- Apple's own fees would be reduced relatively quickly
- Technological savvy users will be able to discern which external sites are safe and get even lower prices when available
- Very few companies will be able to afford not being on the App Store (especially if Apple lowers their fees further)
- Apple will still make it hard _enough_ to use secondary stores that grandmas will not end up with iPads full of malware
Instead it's a boon, especially for folks like myself who use a fair amount of software from alternative stores/installers.
PSA, do not install Facebook on your iPhone. Use your browser.
Apple does deserve credit for forcing some privacy improvements on iOS for the Facebook app but it is in no way comparable to the privacy of a web browser. If you are using Facebook's app because you're on iOS and you're thinking, "oh it's fine, Facebook can't track me" -- please uninstall it, a native app on iOS still has far more tools at its disposal to track you than it should have.
As just one example, I would like to say that Facebook's in-app browser code on iOS is now blocked (https://www.engadget.com/meta-can-track-facebook-and-instagr...) but I'm not sure if that's actually the case. I hope it is, a quick cursory search couldn't tell me but it's very possible that Apple patched this by now. But what I do know is that Apple made a lot of noise about blocking tracking code before this article came out and while Facebook still had these capabilities.
Don't use known untrustworthy native apps. Don't use them on Android, and don't use them on iOS.
---
Also to be clear, the privacy improvements Apple has pushed for on iOS are in no small part to stop allowing access to an advertising ID that should not be on iOS at all. I don't want to act like there's no meaningful improvement here, Facebook's reaction is proof enough that Apple's changes did increase privacy. And I fully support Apple improving privacy. But some of that improvement is Apple putting controls in front of systems that shouldn't exist or covering for systems that are way more open and way less sandboxed than they should be.
So part of the difficulty of talking about Apple's security models and the role that the app store plays in that process is that some of Apple's policies are really only enforced on the app store, even though they should be enforced at an OS level that would apply to every app regardless of what app store it came from. Of course, not every permission can be expressed that way, but some permissions can. Web browsers are proof of that -- Safari doesn't have a quality control system in place to block abusive websites like Facebook, but despite that, it still manages to be better for your privacy for you to use Facebook from Safari instead of via a native app on iOS.
I worry that Apple's app store polices are sometimes used as an excuse to avoid building much more robust protections against tracking into the OS itself, and I worry that better privacy standards on the iOS app store get interpreted as proof that native apps on iOS are just generally safe and private. But Apple's standard of what counts as private "enough" to be on the app store is not always as strict as it could be. Generally speaking, until we get much better sandboxing controls on mobile devices than we have today, known malicious or known privacy-intrusive apps like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or Threads should not be installed period from any app store 1st or 3rd-party, they should be used in a web browser.
Reasonable people can disagree whether a 3rd-party app store would make this problem worse, but please don't have the takeaway of "a 3rd party app store would make the Facebook app suddenly unsafe and my parents would get fooled into installing it." The Facebook app is already unsafe, and your parents already shouldn't be using it.
Apple is doing something incredibly stupid and absolutely killing their relationship with developers. Right when they need it most. They should fix that, but won’t. Wall Street would crucify them for daring to lose revenue. And regulators should probably limit how much they can charge.
But this lawsuit was not the way for that to happen. Don’t root for a bad lawsuit just ‘cause you hate the plaintiff. Fix it the right way.
A ToS a “shrinkwraped” contract. In Apple’s case, it’s enforceability was yet to be tested. We can agree to a lot of things in a contract, but in general, we cannot consent to letting a party break the law at your expense. A judge determined that Apples practices were unlawful and therefore the problematic stipulation of the ToS was struck.
This is an important tool to combat runaway shrinkwrap contracts that can say literally anything and attempt to enforce it.
There's value to be had in more competition the "middleman" market, too!
At the moment, on PC there's a healthy competition between the Microsoft Store, Steam, GOG, Epic Games, EA Origin and probably at least a dozen other smaller platforms, some of which are also available on macOS and Linux.
