Nearly twenty five years ago, the DoJ nearly split Microsoft into two companies due to them abusing their position as an ecosystem gatekeeper. How did we go from that to the point where apple (or google even), acting both as gatekeeper and direct competitor, can dictate how another company can communicate things to its end users/customers?
Your interpretation of the Microsoft case is incorrect.
The DOJ wasn’t going to split Microsoft because it was a “gatekeeper.” There is no legal basis in US Law to do that.
It was very close to splitting Microsoft because Microsoft was held to have monopolistic market share and was abusing its monopolistic position in operating systems to illegally and anticompetitively push their web browser. Violation of antitrust law.
Legally in the United States you wouldn’t be able to do this with Apple today when applying that law because Apple does not have monopolistic market share. I don’t know what the iPhone’s market share in America is today but Microsoft had over 95 percent market share back then. Apple isn’t close to that today.
In Europe the laws may be different.
(Also for what it’s worth I’m not making an argument for whether Apple or Google or anybody shouldn’t or should be broken up. I’m just saying your interpretation of the DOJ’s position back then is not correct)
You don't have to have a monopoly to be guilty of anticompetitive behavior, a monopoly simply means it's easier to be anticompetitive. Apple in the US has a roughly 50% market share.
The dissonant threshold is dominance not monopoly. But specifically willfully and intentionally conspiring to use that dominance to manipulate pricing, exclude competition, and otherwise distort cross market structure to their advantage.
The MSFT vs DOJ did in fact use their monopoly power in operating systems to enter a new commercial market, price anticompetitively (price a competitors commercial product at zero), bundle with their new product with monopoly product in a mandatory and exclusionary way, etc. The actions were willful and planned, had no other commercial consideration other than harming competition. Even so the action came many years too late and Microsoft had successfully destroyed Netscape and it took until Chrome before any competition surfaced.
You're right, in that Microsoft used their dominance in one market (operating systems) to gain an advantage in another market (web browsers)
Apple or Google would have to be doing something similar, like using their dominance in one market (operating systems) to gain an advantage in a seperate market - for example, music streaming services (Apple Music, Youtube Premium) or web browsers (Chrome, as pushed heavily by the world's most prominent OS, Android)
To be clear: Android is not the entire reason Chrome is ubiquitous. My arugument is that Android is, pretty clearly IMO, a competitive advantage when pushing a web browser.
I think a key consideration is they created the entire platform inclusive of the market structure day zero. The law doesn’t protect against market dominance in one or more markets and they’re not leveraging one market against another - they created the markets and distribution channels.
It’s like claiming Amazon Kindle not hosting Nook bookstores is anticompetitive or Krogers not letting Whole Foods sell in their store or Peleton for not opening their bike to other fitness products. They built the platform and the distribution channels, are they obligated to host everything in any channel?
While side loading is a feature of general purpose operating systems not all operating systems offer it, and it’s only really coming to be an issue here because of the ubiquity of their product. But the lack of side loading isn’t new, and has never been offered. To that extent it’s more along the lines of market dominance alone, not using dominance to distort adjacent markets or willful anticompetitive behavior.
I suspect Apple and Google will not be forced to open their products in the US as it’s not clear their strategy runs afoul traditional interpretations of law.
> they’re not leveraging one market against another
I'm sorry, is your point that "Music streaming service" is not a market? Apple allows signups via every way one could access the application - mobile, web, and desktop. Tidal then has a choice: they can have the same advantage as Apple (a smooth flow with signup prompts available everywhere), or they can have the same pricing model as Apple (by not paying the 30% App Store cut). Tidal cannot have both.
How is this not Apple using their market dominance in app distribution (either due to OS dominance or Apple's exclusive app distribution channel, take your pick) to gain an advantage in the Music Streaming marketplace?
I can see your point, but prefer to stick to rock-solid, unimpeachible arguments (Apple Music for iOS, Google Chrome/Play Store for Android). I shy away from Safari/iOS because Apple is using iOS' dominance (in operating systems) to gain an advantage in web browsers - but that browser is only available for iOS and MacOS. They've steered very clear of using iOS' dominance to push for browser dominance in every other operating system not owned by them.
Going so far as to not even release a client leaves them with a relatively safe defence of only pushing for deep system integration with their own products, as opposed to market dominance in web browsers (as they're likely to be accused of).
I certainly think they would have been safer. Bear in mind though, at the time, Windows had 97% of the desktop market [0]. This wasn't a corporation with ~50% of the market (like Android in the US) trying to muscle in, this was a company with their hooks so deep in personal computers that any product they pushed became a de-facto standard that everyone was expected to at least have access to, if not use.
Hell, the most dominant companies on the planet today, including the literal trillion dollar ones, do not have that kind of market penetration. Google search, the closest I can think of, is still <92% [1]. And it's not that I think holding 92% of a market is good. Nor do I think Apple should get away with only allowing re-skins instead of real browser engines. But percentages are room to quibble, and re-skins can be spun as integration or security.
Whenever Apple's gilded cage comes up, there's backlash, whataboutism, and apologists - so as we start to force interop, openness, and more pro-consumer behavior, I stick to the unimpeachable arguments. Even if it's just till we break the inertia and get the ball rolling. I think you're right, and you make an excellent point. But first I want to convince even the Apple die-hards that this level of control is fucked up, because then we can all agree that something has to change.
It is also difficult to prove because a web browser, yes even Safari, is an open platform by design and it can can run 99% of the web successfully just like other browser. Yes that is true even for Safari. People like to call Safari the “new IE” but in reality today’s web works equally well in all major browsers including Safari.
(Wait for someone to comment that that feature XYZ does not work on Safari and therefor it sucks - yes but that is the nature of the web and browsers. Every Single Browser out there has something missing or added. That has not prevented anyone from building great websites that work in all of them. )
I see this point, and others similar to it brought up often, and I think it stems from misunderstanding what antitrust regulation is trying to solve.
By the way, I say this respectfully, not as a dig towards you.
From a US antitrust perspective, almost all commerce has anticompetitive characteristics.
Think about it: very few businesses will act in a manner beneficial to their competitors. Most will actively act against the interest of their competitors, but almost all will not go out of their way to facilitate their competitors (passive anticompetitive behavior, if you will).
Straightforward concepts to understand what I’m trying to say here are things such as Pizza Place A not selling stuff made by Pizza Place B.
Closer to home, another example would be a device manufacturer, like a smart thermostat, not allowing their competitors to create software and apps that replace their software.
Behavior like this can be found all across commerce, from small businesses and startups to big corporations.
So the legislators (to a lesser degree) and the courts, understanding that laws need to be applied equally regardless of who the parties are, recognized that if they’d purely penalized anticompetitive behavior in a general sense, it would severely impact commerce in general.
Even prevent competition to a degree by preventing new market entrants from making their products work exclusively for their own benefit.
Analogous to this is the idea of penalizing all monopolies.
The issue with that would be that so-called “organic monopolies,” sometimes also called “innocent monopolies” (i.e., companies that gained a dominant market share by merely being successful), would be punished for their success alone.
Instead of banning all anti-competitive behavior, and analogous to this, banning all monopolies, they came up with the idea that only those that leverage their market dominance to protect or increase their market dominance should be penalized.
There are a bunch of nuances to be had, but in a nutshell, this means that imposing something onerous is okay while you don’t have dominant market power, but doing it while you have dominance would be a no-go.
Subsequently, this also means retroactively penalizing particular behavior initiated before gaining market dominance is generally not done because it indirectly punishes success.
Circling back to the example of Safari (or WebKit, to be exact), when Apple imposed this rule, it had an insignificant market share and little leverage. Because they maintained this rule from the beginning, this would not be deemed an antitrust issue.
Had Apple not imposed this from the start, but instead, had they started imposing this after they gained market dominance, then it could be an antitrust issue because now you’re leveraging your market dominance against parties who may not be able to withstand this pressure due to a variety of reasons such as being dependent on the ecosystem.
Apple is very conscious of this, which is why it generally starts with a very restrictive set of conditions, and sometimes, along the way, it loosens the reigns because doing the opposite way is not an option for them from an antitrust perspective.
Two clear examples of this come to mind.
First is the App Store, and it's often derided commission. Apple started with a simple 30% commission fee.
Later, they provided a 15 percent point discount on recurring subscriptions after the first year, followed by the same discount for streaming services in the Apple Video Partner Program, followed later by the same discount for developers in the Small Business Program.
Had they done this the other way around, say they started with 15%, learned after gaining market dominance that the 15% wasn’t sustainable, and then tried to increase it to 30%, they would be opening themselves up to antitrust penalties.
Related to this are their guidelines that prescribe what kind of apps are needed to implement IAPs. It started with all apps that provide products and services that weren’t consumed outside the app (i.e., physical).
Then they added the so-called “Reader exception,” later, they exempted free apps that are a companion to specific online tools such as email and cloud storage.
Now that they allow game streaming services, they need to offer IAPs for services sold outside the app, at least for now, because they can always loosen the requirements but never tighten them.
The other example is their relationship with carriers. When Apple launched the first iPhone, and they were insignificant on the mobile phone market, they were only willing to partner with carriers that accepted their prohibition of installing bloatware on the iPhone.
A couple of years later, when they had gained a significant market share, Apple decided to implement Hotspot functionality, FaceTime, and FaceTime audio.
It stands to reason that Apple wanted all carriers to support this functionality on their terms (i.e., without impediments for users), but taking the same stand on this as they took on bloatware, something that would’ve been way easier now that iPhones were a hot commodity, could be seen as levering their market position.
The result is that carriers could do as they wanted with these functions by carrier profiles. In the beginning, a lot of carriers would turn off the hotspot functionality on some plans and would disable FaceTime use on the cellular network; later on, the carriers relaxed with FaceTime usage on their network, but many now put a data cap of sorts on hotspot usage.
Clearly, Apple felt it might lead to antitrust issues if they told carriers to fully support these functions or not expect to be supplied any iPhones for them to sell.
This argument doesn't hold up to any scrutiny if you try to apply it to any other kind of portable software.
Spotify is a music player that uses the Electron framework and it doesn't run on iOS.
Outlook is a email client that uses the WinUI engine and it doesn't run on iOS.
Netflix is an applet that runs on the Microsoft Silverlight engine, and that doesn't run on iOS.
There is something that feels wrong about Apple's restrictions for browsers but different platform necessitating different, often fundamentally different, implementations isn't quite it.
Spotify's distinguishing feature is not "using Electron". Same for all of the other apps you mentioned.
Chrome's distinguishing feature is "not being Safari or Firefox". It has this distinguishing feature on all other platforms like Linux, Mac, Android and Windows. Only on one platform is this feature missing, and that is why it is emphasized so much.
Well even on iOS Chrome is a different app from Safari and Firefox. Mozilla has two different browsers — even on iOS where all browsers are "the same" Mozilla sees enough differences to have two separate ones.
You're just restating the premise. I think Outlook could make a case for just being a wrapper for Apple Mail. Valve could make the case that Steam's distinguishing feature is lacking on iOS. Again, there is some signal here but I've never heard anyone be able to really explain it.
Outlook could make a great case that Apple’s own email client has access to all kinds of great iOS APIs that are only available to Apple and not to third party email clients. Apple mail has deep OS integration that is impossible for third party email clients. Apple Mail can fetch in the background at will while Outlook has to build that on top of mediocre APIs.
the engine it’s running is the safari one, chrome on iOS is just an alternative interface with different syncing semantics.
that said, this thread of reasoning has started wrong, there is no market for web browsers on iOS just like there’s no market for phone diallers on your in-car stereo system.. What you get is what you get, and that’s always been the case and Apple products are the only devices that can run Safari…
if you keep thinking of apple devices as computers instead of like consoles or appliances, then you are going to get upset.
There is a market for web browsers as soon as Google is able to ship a “real” Chrome for iOS and half they start breaking things gently on the web for other browsers. Just like they did over the timespan of a decade.
Once Chrome can ship on iOS you will see everyone’s market share crumble and Chrome becoming the only browser.
