[eyesee]

> Alarm bells should have been raised among us developers when Apple suddenly asked everyone to shell out $99 for the "privilege" of making an app available on the "App Store", and treated it as something normal. And later, more so, when Apple demanded a percentage cut too on every sale you make from your app.

I'm not sure where the "suddenly" comes from. It's not as if there was a time before the fee where developers could ship apps for iOS. There's been a developer program as long as there has been an App Store. For that matter, there was a much more expensive developer programs for the Mac before iOS was even a thing. I remember paying somewhere between $1500 and $3000 when we were writing Mac software in the early aughts.

[webmobdev]

The "suddenly" is in the context of this new practice of charging all developers (big or small) annual fees and demanding a recurring cut of their profit. Before this unnatural practice became prevalent, any computer user and / or Linux / Windows / Mac / Android developer could create and distribute software on the respective platforms for free without any such financial consideration.

My point is let's not normalise this practice in any manner - in the past too we used to pay huge fees for developer tools, but today the computing environment is totally different and that's why even the tech giants are adopting and pushing for free open source developer tools or providing their developer tools for free. Let's not regress to something worse.

[JimDabell]

> Before this unnatural practice became prevalent

We’re talking about computer hardware and software. Complaining that it is “unnatural” makes no sense.

> any computer user and / or Linux / Windows / Mac / Android developer could create and distribute software on the respective platforms for free without any such financial consideration.

This isn’t true. The first Android device was launched to the public after the App Store was open for business. And you are ignoring all the platforms where this was a common practice beforehand, like consoles. Apple weren’t the first to charge for access to a platform, this was already a common practice. Nintendo have been doing it since the mid 80s, for instance.

[Const-me]

The consoles are niche entertainment devices. They also have many alternatives: multiple stores on PCs, and several newer cloud-based products. For this reason I'm OK with the stores in xbox/playstation/nintendo.

With smartphones it's different. Phones are not niche devices, they are ubiquitous and have killed whole industries like consumer photo/video equipment and portable audio.

From consumer point of view, no reasonable alternatives have left. It's for this reason I'm not OK with Apple and Google abusing their monopoly.

[JimDabell]

> The consoles are niche entertainment devices.

They sell by the tens of millions. They are in no way “niche”.

> Phones are not niche devices, they are ubiquitous and have killed whole industries like consumer photo/video equipment and portable audio.

It wasn’t common for things like cameras to have open development platforms either.

[Const-me]

> They sell by the tens of millions

There’re billions of active Android devices. That’s 2 orders of magnitude difference. Compared to these volumes, consoles are niche devices.

And don’t forget about alternatives. If you wanna play videogames you don’t have to buy a console, you can get a PC and buy Windows games from gog, steam, epic or origin. And in some cases like take-two directly from developer. And recently there were multiple attempts to make cloud gaming work, pretty sure some day someone will do that successfully.

Because customers have so many alternatives, xbox and playstation are not a monopoly despite MS/Sony are selling devices locked to their respective stores.

For smartphones, customers only have 2 alternatives. It’s for this reason apple and google are a monopoly, and we should treat them this way i.e. regulate the hell out of them.

> It wasn’t common for things like cameras to have open development platforms either.

I don’t think many people care about open platforms. They care about choice. Back in the days, if you didn’t like e.g. Sony pushing their overprices memory sticks, you could buy a camera that’s not Sony, there were many other good vendors on the market. Nowadays, the cameras are either prosumer and professional (i.e. expensive), or non-existent because smartphones killed them. And while there’re many companies making smartphones, all these smartphones are controlled by just two.

[JimDabell]

> Compared to these volumes, consoles are niche devices.

“Niche” doesn’t mean “this other thing sold more”.

> A traditional game console is in 51 percent of U.S. households.

— https://venturebeat.com/2015/04/14/155-million-americans-pla...

