Apple Argues DoJ Lawsuit Could Set 'Dangerous Precedent' for Tech Design

[Xiao_Xi]

This is why all these regulations are bad, none of them are solving the actual issue, which is lack of competition at the operating system level. Every other issue goes away if you have competition at the operating system level.

What would you suggest if the barrier to entry into the operating system market was so high that no new company could enter that market? Microsoft tried and failed.

If competition cannot regulate a market, it seems natural to me that regulation should.

 

[Guidonculous]

This is why all these regulations are bad, none of them are solving the actual issue, which is lack of competition at the operating system level. Every other issue goes away if you have competition at the operating system level.

Competition at the OS level beyond a few major players would be an awful outcome in practice. Now from a developers standpoint, you’d have to write the same app way more times for it to be available to the general public.

I think what’s missed in all these arguments is that the concept of “lock in” is built into the concept of software development. Sure, you can create solutions that “run anywhere”, but they always come with significant downsides, in particular, that they basically have to work with the lowest common denominator and so they can’t be as powerful and well designed as a native app to a specific platform.

Blockchain promoters made a bunch of dumbass promises that software would suddenly be interoperable, that you could take stuff you bought in one ecosystem to another. Of course, there has been no evidence of this happening, because that’s fundamentally not how software works.

Increasing the number of OS would counter intuitively decrease consumer options for apps because it would be unsustainable for companies to support all those OS, and if they did it would come at a major expense if decreasing the amount of effort they put into improving their offering.

 

[Ctrlos]

If the wider industry worked together more on open standards we wouldn't have lawmakers angry at proprietary formats. Every constraint applied is a design problem that can be solved, but there is more a willingness to protect shareholders over the end user. Open standards ike USB, Email, Bluetooth and HDMI have stood the test of time.

Big Tech could if it wished for example get together and put together an open standard for health data collection and encryption so that all watches and trackers could work with the same data. ZKP technology would also allow healthcare to access it without compromising privacy. For example if your heartrate was high ZKP would verify the query ("Is the average heartrate higher than x?") without actually revealing the exact values. But it doesn't and everything is siloed. Every locked down piece of generated or purchased data is a form of lock-in, intentional or not. I could use any MP3 on any digital music player I liked but I can't read my Apple Books purchases on a Kindle.

Every user on the planet agrees that battery life is perhaps the most important consideration in any phone. All the power in the world is useless if you lose charge in 3 hours. Hot-swappable batteries are long overdue for a return to smartphones and in 2025 you can still buy models that support them and are still IP68. Now that Samsung is designed for fieldwork but the underlying technology could, if platform holders wished find its way into regular phones. The industry could then standardise the technology so that multiple companies can manufacture spares and integrate Qi2 directly into the cell itself. You'd have more innovation in the accessory market because nothing would become outdated every year. Buy a spare and keep it on the charger at all times; Swap out when you need more juice.

The industry could do all of this tomorrow. The technology already exists. But it chooses not to.

 

[Ctrlos]

Competition at the OS level beyond a few major players would be an awful outcome in practice. Now from a developers standpoint, you’d have to write the same app way more times for it to be available to the general public.

I think what’s missed in all these arguments is that the concept of “lock in” is built into the concept of software development. Sure, you can create solutions that “run anywhere”, but they always come with significant downsides, in particular, that they basically have to work with the lowest common denominator and so they can’t be as powerful and well designed as a native app to a specific platform.

Blockchain promoters made a bunch of dumbass promises that software would suddenly be interoperable, that you could take stuff you bought in one ecosystem to another. Of course, there has been no evidence of this happening, because that’s fundamentally not how software works.

Increasing the number of OS would counter intuitively decrease consumer options for apps because it would be unsustainable for companies to support all those OS, and if they did it would come at a major expense if decreasing the amount of effort they put into improving their offering.

They could create an open standard of app distribution that works across platforms. Its how PWAs and web development works.

