A competing Epic Games Store app available through the iOS App Store and through direct installation that has equal access to underlying operating system features for software installation and update as the iOS App Store itself has, including the ability to install and update software as seamlessly as the iOS App Store experience. [1]

[1] https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/21807251/e..., Exhibit D, Page 2, Point 2.

[spott]

I mean the Microsoft Store charges 30% for games, Google play is 30%, Steam is 30%, I'm sure there are app stores I'm not thinking of that charge 30%.

It seems to be the industry standard App Store cut.

[naikrovek]

But the Microsoft Store isn't THE ONLY WAY to get games installed on Windows, and that's what's different.

It isn't the 30%! It's that there's only a single way into iOS. It's a literal monopoly, and they are large enough that this matters, now.

[romanoderoma]

As of march 2019

> The updated ADA includes the new Microsoft Store fee structure that delivers up to 95 percent of the revenue back to consumer app developers. To ensure you receive the full 95 percent revenue, be sure to instrument your referring traffic URLs with a CID.

[shados]

Yeah, the cut is basically irrelevant. It's the power Apple/Google holds that's a problem.

[Zenbit_UX]

No, it's highly relevant.

Consider Spotify vs Apple music. If Spotify has to charge X + 30% to subscriber's on iPhone in order to make X then they absolutely can't compete on price if Apple simply charges X.

[imtringued]

You're just making things up. Apple has explicit exceptions for multi platform subscriptions. The only condition they require is that developers should not cripple the iOS app by removing the ability to create an account from within the app (which means your app essentially has to offer in app purchases as a valid way of obtaining a subscription).

If users want they can create an account on Mac (or even on iOS Safari) and set up a subscription with lower fees outside the app and then use it inside the app.

People can easily use the Netflix accounts they created on their Mac on iOS with no extra charge.

What's not allowed is making an iOS app where you are shown a login screen but no way of creating an account from within inside the app, which forces you to use a separate platform to create the account. The idea is that an iPhone or iPad should be a standalone device and not require the help of another platform or device to do basic things like create an account.

[shados]

Can you create a netflix account within the app on iOS? I thought they specifically had an exception for "reader apps" (and Netflix somehow fell in that category).

I don't use netflix to check.

[naikrovek]

It's not relevant. The cut taken is not the point. It's that the app store is the only avenue onto an iOS device. EVERY OTHER meaningful computing platform (that is, not solely a gaming device) has multiple avenues to acquire and install software. Not iOS, and that's the issue.

I don't know why I keep expecting users here to understand this. It's not going to happen.

[voxic11]

What about Chrome OS? Only some chromebooks have unlocked bootloaders, otherwise there is no way to install new software besides web apps or browser extensions.

[naikrovek]

I said "meaningful" computing devices.

[mekster]

Maybe you just play some games and never were a developer but 30% sounds like a huge fee when you literally have no other way to sell than to use dominating platforms of iOS, Android and Steam.

It was only natural that some successful company would start the fight on behalf of everyone else thinking the cut is too high.

For users, it could mean the reduction of price but users are just too satisfied, they don't care what the developers think but be pets on the platforms.

[trilinearnz]

Notably, and this is probably to their point, Epic's own store has a 12% margin.

See: https://www.epicgames.com/store/en-US/about

[bnj]

Seems like it hints at — is price fixing the right form of anti-competitive behavior when players mutually agree not to compete?

[nodamage]

Companies are free to set their own prices. Setting a price that matches your competitor's price is a standard business practice and is not considered price fixing as long as there was no coordination with the competitor.

In other words:

1. If Apple went and talked to Google and Microsoft and they all agreed to set the price to 30%, that would be price fixing.

2. If Apple looked at Microsoft and saw that they had set their price to 30% and decided they wanted to do that too, that is not price fixing.

[mekster]

Why would those 3 platforms consider lowering their fee if that isn't going to really increase their market share?

It's simply a monopoly situation that competition isn't even required to sustain their positions.

[LoSboccacc]

why people keep dragging Google into this, when Android has plenty solutions for distributing APK outside their play store?

[anoncake]

Android is better, but far from acceptable. Alternative app stores cannot install and update apps in the background. Without root that is – which Google also fights against.

[imtringued]

How is that far from acceptable? It's perfectly fine. This battle is not about who has the nicest store. It's about who has the right to a store at all.

[anoncake]

If prompting the user for every package update and installation is perfectly fine, why doesn't the play store do it?

[nodamage]

To be honest, it seems like a really bad idea to give third-party app installers root access to your phone though...

[danielscrubs]

You do it with Epic Game Store or Steam on Windows... why would it be any different here?

[nodamage]

As far as I am aware Steam does not need administrator privileges to install third-party games. I am not sure about Epic Game Store.

[jonny_eh]

Shouldn’t that be possible on Android too then?

[anoncake]

It's a bad idea to run software you don't trust, with or without root.

[shados]

Fair point. To be candid, every time I've discussed this, Apple fans quickly jump on the "but what about Google!!!" train, and it distracts from the original point, so I just got used to putting them together, because it's not important (for this specific topic).