Apple Intelligence Features Not Coming to European Union at Launch Due to DMA

[MilaM]

European Commission Launches Investigation Against Microsoft for Integrating Teams With Office

Link to: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_3446

daringfireball.net

Well said, Mr Gruber. Very well said.

It would be great if MS took Teams from the market. This software is so bad and painful to use. I am sure with competition we could get a much better product or a range products to choose from.

And if companies still see value in Teams, why would they not pay for it?

 

[MilaM]

Where this falls apart is iOS has always been a closed system. You knew it was the closed system when you bought into it there was never any expectation to have a mall on your phone.

Does not change the fact, that it's bad for competition when there are only two dominant players left in the market.

 

[Abazigal]

It would be great if MS took Teams from the market. This software is so bad and painful to use. I am sure with competition we could get a much better product or a range products to choose from.

And if companies still see value in Teams, why would they not pay for it?

What if the value was in having one integrated product offering that makes it more convenient for the purposes of procurement and device management. People here seem to be stuck in the mental model that "better" means better in terms of specs or performance, when there may well be other factors that matter to the end user (which in this case, is the enterprise company making the purchase, not so much the end user).

So in this case, the system integration is the innovation, something which the EU seems vehemently opposed to because they acknowledge that this is simply not feasible for smaller businesses to replicate. But again, is this a problem of Microsoft, or a problem of smaller businesses?

 

[AppliedMicro]

But you're going to have to live with EU getting the second-rate version of iOS because of its choices.

So?

iOS is an operating system whose main job it is to run apps.
Mostly third-party apps. I'm not going to need everything "sherlocked" and integrated into the system.

This remains to be seen as its mostly speculation on your part.

Popular categories of software find their way onto iOS.

Unless Apple restricts their developers to offer them.
Such as the game streaming apps - though I'm not sure how popular they are, would or will be.
That said, retro emulators seem to enjoy some popularity - and are a great example of where (impending) regulation seems to have made Apple finally give in.

Where this falls apart is iOS has always been a closed system. You knew it was the closed system when you bought into it there was never any expectation to have a mall on your phone.

iOS has been an open system allowing third-party apps since 2008.
Downloadable for free through Apple's App Store, provided their developer paid for his account and the necessary tools and documentation access by subscribing to the $99 developer subscription.

Well said, Mr Gruber. Very well said.

Quote: "Translation: They’re guilty and we’re just going through the motions of giving them a chance to state their case."

👉 Gatekeepers know what they're doing.

"the EC’s stance is that its designated gatekeeping companies — all of which happen, by sheer coincidence I’m repeatedly told, to be from the US or Asia — should be forbidden from evolving their platforms to stay on top. That churn should be mandated by law."

👉 Shill Gruber continuing to spin the europhobic "It's just foreign companies" theory.

"The EC, to my eyes, is saying that it’s illegal for a successful platform to adapt and evolve"

👉Coming back to Apple, their Core Technology Fee and various "entitlement" (that are increasingly getting more and more absurd) are not evolving or an evolution. They're a regression.

 

[Abazigal]

So?

iOS is an operating system whose main job it is to run apps.
Mostly third-party apps. I'm not going to need everything "sherlocked" and integrated into the system.

You are also deciding for everybody else that they are not allowed to get new features for free and that the only way to access added functionality is to pay for more apps.

How does one go about quantifying the pros and cons of allowing smaller developers to eke out a living vs making a feature readily accessible to Apple’s entire user base? For example, smart speed for overcast. Is Apple never allowed to adopt it just because someone else came up with the idea first (meaning anyone who wishes to benefit from it is forced to use the overcast app even if it may be inferior in other ways)?

That’s what I don’t see discussed enough around here. That there are legitimate benefits to Apple’s user base here. Instead, Apple is both at fault when competitors come out with new features that make it better than their stock apps; and also at fault when it subsequently integrates those features into their own devices.

Am I the only one who sees the absurdity of this supposed contradiction?

 

[UliBaer]

European Commission Launches Investigation Against Microsoft for Integrating Teams With Office

Link to: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_3446

daringfireball.net

Well said, Mr Gruber. Very well said.

Wow, the cleanest form of whataboutism i've ever seen this far - thanks!

 

[Beautyspin]

The EU is taking Apple's ability to compete away by making just them another version of Android.

edit: Companies compete by being different not just the same thing is a different wrapper.

