[hortense]

This is why devs are afraid of publicly criticizing Apple, let alone testifying against them in the court. Apple has shown that they will then prevent you from accessing 50%+ of the US market. In short Apple is a bully, has been for more than a decade now, and it has worked out well for them.

[napkin]

But you’ve left out part of the narrative: Developer pushes an App update which purposefully violates the TOS, expecting rejection- having planned in advance to kick off an expensive PR campaign and legal battle.

I don’t deny Apple’s pettiness… Nonetheless, can you provide a different example of why devs are afraid of publicly criticizing Apple?

[ApolloFortyNine]

>I don’t deny Apple’s pettiness… Nonetheless, can you provide a different example of why devs are afraid of publicly criticizing Apple?

Every subscription service should have a banner on their pages saying signing up through iOS takes 30%. Many just disabled signing up.

Of course maybe this isn't the best example since Apple actually made it against their rules to tell users it'd be cheaper to purchase on their site.

Apple's rules undeniably cost end users money. Epic proved it by taking some of that 30% fee and giving it back to the consumer (you got more Fortnite credits buying on Epic store instead of Apple store).

Why people try to defend Apple I'll never understand, my guess is some people who own an iPhone have decided that's 'their team' and who wants to see their team lose? But I'm not sure.

[dogleash]

> my guess is some people who own an iPhone have decided that's 'their team' and who wants to see their team lose?

Apple vs Android is Coke vs Pepsi for Zoomers.

[lasdp]

> Every subscription service should have a banner on their pages saying signing up through iOS takes 30%.

Why do I as a user need this information? When I'm a on gas station, I don't see banners how much tax or fees I'm paying. I can find this information if needed, but total price is what I'd like to see in the first place.

[burnerthrow008]

> Why people try to defend Apple I'll never understand, my guess is some people who own an iPhone have decided that's 'their team' and who wants to see their team lose? But I'm not sure.

Happy to help! It's because some of us are Apple's customers, not Apple's suppliers, contractors or "vendor partners".

We customers like that Apple plays hardball with the people who would otherwise try to fuck us over. Remember that dev a few weeks ago who was giving examples of the "ways that Apple's IAP sucks"? Most of the things he wanted to do were dark patterns that are bad for customers.

If devs have to raise their prices by 15%, so be it. I would much rather that one company has my PII than fifty, anyway.

[jillyboel3]

> Why people try to defend Apple I'll never understand, my guess is some people who own an iPhone have decided that's 'their team' and who wants to see their team lose

It's this. Apple somehow managed to cultivate cult-like behavior in their users, which I've also never understood.

[spwa4]

> It's this. Apple somehow managed to cultivate cult-like behavior in their users, which I've also never understood.

Because an iPhone is a status symbol, like a Mercedes, and thus "proves" that you are a better human being. It's literally about people's self-worth.

[kjreact]

Because everyone who likes how Apple has made it easy for users to manage their subscriptions and enjoy the overall user friendliness of their products we are thus cultists who just blindly do as we’re told. Maybe some people don’t agree with your views; that doesn’t make them cult followers for having a different opinion.

Edit: fuck I just got trolled. According to jillyboel profile we are all just fascists. And dang is preventing him from spamming his trolls on HN.

[ApolloFortyNine]

There's no law against you overpaying Apple when you could get more value by going off app. If you want to spend $14 for something that's $10 on Epics website, your welcome to do so. Epic will still get their $10, and you can gift Apple $4 for making it easy to cancel your future subscriptions.

[jillyboel3]

if 3 posts every hour before getting rate limited is spamming sure

[benoau]

And you've left out part of the narrative: the terms that Epic broke were illegal in the state of California. Hooli's contract is thus invalid.

As for different reason, how about this official policy from ~2015:

> If your App is rejected, we have a Review Board that you can appeal to. If you run to the press and trash us, it never helps.

https://web.archive.org/web/20150411105225/https://developer...