 

[Mac Fly (film)]

Selfishly wish Apple sees the writing on the wall and brings iMessage to Android and Windows to make the app more compatible, giving Apple users more confident use of the app and all of its features no matter who may be on the other end. Pay for the running of the app with in-app money sending. In typical Apple-fashion they could make money sending as easy as sending a message of "$20" with a confirmation pop-up for the sender. "Do you wish to send $20 to John?" Yes, send it. Cancel. Easiest money sending in the world.

 

[theluggage]

I don't understand why we are considered 'locked' into an ecosystem.

Sure - all you have to us buy a new $500 phone and/or break your mobile contract, find alternatives for all the Apps you depend on, possibly pay again for some, move over all your data, learn to use a different OS and possibly different apps, give up any hardware/software features that made you buy the original phone in the first place...

Maybe you'd be prepared to do that as a tech enthusiast who actually enjoys those sorts of shenanigans - but the vast majority of users have better things to do with their time and money and lack confidence in their tech problem-solving skills. Which is how these lock-ins spread.

Why isn't anyone complaining that the other options don't offer whatever it is that made them (those anyones) choose Apple. It goes both ways.

If we're citing undefined "anyones" here, how come that, in most other threads on this site, Android is dismissed as a howling hellscape of user hostility, bugs, malware, ugliness and Google Being Evil running on sub-standard hardware - until we start discussing antitrust cases against Apple and then suddenly Android becomes this magical alternative for anybody who doesn't like the Apple walled garden?

Meanwhile, Google - the main alternative - has a string of antitrust cases and EU rulings reigning in their anti-competitive behaviour (such as trying to force 3rd party Android phone makers to promote their apps). So, yes, it absolutely cuts both ways.

Google & Apple may have started their phone businesses by making the better product & beating the competition, but without antitrust legislation, their job is to do.their level best to pull ladder up after them (which would otherwise be the best for their shareholders - the only real responsibility large corporations have).

So in other words, Apple can’t offer superior functionality between its own hardware, software, and services in order to convince people to buy their products?

Except we're not just talking about Apple benefitting from their own hard work here. There is now a $500bn industry making smartphone apps and, however you calculate market share, Apple controls a substantial wedge of that (probably disproportionate to their unit share of smatphone sales since they only sell more powerful models to deeper-pocketed customers). What about competition and choice within that market?

These contended app store rules prevent competition in that market - in some cases forcing all developers to offer little more than skins for Apple's media player, web browser, payment services etc. so developers can't offer "superior functionality" to convince people to buy their products. Now, if Apple were still a little startup battling the competition, those developers could say "ok, then, good-bye Apple" - but the reality is that the iOS App market is too huge for developers to ignore... and, no, significant developers don't have a choice - once they have shareholders they are obliged to maximise their profits.

Folks, Apple is now a $2tn global corporation with the power to shape markets and a mission to make itself a $3tn company. It's not Jobs and Woz slaving away in their garage crafting new, innovative products from the sweat of their own brows any more.

Of course, the hypercapitalist oligarchy would love you to conflate your human rights over your hard-earned, meagre stash of assets with the rights of huge corporations to do as they will.

 

[clg82]

Apple hasn't "tech designed" anything in years....I think they'll be fine 🤣

 

[Guidonculous]

They could create an open standard of app distribution that works across platforms. Its how PWAs and web development works.

Exactly, the web literally already exists. You’re just asking to get rid of something (unique native apps tailored to specific hardware) to have a second version of what already exists (the open web)

 

[Siggo]

I think the argument is that the rules these jurisdictions are making are bad and do not/will not achieve their stated objectives. They also come with downsides that will negatively impact consumers.

Looking what happens jn the EU, i dont think their regulations weren’t that bad for
Consumers. But im happy to be proven wrong and/or hear the opinion of one EU-lie

 

[Doomtomb]

But uh sir, we must be allowed to build our walled garden in whatever way we see fit.... to make that bag. Shareholders!

