Apple Protests Call for Third-Party App Stores and Lower Platform Fees in Japan

[gregohb]

Huh?
If I want to mod the vehicle I can. If I want to do custom software for it I can.
What has Ford or Chevy to do with that?

do you have a steel mill and gear to create a mold for a new exhaust manifold? You can only mod your car by buying some stuff made by some company. In the case of apps, all of those mods are created using apple's software tools, Swift and Xcode - which are huge complicated tools. If you want to try to write your own programming language and integrated development environment, be my guest. I will check back in a 1000 man-years to see your progress.

 

[gregohb]

CAD Software? No. Schematics so that third party OEMs can produce parts for their cars? Absolutely they do.


I agree - if those tools are more than an API to existing functionality in the OS. Again, the difference is between what is an API and what is a software library (hint - the answer depends on who distributes it - Apple, or the developer).

Nobody is asking Apple, Google, or Facebook to advertise for them. They are asking not to make it mandatory to have Facebook, Google, or Apple advertise for them for the sole purpose of providing an application.

The only way to create an app is to buy Xcode/Swift - and I can't even imagine how many man-years of labor are involved in creating, maintaining, and updating these tools. I used Metrowerks CodeWarrior C++ in the 1990's, and it cost about $400 to have access to that software to create apps for Mac at that time. Now those tools are free.

Suppose you created a new iPhone game or to-do list app. Would you seriously attempt to advertise it via Facebook, Google, or print magazines? Perhaps spend millions of dollars? But you can just put it on the App Store and people search for To-Do Apps, and yours pops up, and they buy it. No up front cost to you at all.

 

[jakey rolling]

The only way to create an app is to buy Xcode/Swift - and I can't even imagine how many man-years of labor are involved in creating, maintaining, and updating these tools. I used Metrowerks CodeWarrior C++ in the 1990's, and it cost about $400 to have access to that software to create apps for Mac at that time. Now those tools are free.

Most developer tools available today are free, with the exception of those that are built to support professional enterprise software development organizations (ie, Visual Studio Pro or Enterprise). VS Code, VS CE, Eclipse, Komodo IDE, GCC, Watcom... the list goes on... are all free.

This isn't the 1990's anymore. IBM isn't selling the OS/2 SDK for $2000 per license in 2022. Johnny Pascal isn't having to shell out hundreds of dollars to Borland just to do some hobby programming in his spare time. High school teachers no longer have to use their personal funds to buy a license for HyperCard just to show their students how easy visual coding is.

It is silly to compare the price for developing for Apple today vs. 30 years ago. You compare the price to develop for Apple vs. the price to develop for their competitors. Of all the modern companies who write development tools, Apple is the one with the least excuse to be charging a hefty amount for theirs - they recoup the cost of building and maintaining Xcode a hundred times over just in developer membership fees.

Suppose you created a new iPhone game or to-do list app. Would you seriously attempt to advertise it via Facebook, Google, or print magazines? Perhaps spend millions of dollars? But you can just put it on the App Store and people search for To-Do Apps, and yours pops up, and they buy it. No up front cost to you at all.

Dude, you just said you used to code with Codewarrior back in the day. You of all people should know that independent software developers existed and thrived long before Apple invented their marketplace. The only reason why the App store is the only feasible solution for developers now, is because there is no competing choice.

 

[Sophisticatednut]

do you have a steel mill and gear to create a mold for a new exhaust manifold? You can only mod your car by buying some stuff made by some company. In the case of apps, all of those mods are created using apple's software tools, Swift and Xcode - which are huge complicated tools. If you want to try to write your own programming language and integrated development environment, be my guest. I will check back in a 1000 man-years to see your progress.

What? You know it’s kind of easy to make a mold for a new exhaust manifold if you want to do it. No need for a steel mill.

You can mod your car as your phone by:
1: buying from custom manufacturers/coders
2: do it yourself.

Many apps on cydia doesn’t use Xcode at all. They use swift( a open source programming language) or objective c. You can use a notepad if
You want.

The only way to create an app is to buy Xcode/Swift - and I can't even imagine how many man-years of labor are involved in creating, maintaining, and updating these tools. I used Metrowerks CodeWarrior C++ in the 1990's, and it cost about $400 to have access to that software to create apps for Mac at that time. Now those tools are free.

Seems you don’t know how programming works with such inaccuracies you describe. You must use Xcode if you want to make officially supported apps to be distributed on iOS AppStore.

