[yyyk]

>In the end, this all boils down to ideological differences. One camp says "it is their store, take it or leave it, they already have competitors

American law abandoned this outlook at the early 20th century. Also, what Apple is doing is making it harder for customers to switch from Apple if they want to. It's ridiculous to invoke competition as a defence when Apple is trying to prevent competition.

[dkarras]

Really? If I set up a shop in the USA, can I not dictate what I sell there and under what terms?

"Making it harder to switch" is moot, once you start purchasing stuff in X platform it is already hard to switch since your purchases do not carry over and sometimes they are not even available on other platforms.

And competition involves getting ahead, and it will feel like you are trying to prevent it from happening because if you are a lot more successful than others, it doesn't feel like competition anymore - even though others are absolutely free to get their shit together and outperform. It is important to discern the difference between "competition is being made irrelevant" and "competition is being prevented".

[yyyk]

>Really? If I set up a shop in the USA, can I not dictate what I sell there and under what terms?

There are limits. From safety to counterfeiting prevention to marketpower/monopoly considerations to various legal duties. In this case, Apple is using its position in the app store to force companies to use Apple's payment processor, and that's classic antitrust.

>"Making it harder to switch" is moot, once you start purchasing stuff in X platform it is already hard to switch

If the relationship was with the vendor directly, one could simply switch the subscription to the vendor's Android app. Because the vendor doesn't necessarily know even who the customer is (since Apple even takes other the email address), it's much more difficult to do. It's true that there can be other obstacles, but this one is an artificially made by Apple just to prevent competition.

> even though others are absolutely free to get their shit together and outperform.

The point is that others aren't allowed to. They can't run with iOS apps, and the user can't switch away from Apple unless the user cancels all subscriptions.

[ksec]

>If I set up a shop in the USA, can I not dictate what I sell there and under what terms?

You can if I can easily set up a store next to you. Selling more of less the same stuff.

By your analogy USA currently only has two store, App Store and Google Play. And there are no third store allowed. Setting up a third platform is literally creating another State to join the US federation.