That is anti competitive and not even addressed in any kind of way by the DMA.
On the contrary, it is the end game for the OWA, which is largely a front for “let’s make sure Chromium will dominate the web so that Google can push project Fugu down everyone’s throats.”
I find this difficult to reconcile with the case against Microsoft, which I understood to be about pushing IE on Windows.
Are you saying that the case against Microsoft wasn't based on anticompetitive attempts to dominate the market for web browsers, that the law has changed since then, or that Windows is somehow different from iOS legally?
Another distinction is that the EU has figured out something in between.
That the US has been waging an economic wars and used unconventional warfare techniques, corporate espionage, corruption, and weaponized the US dollar.
That US businesses have been lobbying and interfering with politics in the EU to provide themselves with competitive edges.
Lobbying is itself illegal in many EU nations hence done undercover, thus is plain bribery and corruption of government officials
EU has started retaliating, that's all. At least in using the justice system the way the US has instrumented its own to serve US businesses, helping them win certain markets, and fine competing foreign to the US businesses, fortunes, and ruining them whenever possible.
Still, not letting side loads, imposing to be an intermediary and payment gateway between all publishers and their audience, taking an outrageous commission rate, plus a fixed developer licensing fee, plus forcing all developers to build the published binaries exclusively on Apple made hardware, plus disallowing third parties to repair, plus circumventing the right to repair bill, altogether is without doubt abusing a position of dominance and deploying anti competition tactics.
Saying these are measures to keep users safe is a fallacy and an insult to educated consumers, all it says really is a reveal of how Apple considers its consumers at large.
This is also not true. Netscape destroyed Netscape. For anyone around at the time, they know that Netscape was a heaping pile of shit on every single platform it ran on.
In comp.sys.*.advocacy groups back in the day, it was a point of nerd pride how well your platform could handle a Netscape crash.
Microsoft got into trouble because they forced OEMs to pay for Windows licenses for all of their computers sold whether or not they had Windows installed and they didn’t allow OEMs to install Netscape.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with entering new markets using the resources you have from your existing markets. Should Netflix never have entered the streaming business?
And it wasn’t Chrome, Firefox started chipping away at IEs dominance before Chrome.
At the time IE was horrific and basically didn’t exist. Microsoft reallocated the entire focus of the company R&D towards development of the next version of IE - a colossal investment of resources that outstripped all of Netscape’s revenues for all of its history just on developing a free browser to put it out of business. So, yes, sure. It was incredibly better. But it was anticompetitive to develop it in that way. With the same resources, could Netscape have done it? Would Microsoft have done it if there was any commercial considerations?
Netscape made a product that ran on over 20 operating systems and promised a future where the operating system was a detail for how to launch a web browser. Microsoft saw this as an existential threat and crushed Netscape under a mount of money that was spent to ensure the only meaningful browser was a feature of their operating system.
After their Pyrrhic victory, IE decayed with very little investment. As you would expect in something that was developed only to destroy.
So it’s “anticompetitive” to use your resources to make a better product to compete in a new market? Was it anticompetitive for Google to give Android away to crush all of the competitors beside Apple? Was it anticompetitive for Netflix to use its profits from its dvd by mail business to create a streaming service? Apple to create iPods and then iPhones? Amazon to start AWS?
Netscape did run on a lot of platforms - and it sucked on all of them.
No, and there were thousands upon thousands of pages filed on both sides arguing both sides with hundreds of pages of written opinions explaining why this behavior is different than normal competition. A lot of it was Microsoft leaderships very specific motive, which was not about creating more competition but in specifically eliminating all competition. It’s not illegal to compete in a market or create new markets. It’s illegal to use market dominance in one market to destroy all competition in another.
How exactly do you think companies that survive and don’t suffer from the “innovative dilemma” manage to survive if they don’t use their dominance in one market to get into other markets?
What Microsoft did was much more nuanced than spend money to get into other markets - it involve pressuring OEMs not to work with competitors among other things. BTW, this is the same thing that Google has been fined for repeatedly.
Apple has excluded all other browsers on iOS, requires you to buy more apple hardware to produce software for iOS, and has all of their rules around IAP and not allowing you to even link to an alternate store in many cases.
If iOS had a 90% market share in the US, I bet they'd have a lot more legal troubles
This actually is illegal in many countries as it is a violation of net neutrality.
I don’t remember what the current net neutrality status is in the United States but if the FCC is currently requiring net neutrality then things like zero rating would be illegal.
I mean, every business is anti-competitive. The only time the authorities step in is when they dominate markets to a degree where competition no longer functions. iOS market share is strongest in the states I believe at 57%, which is certainly high but not even remotely approaching a monopoly.
>iOS market share is strongest in the states I believe at 57%, which is certainly high but not even remotely approaching a monopoly.
Ackchyually you don't need to be a monopoly to warp the whole market in your favor.
Windows was a monopoly back in the day with ~95% market share, but users could easily install any other apps and any other browser besides IE. The issue was many users stuck with IE because it was the default, but Microsoft wasn't blocking them from installing other browsers than IE or other apps not sold through their channels.
Meanwhile, Apple might have only 57%-60% market share instead of ~95%, but unlike Microsoft, it's actively blocking users form installing any other browser that's not Safari based and any app that's not on the AppStore, therefore doing even more damage than Microsoft was doing back in the days.
And speaking of iPhone market share, despite being it 57%-60% of the US right now, it's also the most wealthy and influential of the market, and looking at the demographics, it's at 87% amongst US teens, so it's safe to assume those teens will stick to iPhone when they grow up due to inertia and network effects, and then iOS market share will be close to 90%, therefore a guaranteed monopoly.
> Meanwhile, Apple might have only 57%-60% market share instead of ~95%, but unlike Microsoft, it's actively blocking users form installing any other browser that's not Safari based and any app that's not on the AppStore, therefore doing even more damage than Microsoft was doing back in the days.
Okay so like: humor me. What is the damage incurred by the user's inability to install, for example, a true Firefox on iOS that uses their Quantum engine? I'll fully cosign that iOS' Safari has quirks that make it kind of annoying, very occasionally, like once every few months I'll find something that it does in a bizarre way that others don't. But I swear every time the topic of iOS' dominance comes up, there is a detachment of users out there who are simply furious that they can't install a web browser that doesn't use Apple's WebKit on an iOS device and I just... I do not get it. At the absolute worst I have never given even 10% of the shit required to where I would upend all my stored passwords and whatnot for the ability to even use a different WebKit based browser.
Now, granted, if this was the situation on the Mac, oh hell yes, I would absolutely be right there with everyone else and grabbing my own pitchfork. But on my phone? On my tablet? I dunno, am I weird for just not really caring?
It's not directly affecting you the user, it's affecting the market of app and web developer which have no choice but to dance to Apple's tune as they control a large chuck of a very lucrative market.
Why should you, the user, care? For the same reason users care when Micros ft was a monopoly on desktop.
How is that different than web developers being required to dance to the tune of basically every major browser? They all have little oddities that have to be taken into account, speaking as someone who has done quite a bit of web development, every major browser has it's deviations from the standard, intentional and often otherwise, that require little tweaks to one's code.
And to be totally honest with you, a lot of Safari iOS's quirks are unambiguously good, pro-privacy practices that frustrate the shit out of surveillance marketing firms and I quite hope Apple keeps it up.
> ..to be totally honest with you, a lot of Safari iOS's quirks are unambiguously good, pro-privacy practices that frustrate the shit out of surveillance marketing firms and I quite hope Apple keeps it up.
I don't want to repeat all the arguments already said by others in this thread so all I had to add is that any monopoly can and does eventually end up abusing it's power for profit. Now it's towards developers and competitors, tomorrow it could be towards users aka you.
The fact that you don't see a problem with that is the issue because you seem to assume that Apple is and will always be on your side and looking after your best interest.
The fact that the most popular option in a demographic where someone else pays for the phone is the most expensive option says almost nothing about what those users will do when they have to spend their own money on an option. I highly doubt 87% of the population will be buying a luxury brand with their own money. Convincing mommy and daddy it’s socially isolating to be on Android sure. But their own money in their 20s I doubt it.
> I highly doubt 87% of the population will be buying a luxury brand with their own money.
You're making it sound like they're Lamborghinis or Patek watches. Maybe in developing countries iPhone is a luxury brand, but in no way is it in any western developed countries, especially the US, the wealthiest of them all.
Yes they're expensive as in that's a lot of money compared to a 600 Euro Pixel 8 or a 350 Euro Samsung A54 which do more or less the same shit as an iPhone does, but they're not unaffordably expensive in order to be a luxury good.
>But their own money in their 20s I doubt it.
Credit, installments and carrier plans, make it that anyone can afford an iPhone. I live in a central EU country where average income is less than the US, and even the pizza delivery courier here can get an iPhone.
Let's do some napkin math: The iPhone 15 Pro is ~1200 Euros with tax here. A full time supermarket "wagie" with no education takes home nearly 1800 Euros per month after taxes. Subtract 600 Euros rent, 400 for eating, 200 for utilities and bills, and you're left with about 600 a month to spend as you please.
So you can buy the latest iPhone after saving for 2 months, or instantly by walking in to any carrier shop and signing a 3 year contract for a plan which you need anyway.
How is that "luxury"? Yes I know, this lifestyle is probably luxury compared to how average people live in some nations from Africa, Asia, LATAM and Middle East, but definitely not in the developed west. Otherwise Apple wouldn't be selling them by the boatlaod.
Surprisingly, iOS is a bit more popular in Japan than it is in the US, where it has ~68% marketshare. That market usually favors local manufacturers (Sony among other local companies still make Android phones), but that for some reason doesn’t apply in this case.
In the US, Apple is a minority player. I have no clue why Wall Street values them as a $1T company, when all they do anymore is make a bunch of phones that are under-competitive and over-expensive.
The only time in the past few years that iPhones out sold Android phones in the US (the only market which Apple is a major player in; any of the global markets, they're virtually a nobody) was a glitch in 2021, most likely due to being pandemic-inspired. Never before nor since have they broken the 50% barrier.
Although I 100% agree with what the EU is doing to Apple (and I hope they keep going), I don't understand why they're bothering with such a relative small fry, when Google doing the exact same thing on the Google Play Store is right there, and Google has far more capability of paying fines than Apple does.
Apple has 61% mobile market share in US, and in 2023 it shipped worldwide more phones than Samsung. Having a hefty margin on each device, avg price being way bigger than average Android; on top of that, their % share of total revenue coming from services (app store, subscriptions etc) compared to hardware shipments keeps growing every year.
Apple is a $1T company—actually, $2.8T—because it brings in over $100bn a year in operating income, and was literally the world's single biggest seller of smartphones globally in 2023.
The overall Google ecosystem is obviously more popular worldwide – but the idea that Apple only "makes a bunch of under-competitive phones", are "virtually a nobody" in the global market, or are a "small fry" is low-effort trolling.
> Legally in the United States you wouldn’t be able to do this with Apple today when applying that law because Apple does not have monopolistic market share
That depends on how you define a market. Apple has a monopoly on app distribution to iOS devices. The argument for defining it like is is persuasive because in the Microsoft case you could at least install an OS from another vendor. You can't do that with an iPhone. Your only relief is to buy a new phone from a different manufacturer.
Market analysis under US antitrust law doesn't work that way. You don't just get to choose an arbitrarily narrow market such that a single competitor by definition owns 100% of it, otherwise plaintiffs would basically never lose in court. Market analysis is done by examining actual consumer behaviors, and in general, markets comprised of a single competitor are not permitted by the courts in antitrust cases (unless specific exceptions are met).
Apple owns 70% of the mobile device market in the US, and is the exclusive app distribution channel on the that platform.
Web Apps do not work right (especially when compared to the other major mobile platform) and Apple is making little effort to improve the viability of this potential channel, instead choosing to delete web push tokens every week or so amongst other sabotage of web applications, while these same web applications work just fine on the other platforms that support web apps.
> It was very close to splitting Microsoft because Microsoft was held to have monopolistic market share and was abusing its monopolistic position in operating systems to illegally and anticompetitively push their web browser. Violation of antitrust law.
