[HN Gopher] Japan to crack down on Apple and Google app store mo...
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Japan to crack down on Apple and Google app store monopolies
Author : mfiguiere
Score : 371 points
Date : 2023-12-26 16:54 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (asia.nikkei.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (asia.nikkei.com)
| thriftwy wrote:
| All of the DIY monopoly stuff which tech giants has invented will
| fall apart once one large country starts poking holes in it. It
| doesn't even has to be US (variant: specific states).
|
| From right to repair to app store monopolies, they have invested
| in this walled garden, but they forgot to get permit to erect
| those walls in the first place.
| sylware wrote:
| not to mention hardcore regulation on technical interop, with
| actually simple and cheap to implement alternatives (reuse
| what's there already), that stable in time.
|
| For instance, most online services can be reasonably provided
| to noscript/basic (x)html browsers.
| chongli wrote:
| Why can't they make carveouts on a country by country basis? So
| they lose in the EU and Japan, but they could still maintain
| their profits in the US.
|
| Look at the world of pharmaceuticals. Drugs are way more
| expensive in the US than most other countries. Big pharma
| companies make nearly all of their profits in the US.
| wiseowise wrote:
| > Why can't they make carveouts on a country by country
| basis? So they lose in the EU and Japan, but they could still
| maintain their profits in the US.
|
| I wouldn't be surprised if they do so just to spite.
| anonyme-honteux wrote:
| That would still matter quite a lot. Imagine a world where
| every country on earth would pay drugs as much as the US
| does.
| bee_rider wrote:
| I think people are generally more wary of importing drugs
| than electronics, and it is really easy to import bits from
| other countries.
|
| Tech companies can definitely put up lots of hurdles here and
| might even manage to defeat their customers. But at least
| there will be some possibility to work around it...
| chongli wrote:
| I'm not sure how you could work around it. If you wanted
| to, say, import an iPhone from Europe then Apple could gate
| access to the App Store based on your IMSI. Then you'd need
| a European SIM with your imported phone, so you'd be
| roaming all the time. And presumably Apple could detect
| that you're roaming and just redirect you to the US store
| anyway, disabling any 3rd party app stores anyway.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| > Drugs are way more expensive in the US than most other
| countries. Big pharma companies make nearly all of their
| profits in the US.
|
| I wonder how sustainable this is. If the US imposed the same
| regulations on drug makers that the EU does, would there be a
| material effect on quantity or quality of drugs available
| across the entire globe? To what extent is the US subsidizing
| the low cost other countries like to brag about?
| beebeepka wrote:
| > To what extent is the US subsidizing the low cost other
| countries like to brag about?
|
| None whatsoever. It's preposterous to even consider it in a
| serious manner.
| chongli wrote:
| Most of the work of drug discovery is not done by the
| pharma companies, it's done by publicly-funded research
| labs. What big pharma pays for is the elaborate (and very
| large) clinical trials which are required by the FDA before
| a drug can be sold.
|
| One simple change the US could make is to direct the FDA to
| fast-track approval for drugs that have been approved in
| other countries the US considers to have high enough
| standards of rigour, such as the EU or Canada.
| thriftwy wrote:
| So you run a Japanese VPN, install all the apps you want from
| App Store alternative, and turn off the VPN.
| ForkMeOnTinder wrote:
| > And although Google permits third-party app distribution
| platforms, it still requires apps to use its billing system.
|
| Can someone explain this line? If you publish an app on an
| alternative app store and someone downloads it on their de-
| googled phone, how in the world would Google prevent it from
| making a few API calls to Paypal?
| strombofulous wrote:
| This is incorrect, if you distribute an app outside the play
| store you do not need to use their payment system, even by the
| letter of the law. The rule specifically applies to play store
| apps. It's common for developers of more technical apps (like
| VPN apps) to publish two nearly identical versions - one to the
| play store that doesn't support iap and one to f-droid/their
| website that takes payment via credit card.
|
| It's possible the people writing this complaint may be
| referring to the fact that you can't link to or reference those
| options from the play store edition of the app, but I think
| they might just be misinformed.
| jdiff wrote:
| There is a compounding effect of this though, the fact that
| the Play Store doesn't allow this greatly dampens development
| of libraries that would make it much easier for developers to
| add this functionality to their apps, making people more
| likely to rely on the Google's payments and just dealing with
| its cut.
| Dalewyn wrote:
| I believe it's fair:
|
| * Unlike Apple App Store on iOS, you are under no
| obligation to sell on Google Play Store on Android.
|
| * If you choose to sell on Google Play Store, it's
| reasonable to "pay rent" so to speak.
|
| If you don't want to accept payments through Google Play
| Store, you simply don't sell through Google Play Store.
| jdiff wrote:
| You can believe it's fair, what you can't do is claim
| they support aftermarket app stores while they also take
| actions to stamp them out. You have to acknowledge that
| the situation Google has created conveniently and heavily
| discourages aftermarket app stores on multiple levels.
| You _are_ effectively obligated to publish on the Play
| Store, and in doing so you face increased maintenance
| burden for creating non-Play versions.
| Dalewyn wrote:
| Google doesn't "stamp out" side-loading. They don't make
| it immediately obvious (and they don't have to), a user
| so concerned needs to dive a little into the operating
| system and permit them, but the option is there for
| anyone interested.
|
| This is in stark contrast to Apple where you may not do
| anything outside of the One Apple Way(tm), which in this
| case means you will go through the Apple App Store or
| pound sand.
| spiderice wrote:
| Google knows that they just have to make it inconvenient
| enough that 99% of people won't do it (or really even
| know it's an option). So yes, if you squint really hard
| you can kind of make it look like Google is a good guy
| here. But if we're talking about how it actually pans out
| in reality, Google is no better than Apple.
| mil22 wrote:
| They have deliberately and knowingly made it difficult by
| showing warnings and making users jump through hoops. I
| think evidence that it was deliberate and intentional was
| revealed in one of the many lawsuits in the form of
| meeting notes and reported speech, if I remember right.
|
| https://www.theverge.com/2023/11/6/23948990/and-were-on-
| to-s...
| jdiff wrote:
| Not stamping out side-loading, although that is heavily
| impacted by many of the same issues, but stamping out
| aftermarket software stores.
|
| Apps installed from aftermarket stores:
|
| - Cannot auto-update themselves, it requires user
| intervention for every individual app for every
| individual update.
|
| - Cannot update at all if they were initially installed
| from the Play Store without uninstalling and losing all
| data in the process.
|
| - Require multiple hoops and scary messages for the
| average user.
|
| - Require extra maintenance burdens for the developer who
| essentially has to maintain two forks of the same
| application, further complicated by point 2.
|
| - The payment issues mentioned upthread.
|
| All of this makes aftermarket stores second-class
| citizens, all the while Google claims it welcomes them
| with open arms. Aftermarket stores aren't the only area
| where Google does this, either. Plenty of Android-of-
| yesteryear's customizability and openness has atrophied
| heavily while Google continues to profit off the
| bitrotting scraps that are left.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| I took it to be a subtle (but important) grammatical error. I
| figure it meant "although you CAN use another store on Google,
| if you use Google play you need to use it's billing system".
|
| But maybe Google has something much more insidious than I
| expected
| internetter wrote:
| No, you are correct
| mmahemoff wrote:
| It's a commercial/legal requirement imposed on developers, not
| directly enforced through the technology. It comes down to the
| review process in practice. At some point a human reviewer will
| need to detect the app is allowing the user to pay with PayPal
| and therefore block it from distribution.
|
| They'll probably have some technology to help prioritise apps
| for review if they're likely to be violating (by scanning the
| APK statically for PayPal SDKs or running robot scripts to see
| if they can be presented with a PayPal form).
| spogbiper wrote:
| > At some point a human reviewer will need to detect the app
| is allowing the user to pay with PayPal and therefore block
| it from distribution.
|
| But on Android I can just release the .apk or publish to
| Fdroid app store, etc. I don't think Google would be
| reviewing the app at all.
| mmahemoff wrote:
| You can and correct Google won't review it - that's why
| Android shows a warning when you enable sideloading about
| only using APKs from trusted sources (to my recollection).