>> But why green bubbles?
Uhhh that I can't explain

 

[hovscorpion12]

cloud game streaming is the stupidest thing ever.
it requires twice as much resources on the compute/GPU side - one on the phone (which is there anyway) and an equal in some distant server, plus enormous bandwidth to support jitter free, low latency transport with about 2-4Mbps bandwidth for everyone using it. oh yes, the stream has to be encoded in real time and decoded on the other end too. even if the game alone doesn't require a single bit of connectivity.

smartphone CPUs and GPUs are very powerful nowadays. the amount of distributed computing capacity available on the phones people bought and periodically upgrade (for their own money) and use is simply unparalleled. people provide power and cooling at their own expense, whereas any centrally located resource has to be operated/maintained/powered/cooled/replaced by the "cloud gaming platform" operator. all this costs a huge amount of money and it simply can not scale. it's not like Netflix or YouTube, where the same video stream is locally cached - relatively close to the consumer, many times inside CSP access networks. a humble 2RU OCA from Netflix can churn out 400Gbps worth of streaming video - that is serving up to 400000 simultaneous HD streams. but that's "just" reading from flash, encrypting with TLS and sending to the network. relatively easy to scale. if you want to run GPU intensive 3D games from the cloud, the scale will likely be limited to a few 100s, maybe up to 1000 simultaneous sessions for an appliance with similar dimensions.

I've been working with a "cloud gaming" cluster server, and - guess what - it has a bunch of arm based system on module boards - essentially like a logic board of a smartphone, but no display/speaker/touchscreen. one can just skip this extra layers of bull**** and run the damn app locally.

Nvidia's GFN would like to have a word.

 

[nnoble]

DoJ and not EU? Shocking.

 

[al_berto39]

DoJ and not EU? Shocking.

Looks like even the US as a limit to how many laws trillion$ companies can buy out

 

[surferfb]

The venu series is getting better at smart features on Android, they are still hobbled by Apple though.

The whole point of this is that due to Apple deliberately and conciously preventing users from full use of their device unless they buy everything Apple is why they are being investigated. If Apple wants a unique feature, sure make a unique feature, but because they prevent competitors from basic functionality (replying to messages for example) that is unfair.

Unless Apple has a monopoly (and I'd note that under current they law don't, which is why the DoJ is trying a novel definition of "premium smartphones" and using revenue, not actual market share, to turn Apple into one), it doesn't matter that Apple absolutely benefits from limiting third party smartwatches (which I agree they do), they have every right to do so.

I strongly disagree with your suggestion that the "only" reason that Apple is preventing accessories like smart watches from having the same feature set as Apple Watch is "preventing users from full use of their device." There are absolutely security, privacy, and user experience considerations with letting third parties have access. Just a few examples:

• What is to stop Meta from harvesting the contents or metadata of your messages displayed on a future version their smart glasses to sell targeted ads? Do we really think consumers will understand that clicking "Yes, display my notifications on my glasses" will mean Meta gets to read the sender, app, and maybe even content of every notification? Even without the content, the metadata would reveal things like who you talk to, when you talk to them, how often you talk to them, etc. which Meta will happily use to further build out their behavioral profile.
• If the Garmin watch drains an extra hour from connected iPhones every day because of sloppy battery management, users aren't going to blame Garmin, they're going to blame Apple for the phone not meeting the promised battery life.
• Now say Garmin doesn't enforce wrist detection, or implements it poorly on the device and you get mugged and the thief uses the watch to unlock your phone or Mac. Unlocking a phone, approving an Apple Pay transaction, or unlocking a Mac requires hardware‑rooted trust. With Apple Watch, that’s enforced by the Secure Enclave and strict wrist‑detection algorithms. If Apple were to let any third‑party watch tie into that system, they’d have to trust the other company’s firmware, update process, and security protocols. Again, users are not going to blame Garmin or Samsung or whoever. They'll say "the phone unlocked, it should know better than to do that" and blame Apple.

Before you say "Apple could just create a certification program for third‑party watches", certification only works at a point in time. It can’t guarantee that future firmware updates, security patches, or changing business models won’t introduce risks. With something as sensitive as authentication and notification data, Apple would be assuming liability for every third‑party vendor’s ongoing practices, which is far harder to control than locking down the integration at the get go.

And, if you don't like Apple's restrictions, no one is forcing you to buy Apple products, because again, Apple doesn't have a monopoly!