[napkin]

Yeah, not arguing the legal specifics. It’s good for Apple to be challenged in court.

But Epic did go out of their way to ‘trash’ Apple in the press. For this and other reasons I can’t generally relate to Epic. (e.g. targeting kids with microtransactions, burning piles of money on Epic Games exclusives.)

I would also not want to do business with Epic

[benoau]

Apple is the primary beneficiary by far of games like Fortnite because they allow and tax them in aggregate, even without Fortnite they offer thousands of games for kids to spend a grand or ten in. The legality of the tactics employed by the gaming industry, that can only occur with the platforms complicity, are being challenged in Europe which is hopefully going to end a lot of these practices and derail both Tims grifting off children and cultivated addicts.

https://www.beuc.eu/reports/game-over-consumers-fight-fairer...

[jillyboel3]

> I would also not want to do business with Epic

So don't put yourself in the position where you have to do business with Epic, like forcing them to use your store to get software on the platform over a billion users use.

Apple could easily just do what various courts have ordered them to do: Open up the ecosystem and allow anyone to distribute apps. This has the added benefit of allowing apple to stop doing business with the entities they don't like, because they are no longer involving themselves in a transaction between the user and the business the user has chosen.

It will also save their executives from a prison sentence if they keep this up.

[coldpie]

Yeah, there's no good guys in this fight. Apple may be behaving badly, but Epic broke the terms they agreed to, tried to use the courts to force Apple to change their App Store business model, and even kicked off a public PR campaign trashing Apple... and now they're whining because Apple is not treating them nicely after all that? You went nuclear on Apple, Epic. That's not going to make them interested in having you as a business partner.

[jillyboel]

Shrug. They can open up the apple ecosystem so you don't need their store and then they can refuse to do business.

Apple put themselves in the position that they have to do business with entities they don't approve of, thankfully the courts are reminding them of this. Soon one or more of the apple execs will wind up in prison.

[coldpie]

Yeah, though Epic put themselves in the position of having the gatekeeper of an important part of their business want nothing to do with them, and now they're being whiny babies about it. Both parties suck here.

[jillyboel3]

No, apple is clearly the evil one. They are bullying many, many, many other companies and individiuals in a similar, and often even worse, fashion. Those don't speak up because they're afraid of Apple's wrath. Thankfully Epic did have the balls to stand up, and now various various legal entities are forcing apple to make changes that benefit everyone (except apple).

[lasdp]

As a user I love apple products for making payments safe. I can get a refund if the item I bought is not as advertised or I bought it by mistake, I don't need to figure out how to cancel a subscription, it's couple clicks to cancel for any subscription. I don't want apple to allow purchases outside the app as I'm afraid companies will leverage their power to redirect users outside of App Store to bypass those "payment safety" features that do not benefit them and will use fishy tactics to increase their profits.

[coldpie]

These are billion-dollar companies using the courts to fight over who gets a bigger slice of the pie. They are not your friends or allies.

[ImPostingOnHN]

> Apple may be behaving badly, but Epic broke the terms they agreed to, tried to use the courts to force Apple to change their App Store business model, and even kicked off a public PR campaign trashing Apple... and now they're whining because Apple is not treating them nicely after all that?

> You went nuclear on Apple, Epic. That's not going to make them interested in having you as a business partner.

this is unfortunately the same language abusers use when their victims try to gain support (pr campaign), seek help (use the courts), or fight back (violate unfair terms)

maybe epic just wants apple to stop abusing them and leave them alone while they interact with their customers on a platform that apple has been ordered several times to open up

not being abused shouldn't require you to "be nice" to your abuser, or to want to be their "business partner"

[coldpie]

No one is being abused, you're buying into Epic's emotional advertising campaign.

[ImPostingOnHN]

that is unfortunately also a thing that abusers often say

it is not for you to decide, though

also, I'm not really interested in being the subject of discussion, but if you're going to tell me what I'm doing, at least be right about it: I haven't followed any public statements from either party in the matter; I've only read court documents and rulings; and I have never patronized either company and have no plans or interest to do so. I think that makes me more impartial here.

