[HN Gopher] Apple ordered to open up in-app purchases in Brazil
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       Apple ordered to open up in-app purchases in Brazil
        
       Author : impish9208
       Score  : 34 points
       Date   : 2024-11-26 12:10 UTC (10 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (techcrunch.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (techcrunch.com)
        
       | hu3 wrote:
       | > The Brazilian regulator has determined that Apple should allow
       | app developers to link to external websites for subscriptions and
       | digital purchases. Alternatively, the company could let
       | developers take care of payment processing themselves.
       | 
       | Is this like EU is trying/doing?
        
       | gary_0 wrote:
       | > Otherwise, if the iPhone maker doesn't comply, it faces fines
       | of $43,000 per day.
       | 
       | That's 0.016% of their income, if anyone was curious.
        
         | alganet wrote:
         | From what I could grasp of the official text, there seems to be
         | more conditions.
         | 
         | Apple must make the decision made by Cade public in their
         | website, and also inform all iOS developers affected.
         | 
         | The law which was used (L12529) also allows more aggressive
         | fines (let's say 43.000 per day per iOS developer), or even
         | suspension of services. But these were not mentioned in the
         | decision.
        
           | justinclift wrote:
           | > and also inform all iOS developers affected.
           | 
           | Yay (/s), that'll be another "Terms and Conditions" change
           | from Apple that all registered Apple devs receive an email
           | for and need to sign, regardless of the new terms, in order
           | to continue having builds notarized.
        
         | knubie wrote:
         | > That's 0.016% of their income, if anyone was curious.
         | 
         | Is that 0.016% of their global income, or just in Brazil?
        
           | lanna wrote:
           | $43,000/0.00016 = $268,750,000 I doubt Apple sells that much
           | a day in Brazil.
        
       | alganet wrote:
       | There seems to be a lot of context missing from these articles.
       | 
       | Mercado Libre has its own payment tech. They're like a latin
       | american Amazon+Stripe. I don't know if that plays a role in what
       | is being disputed, but it is worth mentioning.
       | 
       | Mercado Libre also started distributing Disney+ content, similar
       | to Prime. If you buy stuff often, you get a good discount in a
       | Disney+ subscription. This seems to be related to the complaint
       | about restrictions in digital content distribution.
       | 
       | The whole interaction seems to be public (email exchanges and
       | documents, in brazillian portuguese):
       | 
       | https://sei.cade.gov.br/sei/modulos/pesquisa/md_pesq_process...
        
       | dagmx wrote:
       | This will probably just follow their existing precedent in other
       | countries like South Korea and Denmark (the latter limited to
       | dating apps?).
       | 
       | In those regions it's just a reduction of 3% that covers the
       | payment processing.
       | 
       | So it'll give more choice but not enough to drive a lot of
       | adoption, since that's the same or below what other payment
       | processors take as well.
        
         | quitit wrote:
         | While it goes give developers a choice - it favours large
         | business who can obtain a better rate.
         | 
         | The only pro to apple's model is that developers small and
         | large were on equal competitive footing to consumers.
         | 
         | While I believe it's good that developers have a choice, the
         | reality is that this means that larger companies will always
         | have better margins than small operators, helping solidify
         | their position in the market.
        
       | op7 wrote:
       | Wish Apple would start taking a stand again and telling foreign
       | despots the answer is "no". Pull all their assets out of the
       | country and when the government blocks their ASNs, Apple can
       | shrug and point the finger and let that government deal with the
       | social/political backlash of millions of peoples phones turning
       | to bricks.
        
         | dismalaf wrote:
         | Foreign despots like the EU? Apple might be able to tell Brazil
         | where to go but the EU is the world's second largest economy.
        
         | amarcheschi wrote:
         | The funny answer would be "god I wish so".
         | 
         | A more serious answer is, monopolies in the long run are
         | detrimental both for the economy and the general public as
         | well. A company becoming so important that for an issue like
         | this it could threaten to make phones bricks is already a bad
         | signal, but they're not gonna do that cause they like those
         | sweet pesky profits in Brazil and in the eu as well
         | 
         | You think that apple can do whatever it wants on its platform
         | because its their ip? Well then, I don't see why the eu and
         | Brazil can't do whatever they want (perhaps this brings out how
         | dumb the my platform my rules argument is)
        
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       (page generated 2024-11-26 23:01 UTC)