Apple Reinstates Epic Games EU Developer Account, Paving the Way for Alternative App Store

[bcortens]

Never gonna happen.
Apple would lose like 30-50 billion per year of revenue.
Their Stock would tank.
Their shareholders and board members would panick and demand for Apple exec be fired over petty and dumb business decisions they got themselves and the company over simply because they do not like 1 or 2 specific companies that they are now forced to compete with.

The more likely scenario is that Apple continues with their malicious/illegal compliance in regards to the DMA and ends up getting 10% world wide revenue fine which amounts to ~38 billion from their 380 billion globally 😂

Europe is a 90+ billion a year market for them (includes the UK too so let’s say 80 billion or so)

Anyone can look up apples financials…

 

[Lethal-Bacon]

C'mon - The EU case and subsequent actions supersedes these contracts. These are shrewd opponents using every weapon at their disposal.

Exactly.. any "rule" or contract apple makes you sign that goes against DMA rules will either be investigated and removed or ignored by competitors because they know apple cant do anything without being investigated and fined 10% of world wide revenue for their malicious/illegal compliance.

 

[BrightDarkSky]

It is incredibly confusing for normal users. Not the sort of people who post here, but that 100% would result in a confused phone call "which one do I pick" from multiple of my family members.

what an earth-shattering problem it is to choose a web browser. wow. the techie person in the family always is helping other family members set up their phones and computers. what makes this different?

talk about grabbing at straws

 

[Mayhem SWE]

It is incredibly confusing for normal users. Not the sort of people who post here, but that 100% would result in a confused phone call "which one do I pick" from multiple of my family members.

They cannot figure out to tap on the same icon that they normally tap on to browse the web?

But yeah, I'll give you that it is pretty weird to present a dialog listing a whole lot of browsers not already installed on the phone to someone upgrading to iOS 17.4. As this is about giving the opportunity to change a setting that did not previously exist on iOS, it would make sense to present this dialog but only listing already installed browsers (or at least making it super clear which browsers are already installed and placing those at the top of the list).

When setting up a brand new iPhone from scratch, i.e. without restoring a backup from a previous iPhone, it is not totally unreasonable to require Apple to show a dialog saying that "all of these browsers are also available, would you like to download one of them?" Not allowing them to present Safari as the default built-in alternative though…

 

[Lethal-Bacon]

Europe is a 90+ billion a year market for them (includes the UK too so let’s say 80 billion or so)

Anyone can look up apples financials…

yeah i didnt look up what they make from EU only... but seeing they made ~380 B in 2023 i roughly estimated that they made maybe 40-50B just in the EU not counting UK as DMA rules arent active there..

 

[one more]

Why can't I just walk into Target, setup a booth and sell some stuff?

Bad analogy, but ok - imagine you could only sell and buy your goods in two shop chains worldwide!

 

[trusso]

So many people slobbering all over Apple, it's disgusting.

Epic is no angel, but neither is Apple (and likely more so).

Aren't most of us adults here? Can we not at least -attempt- to look at issues like this objectively?

 

[TMRJIJ]

Can somebody tell me if I'm missing anything here?

Eddy Cue's Email:

In the past, Epic has entered into agreements with Apple and then broken them. For example, you testified that Epic Games, Inc. entered into the Developer Program with full understanding of its terms, and then chose to intentionally breach the agreement with Apple. You also testified that Epic deliberately violated Apple's rules, to make a point and for financial gain. More recently, you have described our DMA compliance plan as "hot garbage," a "horror show," and a

"devious new instance of Malicious Compliance." And you have complained about what you called "Junk Fees" and "Apple taxes.".....We invite you to provide us with written assurance that you are also acting in good faith, and that Epic Games Sweden will, despite your public actions and rhetoric, honor all of its commitments. In plain, unqualified terms, please tell us why we should trust Epic this time.

Tim Sweeney's Response:

Thanks for reaching out. Epic and its subsidiaries are acting in good faith and will comply with all terms of current and future agreements with Apple, and well be glad to provide Apple with any specific further assurances on the topic that you'd like.

Eddy Cue:
I don't believe you... [Terminates Developer Account]

EU: Looks in Apple's Direction 👀

Eddy Cue:
sigh...Alright, fine. You can have your Developer Account back.

 

[Pezimak]

yeah i didnt look up what they make from EU only... but seeing they made ~380 B in 2023 i roughly estimated that they made maybe 40-50B just in the EU not counting UK as DMA rules arent active there..

You say that, but when I updated my iPhone I got a pop up message about alternate app stores and I am in the UK.

 

[surferfb]

Even funnier will be watching share holders fire the Apple board and sue them over their decision as they lose billions on returns of their investments.

