[HN Gopher] Apple admits it ranked its Files app ahead of compet...
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Apple admits it ranked its Files app ahead of competitor Dropbox
Author : what_ever
Score : 53 points
Date : 2021-06-11 17:33 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.theverge.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.theverge.com)
| wly_cdgr wrote:
| Platform owner gives its own content preferential treatment??
| Incredible
| webmobdev wrote:
| Developers of ios (and soon macOS) platform have no one to blame
| but themselves for situations like this.
|
| 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.
|
| It is like everyone chose to forget that it is we developers who
| bring additional value to any platform we support, and we readily
| allowed ourselves to be treated like fools by Apple (and others).
| (I guess this is what hapens when we forget our history in this
| industry - the Windows mobile platform died because it didn't
| find acceptance among developers. Mobile platforms like Sailfish
| OS / Tizen OS / webOS today all struggle because they can't
| attract developers to their platform. And yet, we now allow the
| dominating platforms to exploit and treat us with disdain -
| aren't we truly idiots?)
|
| We should never have condoned this totally unnecessary and greedy
| "Apple Tax" practice as it harms both us developers and consumers
| - _our customers are forced to pay more, and we lose money too in
| the process_! I urge all macOS / ios developers
| to see the warning signs. It is still not too late - please
| boycott and remove all your apps from the app store and stop
| paying Apple any money.
|
| No one should have to pay Apple even for signing apps - if they
| want it, we should have the freedom to get it signed by any CA.
| (Remember, open source software has essentially been already
| nearly killed on ios platforms because of this unnecessary annual
| fee bullshit. And Apple wants that because it knows free open
| source software is detrimental to making money from its App
| Store).
|
| We played a huge role in the success of Windows, Android and ios
| - and now, in their arrogance if they want to change the rules to
| screw us, all of us really need to organise and fight back. I
| fear we are at that defining moment now where if we do not do
| anything, this is going to become an accepted norm and standard
| practice.
|
| And this is going to be hugely detrimental to us, in the long
| run, as both developers and consumers.
| donmcronald wrote:
| > Alarm bells should have been raised among us developers when
| Apple asked everyone to shell out $99 for the "privilege" of
| making an app available on the "App Store". And later, more so,
| when Apple demanded a percentage cut too on every sale you make
| from your app.
|
| I'm 100% against the way the app store works right now, but I
| don't have a problem with the idea of those two things if they
| were implemented in a better way.
|
| If you compare $99 to the cost of a code signing certificate
| it's a good deal. The problem is that BOTH are bad value for
| developers. The value in signing is identity verification and
| none of the systems we have are doing a good job of that right
| now.
|
| IMHO, Apple, Microsoft, and Google are purposely keeping code
| signing / trust systems awful because it benefits them. Imagine
| an ecosystem where apps were signed with domain validated
| certificates, which would be free (or very cheap), instant, and
| better than what we currently have, and it definitely feels
| like entrenched interests are working to keep things from
| improving.
|
| Apple taking a 30% cut would be perfectly fine if there were
| competing app stores. If they're providing services worth a 30%
| cut, developers will be willing to pay that.
|
| I thought the app store would fail. My exact sentiment at the
| time was "there's no way developers are going to be dumb enough
| to give up control of distribution." Wow, was I ever wrong :-(
| webmobdev wrote:
| Yes, artificial monopoly is the major issue here.
|
| With respect to the "$99" annual fee, the issue is that it
| isn't a good deal at all when a developer wants to offer the
| software for free - most open source developers don't even
| collect any donation, and it is doubtful if many of them can
| even raise $99 every year.
|
| This is where regulation is definitely needed - big tech
| should not be able to force us to pay and use only their
| signing infrastructure, and government law should require any
| CA to stringently implement KYC (know your customer) norms,
| like banks do, before issuing certificates to any Tom, Dick
| or Harry.
|
| I would preferably like to see the end of such "App Store"
| nonsense, but would gladly compromise and accept it if there
| is no monopoly (with the caveat that side loading / direct
| installation of apps should not be restricted - nobody should
| be forced to use an "App Store" if they don't want to).
