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Apple Would Rather Pay Up to €50 Million in Fines Than Address 'Gatekeeper' App Store Behavior, Says EU Chief
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They completely understand it.
Apple just failed to argue why developers should need to make a new app instead of the one all their customers already use.
It could even be as simple as a geography or based on Dutch banks providing a “free” IAP that provides with 3d party payment options. Developers already can offer uneque IAP based on location etc.
Of all the solutions apple opted for the most complicated one for no good reason outside of incentivizing developers to stay with apples IAP solution.
Because creating a new app with third-party payments is the same as a compiling a new binary with third-party payments. I'm really don't know where you are going with this.
Why doesn't Apple just ban all dating apps in the Netherlands and let customers complain to the government that they messed up with their arcane ruling?
It's not like the Dutch market amounts to anything, it's a tiny place with ~17 million people.
It's not like the Dutch market amounts to anything, it's a tiny place with ~17 million people.
They are working with the EU commission and their current investigation. That is why the ACM was allowed to continue on this one area in parallel and drop the rest
EU have one version tho. It would be as absurd as demand that Texas have one version and New York another and Washington it’s special version. Eu is a single market.
It's going to blow your mind when you find out that the EU is a thing. Think of it like the US, but more functional.
Well the requirement only applies to the Dutch market. Why should Apple extend it to the whole EU?
And that’s not ACMs problem if they target only one section right now. EU commission is already investigating the rest in parallel.
And apple already allow this with Uber etc as pointed out by the court ( apple’s personal opinion of the distinction isn’t relevant)
My opinion, same as the OP who claimed the public opinion of apple is dropping. I edited the post to reflect that.
Nope, not for me. Apple provides a service that deserves to be paid too.
It’s still apples platform.
Two reasons
1: EU law mandates a single market. Just as USA is a single market or state is a single market
2: forcing developers to submit different apps and to make existing consumers to switch or use both instead of offering this in one app for no technical reason outside of “ we want to” isn’t legitimate defense.
IAP can already provide uneque local options. So apple wasn’t able to defend its decision.
Please, explain further.
What are your beefs with the current App Store setup? Do tell us.
- the 30% cut?
- choice of payment methods?
- anything else?
And it’s still EUs market. Apple is free to leave if they don’t like big government stepping on their toes for breaking the law.
But Apple did comply with the requirements, laying out a process for developers to offer external payment methods. But that wasn't good enough for them... so who's acting unreasonably?
Was the original ruling that Apple must allow developers to provide a universal app to the entire world with alternative IAP options? It certainly makes sense that two SKUs provides that ability to cordon off where the ruling is in effect.
Also, they wouldn't need to make a new app. They would just compile the same app with the new features; the same app can be compiled with or without those features, resulting in two separate binaries (one with the feature, one without). You don't need to maintain two codebases -- you just set a region-specific compile flag that includes the alternative IAP option.
Honest question: which APIs allow developers to offer unique IAP based on location?
I can think of a lot more complicated solutions than the very simple one proposed by Apple.
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Still Apple. They did not comply sufficiently. They chose an overly complicated and burdensome solution and were told to do better, and have yet to revise their plan adequately.
Neither of those things is true. Nothing in the EU law prevents you from distributing different versions of your app in different countries.
Does the rule indicate a specific percentage amount that Apple should charge? If no, then they realize that’s not their authority and, as such, did not include any such criteria.
Are you indicating that in the EU, they wouldn’t even expect a definition of what “treehouse” is with any degree of specificity? The EU just assumes that everyone knows what a “treehouse” is? Just considering the different languages across the EU, it doesn’t seem like that’s right.
Almost. Apple dictate that developers in Netherlands can do three things.
1: offer app with Apple IAP functions but no third party payment. In every region
2: offer 3d party payment but no apple IAP and only in Netherlands.
3: both but separate apps
And honestly if Netherlands can mandate it, then any EU nation can
Huh? Whether to offer and support variations of products (beyond price-focused tiers) has been a required decision for companies providing products/services in multiple countries/markets/regions forever. For example:
Watch Out: With iPhone 13, There Are Now 5 Different iPhone Models by Country
Apple has always had different global models of the iPhone, but now there are more than ever.
The App Store is similar. You can publish an app in just one store (typically the country your company is based in/where you reside), to all of the regional App Stores, or only a select. The decision would be based on variables such as development/maintenance difficulty/cost, local laws prohibiting functionality, etc.
There should be no need for such s decision from the customer perspective. Provide just the app version allowing payment via Apple Pay as well as other methods or just third-party methods in the NL App Store and a version with Apple Pay only in other countries/regions stores (assuming the app is being made available elsewhere).
From what I have seen, most developers do not create country/region-specific versions when offering their app in multiple regions. Either the compatibility/support (e.g. languages, currencies) is baked into the sole package and thus reasonably offered or that country/region is simply ignored — which seems to be the logical approach.