Yes let’s abandon a 90 billion a year market in order to save our App Store revenue, that’ll go over well with shareholders…

I clearly forgot jokes often don't translate over the internet. My apologies. This was not a serious recommendation or expectation of what Apple is going to do. I just think it'd be funny to imagine what would happen if the EU Dog caught the car it's chasing. 😂

 

[scrapesleon]

Apple so sacred of EU they reinstated back the account

 

[BrightDarkSky]

I dont know where you guys are from, but things work a little bit differently in the EU.
For example... all the "rules" apple has set up for their "compliance" to our new law(Digital Markets Act) are pretty much irrelevant and some of them even illegal under the DMA if you understand the new law.
Apple has 0 say in who they approve/let compete with them and create the rival App Store on the iOS and they are NOT allowed to ban/terminate any competition regardless if they break what Apple calls their "rules" for the EU.
What they consider compliance is malicious compliance at best and borderline illegal.
For example the "Core Technology Fee" is straight up illegal.
DMA mandates that Apple is to set up their OS in such way that it enables any willing competitor to develop and deploy their rival store FOR FREE.
The only company that decides which apps can and can not be published on rival app store is the rival app store developer/owner.
So when Epic creates and publishes their App Store in the EU there is NOTHING Apple can do to remove them and can not dictate what apps can and can not be published.
Only scenario where Apple can refuse an App to be published is if said app has verifiable malicious code inside of it that will harm the iOS users.

So ladies and gentlemen this year will be full of fireworks, and im gonna go on a limb and say that starting next month after EU Commission reviews all the proposed compliance changes Gatekeepers have sent them that they will immediatelly start a full investigation into Apple for their Core Technology Fee among other things that they are not supposed to dictate.
As you could have seen by events in past weeks, EU has teeth and it will force Apple to change any and all things that is not within our laws, pulling out of market big as EU is not an option for Apple because their shareholders would take a giant L and that would most likely result in board starting to replace Apple Execs who thought that this petty route and complete disregard of our laws was a good idea.

Please do not call me an Apple hater or anything like that, i am a developer and a fan of technology in general, i love Iphones and i use Macs for work on daily basis but that does not mean that i cant be objective towards what they have been doing for years already regarding to their anti consumer, anti competitive and anti developer practices.

the last paragraph is pretty sad, sad in the fact that you have to mitigate blowback from these Apple loving corpo hugging children like behavior. don't worry about these children, this is the internet, tomorrow they'll be playing with Legos or something.

I'm exclusively a apple user, but I'll be damned if I give them a dollar past the hardware I purchased. no apple services no Apple software I don't rely on them for anything else because they are just the worst in terms of hubris and value.

let them call you on Apple later, who cares. consider it a badge of honor.

 

[Analog Kid]

C'mon - The EU case and subsequent actions supersedes these contracts.

It most certainly does not-- two totally different jurisdictions.

More importantly, it doesn't change the character of the individual actors-- who is more of "a jerk" in your phrasing. Epic's violation of terms makes them an untrustworthy party. That doesn't change in the new arena with different rules-- Epic made clear they don't care about rules, so there's no reason to expect them to care about these.

 

[BrightDarkSky]

By far the funniest outcome of this whole thing would be apple deciding "the EU market isn't worth it" and then watch the politicians scramble at Apple users all over the continent scream at the EU bureaucrats for taking away their iPhones. Will never happen, but would be hilarious.

what kind of fantasy world are you in that you think that will happen. what a pathetic comment, it shows that you really are in the wrong room lol

 

[surferfb]

They cannot figure out to tap on the same icon that they normally tap on to browse the web?

But yeah, I'll give you that it is pretty weird to present a dialog listing a whole lot of browsers not already installed on the phone to someone upgrading to iOS 17.4. As this is about giving the opportunity to change a setting that did not previously exist on iOS, it would make sense to present this dialog but only listing already installed browsers (or at least making it super clear which browsers are already installed and placing those at the top of the list).

When setting up a brand new iPhone from scratch, i.e. without restoring a backup from a previous iPhone, it is not totally unreasonable to require Apple to show a dialog saying that "all of these browsers are also available, would you like to download one of them?" Not allowing them to present Safari as the default built-in alternative though…

I agree this would be the best result. But Apple can't promote a default without invoking the wrath of the EU, AND safari might be so far down the list it's not on the first screen, because the order has to be random.

And yes, I have family members who absolutely would be confused by that. I don't even think my mother-in-law knows what a web browser is. She calls the safari app "the internet app." If she saw Safari on the screen she'd probably figure it out, but no promises. That said, I am generally the one updating her stuff for her, so probably not a great example now that I think about it.

