[threeseed]

That's because most iOS developers aren't confused about the situation.

Apple's commission is for the App Store, SDKs, Developer Support etc. Not just a payment processing fee.

And so if there are other stores and payment options which there will be soon Apple is still within their right to collect that fee. As every court around the world has said. They could collect it as a percentage of sales like Epic or just lump developers with an up front large development kit fee like Sony or Microsoft does.

[madeofpalk]

No one is confused (by these rules). But that doesn’t mean developers like it. I haven’t seen a single reaction from developers supportive of this.

They seem hell bent on destroying whatever reputation and good will they have left on chasing those casino games for kids.

[librish]

Then force them to unbundle those fees if they want to collect them. It just doesn't make any sense that some developers have to pay up to 30% of their iOS revenue while others (including huge corporations like Uber, Starbucks, Target etc) pay nothing.

[TillE]

It's 15% for any developer making under $1 million. Even if we think the SDKs should be free, you're not going to find a significantly better deal for payment (with Apple handling all sales taxes etc), auto updates, crash reporting, etc etc.

Smaller developers aren't being ripped off, not anymore. There's a philosophical argument that Apple shouldn't control your device, but that really has nothing to do with the 30% they charge larger companies.

[librish]

Wouldn't Stripe be significantly cheaper?

I'm making the opposite of a philosophical argument, I'm making a practical one. Apple is not going to take away the App Store, or make it too difficult for developers to upload apps, since that would be a real threat to their iPhone business.

Developers need Apple, but Apple needs developers too. Currently their market domination makes it an extremely hard collective action problem for developers. Not being on the App Store means losing out on the majority of your revenue, which makes it tough for enough developers to band together against Apple.

[kj99]

> Wouldn't Stripe be significantly cheaper?

Can we stop pretending the app store fee is just for payment processing?

[librish]

That is currently the only thing they're charging for. Like I said, let them unbundle if they want to. I wouldn't be surprised if they actually end up just taking a revenue hit to keep the ecosystem healthy, which would mean more money for developers.

[kj99]

What are you talking about? Where do they say that they are only charging for payment processing?

[turquoisevar]

> Then force them to unbundle those fees if they want to collect them.

No, thank you.

I’ve seen what that looks like on the video console side of things. Thousands of dollars for the right of publishing on the manufacturer’s platform (i.e., using their IP) and again thousands for each build that needs to be certified.

Hundreds for smaller indie game devs.

I’m happy with my 15% commission and the $99/year fee. Nice and cheap and I get my money’s worth out of it and then some. Best part, they do well (i.e., I only owe them) when I do well. No upfront cost that’s essentially a gamble. No fee per build.

The more is bundled into a commission tied to my revenue, the better.

[judge2020]

The rule has been that physical purchases don't need to use IAPs, since the service you're purchasing is not solely enabled by Apple's investment into the entire hardware/software/APIs stack that allows your users to buy gems in your game.

[danShumway]

> As every court around the world has said.

https://www.reuters.com/technology/dutch-regulator-disputes-...

We're actually not 100% certain whether or not Dutch regulators are OK with those fees. We know that they consider Apple to still not be in compliance with the regulation, and there have been hints that the fee structure may be a part of that. But as far as I know we haven't gotten specific confirmation from Dutch regulators in either direction.

We know that 30% was too high, so according to the Dutch there is an upper limit to what Apple can charge proportional to its normal fees for in-app payments: https://www.reuters.com/technology/dutch-antitrust-watchdog-...

27% might be OK?

We'll have to wait until after Apple's responses to the most recent fines to work their way through courts to know whether the concerns listed most recently by Dutch regulators are the full list or not. It seems a little premature to say that every court in the world is fine with Apple's system when it doesn't seem that Apple has built a compliant Dutch system for us to even point to as an example of what that system could look like.

As it stands, we know that Apple's 3rd-party payment system is not compliant, but we don't know exactly why it's not compliant, and we won't know what a fully compliant system looks like for the Dutch government until after Apple has managed to come up with a proposal that doesn't get them fined for noncompliance.