[jemmyw]

They couldn't start the legal battle without doing this. They needed to get solid legal standing. So yes, they planned it, but they couldn't easily challenge Apple without getting the rejection.

Your suggestion is that they sit on the sidelines and complain about the situation. That's what plenty of people have done, and it makes no difference.

I'm not a fan of Epic, I don't play their games. They did all this for their own benefit. But it's probably a good thing overall.

[arccy]

a successful PR campaign given now we have court rulings that show apple is an abusive company.

abiding by apple's abusive TOS won't improve developers' situations, you have to stand up to them.

[lasdp]

What's abusive TOS? Aren't EPIC TOS abusive where the payments to EPIC are non refundable in many cases or that you don't own your account or that your account can be terminated any second without a notice?

Isn't it a free market where if you don't like TOS you just don't use the product?

[TechRemarker]

They didn’t ban them for publicly criticizing, they banned them for intentionally breaking the rules. So yes, this makes devs more afraid of knowingly breaking the rules like how jail makes people more afraid of breaking the law. And yes fornite team has been quite a bully in their incessant tweets but glad to see Apple not stopping to their level.

[apple4ever]

Yes they broke bad rules and were right to do so.

Devs are more afraid of breaking the rules because the rules change all the time, and they know Apple is petty and cares more about money than being good to customers and developers.

[burnerthrow008]

Should they also break the rules against user tracking without consent? Just curious how far you would take this.

[isodev]

I think a big portion of the problem is that Apple is both the platform (phone) and the store. Similar to Google and Chrome for the web, it creates a conflict. Bad faith movies like slapping warnings, geo blocking dev tools (remember you have to be in Europe to be able to develop an alternative web browser engine lol), limiting side loading etc … feels like “let’s milk the cashcow until people don’t need iPhones anymore”. The longer they can drag it the better. Disappointing tbh.

[FirmwareBurner]

This is why the EU is hitting apple and why the US needs to.

Too many devs have their livelihood at the mercy of Apple's(and Google's) Damocles's sword. At least with Google you can easily sideload.

If even megacorpos like Epic have issues with Apple imagine what being an indie dev or small company will be like.

[DanielHB]

Apple gets around this by saying they are "Promising to Create 30000 american jobs" which the politicians then peddle in their election campaigns. But then it never happens because it is all a promise...

The politicians of course only care about the PR stunt and give them concessions either way.

[FirmwareBurner]

A youtuber did a dissection of all the big tech jobs Trump "created" with his talks with big tech, and all of the new US jobs announced by the likes of Apple or Nvidia were jobs they were planning to create anyway, before Trump got elected Trump is just taking credit for it as if he did anything.

Job creation, retention or destruction is a powerful political tool that companies use everywhere as leverage to get politicians to do what they want. You can see the auto sector in Germany. So the US defending Apple is understandable. All countries protect their domestic big players.

[jillyboel]

This is why apple needs to be broken up into a software company and a hardware company. They're so, so clearly abusing their current position.

[horsawlarway]

Just take the app store away.

From all of them - take it away from Google too. Frankly - Microsoft never actually got much buy in for their store, but take it away from them as well.

Hardware that has only a single approved distribution channel for software, that is owned by someone other than the owner of the hardware, shouldn't be legal.

Further - if you own a piece of hardware, you legally should own EVERY fucking key. If there's a lock in that device, hardware or software based, that has a key - you get a damn copy.

---

Some physical comparisons that show how outrageously unethical this setup is:

You buy a home, but your realtor gets the only copy of the keys. "Don't worry" they say, "I'll just pop by and open er up whenever you need to get in and out. Oh, and by the way, I don't like Ikea - so I won't open the door if you're trying to move Ikea furniture in. Great working with you guys, enjoy your new home!".