|
| Those alternative channels typically provide a tiny
| percentage of active installs compared to Google Play
| installs, however.
| admp wrote:
| This appears to be factually incorrect both for apps installed
| from third-party app stores and from Google Play itself.
|
| See "Alternative billing systems for users" on
| https://support.google.com/googleplay/answer/11174377?hl=en-...
| derefr wrote:
| I would assume that it means that if you're publishing an app
| on _both_ the Play Store and alternative stores, and your
| alternative-store versions of the app offer alternative payment
| methods, then Google will shut down Play Store distribution of
| your app as punishment for that.
|
| Apple (briefly) tried to do something like this previously,
| where they tried to force apps that offered no free-to-paid
| conversion through the mobile app, only through the web, to pay
| the "Apple tax" _on the subscriptions made through the web_ ,
| because they were for a _backing service_ that had value for
| customers almost exclusively due to its use through the mobile
| app. Nobody was willing to put up with this, though, and they
| quickly walked it back.
| AC_8675309 wrote:
| Great, but don't forget to open up the Nintendo eShop and the
| PlayStation store as well.
| Jensson wrote:
| There is an order of magnitude difference in number of devices
| there, smaller brands that ship an order of magnitude less
| devices isn't a target for legislative action. Legislation
| might cover them but there is no reason to target them
| specifically since they are too small to matter.
| CharlesW wrote:
| Why would that make any difference, unless we want the
| government to punish success? And if ~140 million Switch
| consoles sold doesn't constitute "success", where is that
| line?
| infotainment wrote:
| In order to get to a monopoly position, quite a bit of
| success is generally required. Given that, anti-monopoly
| laws are by their very nature, punishing "success".
|
| That kind of "success" for an individual company doesn't
| necessarily lead to the best outcomes for the customer.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| This category of law is broadly referred to as
| competition law, because that's what it's concerned with.
|
| If you had five "competitors" but they all conspire to
| divide up the market between them so they don't have to
| compete with each other, this is problematic in the same
| way as a monopoly. But that's exactly what the game
| consoles do. Alice has a PlayStation, Bob has an Xbox,
| Carol has a Switch. If you want to sell your game to
| Alice, Bob and Carol you can't just strike an agreement
| with one of the console makers because that only allows
| you to reach a third of the market. You can't play Sony
| and Microsoft against each other to get the lowest fees
| because you need both of them rather than being able to
| choose the one offering the best deal.
|
| The best argument for why game consoles aren't like
| phones is that a non-trivial number of people have
| multiple game consoles, whereas hardly anyone carries two
| phones in their pocket. But even then, there are a large
| number of people who only have one console -- large
| enough that game developers still can't ignore them --
| and few people who have all of them.
|
| Likewise, there are companies other than console makers
| who might like to make a game store, or make one that
| services all types of devices. Those companies are locked
| out of the market, even though their presence would be
| likely to drive down margins.
|
| So competition law should be concerned with this, because
| it's limiting competition.
| Jensson wrote:
| > there are a large number of people who only have one
| console
|
| Iphone or Android, yeah. Basically nobody only have a
| Playstation or a Nintendo.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| There are definitely people who only have one console.
| Consoles cost money. Some people aren't rich.
| Jensson wrote:
| Phones are game consoles, people who only have one game
| console today have a phone.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| Phones are power-constrained devices with small screens.
| Consoles consume >100 watts under load with
| correspondingly higher performance and are connected to
| televisions. These are not the same market. They don't
| play the same games.
|
| Arguably gaming PCs (i.e. fast PCs with a suitable GPU)
| are in the same market, but this hasn't really added a
| competitor because Xbox and gaming PCs are both
| Microsoft, and most people don't have gaming PCs either.
| Jensson wrote:
| > Consoles consume >100 watts under load with
| correspondingly higher performance and are connected to
| televisions
|
| Not handheld consoles. And you can connect phones to
| large screens if you want.
|
| > They don't play the same games.
|
| Genshin impact and fortninte? They could play the same
| kind of games, they have weaker hardware so graphics wont
| be there true but they are still devices people play all
| kinds of games on.
|
| > These are not the same market
|
| Why not? Wasn't the original argument that these things
| are the same and therefore should be regulated the same?
| How do you differentiate "gaming console" from other
| computers?
|
| People will only buy gaming consoles as long as they are
| better for gaming than phones are, since people already
| have smartphones. That means that game consoles always
| face heavy competition from phones and need to stay ahead
| of them to sell anything at all.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > Not handheld consoles.
|
| Which is why handheld consoles are not in the same market
| either.
|
| > And you can connect phones to large screens if you
| want.
|
| Neither the user interface nor the input method is
| designed for this.
|
| > Genshin impact and fortninte? They could play the same
| kind of games, they have weaker hardware so graphics wont
| be there true but they are still devices people play all
| kinds of games on.
|
| There are kinds of games you can't play on a phone.
| Phones aren't part of the market for those kinds of
| games, and you can't get out of that by finding some
| different games that can run on a phone.
|
| > Wasn't the original argument that these things are the
| same and therefore should be regulated the same? How do
| you differentiate "gaming console" from other computers?
|
| They should be regulated the same because it's the same
| anti-competitive business practice -- tying app
| distribution to the platform and preventing third party
| competitors.
|
| Far from contradicting the claim, being separate markets
| is the entire problem -- instead of having a common
| market for console games or apps in general where anyone
| can be a distributor for any platform, each platform is
| segmented into a separate market with only a single
| distributor.
|
| What makes things be in the same market is the ability to
| substitute them for one another. If you need a wrench and
| they're sold at both Amazon and Walmart, you can
| substitute one store for the other. But if you need a
| wrench for your Xbox and only Amazon has wrenches that
| work on an Xbox whereas Walmart only has wrenches that
| work on PlayStations, you can't get what you need from
| Walmart anymore so Walmart is out of the market.
|
| > People will only buy gaming consoles as long as they
| are better for gaming than phones are, since people
| already have smartphones. That means that game consoles
| always face heavy competition from phones and need to
| stay ahead of them to sell anything at all.
|
| But it's trivial for them to do this because they have
| different design constraints. A phone runs on battery and
| has to fit in your pocket, so it can't use or dissipate
| >100 watts and it's easy to make a console that can which
| is significantly faster. Then all of the games requiring
| that level of performance are exclusive to the devices
| with that level of power consumption.
| smoldesu wrote:
| > There are kinds of games you can't play on a phone
|
| Actually, I'm curious; what are those games?
|
| I guess "GTA 5" is an acceptable answer. But if you're
| satisfied with 2fps, even that _should_ run through
| Rosetta /Box86 and GPT/Proton. Both modern Android and
| modern iOS devices should have the API coverage to enable
| DirectX12 via-translation, even if their hardware isn't
| particularly amicable to it.
|
| You can play Resident Evil 4 natively on an iPhone. You
| can play Half Life and Fallout: New Vegas locally on
| Android. It's not really a contradiction of your claim,
| but I don't think _anything_ really stops iPhones and
| Android phones from providing PC or console-quality game
| APIs anymore.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > But if you're satisfied with 2fps
|
| This is not "runs" in a practical sense. It has to be a
| reasonable substitute for the console.
|
| Here's the money question: If you're the developer of
| this game, can you reasonably stop selling it for
| consoles and paying the vig to the console makers by
| telling people to play it on their phone instead?
| Larrikin wrote:
| You're making stuff up. I only have one console because
| the majority of games outside of Nintendo first party
| games do not interest me. My cousin has one console
| because his parents told him he could only get one. My
| friend only has a PS5 because he does most of his gaming
| on the computer and wanted a similar experience when he
| feels like sitting on his couch. My coworker only owns a
| switch because she grew up wanting to play Mario and
| Zelda and her parents refused to let her ever get any
| video or PC games.
|
| Not every single person who plays video games is so
| hardcore about it that they must own the entire
| generation of consoles.
| Jensson wrote:
| You and your friends don't have smartphones? If you don't
| consider consoles a different kind of device then you
| shouldn't say you have just one if you have a smartphone
| as well.