Trust me, iOS is no Android. It will take at least a couple of iterations to reach that stage.
If forcing Apple to compete makes it another version of Android, then so be it.
iOS is a lot more than the walled garden.
Just because MacOS allows all these things does not make it another version Windows. You can be open and still compete. (But you might say that MacOS is not competing with Windows because the MarketShare is skewed towards Windows, but then that is how they have to compete).

 

[Beautyspin]

I don’t buy it. The DMA is a law that assigns a special status to Apple, requiring it to give any competitive advantage it has to others. It absolutely constrains Apple. It reduces Apple’s incentive to invest and innovate since other companies must be given access to that innovation. Let those other companies invest and innovate on their own instead of being parasites unjustly living off of Apple’s investments.

Any competitive advantage that Apple has gained by unfair means has to go. The EU as well as the DOJ of the US and other governments want Apple to compete fairly.

 

[Jay-Jacob]

What if the value was in having one integrated product offering that makes it more convenient for the purposes of procurement and device management. People here seem to be stuck in the mental model that "better" means better in terms of specs or performance, when there may well be other factors that matter to the end user (which in this case, is the enterprise company making the purchase, not so much the end user).

So in this case, the system integration is the innovation, something which the EU seems vehemently opposed to because they acknowledge that this is simply not feasible for smaller businesses to replicate. But again, is this a problem of Microsoft, or a problem of smaller businesses?

Most likely businesses use Teams because it is already there part of Office and they don't want to fuss around find alternative and pretty much everyone business side use Teams. Also IT support most likely prefer you use MS software so they can fix if there issues instead of everyone having different software etc. It is pretty common places I work at and other people I know as well. So if business need meeting call to client external outside their business and it pretty much to safe bet that they also have teams as well.

 

[spazzcat]

Trust me, iOS is no Android. It will take at least a couple of iterations to reach that stage.
If forcing Apple to compete makes it another version of Android, then so be it.
iOS is a lot more than the walled garden.
Just because MacOS allows all these things does not make it another version Windows. You can be open and still compete. (But you might say that MacOS is not competing with Windows because the MarketShare is skewed towards Windows, but then that is how they have to compete).

So following this logic, what you're saying is is the iPhone is going to be harmed even more seeing how it only has about 25% market share in Europe by taking away all the things that make it unique. The EU should be doing things to help Apple gain market share not lose market basically Europe is going to be a monopoly for Android.

 

[MilaM]

So following this logic, what you're saying is is the iPhone is going to be harmed even more seeing how it only has about 25% market share in Europe by taking away all the things that make it unique. The EU should be doing things to help Apple gain market share not lose market basically Europe is going to be a monopoly for Android.

Couldn't exactly the opposite happen with an iPhone that is less restricted software-wise and has more utility for Apple's customers?

 

[chmania]

The EU should be doing things to help Apple gain market share not lose market basically Europe is going to be a monopoly for Android.

Why should the EU do that? To help Apple gain market share? It's better to have competition. For example, with Huawei...

 

[laptech]

The source of the article the Financial Times which you have to subscribe to to view the article (maybe MR has a something going on with the Financial Times to get MR members to subscribe to it) so not wanting to subscribe I found another site that reported on the same thing https://www.siliconrepublic.com/bus... said in an,behaviour from Big Tech companies.

and in it there is this line from Apple as to why it is moaning about the DMA with regards to it's up and coming Apple Intelligence feature

But in a statement sent to multiple media outlets, Apple said it is concerned that the DMA’s interoperability requirements would “force us to compromise” products in a way that would impact privacy and data security.

The statement being made by Apple is a bit rich when you consider that Apple is in bed with Google to the tune of billions of $$$ so Google can be the default search engine in it's Safari Browser, Google a company well known as a data harvester of internet users personal data who has also been caught doing things with users personal data that they should not be doing and here is Apple saying they are worried about privacy and data security!!!!

 

[Beautyspin]

So following this logic, what you're saying is is the iPhone is going to be harmed even more seeing how it only has about 25% market share in Europe by taking away all the things that make it unique. The EU should be doing things to help Apple gain market share not lose market basically Europe is going to be a monopoly for Android.

You are assuming that the market share would drop if iOS becomes more open. I think the opposite will happen. Once it is open, developers will no longer be constrained and will be able to use the full power of iOS and make it highly productive. It is possible people who prefer high-cost android devices may totally gravitate towards Apple devices and hence the market share would actually increase.

 

[vantelimus]

Any competitive advantage that Apple has gained by unfair means has to go. The EU as well as the DOJ of the US and other governments want Apple to compete fairly.

