Apple CEO Tim Cook Likens Competition for Attracting Developers to a 'Street Fight for Market Share' in Smartphone Business

[LeadingHeat]

I just wish that these congressman and congresswomen would allow the CEOs to actually speak instead of bombarding them with statements and interrupting them while they’re talking. I found myself laughing out loud at how often he interrupted Cook. Most of the others haven’t been much better.

 

[tubular]

Street Fightin' Tim.

 

[Apple_Robert]

A street fight has no rules. Tim should have said it is very competitive. That would have been more accurate.

 

[Mojohanna32]

He also said developers don’t pay for shelf space. Except for that 30%...

yes, but that shelf space reaches millions of potential customers, unlike retail shelf space that was very limited and still is. No server maintenance, no credit card management, no credit card fees, no security on a site etc. Basically, very little overhead and risk.

 

[emembee]

Apple's stolen a lot over the years.

Watson -> Sherlock
Konfabulator -> Dashboard

Soundjam to iTunes (lol)

 

[Stevez67]

Nobody suggested Apple should sell products that wouldn’t make them money. Not sure where you got that idea from. Apple should simply take a reasonable fee, rather than an outrageous one. Apple is clearly the problem here. These apps work perfectly on other platforms. iOS is the only platform where they are crippled.

Apple is charging fees similar to other vendors. And frankly, in retail in general, a 30% markup is not outrageous.

 

[macbookfan]

Tim misdirected.

> they can write their apps for Android, or Windows, or Xbox, or PlayStation.

Only one of those is another phone platform. Ignoring iOS or Android is not viable if you want to reach a lot of customers. The Apple+Google duopoly inhibits innovation and artificially raises costs.
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Apple's stolen a lot over the years.

Watson -> Sherlock
Konfabulator -> Dashboard

If your app is a game then Window, Xbox, and PlayStation are very much in the mix.

Duopoly is not illegal. But maybe it should be. However that is a different topic all together

 

[jmgregory1]

Nobody suggested Apple should sell products that wouldn’t make them money. Not sure where you got that idea from. Apple should simply take a reasonable fee, rather than an outrageous one. Apple is clearly the problem here. These apps work perfectly on other platforms. iOS is the only platform where they are crippled.

Apple, like every other retailer out there, has margin expectations that everyone who sells to them or through them understands going in. Did you know that Target Stores expect / demand between 65% and 80% margin on products you sell to them, plus back end discounts on top of that for warehousing, marketing, etc. Apple has become a target because they’ve done a good job marketing their stores, and delivering for their suppliers and developers.

So you think Apple should be ok with accepting what, maybe 10% margin on in-app purchases on apps like HULU? Why? Why would 10% be right and not 30%, or 2% or 200%. Apple makes it clear what their expectations are up front. If those rates don’t work with a brand like HULU, why aren’t they considered the bad company for trying to keep that profit for themselves, making their owners and shareholder rich, instead of making it easy for consumers to download through the app on Apple devices.

 

[cocky jeremy]

app store is fair. this thing is a waste of time.

BuT YoU CaNt BuY iPhOnE ApPs AnYwHeRe ElSe!

You mean kinda of how you can't buy Great Value brand at Target?

 

[Baymowe335]

Because Tim said so? It makes no sense.

Actually, it does. I work at an enormous company and business is freaking hard, ruthless, and unrelenting.

 

[lolrepeatlol]

Maybe you should of bought a android, was you not aware of these limitations when you purchased your iPhone?

It's not that black and white. I like iOS. It's a good operating system and I prefer it to Android. Just because iOS has one bad limitation does not mean I will switch to Android. That's silly, because I still prefer iOS as a whole.

Instead, we should fix iOS.

 

[AxiomaticRubric]

Just a red herring show for the public. Nothing will come out of this other than gentle wrist slaps and the growls of politicians who pretend to care.