|
| (App Store is so successful on ios only because side loading
| / direct installation is restricted on it).
| codesternews wrote:
| Even they show now popup and permission on mac. It made
| lots of app and developers living miserable. They are
| showing popups for permission every where.
|
| Thats why there is no income now for indie developers in
| appstore
| imNotTheProb wrote:
| Apple markets to non developers, by advertising to the
| masses, it forces us to join to partake with the masses.
|
| I've been lucky enough to avoid the walled prison but a
| fortune 500 company cannot.
|
| We can only educate the masses that better products exist or
| the psychology tricks Apple uses in their marketing.
| eyesee wrote:
| > 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 wrote:
| 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.
| codesternews wrote:
| Lots of people raised voices but you need to understand they
| are small and no one wants to fight app while making leaving
| passivate wrote:
| The best solution here is to have a competing App Store on iOS
| with their own rules. The new store will have a more realistic
| fixed fee for hosting apps, and devs will be able to cut
| prices. That should incentivize consumers to install the new
| app store.
| mensetmanusman wrote:
| Who do you think could organize a guild of the app developers?
| webmobdev wrote:
| - To begin with existing open source foundations and
| activists. The Free Software Foundation easily comes to mind.
| - In a democracy, political parties - they already are behind
| most unions and merchant / business associations and even
| major non-profits.
|
| (Approaching a political party may be controversial for some,
| but remember that political parties are also an institution
| in a democracy. And we will need political will and
| legislative backing to assert some of our rights. And it
| doesn't matter if there are more than one such organisations
| - there is no one size fits all solution for everyone).
| GeekyBear wrote:
| > 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.
|
| Somebody has absolutely no idea how high developer fees on
| proprietary platforms used to be.
|
| >Double Fine's Tim Schaefer pegged the cost of submitting an
| Xbox 360 patch at $40,000 in an interview with Hookshot Inc.
| earlier this year
|
| https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2012/07/microsoft-comes-under...
| webmobdev wrote:
| True. I don't have an idea of how high developer fees have
| been on proprietary, and _restricted_ use platforms before. I
| have generally avoided them and grew up on mostly open
| platforms (Unix / Linux / Windows) before becoming a web
| application developer and moving on to mobile apps. My main
| point is that the computing environment is very different
| today and we should a fight such regressive practices - just
| because they have been doing something in the past, and can
| do it now at a larger scale too, doesn't mean we have to
| accept it and normalise it. Right?
| codesternews wrote:
| Apple has made life of small developers hard. Mac software and
| app industry has died. Even after notarising apps they show
| malicious popup to users.
|
| Same practices has adapted by apple like search ad etc etc. They
| make competing services and steal ideas of developers and those
| app dies. For eg screen time for Moments app.
|
| They have unfair advantage and small developers could not
| complete. Only handful of indie developers making money from
| appstore and rest apps have died.
|
| They killed the industry.
| bberenberg wrote:
| I spend more for mac apps every year than the year before. And
| I do out it outside of the app store (mostly). Obviously HN
| crowd isn't representative of the general populace but this is
| my limited anecdotal experience.
| codesternews wrote:
| I am developer of mac app which rely on system events. From
| mojave each time I request for permission user see popup this
| app wants to control etc etc. I got it but every time? It
| killed lots of apps.
| Rubayo wrote:
| >>It killed lots of apps.
|
| how?
| Rubayo wrote:
| Yet given all this, for a substantial cohort of customers, the
| Apple brand is still bought as a badge of "coolness".
| nobodyknowsyoda wrote:
| Slightly off topic, but I do love the translucent terminal on
| the Mac. It is very cool
| donmcronald wrote:
| > > the Files app had a Dropbox integration, so Apple put
| "Dropbox" into the app's metadata, and it was automatically
| ranked higher for "Dropbox" searches as a result.
|
| I can smell the bullshit from here and I don't live in the US.