| Jensson wrote:
| We want governments to prevent dominant players from
| cornering the market. Android has billions of active
| devices, the Switch is a tiny system in comparison so it
| isn't a dominant player.
|
| Or are you trying to say that consoles are a separate
| category of devices and shouldn't be compared to number of
| phones? Then why are you even arguing here, they are
| separate! So either these consoles are too tiny to be
| dominant players and therefore doesn't need to be regulated
| like dominant players, or they are a separate category and
| shouldn't be regulated with the same laws as phones.
| CharlesW wrote:
| > _Android has billions of active devices, the Switch is
| a tiny system in comparison so it isn 't a dominant
| player._
|
| But it is in console gaming. Even if you include Xbox and
| PS5, the Switch's market share of consoles is far higher
| than Apple's of smartphones. And of course, Switch
| absolutely dominates if we're specifically talking about
| the handheld game console market.
|
| So what I'm asking is: How is Apple a monopoly in a
| market where they don't dominate and there's lots of
| choice, while Nintendo is not in a market where there are
| 3 vendors that matter, and they completely dominate the
| handheld segment?
| Jensson wrote:
| How do you define "console gaming" that doesn't include
| smart phones? That was the whole point of this sub
| thread, arguing that consoles are just another general
| computing device.
|
| If you say they are different in a significant way then
| why would they have the same regulations?
| notnullorvoid wrote:
| It's not a punishment of "success", it's a restriction on
| monopolistic control of everyday devices which at this
| point are a basic utility.
|
| Game consoles are not ubiquitous devices, and certainly
| aren't a basic utility of modern day living.
| CharlesW wrote:
| If you had to classify the iPhone as either a console or
| a general-purpose computer, I think the answer is
| obvious. (For good reason: A relatively safe app store is
| a feature, not a bug, for average users.)
|
| Apple doesn't have monopolistic control over anything.
| The smartphone marketplace is full of competition, so
| consumers have lots of choices in every segment.
| yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
| > If you had to classify the iPhone as either a console
| or a general-purpose computer, I think the answer is
| obvious.
|
| Sure, it's obviously a computer.
|
| > Apple doesn't have monopolistic control over anything.
| The smartphone marketplace is full of competition, so
| consumers have lots of choices in every segment.
|
| How do you figure? If you want a phone, you're getting
| Android or iOS. In practice it is at best a duopoly.
| Rapzid wrote:
| It's punishing success like cutting the grass or trimming
| the bushes is punishing success.
| gjsman-1000 wrote:
| Never going to happen. Nobody has any interest in going after
| the gaming market (1), and the EU DMA was carefully written to
| not affect game console stores (2).
|
| (1) If "phones" are a category in most people's minds, it's a
| two horse race. Most people, however, think of "gaming devices"
| as the category, not "game consoles" like techies do - in which
| case, it's like an eight horse race between PC, PlayStation,
| Xbox, Nintendo, Steam Deck, smartphones themselves, GeForce
| Now, etc.
|
| Unlike smartphones, where if 2 companies decide to not service
| you, you're screwed; you've got tons of alternative ways to
| play, even within most households. Much harder to show
| anticompetitive interests.
|
| (2) One of the provisions of the DMA is that there must be over
| 10,000 titles for sale. Needless to say, even the prolific
| Nintendo Switch is under 5,000.
|
| Edit: And before anyone objects to me considering PC and game
| consoles in the same market; think like a lawyer. The very fact
| that people ask daily, "console or PC?" shows they are in the
| same market.
| johnnyanmac wrote:
| I think they aren't targets due to
|
| 1) not being a general purpose OS. Sony actually took at away
| that ability in the PS3 so they aren't trying to pretend they
| do more than play media
|
| 2) the hardware and software is ephemeral. In 10 years IOS and
| Android will exist. We will likely be on the PS6 and 2 more
| generations of Nintendo in that time. There's less incentive to
| bother opening up an OS that is abandoned every generation.
|
| 3) due to the model of consoles, most of them lose money on
| sales so they can invoke more software sales. And on top of
| that, larger studios get direct support from Nintendo/Sony.
| There is negative incentive for a studio to ruin this
| relationship unless more companies start making consoles
| themselves.
| lambda_lord wrote:
| Your second point is why the stores need to be opened up.
|
| Nintendo breaks compatibility almost every generation, so if
| you want to replay old games you already purchased on a
| previous console, you have to repurchase the ported versions
| or buy Nintendo's subscription service. I've dropped hundreds
| in the eShop but worry I'll lose access one day, when the
| Switch is EOL.
|
| In comparison, I've been able to run my Steam games on
| multiple devices through the years because PC is a much more
| open platform. There are multiple shops, so Steam has
| incentive to keep games forward compatible.
| filoleg wrote:
| That seems like a very uniquely Nintendo problem rather
| than a modern console problem.
|
| Yeah, PS3 was from the era of consoles where backwards
| compatibility wasn't as heavily demanded (given that Steam
| was in its infancy too), so they went with a notoriously
| and uniquely overcomplicated making games for it (and, by
| extension, compatibility). But PS4 era and onwards, any
| digital purchase you made back then for PS4 is accessible
| on PS5 as well.
|
| And hell, even for PS3 digital purchases it is still kind
| of true. Unfortunately, PS4/5 cannot play PS3 games
| natively, but if you purchased a digital PS3 game back
| then, you are able to stream it using PS Remote Play on
| your PS4/5.
|
| As far as I am aware, a similar thing happened in the Xbox
| space as well. Xbox One generation and onwards, any digital
| purchases you made back then are available on the most
| recent Xbox consoles. And for older games that aren't
| natively compatible (and even a bunch of those that are
| compatible), they provide streaming too (through xCloud).
| Though don't quote me on the exact details about how it
| works for Xbox consoles, as I haven't used one since the
| Xbox360 days.
|
| Meanwhile, Nintendo resells SNES era games in their
| "virtual console" section of Switch eShop at a pretty
| significant premium.
| filoleg wrote:
| Past the edit cutoff, so here is an important edit.
|
| In the 2nd paragraph, i missed a word and meant to say
| "[...] they went with a Cell chip, making gamedev
| experience for it notoriously and uniquely
| overcomplicated."
| ksec wrote:
| >so if you want to replay old games you already purchased
| on a previous console,
|
| I assume you can turn on your old console and replay those
| games right?
|
| Why does the next generation console has to guarantee to
| work with older games?
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > not being a general purpose OS. Sony actually took at away
| that ability in the PS3 so they aren't trying to pretend they
| do more than play media
|
| This is just assuming the conclusion. They're general purpose
| computers that could run arbitrary custom code if their
| owners weren't locked out of them.
|
| And so are appliances and HVAC systems and so on, which is
| exactly why the owners _shouldn 't_ be locked out of them --
| this has significant implications for the entire concept of
| ownership, right to repair and environmentalism etc. They're
| _all_ general purpose computers, and they should be.
|
| > the hardware and software is ephemeral. In 10 years IOS and
| Android will exist. We will likely be on the PS6 and 2 more
| generations of Nintendo in that time. There's less incentive
| to bother opening up an OS that is abandoned every
| generation.
|
| But this is making exactly the opposite argument -- it should
| be opened up because otherwise it will be abandoned and no
| one else can support it. Likewise, the newer system should be
| opened up so people can make it run the older games, or the
| games from other systems from other vendors, whenever
| possible.
|
| > due to the model of consoles, most of them lose money on
| sales so they can invoke more software sales. And on top of
| that, larger studios get direct support from Nintendo/Sony.
| There is negative incentive for a studio to ruin this
| relationship unless more companies start making consoles
| themselves.
|
| This is called a predatory business model, the equivalent of
| printer makers selling the printer below cost so they can
| stick you for the ink. There is a serious argument for
| banning it outright; it's certainly nothing we need to worry
| about protecting.
| ksec wrote:
| By that definition every single model that includes
| software will need to be opened up.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > By that definition every single model that includes
| software will need to be opened up.
|
| Sounds good.
| smoldesu wrote:
| I agree, good luck convincing the FCC.
| blueboo wrote:
| Agreed, mostly, as Id like to point out that the iOS software
| is abandoned/shut down at approximately the same cadence as
| new consoles are launched. Rare's the still-available app
| that was last updated pre-iOS 10...let alone iOS 5 or pre-
| retina iOS.
