The UK flag looks like an iPhone app next to the App Store like that. Wonder what that app does.
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Apple Clashes With UK Regulator in Fierce Response to Warning That Could Require It to 'Redesign the iPhone'
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I use my Mac for work and heavy productivity. Therefore the software needs to be as flexible as possible to get my work done how I need it to get done. And a Mac stays on my desk or in a bag until I need it.
I use my iOS device for communication, gps, and casual productivity/consumption—all non-work/heavy productivity, therefore software flexibility is not imperative. Rather privacy and security are, because an iPhone is with me everywhere I go and has access to very personal data in addition to all the data on my Mac.
I’m speaking only for myself. I realize not every single person uses their devices like this, but due to the differences in the platforms in question, that seems to be how Apple believes their target customers do.
Also with iPhones almost all tasks have to be done through an app, whereas Macs use more websites. So with each app downloaded and able to access systems directly, there is more potential for malware.
For the most part, as a customer, I like the rules and guidelines Apple imposes on app developers, in terms of privacy/security as well as app quality and features. That’s a big part of why I choose Apple over Android. The App Store review process isn't perfect and should be improved, but opening up the platform to non App Store apps would make the situation much worse. Many companies would choose to leave the App Store in order to stop paying Apple’s cut and adhering to Apple’s strict rules, requiring users to download their non-App Store apps. It would not be an option to go outside the App Store, as so many seem to think, it would be a requirement. To continue using the apps I need, I’d have to do much more research or simply put blind faith in more and more companies. I’d rather developers be forced to use the App Store so that Apple does the review for me.
This is not to mention my non tech savvy family members who would more easily be led astray into clever ploys, and the aftermath with which I would have to deal.
But again, regardless of what any consumer wants, a capitalist government should be hands off and let the free market decide. It should only intervene, carefully, if there is a monopoly. I don’t believe that is the case.
Apple should stop kidding themselves and offer side loading applications. They’re inviting harsher regulation by not budging at all
That would explain their software quality as of late
For starters, I would like to see New Law that would force Apple to disable the Today tab of their App Store App until third-party "App Discovery" App Stores "go live" !
This would effectively kill their Propaganda machine !
Apple has both a Duty & a Responsibility to present & recommend the best app to App Store consumers, but they do NOT do that !
The Today tab of the App Store is ALL-about "Apple Propaganda" !
Another word for it, "Fake News" !
And, Apple has NO so-called App Store Editors covering Photo & Video, it's strictly Tim, Phil, & Matt, three NON-technical guys, making the call.
Except for Game Apps, apps for Little Kids, & Streaming Media sub apps, Apple's "curated" iOS App Store is catastrophically broken !
Probably ALL moot however, for obvious reasons (obvious to anyone to follows World News, that is).
This would effectively kill their Propaganda machine !
Apple has both a Duty & a Responsibility to present & recommend the best app to App Store consumers, but they do NOT do that !
The Today tab of the App Store is ALL-about "Apple Propaganda" !
Another word for it, "Fake News" !
And, Apple has NO so-called App Store Editors covering Photo & Video, it's strictly Tim, Phil, & Matt, three NON-technical guys, making the call.
Except for Game Apps, apps for Little Kids, & Streaming Media sub apps, Apple's "curated" iOS App Store is catastrophically broken !
Probably ALL moot however, for obvious reasons (obvious to anyone to follows World News, that is).
Yup. Absolutely. Suddenly installing applications became an extremely dangerous affair for users.
The narrative have two big holes:
- MacOS hybrid model is quite successful in protecting users. A counter proof of the security disaster that would be such an hybrid model on iOS.
- If at the core was an Apple holistic concern over consumers security than its hard to justify the demands on revenue share of 15%/30% for digital services to reach their customers with their Apps. The second would not be a pre-condition of the first. Quite the contrary.