 

[Spock]

You remedy this by campaigning for Apple to make their watches get better battery life - get millions of people to sign you petition, get on the news if you have to, or maybe buy enough shares of Apple stock so you can speak at a shareholder's meeting. Catch their attention and convince them that that is what the public really wants. If it really is what the public wants, it shouldn't be that hard to do - heck, I'll even sign your petition.

You DON'T remedy it by getting the government to force Apple to sell/give technology to Garmin. Because that path would be unethical - forcing someone to give up something of theirs just because you want it.

Otherwise, what's to stop me from getting the government to force you - you in particular, Spock - to wear a full length wedding dress every day for the rest of your life, simply because that's what I happen to want?

Apple should not use software blocks to stop other hardware from working, that gives the Apple Watch an unfair advantage because it is also an Apple product.

 

[MKSoft]

100%. I'm always baffled when people argue for things to be locked into an ecosystem. Even as someone in a household of mostly Apple stuff, opening things up a little would make my experience as an Apple user better.

So, this program I love, which is compiled for a specific OS and CPU needs to run on any other device? Does that mean that all devices need to be the same CPU and OS? Where would the innovation be? That is anti-competitive and problematic.

Now, I feel that app developers should be able to write any app for the device that they can conceive of - albeit I would want to be sure they are not hiding nefarious code and hacks in the app. Security screening and sandboxes that prevent it from escaping beyond its stated behavior is a restriction. Apple should allow web browsers to be made and not just be a UI wrapper over their web browser engine. That way, for example, Firefox on the iPhone would be the full Firefox. (Just like the MacOS version can be). Maybe they will make a better browser or maybe the Safari browser will be better - but today, on iOS, the limitations are such that they are all the same browser engine.

There are some reasons for security and safety but build the right walls/sandbox and let the app live in that.

As to market share - money is not market share. Unit sales is. I am sure that Ferrari makes more per car than most any other car company but that does not make them a monopoly or even a serious threat. They may make a car many would love to own and would pay a premium for. Apple has relatively small market share - it is a premium product and makes good profits from that but that is it. It is not even close to a monopoly. Android is far closer to a monopoly than Apple iOS is. (And don't even mention MacOS as it is tiny compared to Windows)

 

[robvalentine]

Unless Apple has a monopoly (and I'd note that under current they law don't, which is why the DoJ is trying a novel definition of "premium smartphones" and using revenue, not actual market share, to turn Apple into one), it doesn't matter that Apple absolutely benefits from limiting third party smartwatches (which I agree they do), they have every right to do so.

I strongly disagree with your suggestion that the "only" reason that Apple is preventing accessories like smart watches from having the same feature set as Apple Watch is "preventing users from full use of their device." There are absolutely security, privacy, and user experience considerations with letting third parties have access. Just a few examples:

• What is to stop Meta from harvesting the contents or metadata of your messages displayed on a future version their smart glasses to sell targeted ads? Do we really think consumers will understand that clicking "Yes, display my notifications on my glasses" will mean Meta gets to read the sender, app, and maybe even content of every notification? Even without the content, the metadata would reveal things like who you talk to, when you talk to them, how often you talk to them, etc. which Meta will happily use to further build out their behavioral profile.
• If the Garmin watch drains an extra hour from connected iPhones every day because of sloppy battery management, users aren't going to blame Garmin, they're going to blame Apple for the phone not meeting the promised battery life.
• Now say Garmin doesn't enforce wrist detection, or implements it poorly on the device and you get mugged and the thief uses the watch to unlock your phone or Mac. Unlocking a phone, approving an Apple Pay transaction, or unlocking a Mac requires hardware‑rooted trust. With Apple Watch, that’s enforced by the Secure Enclave and strict wrist‑detection algorithms. If Apple were to let any third‑party watch tie into that system, they’d have to trust the other company’s firmware, update process, and security protocols. Again, users are not going to blame Garmin or Samsung or whoever. They'll say "the phone unlocked, it should know better than to do that" and blame Apple.

Before you say "Apple could just create a certification program for third‑party watches", certification only works at a point in time. It can’t guarantee that future firmware updates, security patches, or changing business models won’t introduce risks. With something as sensitive as authentication and notification data, Apple would be assuming liability for every third‑party vendor’s ongoing practices, which is far harder to control than locking down the integration at the get go.