| asylteltine wrote:
| This switch is only useful when it can be hacked. It's SO
| much better when you can run whatever you want to run like
| emulators and other tooling. Or even crazy things, like
| backing up your saves!
| theshrike79 wrote:
| I'd posit that modern consoles are MORE general computing
| devices than mobile phones.
|
| For example the Apple M-series SOC only exists in Apple
| phones and tablets.
|
| Meanwhile the PS5, Xbox Series S/X, Steam Deck all use the
| AMD Zen 2 series CPUs. It's basically off-the shelf hardware
| with generic well-documented interfaces.
|
| The only reason we're not using the Xbox as a cheap Linux
| gaming machine is because it's absolutely closed up for all
| hacking.
| type0 wrote:
| > 1) not being a general purpose OS.
|
| I don't think iOS and Android are general purpose either.
| Phones and tablets are used for games as much as the consoles
| if not more in certain demographic
| pnw wrote:
| All of the recent legislation on this topic, including the EU
| Digital Markets Act, has a numerical unit cutoff which
| basically exempts all video game consoles.
| codedokode wrote:
| Absolutely unfair.
| bee_rider wrote:
| They should. But, more people have phones than consoles. It is
| not even that shocking for a phone to be somebody's only
| computing device. It is more important, and governments need to
| prioritize.
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| It isn't compelling to say that all these competing app stores
| form a monopoly. You have single someone out or the argument
| becomes weak.
| summerlight wrote:
| Those are not big enough to bother about and the power dynamic
| between the platform and its publishers is more even than those
| App Store/Play Store. Remember, regulation takes lots of
| resources.
| Razengan wrote:
| Wow that's a heck of a flimsy excuse, whenever this topic
| comes up
| crazygringo wrote:
| Yup, this is what bothers me the most. Either there's a
| principle here behind opening app stores or there isn't.
|
| If we're opening them up, then let's open them all up.
|
| The idea that video games or stores below a certain mega size
| should be exempt is absurd.
| smoldesu wrote:
| Consoles ship at a hardware loss, iPhones don't. The business
| comparison has always been a tough stretch, and the
| functional comparison of an iPhone to an
| Xbox/Keurig/dishwasher has always been absurd. Apple's
| service revenue channel is unprecedented, and so far
| unchallenged. In cases like Apple Music and the App Store, it
| is unquestionably at-odds with fair competition. Now,
| countries like Europe and Japan are using their markets as
| collateral at the negotiation table. Seems fair to me, given
| that Apple and Google are comfortable treating _their_
| userbases the same way.
| codedokode wrote:
| > Consoles ship at a hardware loss
|
| First, it might not be true (because all console contains
| is a PCB and several chips). Second, if you sell something
| cheaper than you could it doesn't mean you get some kind of
| privilege and exception from the law.
| ksec wrote:
| >If we're opening them up, then let's open them all up.
|
| What will happen to Apple Retail, 7-11, Costco and Walmart?
| Exoristos wrote:
| I'm pretty sure the principle is favoring Japanese
| businesses.
| gyomu wrote:
| Sony and Nintendo are Japanese companies. From the article:
|
| _> Japanese companies would be able to run dedicated game
| stores on iOS devices, as well as use payment systems with
| lower fees from Japanese fintech companies._
|
| It's not hard to read between the lines. This is all about
| letting domestic gaming companies like Nintendo and Sony make
| more money from those mobile platforms.
|
| The techie demographic likes to get lost into arguments about
| the technology and philosophy of computing platforms, but as
| far as the EU and Japan are concerned it's just realpolitik to
| give their domestic companies a leg up.
| TekMol wrote:
| I have a web application with a lot of users. My users are happy
| to use the web. But because of better monetization options, I
| sometimes dabble with the idea to build a native mobile app.
|
| Some years ago, I tried to build an Android app. It required an
| insane amount of tooling. Hundreds and hundreds of megabytes of
| stuff. GUI applications you have to use etc. I didn't even try to
| build an iOS app because that probably means you have to own a
| mac.
|
| Is this still the same?
|
| Or are there some linux command line tools these days I can use
| to convert a web app into an app that I can put on the
| Android/iOS app stores?
| layer8 wrote:
| It's still the same. You can rent a Mac in the cloud for iOS
| development though.
| mksybr wrote:
| You can build on the command line with gradle.
|
| I did end up installing Android Studio for the sdk and virtual
| machine installation, but I'd assume it could be done on the
| command line as well.
| jjnoakes wrote:
| I've downloaded just the command-line tools before and used
| 'sdkmanager' to list and download sdk versions and virtual
| machines, so it is definitely doable without Android Studio,
| although it isn't obvious (or at least it wasn't to me).
| elric wrote:
| I don't understand why this was getting downvoted? The parent
| commenter is right. You can build on the command line with
| gradle. It will still download hundreds of megabytes worth of
| dependencies (the Android SDK etc). But at least you don't
| need any GUI tools.
| mathiasgredal wrote:
| I have done this, but for some reason Android SDK has to be
| weird, so you have to download the SDK seperately and then
| create a properties file in to root of the project with the
| path to the Android SDK. Everyone then also has to have their
| own version of this file, since the path is likely different.
| You also have to make sure that everyone downloads the same
| version of the SDK. (also the path to the SDK cannot have any
| spaces)
|
| Why can it not be like other Gradle dependencies, where
| Gradle will just download the files automatically?
| whstl wrote:
| There are things like Cordova that make it a bit easier, but
| yes you need hundreds of MBs of stuff to compile and test.
| Debugging was a bit of a nightmare, though.
|
| It is also possible to deploy to Apple with things like Github
| Actions without personally owning a Mac (and it can publish to
| Google too, naturally), but then testing is not trivial.
|
| I know 90% of HN will disagree but there is a market
| opportunity here to make this better.
| stouset wrote:
| I'll be honest, if you don't own or regularly use a Mac or an
| iPhone, the odds that you are going to make compelling
| software for either of those platforms is effectively zero.
|
| The web and app stores are littered with the corpses of
| failed, poorly-ported iOS and macOS utilities written by
| developers who didn't fully understand that those systems
| have their own design language, cultural norms, and feature
| sets. They chew through battery, perform poorly, confuse
| users, look like shit, and feel completely alien.
|
| Should that totally stop you from porting some useful tool?
| Maybe not. But the chance that it will see any sort of use
| outside of an extremely niche set of users is slim and it's
| worth accepting that upfront if you're going to spend your
| time and effort on it.
| Jensson wrote:
| Games are the main appstore revenue driver, and I don't
| think that game ports have much to do with iOs standards.
| It isn't like Fortnite or Genshin Impact on iPhone is
| significantly different than on Android.
| stouset wrote:
| No, but it doesn't sound like GP was talking about games.
| Yes, games are a completely different animal.
| whstl wrote:
| True, but there is also a business opportunity for
| dramatically simplifying game deployment, not only web
| apps.
|
| Unity has tools that can partially help with that but
| their execution also sucks. You still need some half-
| working script downloaded from Github or some random site
| to deploy to Apple/Google if you don't want the hassle of
| using the default tools.
|
| It's the same for consoles. It's an ungodly pain in the
| ass even with Unity. Godot makes some of its money by
| porting to consoles, for example. But I don't know if
| there's any money there for a scalable solution.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| I assume "games" here means gambling? Or something that
| is not legally gambling, but effectively is.
| HideousKojima wrote:
| It means video games. And even amongst the most predatory
| mobile games, not all of them use gambling-adjacent
| "gacha" mechanics, plenty just have mountains of
| microtransactions.
| numpad0 wrote:
| Apple cracked down on traditional gaming on iOS, and as
| an unforseen side effect, yes, "mobile gaming" means
| suggestive gambling apps that are eating the world.
| mmebane wrote:
| Genshin Impact is (potentially) an interesting case - the
| iOS version has supported game controllers for almost 3
| years now, but there's been no hint of support coming for
| Android. There's definitely some suspicion in the Genshin
| community that Apple has an understanding or agreement
| with Hoyoverse to keep iOS the premier mobile platform.
