Epic Sues Apple and Google due to Fortnite getting pulled [2020-08-13]

I don't see their market share growing from here on out.

So Samsung will still be there and enough people will import Chinese phones.

They'll punch way above their market share weight in profits though.

As for as online services, you mean iCloud fees? I don't see that as that big. We'll see if this Apple One bundle has any traction but I don't see Apple Arcade or Apple News + or Apple TV + really becoming that big.

 

Fine, they can either be forced to divest Apple Music or give Spotify and Tidal better deals.

Music is not that big a part of their revenues.

How about Elon Musk saying a few years ago, he wanted to approach Apple about acquiring Tesla but Tim Cook wouldn't meet with him?

 

How do you know that Apple's music division doesn't have to pay to 30% to Apple's store/services? In every company I've worked at, from Govt org to private, divisions do pay each other for a number of services and fees. We didn't get our laptops, equipment, or even our overhead for free. It is called a budget and we had to fight for every scrap. Well, my bosses did, and I had the side duty of being the "purser" in two of those jobs.

This is partly done for good accounting practices. I have a guess as towards the other reason (w.r.t. anti trust act), but nothing substantive on it.

 

Your analogy does not equate.

Here is one that works:

It's the difference between a shopkeeper just taking their store inventory for personal use, vs using their salary/pay to purchase goods at their own store. One is legal, one is not. I have both experience and audits from California (also the IRS, but their focus was on something else), when it comes to this. Sure, many try to skirt the law (in CA, at least; according to my CPA), and there are people who own small companies that have "fleet" assets that are really personal use assets (need to pay at least 40% of cost, if that is the case - mostly ignored for computers, but is not ignored for something like a car. However, during an audit, that "little" oversight is scrutinized and tax collectors made whole, with penalties).

No amount of shuffling money between bank accounts will change that. Maybe it is different in the Netherlands, where Apple had (at one point) funneled all of their digital sales.

Also, my analogy is just that, an analogy.

 

Apple pelted with more and more complaints from third-party App Store devs • The Register
December 31, 2020

 

Which small businesses?

If the App Store fees are too much for small developers, they're free to make software for Google Play or any other computing device.

Just like if a Mercedes costs too much for my wallet, I can buy a Honda. I don't have some right to force Mercedes to sell their cars to me at a price I can afford.

 

The developers aren't buying a Mercedes or any product. A subtle distinction but an important one.

 

Some developers want Apple to lower the price to put their apps on the App Store.

They want lower prices.

If they can't afford to pay lower prices, they can't make the seller lower their price.

They have plenty of other options. They don't have some inherent right to sell on the App Store, just as I don't have some inherent right to products that I can't afford.

 

Zuckerberg trying to draft on developer complaints about App Store pricing. In fact he cultivated the Trump administration to try to build antitrust case vs. App Store policies.

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/01/why-facebook-and-apple-are-going-to-war-over-privacy/

That is probably one of the reasons FaceBook was friendly to Trump and to right-wing propaganda spread through FB, why he was unwilling to try to curb such disinformation. Because he was trying to kiss up to the Trump administration, hoping they'd take action vs. Apple, which is on the verge of restricting FB personal data tracking through more transparency via the IDFA permissions change.

Because Zuck knows, if iOS users are thrown a warning with "FaceBook" and "tracking" in the language, he knows most users will decline to give tracking permission to FB apps.

 

Bringing Trump and advertising into the discussion of monopoly gating of platform access is irrelevant, just trying to play to emotion ... that kind of arguing is a bit fanboy'ish.

I think Epic would have more success bringing suit in Europe than the US. The US generally doesn't punish monopolies based on success, the EU is more proactive in creating competitive environments.

 

Yeah one could counter with, trump giving the first mac pro to trump (back in 2014 before he was president) I wonder was tim cook responsible for the rise of trump, did he hope to install trump in the whitehouse wco81? Perhaps you can look into this some more. But I would never cast bad light on tim cook by countering with that

 

Advertising is very much relevant since Zuckerberg is trying to use the Epic/Apple dispute to try to bring regulatory trouble to Apple, because new iOS may impact targeted advertising on iOS.

As for Trump, it's no secret that Zuck tried to stay close to Trump, tried to placate him. Now it's clear that he wanted something out of the Trump administration, specifically make Apple change policies to make iOS more favorable to Facebook's business interests.

 

App Store guideline updates, including the long-awaited requirement that Apps get explicit opt-in from users for any IDFA tracking. That is the one Zuckerberg has been screeching about. FB has been testing a more company-friendly dialog -- i.e. that is outright lies -- to try to get people to opt-in to tracking.

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/202...es-with-tracking-opt-in-requirement-and-more/


Some clarification about game streaming apps and prohibitions on promotions of liquor, alcohol, vaping products. Yes they want to be the new Disney, though they will protect your privacy, as long as that privacy doesn't include common vices.

 

So FB is on warpath vs. Apple.

The change in app tracking policies is not the only or first skirmish.

Turns out Zuckerberg took offense to Cook's comments about invading privacy as business models from years ago.

Zuck wants to inflict pain.

So it turns out FB may have been aiding Epic on the "anticompetitive" claims regarding the App Store.

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/202...les-privacy-policies-we-need-to-inflict-pain/


So Zuckerberg has been pulling the strings behind the scenes on this whole App Store is a monopoly and anticompetitive thing?

 

I don't see how apple is in wrong when giving users the choice on how much they are tracked. It's for facebook&co to make tracking so useful people want to opt in. And this is me owning ton of facebook stock saying this despite this could potentially make me loose money. If apple is forced to back peddle on this I think it might be time to uninstall apps from iphone to prevent said tracking that way.