This was overturned on appeal and subsequently settled out of court so it was never actually determined whether bundling IE with Windows would have been illegal under US antitrust law.
Other aspects of the case were upheld on appeal (mostly related to shady dealings with OEMs) but the appeals panel concluded that the district judge incorrectly analyzed the browser issue. They also overturned the original court ordered split for the same reason.
>The DOJ wasn’t going to split Microsoft because it was a “gatekeeper.” There is no legal basis in US Law to do that.
Being a gatekeeper is not illegal in the EU either and it's not what the parent comment claimed. Abusing a gatekeeper position for anticompetitive purposes is illegal, which is similar to the U.S situation even if the vocabulary is slightly different.
Apple already has >60% market share in the U.S. If that doesn't qualify for a monopoly, then I don't know what magic number will. And Apple has a strangulating choke-hold on their platform compared to Microsoft.
Probably because unlike 25 years ago, US lawmakers and enforcers, realized a large chunk of their economic dominance is dependent on big-tech abusing their market position as gatekeepers, so they intentionally look away when they see how much of their GDP these companies bring in, not to mention aiding the US dragnet mass-surveillance capabilities being the icing on the cake.
What else are they gonna do to earn $? It's not like the world is lining up to buy their ultra reliable and high quality cars and planes.
> big-tech abusing their market position as gatekeepers
No no, you see, that is called “innovation”. And whenever the EU does anything to try to curtail those abuses of power, what they are doing is stifling innovation. Because as we all know, the one thing that matters in life is growth growth growth, particularly company growth, and there’s nothing more innovative than coming up with ways to exploit people’s privacy and attention for profit. And if you can get the ones exploited to rally in your favour, you’ve hit the jackpot. All hail corporate America, let’s raise a glass to the obscenely rich getting richer at the expense of everyone else, that is working out great.
> the one thing that matters in life is growth growth growth, particularly company growth, and there’s nothing more innovative than coming up with ways to exploit people’s privacy and attention for profit.
But wait, there's more! The only reason growth is pushed for so hard is because most of the investors are retired or retiring soon and don't want to work any more. If the companies stop growing then their stock prices might go down. They gambled hard when they removed pensions from US companies and they can't lose the game before they die!
The difference is that if the stock market dips, you still get paid a pension for the set amount of time (paid out of company profits if it has to). With a 401k, you can watch years of your retirement disappear.
I don't know if you are making a joke, because the data says the exact opposite.
When the silent generation had 55% of the "total wealth" (and declining), boomers had 40% of the remainder, but now boomers have 55% (and climbing, instead of declining), and the younger generations only have 26% (combined).
It looks like they are still hoarding (for lack of a better term) wealth than relinquishing it.
> When the silent generation had 55% of the "total wealth" (and declining), boomers had 40% of the remainder, but now boomers have 55% (and climbing, instead of declining), and the younger generations only have 26% (combined)
One, stock ownership, not total wealth.
Two, boomer share is declining after peaking around 2020. It’s flat-ish as they begin retiring. Gen X got screwed, but the pick-up among Millenials looks like a return to the norm. (Look at the Boomer/Silent share in the 1990s.)
Three, the generation on the precipice of dying, the Silents, are not the chief stockholders. Boomers still have decades to live. They’re not looking to eke out another year or two of growth at the long-term expense of anything, they need that decades-on value to bank on.
Weren't millennials a bit too young to have significant (or even any) amounts invested in the market back in 2009? And then they got live through one of the biggest stock market booms in history (which unlike dot.com didn't just blow up)?
OTH Gen X got a chance to lose their savings during the latter stages of dot.com and then again in 2009.
Many millennials graduated from college and couldn't get a job due to the market crash. So, not only did they not have savings, they couldn't save if they wanted to. Then, by the time a good chunk could have savings and start investing, inflation slapped them in the face. Now, grocery shopping for a house full of kids is downright expensive. Not to mention, the amount of monthly bills a household is expected to pay is 4-500% of what their parents had to pay while wages have largely stayed the same, housing costs are through the roof because boomers want to make sure they get their "investments" back, and so on.
All I can think of is where we'd be as a species now, at least technologically, If Microsoft, Apple, IBM or even Commodore and Atari had similar abilities since the 70s to restrict what kind of software developers can make and publish for their platforms...
This is an artificial marketing distinction that you’ve bought into. And insofar as any particular apps exist or don’t on switch, it’s purely a result of gatekeeper decisions on the part of Nintendo - Nintendo keeps there from being an email client or an office suite and that’s the reason you perceive it as “just a gaming device”. They’ve gatekept successfully.
This is the problem, there really isn’t a coherent threshold between switch and iPhone or a reason console vendors shouldn’t be equally considered general purpose devices other than marketing. You could plug in some usb peripherals and run office suites on a PlayStation just fine.
> This is an artificial marketing distinction that you’ve bought into
No, nobody buys a nintendo to do banking on them. I bought a phone since I needed it to do banking. This is a real difference, not just a marketing distinction.
> it’s purely a result of gatekeeper decisions on the part of Nintendo
Yes, and that gatekeeper power ensures Nintendo isn't a general purpose device. If they allowed it to be a general purpose device like Apple did with phones then things would be different.
Controlling such a major share of general purpose devices like Apple does is a serious issue. Controlling a share of gaming computing like Nintendo doesn't matter nearly as much, so therefore lawmakers aren't going after them to the same degree. It doesn't matter if technically they are the same, in practice one doesn't cause issues for society while the other one does.
But the most powerful general purpose computers we have are all wide open for development. A lot of us here write software on our laptops and desktops all day and can download and install whatever we want.
I too think it is funny that there is so much attention paid to a mobile device, but then am forced to remember for so so many of today's youngest "users" that mobile device is their only compute device. While you and I might look at the mobile device as just an additional thing that only gets used when away from keyboards, more and more people don't even have a keyboard to be away from.
I'm also much more sane about how retail works, and realize that MSRP vs retail pricing is how the world works. Expecting to earn full retail pricing while selling your wares through someone else's store is just farcical. Developing a product that can only work on someone else's product and then complains about the rules of that other product's maker puts in place is also just hubris.
That's a nice sounding story, but what actually happened was that George W. Bush was awarded the Presidency after a 5-4 Supreme Court vote stopped the recount in Florida, and the Bush DoJ announced a slap on the wrist for Microsoft just a few days before 9/11, which wiped the story off the map, and everyone forgot.
(I'm not suggesting a 9/11 conspiracy, by the way.)
So Bush is to blame for the war on terror AND for failing to regulate Microsoft? Wow, just when I thought that being a war criminal was enough of a reason to be hated, now comes the cherry on top.
I don't know what you're referring to by "in light of 2020", but in any case it wasn't a complaint, merely an observation.
The point was that there wasn't a "change of heart" about the Microsoft monopoly between 1999 and 2001, merely a change of power, and one that didn't necesssarily reflect the will of the people, who indisputably voted more for Gore than Bush, regardless of the Electoral College numbers.
It appears that the original comment by FirmwareBurner that I was replying to was edited substantially afterward to change the meaning, perhaps in reponse to my reply, which unfortunately removed some context that made sense of my reply.
accusations by Trump of getting the election stolen from him.
Personally, I think there were shenanigans going on and we should be investigating them but I also feel like the hanging chads was a far bigger issue than the shenanigans that happened in 2020.
I don't believe the election was stolen but I also don't believe it's everyone's imagination that some shady shit was going on in places. I suspect that kind of crap happens every election.
Every election will have some shady stuff going on from all participating parties if it's big enough. But it's important to remember that every election has even more stuff going on that can look shady from the outside, but is absolutely normal on further inspection.
2020 was special because the sitting president (who has accused others of election and voter fraud against him in AFAIR every election he's been part of) has primed his emotionally invested base to expect fraud everywhere. They saw a bunch of things they thought were shady, part of which were caused by unrealistic expectations (e.g. "I can just show up and be Poll Watcher without registering beforehand"). If you are aware of shady going-ons that have not been investigated I'm open to hear them, but all the occurrences I've seen have been investigated and explained - but since many people aren't open to normal explanations, the fraud idea keeps and keeps on festering.
If every election has some shady things happen then it's not possible for every bit of shadiness to be explained as anything other than shadiness.
So was there shadiness or wasn't there?
A lot of it can be explained away, which is why I said the hanging chad issue was a bigger problem. but ALL of it? I don't think so, even at the time there were a few things that gave me pause.
> If every election has some shady things happen then it's not possible for every bit of shadiness to be explained as anything other than shadiness.
> So was there shadiness or wasn't there?
I didn't say that there was absolutely no shadiness, but I haven't seen evidence that there was more shadiness than in any other election. The "evidence" brought forth for Trumps position that I've seen hasn't held up to scrutiny.
> A lot of it can be explained away, which is why I said the hanging chad issue was a bigger problem. but ALL of it? I don't think so, even at the time there were a few things that gave me pause.
You're free to share them if you'd like. All I'm saying is that I'm not aware of evidence brought forward that holds up to scrutiny, which leads me to believe that there was no significant deviation from the norm - the simpler explanation is that being primed for months by somebody with a lot of sway, combined with the strong distrust in non-partisan media, has led to these heaps of non-evidence (again, as far as I've seen, I'm happy to be proven wrong).
This very misleading. It was an unusual per curiam opinion, not attributed to specific justices. The anonymous author of the opinion, who turned out to be Kennedy, “included Souter, Breyer and Stevens as agreeing that there were equal protection "problems" without consulting them.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bush_v._Gore#Equal_Protection_...
Usually, I would not engage with this kind of conspiracy theory like comments but I think that this particular case has some merit.
We are solid in a gray zone where we have to decide where are priorities are. Fair market vs tech dominance in US is a great example. Another one is carbon neutrality vs strong industry in EU. I’m sure there are so many others.
It is just important to keep that in mind when building your business because we can easily slide from one side of this gray zone to the other.
It's not a conspiracy theory, i'm not quite sure even how that term could possibly apply -- since this describes the ordinary practice of politics.
The modern republican party does not support anti-trust enforcement, or indeed, most executive enforcement of anti-corporate regulations. So when they are in office, there isnt any.
There's been some increasing bipartisan support for anti-tech anti-trust because republicans perceive them to be (largely accurately) biased towards the cultural left.
> modern republican party does not support anti-trust enforcement, or indeed, most executive enforcement of anti-corporate regulations
The MAGA GOP is unsettled on antitrust. Its defining elements, however, are loyalty and a strong executive, so presumably there would be support for antitrust action against those deemed disloyal.
The Republicans would be exposing the thinking that has resulted in them losing almost every culture war battle in the last ... I don't know how long. The bureaucracies enforcing anti-trust will lean left. Eventually there will be a bias of anti-trust action used to break up any companies that look to be helping Republican candidate elected. It'll be these Donald Trump court cases all over again.
What actually works for the right is free markets. Turns out if they just leave YouTube alone they get Rumble. If they ignore Twitter they get X. If Amazon makes a habit of booting right-wing sites, there will be a right wing version of Amazon. There are more than enough right wing media consumers for a free market to reward right-leaning content. Anti-trust will eventually lead to overregulation and lock in of companies hostile to the right in general and republicans in particular.
There is a much better argument for anti-trust to try and defuse the risk of a vast an hasty flash-mob forming and doing something stupid, but as a political response it just isn't going to be effective.
: The Republicans would be exposing the thinking that has resulted in them losing almost every culture war battle in the last
Conservatives always lose cultural battles in the end, that is why they are called conservatives they are the past the future is always progressive. Conservatives have short term victories but long term the conservatives become todays progressives, it is in the definition of the words.
In the sense that civilisations eventually fall, yes. But as a practical matter until someone comes up with a better idea we should all be conserving capitalism, free markets, liberty and equality. Because the alternatives are much worse.
Just because progressives want to change things and change is technically inevitable doesn't mean we can't push the bad ideas out beyond the life of anyone breathing right now.