| vladvasiliu wrote:
| While I agree that the app will likely feel off, that
| doesn't mean it won't work, depending on what it does.
|
| I have an iPhone, and even though the number of non-default
| apps I use is quite small, I get the feeling that every
| other app is just a web view wrapper or whatever that just
| doesn't care about iOS standards. The examples that come to
| mind are: Uber, Teams and Philips Hue. The latter is a
| laggy mess for some reason, that behaves the same on an
| iphone 14 pro as on a 7. Teams also is a shitshow, but who
| does that actually surprise?
| austinprete wrote:
| Huh, surprised by this because the Hue app runs great for
| me, don't think I've ever seen it lag as a daily user for
| a couple years. Honestly kind of blown away but how well
| it (and the Hue platform as a whole) works coming from a
| company that I don't usually associate with tech.
|
| Goes to show that experience doesn't always generalize,
| and I'm curious what's different in our cases to cause
| that (since I'm also using on a iPhone 14 Pro).
| vladvasiliu wrote:
| I'm generally very happy with how my Hue setup works, but
| for some reason the Hue app sometimes lags on the simpler
| screens, like the settings tab and configuring the
| remotes' buttons. The Home tab where you set the scenes /
| brightness and such usually works fine.
| pests wrote:
| > sometimes lags on the simpler screens, like the
| settings tab and configuring the remotes' buttons
|
| That's because there is no cloud storage or place to
| store those settings other than the devices (or the
| bridge) themselves.
|
| You are not waiting on the app. You are waiting on a
| request and response to the device over Zigbee to save
| the settings, which is not an instant action.
|
| Maybe they could just close the screen and finish the
| work in the background, but I like knowing it completed
| successfully.
| bitzun wrote:
| I hear this refrain a lot, but the reasons I've gotten
| for native apps vs webapps were not very compelling to
| me. I'd be interested in a detailed comparison of some
| real examples of native and web (or react native-like or
| webview wrapper) apps and the practical differences
| (excluding obvious ones like hardware access.)
| type0 wrote:
| > Teams also is a shitshow
|
| I heard it works wonderful if you use Microsoft Surface
| Duo devices
| derefr wrote:
| What is "compelling software"?
|
| Say there exists a single-page, single-view form-based web
| utility (e.g. a tax calculator for some niche.) Does the
| job. Efficient UX. Solves a need rather than a want, so it
| doesn't need to be pretty.
|
| Only problem is that it's hosted on some old website,
| meaning:
|
| 1. you have to bookmark it (and the bookmark probably
| doesn't come with a nice icon, and you could lose track of
| it in the future because it's not part of some "store
| download history" list);
|
| 2. you can't access the calculator when offline;
|
| 3. the site's server could go down tomorrow, and then
| "your" calculator wouldn't be there any more.
|
| AFAICT, from the perspective of a mobile user, the only
| thing that could possibly be _improved_ about this
| experience, would be the very fact of it being hosted on
| the web. As long as it 's made into a client-local
| installable package, registered in an app store with a name
| and icon, all the above problems are solved. And you get
| those key advantages, just by saving the webpage .html to a
| file, wrapping it in Cordova or whatever, and submitting
| that as your app.
|
| (You _also_ get _almost_ these advantages using Progressive
| Web Apps that use offline capabilities -- all _except for_
| discoverability and esp. _re_ -discoverability through a
| unified app-store UX. If the app stores allowed the
| submission of PWAs, such that they appeared in the store
| listings and download history right alongside native apps,
| I think a lot of use-cases for Cordova et al would be
| moot.)
| newaccount74 wrote:
| In theory I agree with you.
|
| In practice, poorly ported web apps often fail in various
| ways. Things like content covered by the keyboard, or the
| layout breaking when you rotate the device, or random
| other stuff that results from a lack of testing. It's
| what happens when developers don't use the device they're
| targeting.
| type0 wrote:
| > What is "compelling software"?
|
| "Compelling" software in the one you are compelled to
| use, for example you go to a techy-utopia-restaurant and
| want to order order your food, but then are compelled to
| install their app because their system is automated /s
| staplers wrote:
| confuse users, look like shit, and feel completely alien.
|
| Developers eyes glaze over when you start talking about
| users.
| whstl wrote:
| I agree in principle, however IMO there is room for much
| simpler apps that don't necessarily follow the UI
| conventions of the platform and still provide a magical
| experience. The keyword here being "simple".
|
| The app of my Bank (Commerzbank) looks the same in both
| platforms (despite being native, last time I asked), and
| IMO provides a much better experience than lots of native
| Apple or Google tools. And IMO a better UI/UX too. Same
| with Monobank from Ukraine, astonishing app that doesn't
| really care about the platform and gets things done in IMO
| a better way than native-inspired apps.
|
| I would prefer for most apps to move into the Commerzbank
| direction than in the... I don't know, Pixelmator? Which is
| 100% native but still feels very unintuitive sometimes
| ("Save as" for example) despite being my daily pic editor
| for 15 years...
| beepbooptheory wrote:
| Isnt this what style guides and, like, profiling are for?
| Which we should be using anyway right?
|
| I don't understand this fundamentally epistemological
| point. I thought in some part my skill as a programmer is
| being able make things _not_ necessarily for me. Or at
| least, as a (maybe kind of niche) frontend dev, I don 't
| think I would have ever gotten a job without some semblance
| of that skill.
|
| I feel like if I relied on my own experience instead of
| agreed upon standards I would be much more a designer who
| makes bad code than a coder who maybe just needs a little
| design/ux direction.
|
| ps: Is this not a sufficient resource?
|
| https://developer.apple.com/design/human-interface-
| guideline...
| stouset wrote:
| That is absolutely a useful resource, maybe even a
| _necessary_ one, but I personally doubt it's sufficient.
|
| It'd be like trying to learn a foreign language entirely
| off something like Duolingo. At some point the only way
| for you to communicate like a native is going to be to
| embed yourself in the language and culture, otherwise
| you'll never quite express things like a native.
| wouldbecouldbe wrote:
| I know you can't port a web app to it easily. But Expo,
| wrapper around React Native, does do a great job at handling
| that. It also comes with a build in ci/cd and over the air
| bug fixes (alternative to codepush)
|
| I've set up a custom flow with Fastlane with React Native.
| Works pretty well, but Major Version, OS and architecture
| update are a huge pain.
| whstl wrote:
| Interesting. I haven't worked with React Native or Expo,
| but that sounds exactly like what I was suggesting.
| wouldbecouldbe wrote:
| It's YC funded:
| https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/expo
| a1o wrote:
| > Debugging was a bit of a nightmare
|
| Debug in Android Studio, connect phone on USB, enable USB
| debugging, hit play button
|
| Debug in Xcode, connect iphone (wireless), hit play button
| whstl wrote:
| Exactly. You need Android Studio or Xcode. Fucking pain in
| the ass.
| noarchy wrote:
| You don't need them, but they do make things easier for a
| lot of people. With Android, at least, you can do plenty
| from the command line if that's your jam.
| whstl wrote:
| My problem with them is not so much that they are GUI
| tools. It's more that they are bloated, low-quality and a
| bit unpredictable. IMO and IME, of course. They do get
| the job done, and people can get used to them if they use
| daily. But if using them is not your daily job (and
| Stockholm Syndrome hasn't set in), they make for a
| terrible developer experience. They take a lot of time to
| setup and there's often various problems with versioning,
| for example. All IMO and IME, of course.
|
| I used to work in a Cordova/PhoneGap/Ionic/[whatever the
| name is today] app I had to make those bi-monthly
| excursions to the codebase that would always take a
| couple days because of Android Studio or Xcode. Setting
| the tooling in a new computer or teaching this to a new
| developer would require a lot of fiddling with version
| for half a day or more until it worked properly.
|
| Sure, if you work on it everyday it doesn't suck, but
| working with multiple apps or working with different
| things was always a terrible experience.
| yoz-y wrote:
| I only used Android Studio when it was in beta so can't
| say much about that. But XCode is honestly quite good,
| not perfect by any means, but especially with Swift and
| SwiftUI it has some really good features (to wit: live
| previews).