Consoles are in no way “niche devices”. You’re only saying that they are because it’s convenient for the point you are making. If we can’t agree on a basic fact like this, there’s no discussion to be had here.

[tracer4201]

I don’t think you answered the ops question. Was there ever a time that you could develop software for Mac or particularly iOS and distribute it without paying the developer license fee?

To be fair - the Unix market is different than iOS apps. And on Windows, anyone could run whatever program… which caused a lot of problems and financial loss. And just because Windows or Unix used those models, why are they the one and only acceptable model?

[webmobdev]

    Was there ever a time that you could develop software for Mac or particularly iOS and distribute it without paying the developer license fee?

As I have said in my original post, that's the point it started going downhill for us developers on the macOS and ios platform; and as Apple continues to further abuse its position, it's time to say a clear no to their regressive and exploitive practices. And as I have said elsewhere too, just because a particular practice has gained ground because the exploitive business model earns somebody more profit, doesn't mean that the exploited have to continue accepting it.

    And just because Windows or Unix used those models, why are they the one and only acceptable model? 

They are more acceptable simply because they don't abuse and exploit the developers who provide a huge value to the platform. If you are fine with a corporate abusing their control over their platform to exploit money from you, both as a developer and a consumer, then we don't really have anything else to discuss because of our differing economic / political belief on this subject.

[JimDabell]

> that's the point it started going downhill for us developers on the macOS and iOS platform

The only developers on the iPhoneOS platform at that point worked for Apple, or jailbroke and used reverse engineered APIs, or built web applications.

You seem to be implying that there was some happy era of open native iPhone application development before Apple ruined it all with the App Store, but that’s simply not true.

[webmobdev]

You are just just talking in circles to confuse the issue -

The major point is that just because Apple is now able to abuse their control over the ios platform (and now mac too), developers (and consumers) should not be willing to submit to such exploitation.

A smart phone is a general purpose computer, with built-in telephony. We use it like any other computer to do multiple tasks. Developers and consumers have always been free to develop or install on computers in the last few decades before Apple, after its popularity with the ios platform, decided to abuse its control and removed this option after finding a business model to further exploit developers and its consumers.

To be clear - just because some exploitive business practice has gained ground, doesn't mean we developers and consumers have to continue to accept it as some kind of new normal practice. If you don't think the current practice is abusive and exploitive to developers and consumers, then please present your argument for the same as that is what we are discussing here.

[JimDabell]

I’m not talking in circles, I’m directly contradicting one very simple thing you are saying. Throughout this thread you are talking as if gatekeeping access to a platform is something novel that Apple brought into the world with the App Store, before which all development – including iOS and Android development – were open. That is simply wrong.

iPhone development was never open; Apple did not “remove this option”. No Android phone was available to the public before the App Store launched. Apple were by no means the first to act as gatekeepers for a platform; this is something that has been commonplace for decades. This is not a business practice that has “gained ground”; it is something that has been with us for a very long time before the App Store existed. The App Store is a continuation of a theme that has existed and thrived for decades.

If you want to argue that it’s no good – that’s fine, make that argument. But don’t rest it on a foundation of “everything was open and good before Apple created the App Store” because it’s simply factually untrue.

[tracer4201]

> it started going downhill for us developers on the macOS and ios platform;

You didn’t answer the question. Was there a time you could develop and distribute on iOS without paying the license fee?

> If you are fine with a corporate abusing their control over their platform to exploit money from you, both as a developer and a consumer, then we don't really have anything else to discuss because of our differing economic / political belief on this subject.

This is a logical fallacy — begging the question — when you state a position as an absolute truth.

No one is “fine” with a corporation “abusing their control”. But your argument is based on the premise that charging for an SDK or charging a license fee to build and distribute on iOS or Mac is itself an abusive practice.

The counter argument is that it isn’t. Because anyone could develop and distribute software for Windows or Unix doesn’t mean that that is the only model and anything else is abuse, which you’re claiming as an absolute truth.