On Android, there's the Play Store, some of the device manufacturers have their own additional stores (Samsung), even carriers have app stores (Vodafone Germany), and enabling a completely independent store like F-Droid is three taps away. The only thing that's unhealthy is how much AOSP functionality got shifted over to the Play Store Services which means that competitors on the OS level (e.g. Amazon's Fire series) have to do a lot of work on reimplementing that to even get basic apps running.
The only platforms where app/game vendors are completely dependent on the mercy of the device vendor is Apple's iDevices and game consoles (Xbox, PS5, Nintendo Switch) - and it's high time for that to end. Users should be free to run whatever they want to run on their devices, and they should be free to decide upon another curator for trustworthyness if they so desire. If the price of that is marginally more expensive hardware, so be it - it should not be allowed to sell stuff as permanent loss leaders anyway, it's unfair business practice.
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.
They seem hell bent on destroying whatever reputation and good will they have left on chasing those casino games for kids.
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.
30% or 15% for one stop global distribution and multi-jurisdictional tax collecting is a deal all day long.
Could Spotify have bootstrapped itself without the App Store?
Trying to break apple’s control is pretty close to destroying exactly why their stuff is desirable.
I can’t speak for others, but I’m sick and tired of big corporate devs acting as if they speak for me, a small indie dev, resulting in outlets and everyday people echoing their talking points “in support” of me.
They have their own interests, some of which directly contradict mine, and they only use people like me as pawns to make their plight seem righteous in the hopes of drumming up support.
I was content with the 30% when I eagerly signed up. I’m downright happy with the 15% discount as a nice bonus to the point that I think the 15% is a steal for what I’m getting out of this arrangement with Apple.
Of course, this is my opinion, and I have no interest in speaking for others. There’s already enough of that going around.
I’d instead ask you to be open to the idea that what you’ve been seeing so far is corporate PR trickling down to you via outlets and other means and hear out the indie devs you come across here and elsewhere.
On a separate note:
As someone who has a legal background and practiced before pivoting to indie development, I’m surprised so many seem to think Apple’s latest move is a surprise or somehow utilizing a loophole.
Legal proceedings aren’t always easy to follow, I’ll be the first to admit, but this was spelled out crystal clear in both the district court’s judgment as well as the appellate court’s judgment.
What’s especially nonsense is that the likes of Spotify and Sweeny didn’t see this coming, like they now pretend. Either they all need to fire their entire legal team or stop being coy because the courts predicted this outcome black-on-white in their judgments.
I don’t think what they’re doing is right, don’t take this as defense.
On the one hand “services revenue” (their cut from casino/exploitive games) is basically the only thing growing. people who want iPhones have them. People who want iPads have them. The Vision Pro is never going to sell 1 billion units. Wall Street demand growth so they “have to“ keep finding ways to juice services revenue a bunch. Or the stock will get hammered.
On the other hand, doing this is absolutely alienating every developer. And that will hurt the brand and their growth and their revenue too. You think there are as many developers who want to develop for the Vision Pro as there would have been if Apple was still as popular with devs as they were 10 years ago?
But of course even if developers weren’t getting really mad they’ve gone so far as to get governments to start taking a deep look at them. And you know that’s not gonna go well.
Juicing revenue makes developers and the governments more bad. Actions by the government or to be better for developers will make Wall Street mad.
They mismanaged it and now they’re screwed. They could’ve been slowly cutting down and opening up this whole time. In small controlled ways they were willing to give up. In ways to let them keep the revenue growth but just slow it down a little.
Instead they’ve got lawsuits. And governments forcing their hand.l to do things they hate and (in some cases) may be bad. And they’re being petulant about it all and going to get in even more trouble for defying courts/legislatures. All while hurting the brand.
Good job Apple.
Apple now charges 15% for smaller developers which didn't exist before. And the rules are far more clear about what is and isn't allowed.
As someone who built apps now and 10 years ago the situation is much better now.
It's ridiculous people talking about developer demand for Vision Pro when there hasn't even been hardware for developers to test on.
Simulators are useful but you can't ship apps until there is real hardware to test on.
How did so many devs show up if the platform fees are alienating them ?
If a regulator comes up with an overreaching plan to open up the app markets and that law or ruling gets struck down by a court, it could cement the status quo even further.