Microsoft gave discounts on Windows licenses to companies that agreed to stop purchasing Netscape client and server software, thereby choking off Netscape revenue streams. It forced Netscape to sell to AOL.
Microsoft controlled 95% of the personal computer market, and they abused that position to put a competitor out of business because that competitor was a threat to their monopoly.
Apple has non-monopolistic market share, but they bundle the Apple Music app on every iPhone (with nudges to subscribe, like the "For You" and "Browse" tabs), and they give Spotify a bad choice: either adopt IAP (with 30% cut) for subscriptions, or handle all subscriptions through the web, but they can't link to their website from their app. While you can subscribe to Apple Music directly in-app.
The "bundling" issue is about where the similarities to Microsoft begin and end (I can't recall if "bundling" was part of the problem with IE in the US too, or only in Europe, where it was definitely an issue and led to the "browser choice" screen).
I've only ever owned an iphone (of the smartphones) and I've never felt a nudge to subscribe to their music app. the closest I've gotten is the notifications when you're not logged into apple cloud.
Find an average (non tech) IOS user, and try to get them to switch to these apps.
Im guessing that there is a large intersection of "apple users" who also take their cars back to the dealership for oil changes and service. It's not stupidity, it's about creating an air of trust. Apple goes out of its way to keep customers trust (as do car dealers to an extent) because the money is in keeping a customer.
As an aside, the source of this complaint being Spotify is interesting. I would love to know from artist who pays better between the two (because I dont think its spottify)
According to reports, Apple pays the most to artists. But Apple also has the luxury of not having to pay a 30% commision fee to another company every time someone buys a subscription or a track via Apple music.
> Tidal also says its HiFi Plus tier pays significantly higher royalties per stream than its rivals, "at least 50% or more vs the regular rate across the four largest streaming services,”
> Let’s start with the elephant in the room. On average, Tidal pays $0.01 per stream, which is way above the $0.003/0.005 offered by Spotify.
> Though Tidal’s service being more profitable for artists is worth praising, the remuneration itself is not the biggest issue here, as it’s the way the revenue streams are distributed among artists.
> Spotify pays artists pro-rata, meaning they calculate the total streams within the platform and estimate the proportion each artist should receive.
> This model greatly favors prominent artists, often leaving independent musicians with mere cents even when they have a loyal and active fanbase.
> Find an average (non tech) IOS user, and try to get them to switch to these apps
You do know that Spotify has 600 million users? And that it got those users without practices like pushing its app in phone setup, account setup, settings, home screen, default music app, default music app in carplay etc.?
> As an aside, the source of this complaint being Spotify is interesting. I would love to know from artist who pays better between the two (because I dont think its spottify)
Neither pays artists directly. They pay money to rights holders. Why no one ever questions the rights holders is beyond my comprehension at this point.
I use Signal with a couple people but it’s not really set up for mass traction so I don’t expect it to become my primary messenger any time soon.
If I were to switch streaming services, Spotify would be dead last on my list, because they’re hypocritical — they pushed out third party devs building alternative players for paying users by deprecating libspotify, refuse to support interop with anything that’s not a Spotify Connect device (HomePod for example supports third party streaming, yet Spotify won’t use the APIs), have treated their users terribly with incessant AB tests and pushing content unrelated to music in their faces, and have spent a ridiculous amount of money trying to lock up and monetize what was previously the most democratic and available medium (podcasts).
At least Apple Music allows third party players and tries to support other ecosystems (Android + Chromecast).
> Find an average (non tech) IOS user, and try to get them to switch to these apps.
Interesting take :)
- the average user doesn’t even use Signal anywhere, let alone an average non-tech iOS user
- As for Spotify, you must mention geography (I guess that’s USA you meant) - because in some geographies Apple Music might not even be the third music app on an iPhone
Where does spotify fit in here? If apple had to comply with it's own rules, do you think they would be able to continue to pay out more than the competition?
Should a store be forced to stock a product that has “This product is significantly cheaper if you buy it directly from the manufacturer” printed on the front of the package?
Typically you are not forced to sell your product on just one store, with some exceptions, of course. In this case, Spotify can only "sell" their app to Apple customers exclusively via Apple's store and they are forced to pay a fixed 30% to Apple for every transaction done through the spotify app, while using a payment system created and supplied by the store owner. And at the same time apple provides a competing product pre-installed on all their devices, which would be the equivalent to placing your product on the eye-level, well-lit shelves while putting away your competitor's product at the bottom shelf. There's a lot more nuance in this case that doesn't fit in with your analogy.
> they are forced to pay a fixed 30% to Apple for every transaction done through the spotify app
Spotify has never paid this. You signed up online and then logged into the app.
To the degree Apple has behaved anti-competitively, Apple Music v Spotify is the clearest case. But it’s not because of payment processing, but that Apple can see Spotify’s data and strategy and then use it against them from a superior marketing position.
If you’re suggesting there’s some sort of data- or usage- mining of Spotify’s app and/or app integrations with the OS going on, you’re going to have to provide much more evidence than just the allegation of “Apple can see Spotify’s data”.
The device might be able to see “Spotify’s data”, but the closest thing Apple-the-company has to “Spotify’s data [on iOS/macOS]” is likely to be device/customer profiles on who downloads the app from the App Store.
And I’m sure the amount of data that Apple has on Spotify and their business and marketing strategies from non-device sources is both vastly superior and vastly more than what they would get from device-based information.
> Both retailers and manufacturers assert that over the past decade this practice has increased materially. In some retail outlets or corporations, the activity is now found in virtually every category. Based on reliable industry benchmarks from the late 1990's it is likely that as of 2001, at least half of major Canadian manufacturers are involved in some form of exclusivity arrangement with Canadian distributors.
“With some exceptions” doing some heavy lifting I guess, considering we’re talking about basically whole industries and product sectors.
> This is absolutely not true at all, exclusivity agreements are incredibly widespread in supply chains.
I never signed an exclusivity deal to only shop from a single grocery store, I don't think that exists anywhere in the world. But buying an iPhone is effectively an exclusivity deal where you agree to only buy from Apples store. This makes it fundamentally different from other exclusivity deals that are business to business, this is exclusivity on individual customers.
I think the Apple store is the biggest such exclusivity deal on customers in history for a general marketplace. I can't think of anything else, except slavery or where a company owns the whole town and thus all the markets, but a company town is still way smaller scope than the Apple store.
Yes, individual customers who choose to buy an iPhone. It’s not like Apple is the only phone manufacturer in the world, and the iPhone is only barely dominant in the United States. There is plenty of competition for the iPhone. If you don’t like the iPhone and its singular App Store, go buy an Android phone.
What you want is an iPhone on your terms. Sorry, that’s not how the market works.
I better like the marketplace analogy: If I go into a marketplace, I can be told by merchants that we can make cheaper deals outside of the confines of a marketplace.
If you want to stick to the "store" analogy, they Apple also needs to handle support, return cases and a lot more financial risk – A store stocks their own inventories and does not just facilitate transactions between two parties.
The fact is that Apple store is not a store, it is a marketplace. And on a marketplace you can not censor people as easily.
Apple does handle returns and I'm not sure what support the average brick and mortar store offers.
Stores don't necessarily own all their inventories (stock consignment) and some products are extremely low risk (e.g. phone cards, gift cards, digital goods, etc.)
Calling it a marketplace seems odd considering unlike in traditional marketplaces, there are no competing merchants selling the same goods. There are no other merchants at all.
It would be like if you went to best buy (or whatever electronics store is in your country) and bought a washing machine. This washing machine (in small print no less) has "in-home purchases" that let you change the modes to include color and whites instead of just a "do it all eco-mode." Best buy takes 30% of all these "in-home" purchases because they sold you the washing machine. They assert that you are their customer and you are not the owner of the washing machine. Oh, and you can't share this "in-home purchase" with anyone else that lives with you. If they want this feature, they have to pay for it separately.
If that makes sense to you ... then I guess there isn't much to discuss here.
The issue as I understand it is that Apple uses its dominance in hardware to direct users to its own music streaming service at the expense of a competing service. Your analogy does not fit.
They have a pretty competitive pricing range too. The combined TV, music, and a bit of encrypted disk space is fairly priced. I used to pay for Spotify separately, but when they raised prices a couple of times in a row. It made more sense to just get Apple TV and music for a decent price as I already was using the 50 GB iCloud package because google likely data mines Google Docs/drive. So don't assume everyone is just getting it because it's “there”.
The issue is Apple's using its dominance in one ___domain to restrict competitors in another ___domain, not whether they offer a better deal. In fact, one would expect that they can offer the best deal around.
The relevant market isn’t the specific Apple device users, but all users and all their competing devices. This is typically how US antitrust law works as it is based on consumer harm. And that’s broad, not the specific consumers who choose to use a particular tool or be in a particular system.
> The District Court determined that Microsoft had maintained a monopoly in the market for Intel compatible PC operating systems in violation
Change "Intel compatible" to "A series compatible" and it's Apple. Change it to "ARM compatible" and it's still Apple given they have 60% market share in the USA. Only countries enforce anti-trust, there is no world government to look at market share it the world.
feel free to point out that part of the document. AFAICT the entire document is in the context of the first paragraph which sets the scope for everything under it
This case does not prove what you think it does because the market for "Intel compatible PC operating systems" does not consist of a single competitor (there are much stricter legal requirements when alleging a single-competitor market).
Just stop buying apple products... it's like people buying Lego toys and whining because they are expensive and cannot plug with Playmobile toys.
So people are so enamored with apple devices that they cannot stop using them, but don't want to pay the rent the company charges them... just go play somewhere else. Or create your own park. That's what Hawuei did, that's what Android did.
As we are discussing EU law what relevant does US antitrust law have?
Consumer are locked into ecosystems so you cannot just say "they can switch to a competing device". Can they move all apps and content from the old device to the new device at no cost? Do they need significant time to setup.
Moving to an area with more grocery stores is orders of magnitude more demanding than selecting another operating system next time you upgrade your phone or computer, though.
Asking my grandma to switch operating systems would be like asking her to start using a new language she doesn't understand as her primary.
Meanwhile, she's moved twice in my lifetime. I actually suspect most people move more often than they switch operating systems, and do so more times in their life, too.
> Asking my grandma to switch operating systems would be like asking her to start using a new language she doesn't understand as her primary.
I hate this rhetoric that old people are stupid and are intrinsically incapable of understanding modern technology.
Computers and cell phones didn't pop into existence overnight. The first home computers entered the market in the late 70's and became commonplace in the 80's. If your grandma is in her 80's now, she was in her 40's back then.
None of us had to learn these things overnight and tech was much simpler back then. All she had to do was keep up with what was happening in society. If anything, all this is more complicated for kids as they weren't eased into it like us older folks were.
Same goes for cellphones. They got common in the 90's and it took decades for them to get to the point that they are basically supercomputers you can put in your pocket.
This is nothing like asking your grandma to start using a new language she doesn't understand. This is more like your grandma stubbornly refusing to learn the meaning of new words introduced into the English language since the 80s. This is about being wilfully disconnected from society. This is not about an inability to learn but an unwillingness.
This is not an age thing, to get to the point where switching cellphone OSes is an impossible task you had to have checked out decades ago. It has nothing to do with age and everything with apathy and laziness.
My kid will simply kill me outright in using a phone as a controller. I never learned those motor skills and my brain probably is incapable of spending the time in learning them. I remember pwning my dad in N64, while I watched him turn in circles.
Further, when you get to your 40s and some "new tech" comes out (like these VR headsets), you have to take a gamble. Is this yet another fad, like the last time ... or is this going to stick around. You have far less time than some teenager to go figure out how things work, on top of that.
> orders of magnitude more demanding than selecting another operating system
Having switched from Apple to Microsoft Phone to Android and back to Apple ... I disagree. In that time, I've moved states and even countries. Moving is far less demanding than switching operating systems. Moving is pretty simple: you pack, move, then unpack; and you even get to keep all your stuff! Switching operating systems requires researching for similar apps, purchasing them again, potentially copying music/photo libraries using sketchy tools, hunting down tutorials for how to do things you don't know how to do, etc.