 

[turbineseaplane]

Being in the US, I am really jealous about this. Yeah, we can "change" our browser but with it still being webkit, it sucks. I want to use Firefox WITH extensions on iOS but no, Apple is being dumb about it.

Me too

I use Firefox on all my desktop computing and it sucks to go back to gimped little safari on iOS and iPadOS

 

[surferfb]

what kind of fantasy world are you in that you think that will happen. what a pathetic comment, it shows that you really are in the wrong room lol

The last line of my post that you quoted literally says "WILL NEVER HAPPEN"

But as stated above, this was a joke that didn't translate. I'll edit the comment if I still can to make that more clear.

 

[Realityck]

Apple so sacred of EU they reinstated back the account

I still think the last week has been creative rumors rather than facts. The articles seem awfully conveniently sequenced.
Apple Explains Why It Terminated Epic's Latest Developer Account
EU Probes Apple's Decision to Shut Down Epic's Developer Account
Apple Reinstates Epic Games EU Developer Account, Paving the Way for Alternative App Store

All this did was greatly increase the number of web hits sites receive greatly boosting ad income.

 

[Pezimak]

I clearly forgot jokes often don't translate over the internet. My apologies. This was not a serious recommendation or expectation of what Apple is going to do. I just think it'd be funny to imagine what would happen if the EU Dog caught the car it's chasing. 😂

No problem, as a share holder though you should pay close attention to any EU moves to investigate Apple over its DMA handling, it could lead to a large fine. I think Apple lawyers and compliance officers need to read the small print VERY carefully.

 

[ManuCH]

This is absolutely ridiculous and Apple made a fool of themselves by first banning Epic, then reinstating them. That's a PR nightmare.

In my opinion, they need better lawyers for the whole EU situation. It almost seems like they've been badly advised by lawyers who don't know how crazy EU politics can get when they wanna screw with big companies.

As someone else said, Apple needs an actual second headquarter somewhere in the EU, where people can just "backchannel" and get along. Trying to coordinate that from Cupertino where they have no clue about how the EU works is bound to fail (or at least make Apple commit a lot of expensive mistakes).

And no, I'm not a fan of the EU, and happy to live in a country in Europe that is not part of it.

 

[dgdosen]

It most certainly does not-- two totally different jurisdictions.

More importantly, it doesn't change the character of the individual actors-- who is more of "a jerk" in your phrasing. Epic's violation of terms makes them an untrustworthy party. That doesn't change in the new arena with different rules-- Epic made clear they don't care about rules, so there's no reason to expect them to care about these.

The EU ordered Apple to change their business practices. Apple makes a change, but flexes their control at the same time. The courts are involved. They're still involved.

It doesn't matter what we think, it's in the court's hands. They can decide untrustworthiness in this situation. Also, last I checked, Sweden - EU member.

 

[BGPL]

So tired of Apple's flagrant greed, when out of the other side of their mouth they spout garbage about people and the environment. Tim Cook and the rest of the board are more capitalistic than Trump, a man they apparently despise for some reason. Tim and Donald would get matched on dating sites if one of their preferences were different.

 

[sw1tcher]

Failed analogy. They are opening the store directly inside Target and using everything Target its paying for to sell their product and paying Target $0.

First, when alternative app store developers still have to pay Apple for a develper account, that's not paying Apple (Target) $0.

Second, it's a failed analogy only if this alternative app store is being runing within Apple's App Store. As I understand it, it is not. If it is being run within Apple's App Store, then why do users have to download and install a separate app store app?

Getting started as an alternative app marketplace in the European Union - Support - Apple Developer

developer.apple.com

iOS 17.4 SDK introduces new capabilities that let marketplace developers build and distribute marketplace iOS apps as part of an alternative app marketplace in the EU. These apps can install and support software on devices, access data across a catalog of apps, manage users’ purchases and subscriptions, and more. Marketplace apps must meet Notarization requirements, like all iOS apps, and can only be installed from the marketplace developer’s website.

This is not across the street when you need Targets customers and Targets hardware and Targets software to sell your products.

When the alternative app store / marketplace "can only be installed from the marketplace developer’s website" then it is not on or using Apple's (Target's) property/platform/infrastructure. That "marketplace developer’s website" is analogous to a business located across the street and away from Apple's/Target's infrastructure.

 

[TigerNike23]

I guess I should feel happy for the small independent developers this legislation was supposed to help, but instead it’s multi-billion dollar Epic Games.

Great job, EU…

 

[haunebu]

Tim Cook bends the knee!