| Lol.
| crazygringo wrote:
| These are exactly the kinds of issues antitrust legislation needs
| to be updated to handle.
|
| I have no issue with a company running a store and selling its
| own products within, but it has to provide a level playing field.
|
| It's good they fixed it -- that the VP in question didn't know it
| had been done and then nixed it -- but this shouldn't even be
| legal in the first place.
| vmception wrote:
| So you would be fine if a separate "Apple Apps Inc" was
| required by law to exist, and it had created the Files app
| instead, and it had the same dropbox integration and it was
| therefore in the accurate metadata, and it surfaced higher than
| the dropbox app anyway?
|
| Congratulations, we did it guys.
| zaptheimpaler wrote:
| Makes no sense. The whole point is they manually boosted
| Files to make it surface higher. If it surfaces higher under
| a level playing field, that is fine.
| Railsify wrote:
| Would that extend to grocery stores, where would you force
| walmart to put their own brands?
| donmcronald wrote:
| > Would that extend to grocery stores, where would you force
| walmart to put their own brands?
|
| It's not a fair comparison if you're at a physical store
| since things are too different for an analogy. However, if
| I'm searching on their website and type in a specific brand
| so I can find which aisle it's in I would expect to get the
| brand I searched for, not a Great Value knockoff.
| passivate wrote:
| A grocery store has limited storage space, a limited amount
| of advertising space, limited staff, etc, etc. The amount of
| upkeep is also very different compared to a digital store.
|
| I think its not really an apt point for comparison.
| crazygringo wrote:
| I don't see any uneven playing field when it comes to grocery
| stores.
|
| The national brands and store brands are always next to each
| other on the same shelf. So there isn't any problem that
| needs solving. Also brands already pay for promotional
| positioning (like the ends of aisles), and when the store
| puts its own brands in those spots it loses out on those
| payments, and so is effectively paying equally.
|
| So the field doesn't need any evening out there.
|
| If grocery stores ever started putting the name-brand stuff
| in a back room that took twice as long to get to, then it
| might become an issue, but as of right now it's just not.
| singlow wrote:
| The brand names pay for their spot, so its moot. There is
| no meritocracy in grocery store product placement. For the
| most part the grocery store doesn't have a formula to
| decide where to put most things based on sales data. If you
| sell a cereal or soda or fancy mustard and you want premium
| shelf height, just pay extra for it. The store basically
| rents the shelf space out.
| bombcar wrote:
| You don't see the brands they don't carry at all. Only the
| brands they carry get displayed and they often make more
| money on the name brands anyway.
| mikestew wrote:
| You mean the grocery stores that have many competitors who
| also sell groceries? How would you extend that analogy to the
| iOS App Store, which has no competitors whatsoever who sell
| iOS apps?
| imNotTheProb wrote:
| Web Apps?
|
| Apple users are used to lower quality products, making them
| visit a website should be no big deal.
| gruez wrote:
| >You mean the grocery stores that have many competitors who
| also sell groceries?
|
| google?
|
| >How would you extend that analogy to the iOS App Store,
| which has no competitors whatsoever who sell iOS apps?
|
| By that logic costco has no competitors whatsoever that
| sell kirkland signature products.
| abhorrence wrote:
| I think if we took the reverse analogy, this would be
| like a situation where depending on the model of car you
| owned you could only shop at a specific grocery store.
|
| Bought a Honda? Only Kroger for you. Ford? You get
| Albertsons.
|
| There's a sizable purchase with phones and computers that
| creates a cost to switching stores. There's no cost to me
| to go to Kroger one week and Albertsons the next.
|
| Something like Amazon is more comparable to grocery
| stores, but I think there's a "trust" cost that makes
| them not directly comparable.
| singlow wrote:
| But if you have an android phone you can buy apps where
| ever you choose, even from the developer directly. There
| are alternative app stores. The market has a low barrier
| to entry.