I don’t agree: Specifically if you live somewhere with only a single food store, there’s a decent likelihood that you’re either heavily invested in the area (farming, forestry, …) or that you can’t afford to live anywhere else.
More generally, moving means leaving friends, forcing kids to change schools, and if moving far, learning new laws and customs. Not to mention that packing and moving all that stuff takes days and/or costs thousands of moneys. Extracting files from Google Drive and iCloud is a pain, but is it _that_ bad?
> More generally, moving means leaving friends, forcing kids to change schools, and if moving far, learning new laws and customs.
Moving the goalpost are we? Sure, if you keep moving it far enough, long enough, then yeah, you'll find a set of conditions where this is no longer true (such as having a family, friends, changing schools, etc).
> Extracting files from Google Drive and iCloud is a pain, but is it _that_ bad?
I take it you haven't done it. Put your money where your mouth is and just switch. It's that easy, right?
I've used... six mobile operating systems in the last ten years. Some learnings:
1. There are cross-platform alternatives for file storage. Consider using them for important things.
2. For work things and organized volunteerism you'll use the tools of the company/organization anyway.
3. Backups help when migrating. You need backups anyway, so make use of them.
4. Only migrate things you actually care about. Screenshots from last year or that draft email to the electrician who installed your fridge? Let them burn
Agreed. I did the apple-android-apple switch multiple times. At worst, it took me a day of transferring data and making sure all works the way it is supposed to, and then a week or two getting used to the UIUX (because each switch had multiple years in-between). That's quite nothing.
My move back from west coast to east coast of the US recently was way more demanding and taxing in every single way, even if we exclude monetary factors entirely. Moving countries would've been multiple magnitudes even more complex than that. Did that once almost 15 years ago, so I have a basic idea of how difficult it can get. It wasn't even that difficult at all compared to most cases. Doubly ridiculous to hear people trying to compare moving cities to switching between iOS and Android.
Sprinting is def harder than running for 2 hours. I used to run 5-12 miles (8-19 km) in a single session, every week. I still got winded doing sprints.
But it’s not your only choice to shop in the App Store. Having an iPhone does not prevent my from buying an app from the Play Store on my Android phone, from buying a game from PSN on my PS5 or from buying a book from Amazon on my Kindle.
Woah, I can install a game from PSN on my iPhone!? I must have missed that feature... /s
We already know the players in the market will conspire to increase prices artificially if given the chance (United States v. Apple Inc., 952 F. Supp. 2d 638 (S.D.N.Y. 2013)). So, no, I don't believe these are actually one market because not even the players think it is one marketplace. They argue this exact illusion to keep anti-trust from applying to them, but behave as if it isn't a single market.
All we need is for lawmakers to change what the definition of a market is, in order to deal with this loophole.
If Walmart owned all the shops in a particular city, then yes, that should happen
In fact regulators do not allow this to happen. For example, I know the UK competition regulators would not allow the same company to buy more than a quarter (IIRC) of the pubs in an area. Source: I heard the CEO of what was the biggest pub company in the UK at the time say it.
I don't accept the value of that definition, because it would also mean Nintendo isn't allowed to be a monopoly over their own games consoles, with Android being analogous to Xbox.
Microsoft was beaten with a legal stick because they didn't bribe lawmakers, i.e. running a business without lobbying. Tech companies don't make the same mistake these days.
Did you read the part that said, "The case was remanded back to the D.C. District Court for further proceedings on this matter, with Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly presiding." That's not a win. The case was ongoing, and likely would have gone to the Supreme Court eventually, though the court was too cowardly to take the case immediately.
There was a settlement with the DoJ. You don't settle when you win and the other side loses.
It seems that you're very confused. The OP claimed, mistakenly, that Microsoft won the case. They did not. When two parties settle a case, there is no winner or loser, and the case isn't decided by a judge or jury.
The DoJ and Microsoft settled the case. There was no winner or loser. If Microsoft had won the case, then the notion of settlement doesn't even make sense. And depending on the law and jurisdiction, legal fees can be awarded to the winner of a case. But with a settlement, one party doesn't usually pay the other party's legal expenses as a stipulation; that would be weird. So I really don't know what in the world you're talking about, and maybe you don't either.
The question here is a simple factual one: Did Microsoft win the case? No, they did not. The OP's assertion was wrong. You seem to be contemplating a different question, namely, does it make sense for parties to settle before going to judgement, which is why you think the answer is "extremely obvious". And of course it makes sense to settle, which is precisely what Microsoft and the DoJ did. They settled. Microsoft did not win. When you win, you don't settle. And the issue of legal expenses is irrelevant to the question of whether Microsoft won or not.
The word "win" does have more than one meaning, a collquial one an a legal one. Nonetheless, whynotminot clearly meant it in the legal sense.
drooopy: "Nearly twenty five years ago, the DoJ nearly split Microsoft into two companies"
whynotminot: "Didn’t Microsoft win that case?"
We all know that Microsoft was not split into two companies. That was even stipulated by "nearly" in the initial post. That was obviously a "win" in the colloquial sense, so if that was the intended meaning, then why would whynotminot have even posed a question in the first place? There was no question. Yes, Microsoft "won", colloquially, and just got a slap on the wrist. That was the very background and context of the initial post by drooopy.
So no, you're mistaken about which sense of "win" was under question.
The question would have been phrased differently if it was meant in the colloquial sense, something like, "Didn't Microsoft win in that settlement?" But really, nobody would even phrase that as a tentative question rather than as a statement, because obviously Microsoft came out very well in the settlement, and besides, that was never in dispute with the original post by drooopy, because drooopy was lamenting the fact that monopolists have faced no consequences. Your interpretation of the conversation makes no sense.
Furthermore, whynotminot specifically said, in reference to the Wikipedia article about US v. Microsoft, "which is why I replied skeptically because it says Microsoft had most of it overturned on appeal." This again points to the legal sense of win.
This is a ridiculous, nutty criticism. You're complaining that I left off "lol I did" and instead replaced it with "in reference to the Wikipedia article about US v. Microsoft"? That's exactly what you did by adding "[read the wikipedia article]"! In fact, you left off a part of the sentence too, the "lol" at the start.
> this very clearly is the poster explaining they meant it in the colloquial sense rather than the strict legal sense. If they had meant it in the strict legal sense they would have claimed _all_ of it was overturned on appeal.
No, this doesn't follow at all. It's still the legal sense.
Moreover, that wasn't the end of the case, which was my point in responding to whynotminot. We don't have to guess about what whynotminot meant, because they said exactly what they were referring to: the appeal. They were not referring to the settlement. Nor did they consider that the case was remanded back to district court. So any legal or colloquial "win" was temporary at best.
> bolster your own argument, namely that people who can win don't settle
No, my argment was that people who did win don't settle. As I explained above, the appeal judgment did not actually end the case, which is why the parties ended up settling.
> and now here you are, cherry-picking quotes to try and make an argument. Very alpha of you.
Yeah. MS was a completely different situation. They had something like 90%+ OS marketshare and were able to use the threat of cutting off a PC makers access to Windows in order to force them to use IE. Tbh, the case is more relatable to the case Google just lost than to Apple. In that case, Google cut secret deals to exclude phone manufactures from including other stores.
Why does this even require an antitrust probe? Why aren't there just clear laws against this stuff that Apple would never have done this in the first place, especially in the US where Apple is based?
If I'm reading it correctly, the problem is that Apple Music and Spotify compete, but Apple Music gets preferential treatment, because:
- Apple Music allows you to subscribe from within the app, and Apple isn't taking some % cut in the App Store from its own apps
- Spotify can't afford to pay a % cut to the App Store, so not only do Spotify subscribers encounter a hurdle (can't pay from within the app), but Apple doesn't even allow Spotify to provide users with a link to pay on the website from within the app
This is quite obviously completely unfair. But it seems like there aren't really laws directly against this thing. These investigations and court cases seem to be relying on other statutes around antitrust, anticompetitive behavior, etc., that aren't always clear.
But today, app stores and platforms and marketplaces are a common thing, where Amazon sells its own products on Amazon, Apple sells is own apps on the App Store, Google lists its own websites on Search.
Why isn't there incredibly specific and detailed legislation to prevent companies from favoring their own products in stores/platforms/marketplaces specifically? Why are we relying on outdated legislation that companies think there's a good chance won't apply to them if taken to court?
In other words, why don't we have clear laws that would have prevented Apple from ever considering this self-preferential behavior in the first place? This seems like such a no-brainer for legislators. It doesn't even seem like a Republican thing or a Democrat thing where the other side would oppose it -- it just seems like a common-sense thing.
You're talking about the Digital Markets Act (DMA) which will come into effect in the EU in about two weeks. It does exactly what you say, although Apple is still actively trying to sabotage it with a sloppy implementation.
Apple appears to be following a trajectory reminiscent of Microsoft's pre-Satya Nadella era.
Apple’s myopic focus on safeguarding its only growing revenue stream, the App Store, coupled with hubris in its dealings with developers and an abrasive approach toward regulators, suggests potential challenges ahead.
The optimism surrounding Tim Cook as the savior of Apple may be subject to reconsideration, as his tenure may not be remembered favorably. Under his leadership, Apple has seemingly become a crack head, getting high on the App Store revenue.
It’s not myopic. The App Store tax is an absolutely enormous part of Apple’s net income.
If Apple completely lost their software tax revenue (not on the table in the foreseeable future) I would expect their market cap to go down by like… a trillion dollars?
Back of the envelope math usually leads me to conclude Apple makes about $30B net income per year off of the App Store tax, plus or minus a generous error bar. This ranges between a quarter to half of Apple’s total net income.
App Store tax including the tax itself, plus App Store search/ad racketeering.
I don't think most people object to the App Store tax as a concept. They object to the idea that 30% is fair, and that there's no competitive market where different companies can set up different stores and compete on fees to determine what level of fees actually works in a competitive market.
I think 30% (with all the restrictions on top of that) is extortion. But I don't think Apple should have to accept 0% either.
Software distribution should be a perfect competition economic service. The fee should not be 0%, but it should be driven to effectively 0 profit. And a very large population of apps could very comfortably be direct downloads from the web. Or say, in a timely manner, a simple portable web app.
In my experience, the non computer savvy problem with non iOS devices have far higher probabilities of having malware than the non computer savvy people with iOS devices.
Don't compare Apples with oranges. Android and iOS have roughly the same amount of malware and similar app sandboxes that neuters malware unless the user is utterly braindead and granted the app all kinds of unnecessary permissions.
Regardless, just like it's possible to leave your gun out and get shot by your own child, it should also be possible to infect your own device with malware if you don't care about safety.
Stop infantilizing people and let them make their own choices.
The irony of people saying this is ok, but people choosing not to download small pieces of software not distributed from the App Store is not; is hilarious
In my experience, the people predisposed to scams end up getting extorted over the phone, email or internet anyways. None of it is particularly great, but it does feel like a poor argument against optional sideloading capabilities.
Schiller claimed they don't need AppStore revenue, and could cap it at a billion dollars a year or something. But then they smelled the money (even though they already have the money flowing out if their ears)
If Steve is the revolutionary, then Tim is the professional business/bureaucratic guy, whom I'm sure has optimized Apple a bunch from an operational and business perspective.
And when you have a business person running for too long, the company is going to focus on maintaining what is the growing revenue stream, market share, etc.
Researching and developing M processors allowing laptops unparalleled power relative to power usage, R&D for AirPods which apparently had sufficient utility to become quite popular, and R&D for Apple Watch which also became quite popular.
Apparently, this qualifies as
> Under his leadership, Apple has seemingly become a crack head, getting high on the App Store revenue.
To some people…
And also developing a new business creating and selling movies and tv shows.
>Researching and developing M processors allowing laptops unparalleled power relative to power usage, R&D for AirPods which apparently had sufficient utility to become quite popular, and R&D for Apple Watch which also became quite popular.