And, if you don't like Apple's restrictions, no one is forcing you to buy Apple products, because again, Apple doesn't have a monopoly!

THere's alot of rebuttals to arguements I didn't make in there lol. In fact all I argued for was access to phone calls and texts.

As to your third point, I specifically used the apple watch using that as a unique feature.

Apple wouldn't be assuming liability at all.

 

[cocky jeremy]

So in other words, Apple can’t offer superior functionality between its own hardware, software, and services in order to convince people to buy their products?

So, eliminate competition? Seriously?

The whole thing is stupid on a whole new level. Basically tells company, "Don't create cool stuff, we'll just try to force Apple to share their **** with you."

 

[MKSoft]

Clearly, Ferrari needs to be regulated - they make 27% profit on their cars.
Just like Apple makes more profit on their iPhones.
Ferrari needs to support having Ford or GM engines and Honda suspension systems as plug-compatible replacements. And you should be able to use whatever brakes you want, and any pads should fit the Ferrari brake calipers as it is lock-in to force the pads to be made to Ferrari sizes and tolerances.

 

[ProbablyDylan]

Man just let smart watches actually interact with notifications and talk to the internet without the app being open. The Apple Watch should be the best choice by its own merit not because it's the only choice that works as expected.

 

[surferfb]

As to your third point, I specifically used the apple watch using that as a unique feature.

Where do you draw the line? Saying “just texts” inevitably means iMessage, since most users don’t even know the difference outside of the bubble color. iMessage carries end‑to‑end encryption, typing indicators, read receipts, etc. which Apple now has to support on third-party devices. The same with “just phone calls”: for a lot of people that really means FaceTime; my brother lives in Germany and we only ever call each other on FaceTime. Should Apple be required to hand over hooks into iMessage and FaceTime to Garmin, Samsung, or Meta? From a user’s perspective it all blurs together, but from a security and privacy standpoint the boundaries matter. Once you open the door for “just texts and calls,” you’ve really opened the door to the entire Apple communications stack.

And while you say "unlocking devices is unique", others will say it is anticompetitive and unfair. The EU even says if Apple offers a feature to itself, it has to give that feature to anyone who wants it. I've had users on here tell me that Apple not giving Bose the "easy pairing" features AirPods have is blatantly anticompetitive and Apple should have been required to give it out when they invented it because it's "not fair" that AirPods work "better" with iOS than other headphones.

Apple wouldn't be assuming liability at all.

If Apple let third‑party watches handle unlock and payment, and one was compromised, who do you honestly think users would blame: Garmin, or Apple? That’s liability, whether you call it legal or reputational.

the first 2 arguements are laughable, sorry.

If a third‑party watch drained battery life, harvested notification data, or let a stolen device unlock an iPhone, 99% of users would hold Apple responsible, not Garmin or Meta. Apple has strong incentives beyond profit to limit third-party device access. If you disagree, that’s fine, you're entitled to your opinion. But dismissing privacy and security concerns as “laughable” doesn’t make them any less real.

 

[theluggage]

So, this program I love, which is compiled for a specific OS and CPU needs to run on any other device?

No, of course it doesn't (although that would be nice). We're not talking about unavoidable incompatibilities between different hardware. We're talking about deliberate hardware/software measures that have been added purely to restrict what can run where.

 

[VulchR]

Beating the competition is not a monopolistic practice.

 

[theluggage]

Beating the competition is not a monopolistic practice.

Until you succeed in beating the competition and become big enough to stop worrying about innovating - beyond a new coat of paint on the UI and some more emojis.

...and the issue is not having a literal monopoly - it is anti-competetive practices that let you pull the ladder up after yourself. That can happen as soon as there are just a few, big players in the market.

 

[macsimcon]

Is President Biden insane? You can’t have a monopoly with barely 50% of a market! Is the DOJ suing Google for its Android “monopoly”?

Perhaps the DOJ could protect us from ACTUAL oligopolies in credit cards, banking, cable, Internet access, glasses, airlines, cereal, music labels, insurance, and film studios?