It isn't established that they compete unfairly. It is established that the EC passed a law specifically targeting Apple to force it to provide access to proprietary technology to competitors.

You are assuming that the market share would drop if iOS becomes more open. I think the opposite will happen. Once it is open, developers will no longer be constrained and will be able to use the full power of iOS and make it highly productive. It is possible people who prefer high-cost android devices may totally gravitate towards Apple devices and hence the market share would actually increase.

Why should it be "open"? If you want open, then go Android, which already has the larger market share. Opening the Apple platform will simply degrade the privacy and security of the Apple ecosystem and compromise interoperability between devices. "Open" strips Apple of its unique value, its secure ecosystem. That is what the EC is trying to kill: Apple's value proposition.

 

[vantelimus]

While users might have a choice, publishers have to use the platform that their customers chooses, or forgo a significant share of the market.

Every publisher has access to the web. The web is the cross-platform environment that works every where. Problem solved. You, Ms. Publisher don't have to forgo access to market share. You merely have to put work into creating a value proposition that attracts users. If you can't do that with a web interface, then you won't do it with an app.

 

[chmania]

Why should it be "open"? If you want open, then go Android,

That's more or less Stockholm Syndrome...

 

[vantelimus]

Does not change the fact, that it's bad for competition when there are only two dominant players left in the market.

Only two? There are a number of companies that offer phones. Most of those phones run the operating system that you like, Android, because it is open. They all have their own modifications to the OS to make it more to their liking. The barrier to entry for any other company to manufacture phones is relatively low. They can OEM the hardware, clone the Android software, and have another offering available rather quickly. The investment to do that won't be the many multiple billions of dollars Apple, Google, Samsung, Huawei, and many other companies that fell by the wayside (Treo, General Magic, HTC, Nokia, Microsoft, Motorola, etc.) while the market was growing. The problem is that no one wants to invest that capital because there are already two ample hardware options and two different software bases. One software base offers security, privacy, and integration across a family of devices. The other offers open integration to everyone. Your definition of "competition" seems to be to make both software bases equivalent so there is no differential value proposition. That is the killer of competition and innovation.

 

[vantelimus]

That's more or less Stockholm Syndrome...

Cute remark, but completely meaningless. If you think preferring one product over another is Stockholm Syndrome, then you have no credibility.

 

[MilaM]

Every publisher has access to the web. The web is the cross-platform environment that works every where. Problem solved. You, Ms. Publisher don't have to forgo access to market share. You merely have to put work into creating a value proposition that attracts users. If you can't do that with a web interface, then you won't do it with an app.

Web apps could be an alternative. Unfortunately Apple knows this too well, and therefore they took much care to not implement important features in Safari/WebKit. This way it's even harder than it should be to go this route for publishers. Some would call this anticompetitive behavior.

There is also the problem, that consumers are so used to the app store distribution model, that hardly anyone even thinks about installing a web app on their phone. It's too exotic and has important technical downsides. If web apps could advertise in Apple's App Store, that could work for a subset of apps though.

It's going to be interesting what happens, when we get alternative web browsers on iOS. They could actually make web apps more popular again.

 

[chmania]

It's going to be interesting what happens, when we get alternative web browsers on iOS.

Just installed on my iPhone, did that just to check

And, uninstalled it.

 

[spazzcat]

You are assuming that the market share would drop if iOS becomes more open. I think the opposite will happen. Once it is open, developers will no longer be constrained and will be able to use the full power of iOS and make it highly productive. It is possible people who prefer high-cost android devices may totally gravitate towards Apple devices and hence the market share would actually increase.

99% of customers have no idea there are other stores on the iPhone. They are the ones buying phones.

 

[spazzcat]

Why should the EU do that? To help Apple gain market share? It's better to have competition. For example, with Huawei...

This isn't going to help sell one Android phone over another, iOS is the only competition to Andriod.

 

[spazzcat]

Couldn't exactly the opposite happen with an iPhone that is less restricted software-wise and has more utility for Apple's customers?

I have used an iPhone since day one, I have never not had what I needed especially after the App Store opened.

 

[UliBaer]

I think what @MilaM means is not alternative browsers (using WebKit underneath) but alternative browsers with really alternative engines (like Gecko in Firefox and Blink in Chrome for example) that really benefits from their different architecture.
At this moment all "different" browsers on iOS are simply only "skins" for WebKit. No browser manufacturer has considered the hassle of developing two different branches of his browsers, one for EU (and probably a lot more in the future) and one for the rest.
This is one follow up of the malicious compliance, so absolutely intended by Apple...