What has any of that got to do with Tim Cook, when Tim Cook is not the one who leads of any of these? Apart from Apple Watch, the other two has much of the foundation built during Steve Jobs era.
If Cook is held accountable for “getting high on App Store revenue”, I don’t see why he isn’t accountable (“under his leadership”) for the rest of the things under his long tenure.
Jobs died in 2011, AirPods launched in 2016. M1 launched in 2020. Surely that is sufficient time to credit Cook’s leadership with some of the progress on those products.
In deed, I wouldn't say Tim is a crack head. He is just NOT Steve. And Steve had an influence on the culture of the company that Tim can replicate. e.g: what Steve expressed at the Stanford commencement speech, was one of things that had many talented people got inspired about Apple. Now days it is just another MS/IBM/Oracle type corp with better design and brand with everything driven by market share, TV/Ads streams, etc.
> “The App Store has helped Spotify become the top music streaming service across Europe and we hope the European Commission will end its pursuit of a complaint that has no merit.”
Meanwhile, millions of developers helped the App Store become the top app store across the globe.
Spotify was late to the market, though? I was running a paid streaming catalog for all the major labels in late 1999/early 2000, and Apple was following us into every meeting with the labels.
I think the EU has really hit the jackpot with Apple, Google, and the like. It's not that these big players don't deserve a slap on the wrist; it's more about how long the EU waited to act and the deafening silence before now.
Remember the Microsoft antitrust drama in 2001? [1] That saga said more about the political games than anything to do with Microsoft breaking the rules. It feels like today's crackdowns on the tech giants are more about putting on a show than enforcing the law fairly.
I'm just hoping the EU doesn't decide we need another annoying pop-up or something. We've got enough of those already.
You would prefer that the EU slap businesses around with arbitrary fines faster? Be careful what you wish for; you might get it.
Law and government do not move fast. Yeah, sometimes that sucks. However, you want your law mostly predictable. You don't want to suddenly wind up in jail because some activity is making Dear Leader look bad on Weibo today.
In the article, it says that Spotify filed the complained in 2019 and these big cases can take a long time. There's no big consipiracy theory, I'm sorry!
> BTW, the EU has been quasi irrelevant in realpolitik terms.
The EU itself is the biggest financier of the Ukraine. That is in addition to the individual contributions of the EU member states.
The military assistance is of course a member state prerogative, but pure financial support is not nothing – after all Ukraine tries to run a country while fighting a war. And Ukraine uses that money to purchase that military equipment.
This is not a conspiracy theory. Big cases shouldn't take a long time with the existing technology. It is on the political side to know how to execute laws faster.
People around the world are silently accepting slow law systems instead of speeding them up. We are in 2024.
BTW, I have experience working with lawyers and the legal system in significant cases. You will cry or laugh if you witness the processes and tools used.
Regarding EU, you said that forcing websites to put UI dialogs asking for accepting cookies is a good consumer protection?
You take one issue and try to nullify all consumer laws with it. First, cookie banners are not legal anymore. They should be a dialog where 'No' is the first and foremost option and 'Yes' (opt in to tracking) requires permission per type of tracking. IMO this is a large improvement over: don't even ask, just track users based on PII everywhere, which is the case pretty much everywhere outside the EU.
The fact that you see banners everywhere is data hungriness of those websites. They could simply not track you by default and no banner would be needed. Though I wouldn't be surprised if a future iteration of the GDPR will forbid such banners and require no tracking to be the default.
But leaving this specific points. There are many great consumer laws in the EU:
* Your data bundle is valid in all EU countries. Before the EU intervened, providers would charge you through the nose for data outside your country.
* A web shop in any EU country is required to deliver to any other EU country. You live in Germany, but see a phone at a Dutch web shop that is much cheaper? The Dutch web shop cannot refuse you service because you are in Germany.
* You can return any online purchase within 14 days without justification (14 days after receiving the product).
* There is a single Euro payment system (SEPA). How big this is, is hard to grasp if you are in a large country. But it was hard to transfer money between countries, let alone without incurring fees. Now you can transfer money to any account in the EU without fees using in a uniform way (IBAN account number).
* Strong warranty laws. E.g. if a company does not solve an issue within a reasonable time, they are required to give you a full refund.
I could go on and on, there are so many good examples where EU regulations improve day-to-day life.
> First, cookie banners are not legal anymore. They should be a dialog where 'No' is the first and foremost option and 'Yes' (opt in to tracking) requires permission per type of tracking.
Got a reliable source for that? Because I actually need to have one to send out to a bunch of non-complying companies.
3. The data subject shall have the right to withdraw his or her consent at any time. The withdrawal of consent shall not affect the lawfulness of processing based on consent before its withdrawal. Prior to giving consent, the data subject shall be informed thereof. It shall be as easy to withdraw as to give consent.
I know Europe. Thank you. Never said that EU doesn't have consumer protection laws.
I will illustrate my central point using the SEPA system you mentioned and forgetting the USA prehistoric finance platforms.
SEPA was introduced in iterations in 2008, 2009, 2014, etc. The EU has the resource means to achieve this in a way that other countries (e.g. development or underdevelopment ones) couldn't do.
Argentina, a super corrupt, infinite loop bureaucracy
, and relatively weak country has implemented direct bank to bank transfer without fees (only taxes!) in 2001. This shows my point clearly. This was implemented in less than two years. Indeed around 1 year because they took one to work in the law.
Comparing Argentina to the EU (in political terms) is, in general, completely unfair. I don't know you but I would be concerned as a taxpayer if I were living in the EU zone.
It is indeed completely unfair as Argentina is a single country of 45M people while Europe has ~10x the population and consists of 27countries - the fact that international bank transfers took longer to implement than intranational ones in a single country is kind of irrelevant? Or are you saying that argentina implemented international bank transfers (... With whom?) In only one year?
Argentina is a single country. SEPA covers 27. How long do bank transfers from Argentina to, say... Colombia take? I honestly don't know, but I'm going to assume longer than they do between EU countries.
We can benchmark both and continue the discussion since we can engage in a apples vs organges discussion. This is where qualitative metrics are important. We are talking about 7 years of difference and Argentina is a complete stalled political system. One more thing, this was in the middle of the highest crisis since 2000. At least it shows that when politicians need to move forward it happens.
BTW, Argentina also had many local banks in different regions. The EU region is just ~1.5x larger than Argentina.
Argentina: 1 country. 1 currency. 1 law applicable to the entire country.
SEPA: EU + Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom: 31 countries. 12 currencies (7 currencies in the EU alone [1]). 31 different laws (while EU countries must adhere to the overall EU laws, they are free to implement their own laws as they see fit within the general framework).
wslh: yes, yes, they are entirely comparable, after all Argentina also has regions.
The issue was getting all of the different banking systems into synchronization and forcing the banks to get there.
SEPA effectively got everyone to the level of some of the smaller EU countries that implemented similar systems by early 1990s. It wasn't easy, because some of those countries had population that still thought cheques are a good idea.
> Regarding EU, you said that forcing websites to put UI dialogs asking for accepting cookies is a good consumer protection?
The EU did not require those cookie pop-ups. Websites could have used no cookie popups and let users go to the website settings (or an "allow cookies" checkbox in the top right corner of every normal page) to turn on cookies. Instead, websites added annoying cookie pop-ups to maliciously comply or added third-party cookie banners "on accident" because the not-lawyer website owners didn't realize that the GDPR didn't ask for cookie pop-ups.
It is not about "exact" technologies but about having a goal and execute it in a smart way. That "exact" technology could be a tool that you know how to find and use from GitHub that is written in any programming language.
Not this again. These fines are barely a blip on the radar compared to the yearly EU budget and the budgets of Western European countries. Also, the EU has handed out fines to anti-competitive companies for a long time. E.g. 855 million Euro in 2001 for vitamin cartels:
Also various car companies, like Daimler in 2016 for 1B.
The EU is really different than the US, in that most citizens and countries believe in market regulation. And all these regulations like GDPR, DMA, DSA, etc. are all expressions of that. It just takes years for these regulations, to land, first because writing such regulations is complex, especially because companies try to find loopholes. Secondly, we are 27 nations, and that just makes things go slower. After they are accepted they are usually effective, e.g. takeout functionality of various large services were mostly a side-effect or EU legislation requiring that users can get their stored data and get it removed.
It just takes many years to finetune, because companies unintentionally or intentionally misinterpret them (like the many websites that have a GDPR popup, where opt-in is a single click and opt-out is multiple clicks, which is illegal under the GDPR).
I am european, I live in Europe and I much prefer the EU approach to the US approach.
I still feel that the EU drags its feet on enforcing rules on large european companies, like the automakers, while moving slightly better on US companies. Yeah, they did eventually fine Volkswagen. After the US got the ball rolling, and it became impossible to sweep the whole thing under the rug.
Of course, the US does the same thing. The 737 MAX was grounded in Europe, while the US FAA dragged their feet until it really became obvious that it must be done.
The GDPR DMA DSA are really great. I'm not at all sure we would have them if the internet giants were european. How many laws requiring interoperability between car parts or industrial machine parts do we have?
> I'm just hoping the EU doesn't decide we need another annoying pop-up or something. We've got enough of those already.
It didn't. The website operators decided to be a pain towards their customers so they can continue to track the hell out of them. They could just, you know, not do that.
100% this. Though in the end they'll only end up hurting themselves, because if it doesn't work, I would not be surprised if the GDPR gets updated to require opt-out by default without any user action and opt-in as an explicit action.
Seconded. I find it absolutely amazing that people try to paint the EU in a bad light for obliging web sites to let their users know they're being tracked. I'm grateful that I'm protected by institutions that work for the people, not for the corporations.
Yup, it merely surfaces all the bad actors out there that were previously unseen (except on your CPU/network/flamegraph)
I mean when one pushes me a banner with a clear CTA to accept everything and an intractable rat's nest of dark patterns to reject anything then I clearly and unambiguously know which side of the line they stand.
Would you rather take a 50% pay cut, or slightly annoy somebody else? Because that's essentially the choices they're giving companies. They should have 100% seen through this, and made the do-not-track header enforceable. Legislators actively chose not to though.
Browsers could have implemented something that was compatible and sent the header accordingly, but they didn't. It's not the government's fault this is the way the industry implemented the law.
They didn't implement it, otherwise I would see a browser-level popup instead of a nasty dark-patterns modal on websites. The do-not-track header (at least at places I worked) were generally respected, going so far as to completely disable analytics for those users. However, this is not active consent ... so, no browsers did not implement this.
They literally did. It was shipped in all major browsers. It was even shipped in IE 9.
It's still being shipped in most browsers. Though it's now deprecated and Safari removed it because it was, guess what, used as a fingerprinting variable.
> I would see a browser-level popup instead of a nasty dark-patterns modal on websites.
No, no you wouldn't. If industry at large cared about user privacy, they would actually come together and agreed on such a popup. And in the absence of such a popup they wouldn't come up with the plethora of dark patterns they now blame on the EU.
As is, they used DNT for fingerprinting, and employed dark patterns when asked (quite nicely, but in no uncertain terms) not to track users and not to sell their data without users' consent.
> The do-not-track header (at least at places I worked) were generally respected, going so far as to completely disable analytics for those users.
There are places where you didn't work. And they couldn't care less about user privacy, or user preferences.
It's very likely that the same very places you worked at now offer a "we care about your privacy, here's 1922 partners that build a profile on you, accept".
No. I said browsers could have implemented the GDPR pop-up. Someone else asserted that they did via do not track headers and I’m giving up trying to convince people that do not track headers are not GDPR compliant.
- Browsers could have implemented something that was compatible and sent the header accordingly
- Browsers literally implemented a header, called Do Not Track. You provided "active consent" by setting that header in the settings
The great amazing industry that does no wrong immediately used it for tracking.
Fast forward a few years. The industry is told in no uncertain terms: do not track without user consent. How did the industry respond? Did it implement this at browser level? No. Did it come up with a standardized pop-up? No. The industry immediately responded with malicious compliance and dark patterns.
