I get the reasoning, but I chose Android because it's open and I've never run into any of the anticompetitive problems people claim are so damaging. If Google had known that this was the deal at the beginning, I doubt they'd have created Android the way that they did and I wouldn't have an open platform to use—we'd just have two walled gardens.
How is that better for consumer choice?
> Stop requiring Google Play Billing for apps distributed on the Google Play Store (the jury found that Google had illegally tied its payment system to its app store)
> Let Android developers tell users about other ways to pay from within the Play Store
> Let Android developers link to ways to download their apps outside of the Play Store
> Let Android developers set their own prices for apps irrespective of Play Billing
Have you really never ran into any apps that would have hit these restrictions ?
If you've never have use the Play Store in the first place that would be the case, but otherwise I'd assume every app you got from there are subjected to those.
On banking apps, I wonder how isolated they are. My bank offers insurance services, and they can be paid through other means than my bank account. But I can't contract them in my app, it's only available by phone or through the web site.
I wonder if they just took the safest route and removed any "buying" operation from their app instead of having to fight Apple or Google later (used both apps, had same limitations)
The restrictions on non-Google billing did impact my employer, but it was less of a problem in the US as in some other countries where Google only billing meant we couldn't charge users as very few had Google compatible payment methods and Google wouldn't let us use other providers that could accept money with the payment methods people actually had. We had other methods in our apk download, but I recall having to take those out, too.
Of course, Apple made payment go through them, but most Apple can accept payments from most of their users, and a lot of their users have a payment method on file.
Amazon Kindle is the poster child of that, but there's a myriad of other services that won't make an app to protect their feelings structure.
I suspect you mean, you chose Android because Google _said_ it was open.
Plenty of tech people chose Android because they knew others would be able to carve out a workable system based on the open source bits even if Google didn't actually keep it open.
This ruling is basically against Google rug-pulling - for example, looking the other way on third-party billing until deciding (after critical mass) that you are going to start enforcing the use of Google's payment services for certain classes of apps. At that point you are destroying businesses with such back-tracking.
They were slapped down because Google claimed they were open because you allow third party stores, but creating roadblocks (Play services, DRM licensing and device certifications for streaming apps) and applying pressure or doing revenue-sharing schemes with device manufacturers on the back-end to keep them from making their own store.
It is very difficult for a judge to slap Apple down for antitrust when Apple has been very careful to keep consistent rules and to only change them when it is considered invariably considered a benefit to the App Store developer (subscription rate reductions after one year, small business program, opening up new categories of apps like legacy emulators).
It is hard to argue a point when Apple started abusing their position when their behavior is consistent. If the App Store is a bad deal then why has it grown to be such a juggernaut from nothing?
That is why the EU took a different philosophy with the DMA.
I appreciate that Android did not go down this route because I don't believe any of these choices would have caused Android to fail.
That sounds like you either haven’t heard all of the indie developers complaining or are inclined to find reasons to say problems with “your side” have some other explanation. For example, this was just a couple weeks ago where Google’s “open platform” blocked a popular app from doing what their mutual customers wanted:
https://ia.net/topics/our-android-app-is-frozen-in-carbonite
If someone chose iOS because it’s closed then the judge has decided it can stay mostly closed.
Also Google is where it is because they pitched a platform that was friendlier for carriers to load up with crapware than Apple was. It wasn’t really openness for openness’ sake. If Google hadn’t done that we might have been in a world where Palm or Microsoft were the secondary or primary player next to iOS.
I'm concerned about the precedent this sets. As long as this is the state of US law, we won't see another open platform developed in the US because these rulings together say that the only way to be sure you're not punished for anti-competitive behavior is to ensure that no one can ever define a "market" around your platform. Only a fully walled garden is safe.
Apple published the rules for their App Store over a decade ago and has largely stood by them so Apple is not being punished.
Having a closed platform isn't illegal. Just ask Nintendo.
Anticompetitive behavior is illegal, even when you are anticompetitively competing in a market that you yourself chose to create by creating an open platform. Just ask Microsoft.
If Google's leadership didn't understand that legal restrictions their choice placed upon them, that failure is on Google's leaderhip.
> "If the law supposes that," said Mr. Bumble, squeezing his hat emphatically in both hands, "the law is a ass—a idiot. If that's the eye of the law, the law is a bachelor; and the worst I wish the law is, that his eye may be opened by experience—by experience."
(Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist)
They (and Microsoft) could have created an open platform and then competed in the market they created withiut resorting to illegal behavior.
But it never was. You were defrauded and everyone who made that choice for those reasons were illicit market gains because of the secret agreements Google exerted over the entire ecosystem around you.
It was never really open but you also never really knew about that because all of the real options were taken out back and killed before you saw them.
No. I knew exactly what I was getting and I've been enjoying it for years.
Is it perfect? No. But I know better than to demand perfection when something entirely suitable to my needs is already available.
Everything you have bought on Android was illegally taxed, and numerous things you bought outside of Android you also overpaid for as companies tried to absorb the abusive fees as well.
You didn't "see" the anticompetitive concerns but you also never benefit from any of the options you would have if Google had operated a legal business model.