Suppose you created a new iPhone game or to-do list app. Would you seriously attempt to advertise it via Facebook, Google, or print magazines? Perhaps spend millions of dollars? But you can just put it on the App Store and people search for To-Do Apps, and yours pops up, and they buy it. No up front cost to you at all.

AppStore is the worst place on the planet to advertise anything. If people wants to find apps they google it and find lists on random blogs or YouTube videos.

No possible way to review multiple apps on the phone without it becoming clunky and the computer doesn’t allow you to search iOS apps anyway so you end up using google

 

[code-m]

IMO, if someone is going to claim that a single 1st party store is anti-competitive versus 3rd party stores then it should be easy to demonstrate that lack of competition through prices, quality, selection and satisfaction with apps on the platform. None of the governments in question are doing that. They're entirely avoiding those kinds of comparisons. That's a rather obvious red flag within the "game".

What happened to the “free market” argument? One can spin this either way. On one side it could be debated that Apple being a closed market and Android an open market then the people can decide which is better or if both markets were open and Apple had an option for also a closed market then the free-market will demonstrate if a closed or open market on the same platform would acceptable. The issue with the first scenario is that on iOS there is only a closed market while Android has an open and closed market options. Regardless of the debate of Trojans, viruses, malware, scams etc that is not the issue as even the walled garden has holes and still permits these types of vulnerabilities but next it will be argued that there are far fewer of these types of vulnerabilities on iOS compared to Android and that is besides the point concerning this matter.

 

[gregohb]

You of all people should know that independent software developers existed and thrived long before Apple invented their marketplace. The only reason why the App store is the only feasible solution for developers now, is because there is no competing choice.

Thats not true. I bought a writing app on the App Store, and it turns out they sell it directly too. When it did not do what was promised, they said that if I had bought it from them, they could credit me, but since I bought it through the App Store, I could not get any justice. But how would I have known about their independent sale of the software?

To get back to the point, Apple provides what Metrowerks, Borland, Xojo, or other companies used to (or still do) sell. It makes sense they should get some return on their investment - although you might argue that just having apps available for the iPhone is the benefit to apple. Apple also provides a one-stop marketing platform to find your apps too, and they deserve a cut for that.

That said, 30% of your profits, plus the developer annual fee is excessive - as everything Apple does, its over priced and out of touch with reality. They should be clamped down on - but not shut down 100%. Their own greed got them into this situation whereas if they were reasonable to start, they may not have provoked this discussion.

 

[jakey rolling]

Thats not true. I bought a writing app on the App Store, and it turns out they sell it directly too. When it did not do what was promised, they said that if I had bought it from them, they could credit me, but since I bought it through the App Store, I could not get any justice. But how would I have known about their independent sale of the software?

I have a few programs on my computer that are written by small developers, and I found them the "usual way" - by doing a Google search for whatever type of tool I was looking for. I'm not sure if I'm misunderstanding your question, but again, there have been ways to find programs from indie developers for literally decades - especially the last 2 and a half decades when pretty much everyone has been connected to the internet.

You seem to think that it is the developer, and not Apple's own App Store policies that have robbed you from "justice" here. That's very telling.

To get back to the point, Apple provides what Metrowerks, Borland, Xojo, or other companies used to (or still do) sell. It makes sense they should get some return on their investment - although you might argue that just having apps available for the iPhone is the benefit to apple. Apple also provides a one-stop marketing platform to find your apps too, and they deserve a cut for that.

Apple can take their cut from any developers that choose to continue to sell their apps on Apple's marketplace all they want. If Apple feels like they should be charging for their software development tools, then they can continue to do so. I have no issue with companies pricing their products and services as they see fit - provided that they are doing so in an environment where there are competing options that can keep them in check. This whole thing is about Apple locking their developers and customers into their own store and their own tools and then charging exorbitant fees for the "privilege".

 

[dk001]

I have a few programs on my computer that are written by small developers, and I found them the "usual way" - by doing a Google search for whatever type of tool I was looking for. I'm not sure if I'm misunderstanding your question, but again, there have been ways to find programs from indie developers for literally decades - especially the last 2 and a half decades when pretty much everyone has been connected to the internet.

...

On your great comment, for all platforms I find the software I need via word of mouth, recommendations from things like YouTube video, articles, and Google. The official "app stores" are generally the last place I look and last place I purchase from.