Setting it in your browser settings is not compatible at all. It isn't active consent by any definition of the word. It isn't per-site but set globally (hence how it could be used to fingerprint browsers in the first place!). The header failed every possible test for actually providing any actual signal.
All browsers had to do was create active consent (like they do for pop-ups, remember those?), send the appropriate header, and that is it. It would only require a few changes but the industry decided not to do that ... for whatever reason.
Is your contention that all of these websites and providers all simultaneously decided, incorrectly, to use these popups and that there is no legal requirement for them?
GDPR does not require any website/webapp by default to show a popup.
What GDPR requires is consent for tracking PII.
If you or anyone run a website and dont track/store/process any PII tracking information without user consent you dont need the popup.
Here is an example:
Do not put any GA or tracking analytics that tracks PII on your web app and you can still have signups and login if you gave a good terms of use and you require consent for the user when they signup. You can even use cookies in the login/signup flow but use them only for making the auth work and not for tracking.
PS: If you do signups please read the GDPR and offer to the user the option to manage their consent for accepting to provide data when they created their account: for example (IANAL) the user should be able to delete their account, download their data, retract the consent and have their account with all the info provided destroyed. You can keep data for legal reason for the minimum required period.
It's not my "contention". You could read the text of the law and point out the exact places where it talks about cookies, popups, or browsers: https://gdpr.eu/tag/gdpr/ (Hint: there are no such places)
> all of these websites and providers all simultaneously decided, incorrectly, to use these popups and that there is no legal requirement for them
Yes. Yes they did.
The bigger players decided that they have god-given right to your data. Facebook has literally spent the past several years arguing that in courts.
The smaller players rely on a handful of literal ad-industry-owned leeches like IAB[1] or OneTrust to get their popup banners from because people are stupid and/or lazy and don't want to deal with details.
So they, like you, were sold a lie of "to be compliant use our services".
Well, EU law requires you to use cookie banners if your website contains cookies that are not required for it to work. Common examples of such cookies are those used by third-party analytics, tracking, and advertising services. These services collect information about people’s behavior across the web, store it in their databases, and can use it to serve personalized ads.
At GitHub, we want to protect developer privacy, and we find cookie banners quite irritating, so we decided to look for a solution. After a brief search, we found one: just don’t use any non-essential cookies. Pretty simple, really.
--- end quote ---
[1] Literally Interactive Advertisement Bureau. Fined 250 000 euros in 2022 for non-compliance.
The point of the popups started out as smokescreen for continuing behaviours illegal under GDPR
The way most of them are designed is in fact illegal.
For reference, every time a popup claims consent for "legitimate purposes" for some 3rd party? That's flat out illegal - actual legitimate purposes need no consent... and also can't be shared with third parties like this.
I'm absolutely happy if those companies fund the new north/south rail corridor, it'll help us in EU much more than airpods.
And if they decide to leave and let local companies take over certain parts of the market, keeping profits and jobs locally (instead of Bermuda and Cayman islands) then all the better.
I don't think we can lose here as EU citizens. It's not like Trump will do anything different to protect US when he gets elected.
I always wonder what happens with these fines. Does it get absorbed into the EU budget? Does it go to the customers/citizens who were disadvantaged? Or does it go schools or the disadvantaged?
Does Apple actually pay or does this end an endless court cases and thereby the fine is absorbed by the lawyers?
“Fines imposed on undertakings found in breach of EU antitrust rules are paid into the general EU budget. This money is not earmarked for particular expenses, but Member States' contributions to the EU budget for the following year are reduced accordingly. The fines therefore help to finance the EU and reduce the burden for taxpayers.”
So would a US tax payer. Just he would be incentivised to trigger a US fine on Apple instead of a EU fine. So would a Japanese, or any tax payer, really. How did you come up with the idea that this is EU specific?
Last quarter, Apple had ~$120,000,000,000 in revenue. Or about $1,300,000,000 revenue per day. As I write this, the story has a '6 hours ago' HN timestamp. And Apple's revenue has almost equaled the fine since the story was posted.
OK, but what about profit? Apple had $93,000,000,000 net revenue in 2023. Or about $250,000,000 per day. So the fine is about two days profit. Or around 0.5% of annual profit.
And in the EU† they had $30,397,000,000 net sales in 2023 [0], about $83,000,000 per day. Nearly a week of profit in the EU†. Around 1.6% of annual profit in the EU†.
Even with only looking at the EU† sales, this does not seem to be that bad of a fine.
What’s strange is that this wasn’t a rule imposed just against Apple’s competitors. This rule applies to all apps on the store. The idea that they feel justified in imposing a fine specific to the music streaming apps seems like they’re hiding the ball a bit.
So Apple should be forced to allow Spotify to offer a payment alternative outside of the App Store? Should this allowance be made for just services competing with Apple, or should we be allowed to dictate how Apple does their business across the board?
Slack doesn’t compete with Apple directly, should they be allowed to sue over the 30% fee?
Smartphones are just small PCs with touch screens. They should have similar vendor/customer dynamics: no app store monopoly, no inserting yourself in my private business transactions to extort some rent seeking 30% middleman fee, etc. The present behavior of this "mobile PC" duopoly is absolutely nuts, and needs a reckoning for their anti-consumer behavior.
All of that is a known entity before buying an iPhone though. You don't have a right to change the terms you agreed to before/at purchase.
I'd rather not be limited to Apple's app store, but if I buy an iPhone, I'm accepting its involvement in the purchase. I don't get to go back and say "oh yeah, and I demand that you remove these conditions."
Android allows for alternative app stores, yet they're barely worth mentioning. That's a tell that the market doesn't care whether a smartphone ties users to a single app vendor or not.
> no inserting yourself in my private business transactions to extort some rent seeking 30% middleman fee, etc
Except that Spotify can avoid the 30% fee, so that's hardly a good description.
It just means that when someone else comes forward to complain about the same thing in another industry, they can fine them again for basically the same thing.
This just seems like even more nonsense from the EU to generate money for themselves.
What is the problem? I'm an Apple user on all my devices and I use Spotify for my music streaming without any issue from Apple.
This seems somewhat unfair to Apple to me. It's not like they block Spotify, it's very easy to install, subscribe and use on Apple devices and everyone knows Spotify and that it exists, of course Apple are going to promote there own streaming service, that is just normal business. I don't buy a sandwich at a cafe and then have them try and offer me a drink for the cafe next door as another choice.
It's quite shocking what appears to be the common ground here.
The EU has been trying to give users (YOU!) freedom of choice when it comes to YOUR personal data. But you are complaining that businesses tried to circumvent this with cookie banners?
In this case the EU is trying to make sure there is COMPETITION, which benefits YOU. Capitalism, Free Markets, etc. Not a fan?
And coming up next: The EU is trying to make sure that YOU are allowed to install any application you want on a device YOU own. Again, a device YOU own, not Apple.
And this time around, Apple is going pure evil on this, by trying to force application stores offering open source (isn't this supposed to be a thing here, you know, HACKER news?) to pay them for allowing YOU to download a free open source app onto the device YOU OWN. Are you guys again going to defend them for that move?
Apple has absolutely no legitimate reason for all of this. Not by any commonly known definition of the term "free market".
There is so much shit going on here in my region (Central EU). There is a lot to complain about when it comes to the EU. But complaining about a governmental entity fighting for the rights of the people instead of the oligarchs for a change?
Seriously, what's wrong with some of you guys? Do you really want to live in a world where a tiny number of mega corporations, some of them run by lunatics, are allowed to have full control over devices you own AND all of your personal data?
I am SO looking forward to the EU smashing Apple to pieces for the disgusting stunt they are right now trying to prevent users getting back some control over their hardware.
I would assume that a US-based hacker/nerd/tech enthusiast would respond to what the EU is trying to achieve here with: "Hey, why can't we over here also have some of that? Is it normal that OUR government is not fighting for our basic rights?".
Sorry for the harsh words, but this really needed to be said. Some people really need a reality check and look at this site's title. No, it's not "i-want-musk-to-rule-the-world-and-eat-my-firstborn.com".
> Do you really want to live in a world where a tiny number of mega corporations, some of them run by lunatics, are allowed to have full control over devices you own AND all of your personal data?
Long story short, yes, a lot of people here do. It's the temporarily embarrassed millionaire syndrome that drives a lot of American politics, but in a tech context.
They believe that one day, they could be the lunatics running the mega corporation and exploiting users, and when that day comes, they don't want the EU to stand in their way.
But still: How on earth could a nerd/hacker/tech enthusiast have the position of "I should not be in charge to decide what Software I install on hardware I own"?
Do these people really think that Apple knows what's best for them and has the sole right to decide? Do these people not trust themselves at all to know what Apps they want to install, what music they want to listen to, and what content is safe for them to read?
The enthusiasm is for money and power. The 'enthusiasm' broadcasted over "hacking", "autonomy", "libertarianism", etc, is virtue signaling because of the kind of message board HN is 'supposed' to be.
I agree on the virtue signaling. I'd prefer to call it "trying to find common values", but yeah, it does fit the definition.
But I disagree about the "supposed to be".
It genuinely strikes me as completely illogical.
Albeit used much less in those circles around here in the EU, I had my fair share of contact with hackers/nerds/geeks/devs/etc that use MacBooks. When asked why they accept working with such a locked down platform the response I got most of the time was "it's BSD, I can run and compile whatever I want".
But that's not the case when it comes to the IPhone. Here right now as an owner you don't have much rights on something that you own.
I sure can see that you simply can be indifferent on that - such as one might have the position to be happy to have an "open" platform on the desk, and a walled garden in their hands. But being in OPPOSITION of having those who also want the platform in their hand to be open? I still find that very counter-intuitive and strange.
Most of the discussions here are about logical subjects, and positions typically appear to me to be very rational.
But the comments I often see here whenever "EU tries to enforce data privacy laws and enforce free market access" comes up don't appear to be very rational to me. For what I would call the "hacker community" over here in the EU, even when using the broadest possible definition of the word, appears to be cheering in unison whenever - often with the help of that community - another goal post has been moved when it comes to regaining some personal rights.
For me it's now two years that Apple again and again is rejecting to accept an Open Source community app to its store due to it on initial sign-up requiring a connection to an OAuth2 provider in a dedicated browser Windows. Once. As this is a requirement from the OAuth2 provider. Apple is rejecting this again and again on the sole comment that this dedicated browser window opening up once after installation would be a bad UI experience. All while 100,0% of the users of the app are just happy with that, and that the vast majority of apps on the App Store using for example Gitlab as an OAuth2 provider have the exact same flow.
It's two years now that the Android users are happy, and the iOS users have to live with installing one "preflight" version after another.
So yeah, there you have it: Of course I was looking forward to simply providing the app via Sideloading or an alternative App-Store, but by simply ignoring the laws the EU has made with a "come, fine me" attitude, I probably can wait another year before the EU has success enforcing its laws. It's hard for me to grasp that anyone in the developer community could justify Apple blocking both sideloading Apps and installing them via third party app-stores, no matter how much fan posters of any giving company they may pinned to their wall...
I don't understand the dissonance myself, though as I'm neither a developer nor a "hacker" of any sort that might affect my opinion. The desktop computer is the most open computing platform ever developed and the first to reach the masses, and the way things are looking it will be the last; yet this is something the libertarian free-market capitalists here cheer? They complain about tech illiteracy but want to keep everyone in a state of learned helplessness? I just don't get it.
In another thread about Apple's compliance with the DMA, people were arguing that the locked down nature is why they bought from Apple. They believe it's beneficial.
I guess it's the same kind of person who, in other circumstances, might prefer an authoritarian government that would restrict their rights (e.g. women who are against women having the right to vote); they genuinely want it because they think it produces better outcomes than something totally free, and they don't value their own freedoms as much as someone more independent and libertarian would.
I think your comparison with women's right to vote is spot-on. But in most parts of the world there has been and still is progress.
But thinking about it, the US moving backward on this subject, too - a lot of people now believe it's OK to take control over someone else's body. And there are women who actually are against reproductive rights for women.