You've just bought a new car, you tried turning into your neighborhood, but suddenly the car stops. You call the dealer: "Oh, I see your neighborhood road was paved by PavingCo, They don't pay our manufacturers' yearly inspection fee, so we can't certify that our car can safely drive on that road. So we disable it when the GPS detects you're about to drive there."

---

This is fundamentally about ownership. Hardware manufacturers are playing with utter fire here, because this is the first time in history there exists enough infrastructure that a device can phone home and ask "Is this ok?" to the maker, rather than operating as the owner desires.

As far as I'm concerned - you don't own a device that does that. You're just renting it, and the manufacturer can and will extort you with rent-seeking behavior at EVERY turn.

Phones are only the first stop - this is going to spread to absolutely everything that uses electricity unless this gets extinguished real fast. We're already starting to see the same games in Cars, IoT devices, TVs, etc...

I'm eagerly awaiting the day my drill stops working because I'm not trying to drill the manufacturers' overpriced screws with it...

[gmerc]

They did this even to Facebook back in the day, primarily holding app updates hostage to kill Instant Games

[high_na_euv]

Imagine if Microsoft banned Steam Or Rockstar on Windows

The outrage would be massive, that would be giant scandal

[xethos]

Microsoft locking out third-party applications with Windows S, and/or pushing users to Microsoft's own game store, was actually a real threat to Valve. That's one of the major reasons Proton is a thing: Valve realized they were entirely dependant on a party they had no leverage over, so they built and invested in Linux.

Should Microsoft ever make a move now, Valve isn't completely at their mercy.

[pjmlp]

Valve is still at the Microsoft's mercy to tolerate Proton's existence.

They should have made it attractive for developers already targeting UNIX like systems, with PlayStation and Android NDK, to actually bother shipping GNU/Linux builds of their games.

Instead, they translate Windows games.

[mystified5016]

> Valve is still at the Microsoft's mercy to tolerate Proton's existence.

No, they aren't. Valve is way, way too big a bear for Microsoft to poke. If they banned Steam, the backlash would be severe.

It would also result in even more users switching to Linux to keep access to the games they've already paid for, and which work under Linux due to proton.

Microsoft is at Valve's mercy. Valve doesn't need Microsoft, but Microsoft very badly needs Steam around to keep gamers on windows.

[pjmlp]

XBox is one of the biggest publishers, where would all those Windows gamers go?

To a platform emulating Windows? (no need to correct me on how WINE works)

If at all they would be migrating to Nintendo and Sony consoles, if not having second thoughts about XBox consoles and cloud/GeForce Now.

Additionally, most of what Valve stands for will be gone the day Gabe is no longer at the company, enjoy while it lasts.

[high_na_euv]

But it didnt happen

[shadowfiend]

Epic didn't publicly criticize Apple or testify against them in court to get into this situation, they willfully and deliberately broke the legal developer agreement that they signed to get press coverage (they could have filed suit on the anti-steering rules regardless).

Not only did they do this, they then filed suit to say that Apple shouldn't have been allowed to suspend their account—and lost (though arguably won the broader war since anti-steering is currently dead).

There are a ton of things Apple is doing wrong around developer stuff and anti-steering rules and all of it, but I dunno, I feel pretty good about them saying to a specific developer, “actually, you've shown yourself to be willing to ignore the legal agreements you sign, so we're not going to be doing business with you any longer“. Epic's stunt should cost them, if they then want to talk about how they've martyred themselves for developers everywhere. Good work, but a martyr who comes back to life isn't really a martyr, right?

[aaomidi]

Yeah this type of behavior will eventually get Apple broken into two. And they’ll deserve it.

[HDThoreaun]

Apples terms of service were illegal. Illegal agreements are not binding

[shadowfiend]

While I don’t claim to know the finer points of the law, I believe the judge was pretty crystal clear that Apple was 100% within their powers to kill the developer account that Epic used to do this.