Even having this in mind would not form the basis of regulators intervention in systems the likes of the iOS App Store policies. But what does might be indeed is when joined with Apple continued predatory practices, both against their customers and digital services. The game they played against the Right to Repair for a decade is one, requiring users to buy replacements almost at full price for something that could be easily solved for less that an hundred, then on going efforts of deploying first party services competing with current digital services operators "manipulating" the tech to their favor ... finally Apple have shown to have no scruples when it comes to pricing their products, case in case their monitor stand on Apple XDR display, and now the new displays and their stands totally designed to create a speculative environment around trivial features such as moving a monitor up and down with ones hand ($420) ... in the era of robotics.
Finally ... what Apple is in effect been able to successfully build ... is a technological border around billions of users devices ... on top of a wider free roaming Internet world sustained by many other businesses that are now required to pay for something that it’s a given ... . This would not be much of a concern if was not concerned with billions of users.
Anyway, will see. Today there are more pressing concerns on the world than Apple problems with regulators.
Cheers.
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Apple being forced to allow alternative "App Stores" is a good thing for competition. It can't come soon enough.
Not really. Apple mostly just promote apps they like on the Today section. They aren’t responsible for those apps.
Mind you, I did see they were promoting a particular language learning app the other day, when I was expecting to see a list of apps presented. Drilling down into the comments, a lot of reviews were complaining about the app’s pricing mechanism (do badly on your tests and you’ll be punished financially). Also, I don’t like the way that some games are only available on Apple Arcade. I will never subscribe to Apple Arcade because… subscriptions.
The problem and the key point with Apple's browsers engine restriction is that it gives Apple control over what websites and web apps can do functionality- and UX-wise, what subset of standardised web APIs they can use, and the quality of those APIs, which is anti-competitive because web apps directly compete in many ways with apps downloaded from the App Store. There are already various standardised web APIs Apple don't implement under the guise of "privacy", but more likely because they can't countenance web apps coming close in any way, shape or form, to the native app UX and functionality. PWAs etc. clearly compete with App Store apps so Apple has a strong interest in surpassing them (as they have done so far). Apple can't control what is made available online, so they need leverage via the browser engine.
It's like if Windows forced all web browsers on its OS to use IE's engine, back in the day.
It's hard to argue that this isn't a monopolistic practice.
It's like if Windows forced all web browsers on its OS to use IE's engine, back in the day.
It's hard to argue that this isn't a monopolistic practice.
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This is disappointing. 161 Comments, and the usual Apple should Pull out of the UK market comments are no where to be seen!
What happened ?
What happened ?
This is another definition of "installing." I do it all the time on my Mac. Sometimes I install from the App Store. Sometimes not.
The closest I can think of is the automobile industry and that’s done for safety reasons, not bexcuse the government doesn’t like the way they do business.
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The problem with statements like this is that macOS != iOS. Sure there are similarities but one does not equal the other and are geared toward 2 different audiences/consumers. iOS was built from the ground up with security in mind. Side loading aka installing outside the Normal security measures iOS provides, is inherently unsafe. If it were really up to apple, there wouldn’t be any 3rd party apps, just look at iphoneOS 1.0, Steve and co really tried to push for web apps, consumers and developers said no. Hence the App Store, the compromise solution apple came up with (or maybe they just weren’t ready to have an App Store when they launched the first iPhone). Mind you, with that said, i doubt the iPhone would be the success it is today without the App Store and the many apps that were made possible because of it.
No court up until this point has found this to be a monopolistic practice, even though some may want it to be that.
Very well said. If the web app experience was just as good as the native app experience, developers wouldn’t need the App Store anymore.
Maybe Apple can do a WORLD WIDE survey of its customers and ask them what they want, I am confident that the majority of them will prefer NOT opening up the OS. People buy the iPhone, iPad because they prefer the security it offers. If I want features and don’t care about security, I will buy Android. Opening IOS takes away competition and choices for consumers.
It's very successful due to the 3rd party Apps.
That has nothing to do with the App Store
Software platforms are all successful primarily due to third party software.