 

[Analog Kid]

Remember the skeuomorphic designs? Apple stole the bookshelf look from an indy dev from the app store.

I’m not sure which Apple and 3rd party apps these would be, but taking a design cue from another app is different than stealing the app based on App Store download data. Given that Apple was all about the skeuomorphs at the time, is it not possible they would have eventually arrived at that anyway? Is it possible the 3rd party followed Apple‘s lead on skeuomorphic designs to begin with?

Apple's stolen a lot over the years.

Watson -> Sherlock
Konfabulator -> Dashboard

Sherlock: 1998
Watson: 2001

At the very least, it should be:
Sherlock -> Watson -> Sherlock

Desk Accessories: 1984
Konfabulator: 2003

Desk Accessories -> Konfabulator -> Dashboard

Again, there’s some design language getting shared around, but that’s a far cry from stealing an app based on AppStore popularity and selling it for profit.

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Soundjam to iTunes (lol)

Sound jam was purchased by Apple.

 

[repoman016]

As a consumer, all I want is for my experience on the iPhone to not feel crippled. But right now, with Apple effectively blocking their competitors’ services from fully functioning on iOS, I’m unable to have a very good experience as a consumer.

Two examples that come to mind are: 1) The inability to purchase movies in the Vudu app. 2) The inability to purchase eBooks in the Kindle app.

Apple prefers you buy movies from iTunes/AppleTV, and eBooks from iBooks. So they intentionally cripple the competition.

This is not only hostile to developers, but hostile to consumers.

Android is not affected by either of these issues. Both of those apps are fully functional on Android.

Apple, please do what’s best for consumers. Stop crippling apps.

Or like when they removed all of the vape apps because people weren't allowed to be an adult unless apple said they were. specifically looking at the pax app here.

 

[Analog Kid]

So you need to go back to some minor example 10 years ago...and a citation that has some credibility would help.

Given that it’s Cook on the stand, it seems reasonable to ask for an example under his leadership...

 

[swm]

He also said developers don’t pay for shelf space. Except for that 30%...

i'm sorry, but i start to think you don't know how retailers operate and what shelf price is. if you are a sw developer, i wish you good luck to sell your product on the internet on scale at full price. even a payment gw will charge over 3% + a fixed fee on every single transaction. let's speak $0.99 prices. usually you have a $0.10 transaction fee + 3% until you reach a higher annual revenue - this means it's already 13% for the payment collection. then it needs to be wired to your account = extra costs, even if they do this in batches. have a scalable platform to serve your customers, operate a worldwide service of redundant nodes to ensure stuff is up 24/7. storage space, marketplace troubleshooting, network connectivity - all these simple things add up. and you get a constantly developed IDE with all bells and whistles - with MS you will need a DevNet subscription for this, which isn't for free. a very well organised thing called TestFlight to be able to do beta/FUT on scale. analytics for your sales. and a 10% discount on apple products you buy each year.

the fact that the roughly 1/3 in size IOS market generates 2.5x more revenue from app sales makes me wonder that developers are just fine with this 30% cut. please also consider what you as a developer get for this 30% - this puts the whole thing into a different perspective

 

[citysnaps]

Apple is charging fees similar to other vendors. And frankly, in retail in general, a 30% markup is not outrageous.

30% is most reasonable for the services Apple offers and development tools/environment they create and support. And of course there's a piece of that representing profit. I know...that's a nasty word, here.

 

[farewelwilliams]

Also that annual $99-299 fee.

Total BS. Apple isn't fighting to keep developers on the App Store. Epic and Steam fight each other for apps to populate their stores. There is no other store for iOS, and Apple knows it, and so Apple has zero competition. If developers want to distribute to people on iOS, their options are either a web app with all the compromises that entails (compromises which Apple dictates, by the way, since web browsers with alternative engines aren't allowed), or via the iOS App Store with the hundreds of rules Apple arbitrarily enforces, or via a variety of backdoors (jailbreaking, sideloading, etc... legally gray area to be going here, where Apple will retaliate if they find you doing it.)