|
| Provisioning and testing purchases is always a mess, but
| that's mostly because the code world meets politics
| there.
| whstl wrote:
| Again, they're fine for development as a daily driver.
| For casual use (occasional maintenance/debugging,
| publishing), not so much.
| pelagicAustral wrote:
| for a small window of time, there was an alternative...
| https://creolabs.com/ but this is gone now.
| Alifatisk wrote:
| Not if you use Flutter
| smallnix wrote:
| Does anyone use that in production for large B2C
| applications?
| quaintdev wrote:
| Google pay is written in Flutter
| surajrmal wrote:
| https://flutter.dev/showcase has many high profile examples
| maelito wrote:
| The French railway ticket website, sncf-connect.com is in
| Flutter.
|
| Largest e-commerce service in France.
| MajimasEyepatch wrote:
| Flutter is pretty nice, but I have a really hard time
| trusting Google to continue supporting it.
| etchalon wrote:
| Google has Bubblwrap, which will take any PWA and create an
| Android wrapper for you:
| https://developers.google.com/codelabs/pwa-in-play#0
|
| There are tools like that for iOS too, but you absolutely have
| to have a Mac.
| tadfisher wrote:
| Google has a CLI tool for producing an APK bundle:
| https://github.com/GoogleChromeLabs/bubblewrap
|
| Tutorial here: https://developers.google.com/codelabs/pwa-in-
| play
| charcircuit wrote:
| >It required an insane amount of tooling.
|
| The all the extra tooling makes it easier to make Android apps.
| Nothing is stopping you from downloading the Java JDK and
| Android SDK and running javac, d8, aapt2, zipalign, and
| apksigner yourself.
| wiseowise wrote:
| > Nothing is stopping you from downloading the Java JDK and
| Android SDK and running javac, d8, aapt2, zipalign, and
| apksigner yourself.
|
| That is the tooling that OP is talking about.
| charcircuit wrote:
| It sounded to me that they thought they had to use Android
| Studio as they were complaining about a GUI.
| eomgames wrote:
| I've had success with react native for deploying web type apps
| onto both ios and android. Expo really flattens the learning
| curve, it's something to grow out of for sure. I look at it
| like having an app vs wanting to have an app.
| freedomben wrote:
| What do you use for front end for your web app? If you use
| React or Vue or something that does client-side rendering, you
| can often turn your app into a PWA fairly trivially by just
| adding a manifest. That is IMHO _definitely_ the way to go as
| long as you don 't need to use native functionality/APIs.
|
| PWAs are still a little tougher on Apple since Apple holds the
| reins to their platform _very_ tightly and doesn 't want apps
| getting to users without going through "curation," so if iOS is
| an important market for you and your users will find you
| _through_ the app store (rather than looking for you in the app
| store after finding you elsewhere), then a PWA may not be the
| best choice.
|
| If you use server-side rendering, then it will of course be
| more work, but I'd still probably go the PWA route and write it
| in React or Vue. You already know JS so there's much less
| learning, and it's the most "write once run anywhere" that
| there is. You'll likely have to buy a mac though, although
| there are services you can "rent" one for
| building/signing/submitting to Apple.
|
| React Native can be a good option as well, especially if you
| need to call native APIs or must be in the Apple store (Google
| Play Store can take you as a PWA). Most of your code can be
| js/ts so less learning curve, and you can generate a
| submittable app package that can go in the Apple store (and of
| course Google).
|
| If you need to make extensive use of native APIs though, then a
| real native app may be better, though of course you will need a
| separate one for ios and android, and there's a lot of learning
| to do. And you'll definitely have to buy a mac.
|
| tldr: a PWA is (probably) the way to go
| stronglikedan wrote:
| > But because of better monetization options, I sometimes
| dabble with the idea to build a native mobile app.
|
| Likely not in this case.
| mouzogu wrote:
| just porting a basic chrome web extension, like 2 js files to
| safari requires something like 10 GB of Xcode downloads and
| various other crap.
|
| i'm not doing that.
| holoduke wrote:
| Why not if I may ask? Vim only user? Its possible to build
| ios and android apps with your own build tools. Its a lot
| true.
| holoduke wrote:
| Try to create a app like behavior in javascript and use a
| webview in android and ios to wrap your app. We do it like
| that. You will still have some native parts like push
| notifications, ads, social logins etc. But your ui render is
| web. Just make sure you have an app like experience. Doable
| these days.
| anordal wrote:
| The irony is that most people who think they want an app would
| not see the difference between that and a shortcut to your
| webpage.
| izacus wrote:
| So the size of the tooling was about the same size as the your
| web app pushes on every user?
|
| The horror.
| beretguy wrote:
| Look into PWA.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| _I tried to build an Android app. It required an insane amount
| of tooling. Hundreds and hundreds of megabytes of stuff. GUI
| applications you have to use etc._
|
| FPGA developers snicker under their breath, but if you look
| closely you can see the tears welling up in their eyes...
| rmbyrro wrote:
| Perhaps a progressive web app will work for you
| Pxtl wrote:
| I remember whent the DMCA was being proposed, there were
| arguments that the anti-circumvention protections would basically
| allow copyright holders to rewrite copyright law however they saw
| fit, with no regards to fair use.
|
| With or without the DMCA, that's proven prophetic. Between
| cryptographic protections and server-based architecture, we're
| into an era where "owning" things now means whatever the seller
| wants it to mean.
| layer8 wrote:
| https://archive.ph/KUyIW
| tehlike wrote:
| I'm curious how much apple and Google will be allowed to charge
| for alternative payment methods. In Korea, google and apple
| (iirc) still can charge 26% of the transaction as their fee,
| making the change fairly moot (and even counter productive).
| kelthuzad wrote:
| when sideloading is finally available I don't see how Apple (or
| Google) would receive any share of developer profits since they
| can't see or control 3rd party payment api calls made by devs
| freedomben wrote:
| I think Google really made a strategic mistake by copying Apple
| on the payment restrictions. It kills me to see Apple and Google
| lumped together as "monopolies" when Google's policy is IMHO 100x
| less monopolistic than Apple's given you can sideload and use
| completely different app stores, and enable "developer mode"
| without paying a subscription fee just to run your own app on
| your own device. But the payment restrictions are definitely
| monopolistic-style abuse. Had they not have copied that, I don't
| think they'd be under this microscope and losing lawsuits and
| what not.
|
| It does still blow my mind that Apple won their lawsuit from
| Epic, yet Google lost, when Google is far less restrictive. IANAL
| but from what I've understood it mainly came down to the fact
| that G execs put the stuff in writing whereas Apple did not, so
| with G there was some real damning evidence of the anti-
| competitive behavior. But ironically, the reason G execs were in
| the position of having to buy off people and make deals to stifle
| competition is because of their looser reins over the platform.
| If they'd been draconian and hyper-controlling from the start,
| refusing side-loading and similar like Apple does, they wouldn't
| have had to pay people off and make deals to crush competition as
| that competition couldn't have even gotten off the ground in the
| first place.
| jahewson wrote:
| > enable "developer mode" without paying a subscription fee
| just to run your own app on your own device
|
| Apple actually doesn't charge a fee for this. You can build an
| app in Xcode and install it on your own device. You can't
| distribute that app publicly though.
|
| > G execs were in the position of having to buy off people
|
| There's your answer - having a monopoly is not problem,
| _abusing_ it is.
| ElectroNomad wrote:
| It only works for around 10 days...
| jahewson wrote:
| 1 year if you have a developer account, otherwise yeah 7
| days?
| bpye wrote:
| There are also entitlements you still can't use and a 3
| app limit with a free account, at the very least.
| jahewson wrote:
| That's true!
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > There's your answer - having a monopoly is not problem,
| _abusing_ it is.
|
| But tying (e.g. of an app store to a platform) is classic
| monopoly abuse.
| peyton wrote:
| Tying means forcing people to buy an undesired good when
| they buy a desired good. Is anybody buying an iPhone who
| doesn't want the App Store?