Why does this feel exactly like the 2020 election, where one side lost but keeps complaining that everyone is acting like they lost.
> The Epic Games v. Apple trial took place throughout May 2021 and was decided by Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, who sided with Apple in nine of the ten counts brought against it by Epic Games. The count in which she sided with Epic related to Apple’s restriction against linking to web-based payments from within an app; she found that this violated California’s Unfair Competition Law and issued an injunction preventing Apple from enforcing this anti-steering provision;
It makes life so much easier and saves money because it’s very hard to forget about subscriptions I no longer use when they’re all listed in one place. Also if I want to refund a purchase for whatever reason I can deal directly with Apple instead of the developer.
All things considered Apples tight grip on the App Store works for me.
you can find all your subscriptions there in one place until you start a new subscription on the web (maybe because it's cheaper), or you have one on a console. now suddenly you have multiple places to look again
there's no reason subscription management couldn't be managed at a higher level, outside of any tech platform. if 99% of banks weren't so technologically incapable it would seem obvious that it would be there, with the rest of your transactions. review/cancel/challenge/refund everything in one place, subscription or not.
The fact that not all subscriptions can be found there doesn’t take away from the ones that are. Perfect should not be the enemy of the good.
And that doesn’t even begin to touch the security aspect of it. Apple isn’t perfect but I trust them a heck of a lot more than the median no-name app developer out there.
That's what you get in a world with sideloading. The apps you've bought will remain on the App Store for as long as the developer extends agreements with Apple. If you don't sideload, your App Store purchases will be consolidated and organized however Apple chooses for you. You lose nothing.
The worst-case scenario for you is that your favorite developer stops using the App Store; but that's also a possibility regardless of sideloading. If a compelling alternative makes Apple's offerings seem weak, then it's up to Apple to respond.
The judge ruled that Apple is entitled to take a cut of transactions, regardless of who acts as your payment processor.
> as discussed in the findings of facts, IAP is the method by which Apple collects its licensing fee from developers for the use of Apple’s intellectual property. Even in the absence of IAP, Apple could still charge a commission on developers. It would simply be more difficult for Apple to collect that commission.
https://stratechery.com/2021/the-apple-v-epic-decision/
The judge did hint that Epic screwed up by arguing that Apple should not get a cut of transactions at all, instead of arguing that 30% was too high.
It should be clear that this is not a developer issue. These companies have complete contempt for their customers. It is not the developer who pays Apple, it is you.
At some point, customers will find a way to return that contempt.
Companies have a right to charge a fee for using their platform.
Apple can not be forced to give you their SDKs, Services etc for free and help you sell that product on their marketplace for free. They have a right to charge something. You can rightfully argue that the 27% is way too high and courts have agreed. But those like Epic hypocritically arguing for 0% no one agrees with.
The argument is we wouldn't need their marketplace and services if they allowed users to easily download and install software downloaded from regular websites.
you know... the way it always worked and still works in Linux/BSD.
There are obviously security implications to this, but I believe if I own the device I should be able to take the risk.
As far as their SDKs they actually do need to provide those for free, otherwise nobody will develop software for iOS and they won't be able to sell devices.
(all this seen in comments in other threads on hn)
It is strongly more consumer friendly than alternatives. I pay my money, I receive a software or service. I use apps that are largely free of intrusive ads, scams or tracking.
As a consumer I will (and do) take this deal every day of the week.
I logged in to Windows for the first time in a while, the other day, and felt violated by the amount of ads, marketing and promotional content the OS itself was throwing in my face.
I see similar things when I watch friends use their Android phones.
No thank you.
Yes, the App Store is valuable. No, generic payment processing rails aren’t. Even the 1-3% charged by CC companies is bullshit. Apple, of course, charges 10x this.
The only reason they get away with it is because they have leveraged cryptography to stifle competition. If other app stores were possible on iOS, Facebook and Epic and Netflix would collaborate to create one in a heartbeat and billions of people would stop having to pay higher prices to inflate Apple’s stock value.
Looks like 3% to 6% fees would absolutely run an app store.
[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-05-01/apple-s-a...