That has been the case long before any "App Stores" -- nor does any of that success need an App Store (on any platform)
(on iOS the 3rd party devs and their Apps are routinely held back by the App Store and the Apple business guidelines)
While you are correct about the Email, I'm afraid we just won't agree on the App Store issue.
Do bad apps slip through the cracks?
Yes, of course they do.
And if the OPs mother happened to download a bad app, it's a simple "Delete button tap" away, and she'll never have to think about it again.
It Won't linger, it won't be hidden somewhere on her phone, if it's gone it's gone.
And if she paid for it, a simple contact to apple and there's pretty much a 95%+ guarantee that she'll get her money back one way or another.
With a side loaded app, its not the same situation at all, especially if big companies like Facebook, Amazon, etc remove their apps from the App Store to get around Apple's privacy policies, app tracking transparency, microphone and camera logs, etc.
If she downloads a bad actor from a third party website, its possible that a simple "delete button tap" won't actually get rid of it.
If she accidentally pays for something that's not what was advertised, Apple can't guarantee anything.
And because iOS is so huge, and because developers like FaceBook and TicToc are big enough to survive without the App Store, it's very possible, and I would say probable that iOS would turn into the new Windows XP.
It's the last thing that anyone wants.
And yes, it very much is a problem on the Mac.
But the biggest difference between the Mac and iOS is that more and more, the Mac is becoming more niche. Only people who really know how to use it purchased them, and usually those people understand how to keep themselves safe. Everyone else just buys iPads, with some exceptions of course, but since it launched in 2010 the iPad has pretty much always sold way more than the Mac to regular consumers.
Also, the most personal things on iOS where privacy is of the most importance like social media, entertainment consumption, etc are done within applications.
On the Mac, that’s all done on websites for the most part.
There obviously are some application clients but while iOS is pretty much nothing but apps apps apps, the Mac is not.
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It’s not monopolistic at all. Apple do not control how websites are developed. If privacy-busting or novel programming techniques are employed by site developers, the site won’t work with certain devices is all. This is primarily a safety feature. All iOS browsers (and apps) that render web pages do so in the same way. No browser or app is at an advantage on iOS, ergo no monopoly.
FYI, Microsoft most certainly did behave in a monopolistic fashion. Whilst they never insisted that browser developers use IE’s engine, they did at one time induce site developers on MSDN to create sites that relied on proprietary MS technology: So-called ActiveX components. You got special benefits as an MSDN subscriber if you could demonstrate that you had created an ActiveX-friendly site. Bad bad bad.
First page pretty much summarises the narrative of the comment section I believe.
Either way, Apple should do the following:
1. Pull out of UK market.
2. Immediately disable sideloading of any kind on macOS and force uninstall all apps that are not from Mac App Store upon upgrading.
3. Pull back recent iOS changes that “opens iOS” and retreat to iOS 1 era and start again.
4. Attempt to outlaw sideloading in US at least.
Either way, Apple should do the following:
1. Pull out of UK market.
2. Immediately disable sideloading of any kind on macOS and force uninstall all apps that are not from Mac App Store upon upgrading.
3. Pull back recent iOS changes that “opens iOS” and retreat to iOS 1 era and start again.
4. Attempt to outlaw sideloading in US at least.
Why should they? And why should it be related to what Amazon charges? Why not relate in-app purchase commissions to what similar companies in similar industries charge? Here's some info on what they were charging in 2021.
You don't know Apple's costs. You don't know how much they spend on running, maintaining and improving the App Store, Xcode, Developer websites, security, etc. You don't know how much they pay to employ staff to review apps, market them, deal with developer queries, improve Xcode and the other developer apps, or how much they pay their legal team to sort out contracts and tax agreements.
15% might give them a little profit, they might break even, and they might make a lot of profit, but that's up to them - it's their business/ If they make no money on it they have to cover all these costs through other revenue and profits.
If they were charging 50% then yeah you might have a point.