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| Of course there are. There are people who like the
| hardware, or the OS, or don't want a green bubble, but
| would be happy to have F-Droid or Steam on iOS, or get a
| discount on existing apps by buying them through someone
| who charges a lower fee. Or just have the competition to
| Apple's store which could cause Apple to charge a lower
| fee themselves.
| summerlight wrote:
| https://www.justice.gov/archives/atr/competition-and-
| monopol...
|
| Your interpretation on tying is not well aligned with
| usual legal interpretation. Unless the App Store is
| considered not to be a separate product (which had been
| Apple's argument for a long time on App Store and Safari
| by designating them as "system services of iOS"), this is
| clearly tying. The question is if Apple's current
| practice is illegal tying or not. Whether the customer
| wants it or not is not important here; you can give them
| freely to gain market dominance then reap profits later
| on whenever the competitors are all gone.
| mmanfrin wrote:
| > having a monopoly is not problem, abusing it is.
|
| Having a monopoly should be case enough.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > IANAL but from what I've understood it mainly came down to
| the fact that G execs put the stuff in writing whereas Apple
| did not, so with G there was some real damning evidence of the
| anti-competitive behavior.
|
| It mainly came down to the fact that they were in different
| courtrooms and the higher-level appellate courts haven't yet
| decided how they're going to reconcile the results (possibly by
| overturning one of them).
|
| It's kind of an interesting case study in the arbitrariness of
| the law. The most important question in either case is if
| excluding competing app stores is permissible. It's obviously
| anti-competitive, but doing anti-competitive things is
| sometimes allowed if you have a legitimate justification.
| Apple's argument is presumably that they need to for security.
| This is, of course, BS, because a user who wanted Apple to vet
| all of their apps could still choose not to install any from
| outside of Apple's store even if Apple didn't prohibit them
| from doing so.
|
| Google could make the same claim -- they have to discourage
| these filthy competitors because some of them might not be
| selective enough in what they include, so suppressing them
| improves security -- and it would be equally BS. But then you
| uncover some emails that make them look _unsympathetic_ , or
| admitting that the pretext is a farce, and now it's less likely
| they get away with the charade.
|
| The root of the problem here is that the rule that you can do
| something anti-competitive if you have an excuse has the
| potential to swallow the entire law. "Our competitors are
| smelly and vile and we have to protect our customers from
| interacting with them even if the customer explicitly wants to
| do that" is a generic excuse that could be used to justify any
| anti-competitive behavior. That's easier to see if you can read
| some emails conceding the underlying motive, but it's true in
| either case. Hopefully the higher courts will be able to see
| that in both cases once they've seen it in one of them.
| fsckboy wrote:
| > _higher-level appellate courts haven 't yet decided how
| they're going to reconcile the results_
|
| there are many areas of the law that don't set precedent and
| don't need reconciliation
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| Both of the cases have been appealed. Appellate court
| decisions set precedent within their jurisdiction. If the
| Supreme Court takes the case (not unreasonable that the two
| could be heard together), they'll issue an opinion and
| create a national precedent.
| toasted-subs wrote:
| Let alone you have to pay a subscription fee for Apple.
| udkl wrote:
| stratechery has a reasonable explanation in one of the recent
| articles :
|
| "That last point may seem odd in light of Apple's victory, but
| again, Apple was offering an integrated product that it fully
| controlled and customers were fully aware of, and is thus,
| under U.S. antitrust law, free to set the price of entry
| however it chooses. Google, on the other hand, "entered into
| one or more agreements that unreasonably restrained trade" --
| that quote is from the jury instructions, and is taken directly
| from the Sherman Act -- by which the jurors mean basically all
| of them: the Google Play Developer Distribution Agreement,
| investment agreements under the Games Velocity Program (i.e.
| Project Hug), and Android's mobile application distribution
| agreement and revenue share agreements with OEMs, were all
| ruled illegal.
|
| This goes back to the point I made above: Google's fundamental
| legal challenge with Android is that it sought to have its cake
| and eat it too: it wanted all of the shine of open source and
| all of the reach and network effects of being a horizontal
| operating system provider and all of the control and profits of
| Apple, but the only way to do that was to pretty clearly (in my
| opinion) violate antitrust law."
|
| The key is 'unreasonably restrained trade' - Any OEM was
| eligible to use Android, but what google did was restrict
| competition by 'entered into one or more agreements that
| unreasonably restrained trade'
|
| https://stratechery.com/2023/googles-true-moonshot/
| robertlagrant wrote:
| I think even this is a little unfair. Almost no one buys
| Android because they are a horizontal operating systems
| provider, and OEMs don't use it because of same, because the
| former don't care and the latter already know the reality.
| People use it because it's their best option, and not due to
| any monopolistic practices excluding alternatives. It's just
| the best option.
| LargeTomato wrote:
| Agreed. If Google locked down their app store more
| aggressively they'd be legally in the clear. They played
| nice, just not nice enough, so they got anti-trusted.
| type0 wrote:
| > product that it fully controlled and customers were fully
| aware of
|
| No my experience, there are plenty of these techy customers
| online but I have yet to meet such Apple user IRL
| Terretta wrote:
| >> _product that it fully controlled and customers were
| fully aware of_
|
| > _No my experience, there are plenty of these techy
| customers online but I have yet to meet such Apple user
| IRL_
|
| The entire premise and point of the Apple experience is not
| having to be fully aware of the tech. At all. Ever.
|
| For most Apple users, the tech is just not the point. It's
| that it is air. Don't think about it unless it's missing or
| stinks.
| gchamonlive wrote:
| Google couldn't have been restrictive from the start because of
| how Android came and solidified itself. Google tapped and
| profitted heavily on opensource, whereas apple had not only
| their OS but all the hardware developed in-house, without
| external collaboration for the most part.
|
| The scenario surrounding iOS history lends itself pretty well
| for solid walled gardens
| GeekyBear wrote:
| > It does still blow my mind that Apple won their lawsuit from
| Epic, yet Google lost
|
| When Google chose to open the Android OS, it created a
| marketplace for Android devices which it attempted to control
| by the use of anticompetitive contracts and actions.
|
| The parallels with Microsoft and Windows are obvious. Microsoft
| has been found guilty of anticompetitive actions in the Windows
| PC marketplace it created by opening up Windows.
|
| Yet Microsoft also has the XBox, which it did not open up to
| other hardware makers and which is just as much of a walled
| garden as iOS.
|
| There have been no legal ramifications of Microsoft choosing to
| be the sole maker it's own product, nor of having it's product
| be a walled garden.
|
| It's not illegal to have a monopoly over your own product and
| it's not illegal to have a walled garden.
| CydeWeys wrote:
| > It's not illegal to have a monopoly over your own product
| and it's not illegal to have a walled garden.
|
| The larger point being made is that once your product has a
| commanding share of the market, it should be illegal, as it's
| clearly anticompetitive by that point.
| GeekyBear wrote:
| Then you will have to make it illegal for Microsoft to have
| products like Microsoft Office or XBox that it has not
| opened up.
| 0xFF0123 wrote:
| I would understand the argument that the office doc file
| format should be public and understandable, but I don't
| see an argument that the program itself should be open.
| GeekyBear wrote:
| I believe the argument that grandparent comment made was
| that "once your product has a commanding share of the
| market, it should be illegal, as it's clearly
| anticompetitive by that point"
| sensanaty wrote:
| I don't think anyone would be against breaking up M$ a
| bit. Why wouldn't you want some proper M$ Office
| alternatives?
|
| Xbox is a bit trickier presumably because of PC gaming
| and Sony/Nintendo, though considering it's M$ I say fuck
| it and force them to open it up anyways.
| nicce wrote:
| > If they'd been draconian and hyper-controlling from the
| start, refusing side-loading and similar like Apple does, they
| wouldn't have had to pay people off and make deals to crush
| competition as that competition couldn't have even gotten off
| the ground in the first place.
|
| Difference here is that Apple manufactures and controls all the
| devices but Google does not.
|
| When Google's decisions impact other manufactures or they even
| are dependent on it, it becomes monopoly problem. But Apple
| does not impact anybody else.
| orenlindsey wrote:
| I agree, Google is wayyyy less monopolistic than Apple. And
| it's absolutely hilarious that Google lost while Apple won.
