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

Whats this?
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202074

 

Apple demands Steam sales data in battle with Epic.

https://www.techspot.com/news/88690-apple-demands-sales-data-hundreds-steam-games-part.html

https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.364265/gov.uscourts.cand.364265.346.0.pdf

 

If nothing has changed, Apple only charges 30% if the sign-up of a subscription originates from an iOS product. I guess Apple looks at it as an Apple device that helped drive the sale so should receive a portion of the revenue. Plus if the subscription was generated elsewhere, you wouldn't be paying through the Apple store so there isn't anything for Apple to tax. Also, it is reduced to 15% after a year.

This is a common revenue model for a lot of platforms, outside of PCs. Some companies get around it by offering subs at cheaper pricing when signing up through an alternative device (like a PC).

 

And the judge awarded in favour of Apple's request, although limited the request to 436 games. This does feel a bit loopy that a third party (Valve) to the Epic/Apple litigation can be compelled to disclosure confidentially to the court to held defend Apple. Sure, I know this information will be tightly controlled and not made public but it feels nuts.

At this stage it's difficult to see how Epic are going to win against Apple or Google. Steam's data will undoubtably show that despite Epic having a thinner retail margin than Steam, that the 30% industry 'nom' has not been impacted sales which is fundamentally Apple and Google's argument. If this were the case, Valve would certainly have changed Steam's retail margins by now.

Epic's case against Google seems even more flimsy given you can side-load apps on Android. This is definitely a case where companies simply have too much money just suing each other to marginally increase that already-mountain-sized piles of money.

 

You can side load apps onto a non-jailbroken iPhone as well, its just harder. See https://altstore.io.