All of this feels so strange to me. Since the IBM PC the industry got a huge boost due to the PC being an open platform. Back then outside of IBM it was pretty much unimageable that anyone would say "don't open up that platform, we prefer a walled garden". But now, 40 years later, the lessons appear to be forgotten.
Maybe those who have this belief that a locked down computer platform is a good idea are young, and due to there not being computer history lessons in schools simply have not experienced those decades themselves?
I am not sure how much those groups / beliefs really overlap, but I have the feeling that those who want an almighty Apple might be the same people who want a "lean" government. Which means that they have more trust in a corporation where they don't have any say compared to a government that they can (more or less these days) elect themselves.
That again might be due to potentially missing history lessons. Maybe people simply don't know what Microsoft back then tried on dirty tricks to destroy the open source movement, and now is trying again trying to force you to use Edge, just as Apple wants to force you to use Safari. Again I would expect that people in this forum agree that it will be beneficial for humanity that there are multiple browser engines available. I mean - I guess nobody here would find it attractive to only have two different car manufacturers, who also exercise full control over what you can do with the car that you OWN.
Just to give another example: Pretty much everyone watches porn. Do they find it attractive that Apple is deciding on what on is OK and what is not? I know that people in the US are much more prudish and inhibited compared to most EU countries. But EU magazines got banned from the app store due to showing women's breasts in a medical context etc. Again I don't understand why people even trust a corporation to know better about their sexuality then themselves.
Humans are weird, and only to be enjoyed in small dosages. But I expected that people who prefer free markets, choice and empowerment of the users to be the fast majority on this forum. But that clearly is not the case.
but it is not oligarch who get the taxes, apple stock owners I guess
it is somehow the job of Apple management to maximize profit, they are doing this
question is whether they really optimizing future profits with this behaviour, they could have moved on already
I wanted to buy my mum an iphone, I am all linux and android, my partner has iphone and ipad and even if I dont like apple and microsoft logic, they are good products
I thought with face id it is easier to be safe and she will not really see that I forced a pass manager on her :)
and I was sure now apple abandons this behaviour and they were put on the right track, apple was somehow an option for me... until this happened
no way I ever buy an iphone anytime in the future for anybody
but I am probably a minority... I think this kind of behaviour is disgusting that apple does
however, if app store revenue is 100B dollar, every year, logically understandable, 500 million fines are noting
still, the world is governed by emotions too, and I will never forgive Apple
I'm using the term "oligarch" here to try make it clear why "let's have a very small number of not democratically elected people/organizations in control of your human rights" historically has proven not to be a very good idea, and why it's somewhat better to have a functioning democracy taking care of that. And as a huge chunk of our human rights are now digital and managed by corporations, it means that it's essential to maintain a free market, so that at least some choice is left.
It makes me feel old, but I do remember the times when the US lectured EU countries about those concepts. It's frustrating that people here who clearly are expected to be well educated and who might be coming from that country that used to lecture others about freedom, free markets and ownership rights no longer put any value in that.
It all appears to be empty words these days. "Stand your ground"? No? It's my hardware. I paid for it, with money I got from doing work. I own it. It's mine. I decide what Apps I install, I decide what music I listen to, I decide if I want to watch porn on it. Why has the concept of "owning" something lost all meaning to some?
US companies control all OSs but linux... they are surely working together with NSa and the US government which in turn let them become extremely powerful monopolies... what are oligarchs? people who play together with strong governments... Ithink the upper management of these US companies not just become oligarch-rich from soaring stock prices but the actual thing oligarch enjoy is power which is not 1 to 1 money
in the economical sense stock companies have shareholders, simple employees and management and the goal is to maximize profit... totally legit and apple is seemingly doing this by crippling the web because using apps from taxed app store and using browsers to browse simple websites is what fits their thinking and current(!) sales model
but you are right, why do people argue for apple I really dont understand... all you have to do if you want to stay simple and apple-safe to follow their suggestions, use safari, never download other browsers, do not use other app stores etc... a choice will not make their system worse
and what I want to add, I am not sure Apple actually on the profit max way with these decisions... not because I never buy iphones ever again because most people who buy apple rather tend to beleive them and accept and follow which is an understandable strategy when there is so much information around
but they missed making Safari THE browser where they now could distribute Apple products on all OS which may have lead to doubling the great profits we see nowadays... they could have bought tesla or porsche which fits this individualistic walled garden system they are so good at...they missed the cloud business, missed ai and who knows what else
and sometimes it is better long term if you lose some money but you let your developers experience some real competition which leads to actually better present value of long term future profits even if you lose some monopolistic profit
and they do not have to disappear to fail, we never know the relative path, what could have happened... maybe being the biggest market cap company of the world is still failing relative to following a path with more competition, innovation etc...
well if you think that you are a proud US citizen who somehow has Apple/Google, I think they actually pay their taxes in Ireland?
"When a customer buys an Apple product outside the United States, the profit is first taxed in the country where the sale takes place. Then Apple pays taxes to Ireland, where Apple sales and distribution activity is executed by some of the 6,000 employees working there. Additional tax is then also due in the US when the earnings are repatriated."
of course as means of power like NSA-level information you have them :)
and in the end, third party cookies are banned (cookie banners is not required actually if you do not have tracking)
But now, reading it again - I indeed might have misunderstood the comment as "There won't be a company like Apple coming from the EU" (which I agree to), while they might actually have meant "Apple can't split in half to apply different rules for the EU and the US". That I would absolutely not agree to. Apple is apply to comply with Chinese laws to the fullest extend, which at least at this point in history still differ quite a lot with the US ones ;)
It's just that Apple for now is still taking Chinese authorities more seriously than the EU ones...
(But maybe I am now misunderstanding YOUR interpretation of the parent-posting. Dunno.)
Wow, this really proves my point. Are you assuming government only exists for the benefit of corporations?
No, the EU is not acting this way because they want an "EU Apple". Nobody over here has the illusion of any such mega corporation ever coming out of the EU. The IT industry we once had was killed mostly by price dumping from China in the late 2000ies.
Those mega-corporations are solely coming from non-free regions. If there is someone right now starting to massively take away market share from US mega corporations, then it's Chinese mega corporations.
The EU are doing this because they wish to protect the basic rights of their citizens. Well, and they are not purely doing this out of their own - a small number of hacker activist for the last couple of years have sued pretty much all EU institutions to make them enforce the laws we have here.
I would recommend you check out the very first three words of the US constitution again. Spoiler Alert: It's not "We the oligarchs" :)
> No, the EU is not acting this way because they want an "EU Apple". Nobody over here has the illusion of any such mega corporation ever coming out of the EU.
i don’t know what case you’re making, but “sore losers” isn’t a winning one.
> Those mega-corporations are solely coming from non-free regions.
all of them come from a place that is a lot more free than any country in the EU: the US.
> The EU are doing this because they wish to protect the basic rights of their citizens.
Ok, then let's assume that the European Court of Human Rights has been corrupted by evil forces from... erm... Mars... that want to ... erm... poison the planet by giving EU citizens control over their hardware and personal data. Or something?
Less naive, I guess.
I'm not playing your "sore losers" game. You are implying that all there is left to fight about is which mega corporations shall be in control of your personal rights.
Fine, if that's what you want.
I want to be in control of my data, and to be in control of the hardware I own.
This doesn't limit your freedom to have Musk, Google, Apple or whoever control your hardware. Give them your private keys. Give them your brain. All your choice and fine for me.
But my hardware stays my hardware, my freedom stays my freedom, and my data stays my data :)
Just because I demand to be in control of my hardware and data instead of a corporation or oligarch does not limit YOUR rights to have a corporation or oligarch to be in control of your hardware and data in any way.
So what do you have to lose? What fight are your fighting here? What's wrong with EU people wishing to keep some of their basic human rights and a free market? It does not limit you. Just because Apple is forced to play by the rules in the EU does not limit them to play by the the-winner-takes-it-all concept that now appears to be common in the US now over there.
you somehow assume that i care about any of this stuff. i do not. i simply don’t think the EU knows anything about anything and that it has the best interest of citizens at its core.
i think the EU will continue to split the internet for people like yourself. while the rest of world will continue doing what they do.
I'd like to clarify on "was killed mostly by price dumping" - that was only part of the reason. Huawei selling below production cost killed much of the EU hardware vendors (Siemens, Alcatel Lucent), but there also was a massive lack of investment in education, a terrible failure culture, and a pretty much non-existent VC market to blame.
But anyway: There is nothing left over here that could only remotely catch up with the pace technology is developing in the US and China. We would be 10+ years late to any such game.
So: It's really just about making sure some of our basic human rights, democracy and free markets survive while the US and China are fighting it out on who is going to control us.
You may prefer to say it in a different way than "smash 'em". But yes, if you violate the laws of the region you are operating in, there must be consequences. So, if you prefer: "Fine them. Jail them". Better?
And in regards of the chat control shit: Yes, this has been going on for decades now and pops up again and again. Originally it was pushed into the EU by the US via the UK. The crypto wars in the US appear to be over for now, but some European right-wingers are still dreaming about it.
But just this week the European Court of Human Rights has decided "chat control", aka weakening end-to-end-encryption is a violation of basic human rights.
This doesn't mean that the right wingers in various EU countries won't try again, but it's pretty futile. We, the people, won.
I would like to say that this is an unmeaningful amount of money for the people at Apple since they will make that in a couple of afternoons, and I wouldn't exactly be wrong, but I also know that these same petty people take this as a personal affront and will do their utmost to fight it, and be passive agressively patronizing about it.
-The EU has a really liberal policy of meting out massive fines to US companies, seemingly seeing them as free money
-Apple is abusive, greedy and entitled and desperately needs to be checked. Apple's hubris (like "don't tell customers they can pay significantly less outside of the app") can only be defended by the Stockholm syndrome few who have deluded themselves into thinking this is rational or justified. It is plainly evident that Apple operates their actual app store team as a discount, rag-tag minimalist operation doing the absolute least possible, yet that yields a profit for them greater than the entire Citibank conglomerate. Just insane. Apple's take from the industry as rent-seeking is greater than entire industries, and we still pretend that it's some need.
There is zero justification for the no-value rent-seeking Apple commits in the app store. And if you have loads of Apple devices in your world like me, seeing Apple saturate markets and start to have trouble growing their already insane profits should cause you some concern as now is when they're going to look to lean on their rent-seeking and "service" income sources more than ever.
It goes to the EU budget. They don't specify where the money goes to when issuing the fine for the same reason a cop doesn't tell you where the money from your speeding ticket is going to be spent on.
these things usually just go back into a general fund; similar to how they do in the USA to avoid "we can charge these companies and get the money back into the department of * and get even bigger!" Well except for civil forfeiture, where they just basically rob people of things without proving anything of note and give the proceeds back to police departments.
> The EU can create new rules out of thin air with arbitrary timelines to implement.
Yes, it's called the legislative arm of government and it's usually where new laws are passed. I'm sure it must seem like a novel concept to some people, but once you live here you get used to it!
I would really like to see if this is a stand Apple could or would make. Apple obviously thinks it has a lot of power, but does it think it could wholesale exit a market?
Apple's introduction of alternative app market rules (and the fees they intend to charge for them) shows that Apple is willing to follow the rule, but make it painful enough that few would take that alternative. I doubt they'd leave the market entirely, but obviously they're willing to test the resolve of the EU's law and rulings.
I'd kill to see Apple pull out of the world's 2nd largest market over their monopolistic bullshit.
Though we both know the psychopathic C-suites & their shareholders would crucify Tik Apple if they pulled out, so there's no chance that's happening, especially with these pathetic fines.
If EU's fines are based in global revenue percentage, then they shouldn't be the one collecting all the fines. If they act as a global messiah, they should distribute the fines and not use it for their own politics.
I'd like to see the EU fine companies based on the harm done worldwide, not just in the EU. But then allow Apple to decide to redirect some of that fine proportionally to over countries regulators (and if the other country doesn't want to take it, it is still owed to the EU).
I think that would help level the playing field, where some (smaller) countries can be walked over by big tech companies because the country is incapable of flighting big companies.