|
| Apple only has control over consumers who chose for them
| to have that control. If you are selling an app to an
| iPhone user, you are selling to someone who only wants
| your app if Apple blesses it. If you are an Apple user
| that doesn't want that, then why did you by an Apple?
| Free yourself and buy a real computer or phone next time.
| passivate wrote:
| We need to re-evaluate what "rights" mean in a digital
| age. Apple should not have a monopoly on digital stores
| on iOS. "Apple made it so they can do anything they want.
| Take it or leave it" - is not an acceptable position (in
| my opinion).
|
| >By that logic costco has no competitors whatsoever that
| sell kirkland signature products.
|
| Can you explain how you came to that conclusion and what
| 'that logic' is?
| gruez wrote:
| >Can you explain how you came to that conclusion and what
| 'that logic' is?
|
| Because the parent poster was applying arbitrary
| restriction on it (apps, but only ios) to make a point. I
| replied with the equivalent example for costco (grocery
| store products, but only kirkland signature).
| ksec wrote:
| Because you have both Costco _AND_ Walmart _Stores_
| selling their own brand within the same _state_ which
| allows heavy _Store_ competition within the _State_ along
| with dozen of others _Stores_?
|
| The iOS state has 65% of users and 75% of App spending
| and it has _one_ Store.
|
| You can perfectly have your own retail brand when there
| are plenty of competition within the market. If you argue
| there is still another _state_ with diverse choices, you
| are either hit with a Duopoly argument, or a monopolistic
| power argument where iOS have too much power within
| market economy.
|
| People have been using these over simplify analogy with
| Xbox and Retail and there are not even the same.
|
| Either way, there should be no denying there is something
| wrong with the way things are currently being handled.
| GeekyBear wrote:
| >selling its own products
|
| The Files app is bundled with the OS, but not installed by
| default. It's not exactly "sold" as it's free and isn't ad
| supported either.
|
| It's hard to find a profit motive here.
|
| Google, on the other hand, has long allowed you to bid on your
| competitor's product name so you will show up ahead of them in
| the search results.
|
| They also have a history of scraping other people's content and
| then more highly rating that scraped content on their own sites
| in their search engine.
|
| It's easy to find a profit motive there.
| webmobdev wrote:
| > It's hard to find a profit motive here.
|
| Promoting the use of iCloud - when your space runs out, you
| will consider paying for it.
| GeekyBear wrote:
| >Promoting the use of iCloud
|
| The Files app transfers files back and forth between SMB
| shares, local flash drives, and any of the major cloud
| services.
|
| iCloud is not required at all.
|
| Try again.
| webmobdev wrote:
| If you are ignorant about it, iCloud support is
| integrated into the Files App and is the most promoted on
| its support documents too - https://support.apple.com/en-
| us/HT203052 and https://support.apple.com/en-in/HT206481
| ... If you use DropBox app, you are obviously going to
| prefer DropBox cloud service over iCloud - that not only
| means a potential loss of revenue in the future but also
| the fact that they aren't tied into Apple ecosystem and
| can abandon it. Additionally, anyone not using the Files
| app also denies Apple the means to collect file metadata
| which are valuable to profile you.
| GeekyBear wrote:
| > If you are ignorant about it
|
| I'm apparently not the person who is ignorant of the fact
| that iCloud is not required in any way to use Files.
|
| Any SMB share, Flash drive, or major cloud service will
| work with it just fine.
|
| If you are trying to come up with a profit motive as
| large as Google, where they sell search results on other
| people's product names, you aren't making a compelling
| case.
| kadoban wrote:
| Why is this a competition? They can both be wrong.
| netizen-936824 wrote:
| The profit motive is keeping users in their ecosystem
| judge2020 wrote:
| > "We are removing the manual boost and the search results should
| be more relevant now," wrote Apple app search lead Debankur
| Naskar, after the company was confronted by Epic Games CEO Tim
| Sweeney over Apple's Files app showing up first when searching
| for Dropbox. "Dropbox wasn't even visible on the first page [of
| search results]," Sweeney wrote.
| neonate wrote:
| https://archive.is/JoZkj
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