$99 pays for 3 hours of app review time. hardly accounts for CDN servers storing your app.

 

[Appleman3546]

He compared it to a street fight, but on this iOS street Apple is the only competitor. The only other Avenue is a street with androids on it

 

[MOFS]

Just a red herring show for the public. Nothing will come out of this other than gentle wrist slaps and the growls of politicians who pretend to care.

I think things have already come out of this: look at the options to change default apps in iOS 14 and then pulling back from releasing Apple Tags due to Tile. While I agree that there is unlikely to be significant ramifications for Apple, some changes have already happened as a result of these hearings.

 

[LeadingHeat]

A street fight has no rules. Tim should have said it is very competitive. That would have been more accurate.

Maybe true, but “street fight” grabs more media attention. Case and point, the title of this MacRumors article for clickbait.

 

[calliex]

I can’t watch the livestream while at work but I’ve been reading some of the questions. I’d like to know why these politicians are wasting everyone’s time asking stupid questions? They should bring in people who understand how these companies operate to ask questions, not people with the same level of understanding as my 70 year old parents. 🙄

Watch out there has got be a few 70 year old tech people on this forum besides me.

 

[m11rphy]

What a ridiculous thing to say. Buying an Android phone is not the solution to fixing iOS.

Fixing iOS is the solution to fixing iOS.

Its not a ridiculous thing to say, whats ridiculous is buying a phone that doesn't offer the features you clearly. Android seems to offer the user experience you want from phone. Your acting like a person who marries someone hoping they will change lol

 

[Brandon916]

i'm sorry, but i start to think you don't know how retailers operate and what shelf price is. if you are a sw developer, i wish you good luck to sell your product on the internet on scale at full price. even a payment gw will charge over 3% + a fixed fee on every single transaction. let's speak $0.99 prices. usually you have a $0.10 transaction fee + 3% until you reach a higher annual revenue - this means it's already 13% for the payment collection. then it needs to be wired to your account = extra costs, even if they do this in batches. have a scalable platform to serve your customers, operate a worldwide service of redundant nodes to ensure stuff is up 24/7. storage space, marketplace troubleshooting, network connectivity - all these simple things add up. and you get a constantly developed IDE with all bells and whistles - with MS you will need a DevNet subscription for this, which isn't for free. a very well organised thing called TestFlight to be able to do beta/FUT on scale. analytics for your sales. and a 10% discount on apple products you buy each year.

the fact that the roughly 1/3 in size IOS market generates 2.5x more revenue from app sales makes me wonder that developers are just fine with this 30% cut. please also consider what you as a developer get for this 30% - this puts the whole thing into a different perspective

But some sellers can go to Best Buy, Target, Walmart, etc... to sell their products. Epic Games took THE biggest game Fortnite off google play store and went and sold it on their own store on android still. Why can't developers have options? Sell on Apple App store and their own store which can be accessed on Apples device like Android?

 

[m11rphy]

It's not that black and white. I like iOS. It's a good operating system and I prefer it to Android. Just because iOS has one bad limitation does not mean I will switch to Android. That's silly, because I still prefer iOS as a whole.

Instead, we should fix iOS.

What your saying makes no sense, you knew the limitation when you bought an iPhone, the App Store is not new its 12 years old and has always been the same. Apple has not taken anything away from you that could do when you bought your iPhone. Everything you buy involves compromise and before you purchase its a good idea to work out your essentials so you don't have to spend your time owning that product feeling that you didn't get what you want.

I personally find it really annoying that Apple don't make Netflix , Disney and Amazon offer apple store subscriptions to be on the App Store, I don't really want to have step outside apples walled garden and have to give my credit card to numerous different companies, I also think Netflix should be made to integrate with the Apple TV app so that I can have a better user experience and not have to jump to different apps. The fact is my user experience would be better if apple cracked down on these over companies