| madeofpalk wrote:
| The jury found that Google created a market of Android app
| distribution, and then they squashed competition in that
| market.
|
| No just market exists for Apple (it's an entirely closed and
| self-contained ecosystem) so there was no need to 'squash
| competition' - it just doesn't exist!
|
| https://www.theverge.com/24003500/epic-v-google-loss-apple-w...
| solidsnack9000 wrote:
| I am puzzled as to how Apple -- or especially Google -- are
| supposed to run their business given this: "The legislation aims
| to force them to allow third-party app stores and payment systems
| as long as they are secure and protect user privacy."
|
| At present, Apple's model is based on a certain expected revenue
| per device that is a combination of some profit on the device and
| some profit due to apps. If the profit due to apps is reduced
| somehow, it stands to reason that profit on the device must go up
| -- in other words, the device must be sold for a higher price.
|
| Google does not always even sell the device and Android is open
| source -- the only revenue Google gets from many devices,
| apparently, is app sales.
|
| Maybe the margins of free-and-clear profit for Apple and Google
| are high enough that this really doesn't matter -- they'll still
| be able to cover whatever costs they formerly had with plenty
| left over to spare -- but even given that, I do wonder what the
| regulators think Apple and Google are going to do about a change
| like this.
|
| _EDIT_
|
| It seems like many people are taking the lead sentence ("I am
| puzzled as to how...") as expressing sympathy for Apple, Google
| and other large monopolies (one commenter writes "We shouldn't
| weep for monopolies."). This is not the focus I wanted to bring
| to the topic -- really it is more about how they will change,
| given that the old way of running their business will not work at
| the same rate of profit anymore. Maybe many commenters think that
| the rate of profit is high enough that nothing will change, &c.
| One commenter writes "Maybe by selling hardware?", but then I
| wonder, will Apple adjust prices upward? Maybe only in Japan?
|
| One commenter asks "Why should anyone be concerned with the well-
| being of Apple or Google?" and I would say, I'm not sure they
| should be; but it's worthwhile to be concerned about how they
| respond to this situation. I also wonder what the regulators
| thought about this problem -- how they modeled the tech giants'
| response.
| echelon wrote:
| > I am puzzled as to how Apple -- or especially Google -- are
| supposed to run their business given this
|
| Maybe by selling hardware? Maybe by offering a better set of
| platform services than everyone else? Proper competition in a
| market full of alternatives.
|
| We shouldn't weep for monopolies. Especially given the
| smartphone is the most important invention and device of the
| century. They've managed to become central to every type of
| communication and commerce, and they're dominated by two
| companies. There should be intense competition for this space,
| not a steady state between two giants.
|
| These companies are obscene with the control they wield. They
| tax 30% of revenue, force you to use their payment and login
| rails, prevent you from having any sort of customer
| relationship of your own, let competitors place ads against
| your product (forcing you to pay even more), and don't even let
| you make your own technology choices or deploy when you want.
|
| They're not customer friendly either. They give children
| psychological issues about having the latest device and right
| color text bubbles. They don't let you self service, replace
| the battery, and brick themselves when you use third party
| components.
|
| These devices are essential for navigation, dating, hailing a
| ride, delivering food or items, ordering at or reserving a
| restaurant, performing many types of jobs, finding work,
| scheduling events, etc. etc. etc. It's almost impossible to
| live without one. And every action gets taxed and controlled by
| two companies.
|
| These two companies are heinous and this needs to immediately
| be opened up for competition from all sides. This is broader
| than Standard Oil even dreamed.
| colechristensen wrote:
| Apple having a market cap of 3 trillion dollars... I mean, I
| think they'll be ok. This is, in fact, a strong indicator that
| they do not need the protection of app store exclusivity.
| TheLoafOfBread wrote:
| I mean, when I was buying something on Windows, it won't forced
| me to use Microsoft App Store. So why Google and Apple should
| be an exception?
| izzydata wrote:
| It's better for the consumer when businesses aren't near
| monopolies. Why should anyone be concerned with the well-being
| of Apple or Google? They have had a lot of time running their
| anti-competitive companies. I think they will be fine. Not to
| mention the US is incapable of enacting anti-trust laws the way
| it should so there will always be at least one country that
| will get exploited.
| jncfhnb wrote:
| Apple can suck on the fact that software distribution is
| something that ought to be perfect competition with basically
| no profit margin and take the L.
| bdcravens wrote:
| (Ignoring the fact that both companies are ridiculously huge
| before the first penny of app store revenue)
|
| - Apple makes a tremendous profit off of device sales.
|
| - While Android is free, Google charges licensing fees for
| Google Mobile Services (which includes Play Store, so perhaps
| companies could omit that, but I don't think that'll happen
| anytime soon)
| dehrmann wrote:
| I'm curious to see how this shakes out. Will there be viable
| third-party app stores? Will we find that the gatekeepers added
| value in controlling quality? How many viable apps did they keep
| of the market for anticompetitive reasons? What does a more fair
| revenue cut look like?
| seydor wrote:
| we are not going to uncharted territory. this has been the
| standard way to install applications since the beginning of
| time, it is only in the past 15 years that the general publi
| has been deemed "too dumb to save themselves"
| dehrmann wrote:
| Ignore that *nix distros have had package management for a
| long time. Those platforms are too niche to draw conclusions
| from.
|
| I used to fix computers as a side hustle from ~2000-~2006.
| There was a lot of shit software on the market, no one knew
| what was good, and the public really was "too dumb to save
| themselves." Back then, just look at antivirus software.
| These days, look at VPN snake oil. What's different now is
| apps are more sandboxed, but new apps are just a few taps
| away.
| izacus wrote:
| And that's a small cost to pay to make sure market
| competition still exists in the future and that the
| corporations in the west are forced to innovate instead of
| killing economy by stagnation and walled gardens.
| spogbiper wrote:
| I'm not sure how you define "viable" but Amazon has their own
| app store for Android. I recall that some years ago I installed
| it because they gave away paid apps every so often. Looks like
| its still a thing: https://www.amazon.com/gp/mas/get/amazonapp
| octacat wrote:
| Web platform is already pretty secure/privacy oriented (maybe
| more than the phone apps).
|
| But web apps are impossible to install on the phones, because
| apple/google love and push their native apps (love their 30%
| cut).
|
| oh, people would say "but what is about resources?"... - many
| apps are just web-view anyway.
| i5-2520M wrote:
| How are web apps impossible to install?
| octacat wrote:
| You have to use browser on mobile to enter them (no way to
| add an icon for them). + there are some other limitations.
| There was an article about that.
|
| Web platform is pretty capable to be used for app
| development, it would save a lot of developer hours to not
| develop for 3 platforms.
| danieldrehmer wrote:
| *to katana slice
| kmeisthax wrote:
| For context, the Japanese market is as favorable to Apple as
| America is. Japan has a lot of very specific features that phones
| need to support[0] and Apple is usually ahead of Google on
| implementing them. This is in contrast to the EU where Android
| dominates because they used to be the only 'cheap' option.
|
| [0] Most notably, Felica, the protocol used by all the
| contactless payment cards Japan's transit systems use. If you've
| ever been to Japan, you probably have a PASMO or Suica card[1]
| knocking around somewhere in your drawer. Japanese flipphones
| have supported that protocol since right when it came out. Apple
| added it at the same time they added Apple Pay and NFC support in
| the states.
|
| Also, emoji _used_ to be a Japan-only thing that required an NTT
| or AU SIM until westerners started noticing the funny faces and
| started writing copy-paste apps to get around the missing
| keyboard.
|
| [1] Suica game but it's transit cards instead of watermelons
| codedokode wrote:
| Shouldn't this apply to Japanese game consoles as well? Why
| American companies must allow third-party stores, but consoles
| must not?
| hinkley wrote:
| I don't want to sift through garbage and spyware on my phone, so
| I've always been a bit, "why is this a problem" about this whole
| situation, but recently had the thought, "I sure would like to
| not have to but the Civ VI expansions through both Steam and the
| App Store."
|
| It makes me wonder, if Apple and/or Google partnered with Valve
| if that would be enough good will, or if nobody will be happy
| until every device is a market for lemons.
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