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Exactly my point. Instead of mandating much more drastic measures, like breaking up Apple or Google, maybe it's more reasonable to look at the problem and craft legislation that facilitates competition on the platforms. Time will tell which approach will result in the best outcome 🤷‍♂️.
Exactly. But apple hasn’t had a judgement against them. I’m not for crafting legislation just because. Google will have to deal with their judgement. The issue for google is their popularity.
 
OK let's say the EU is successful in legislating the walled garden out of existence.

Does Europe really win by weakening Apple and making iOS little more than a really expensive copy of Android?

Taking Apple's uniqueness away, making the mobile phone market more homogeneous will be to the advantage of those with the lowest production costs and greatest government subsidies. Say hello to a market dominated by Chinese brands.

I don't see a significant advantage for Europe in that case, but I will bow to your superior knowledge of economics.
All I can do is say — and I mean this sincerely, not with snarky subtext — is that it would be useful to read up on this stuff, both on the general topic of anticompetitiveness and this situation specifically as discussed by economists rather than pundits. You may find that you feel differently once you get past all the rhetorical arguments.
 
Strawman. The US isn’t telling mobile phone manufacturers what connector to use. The US isnt telling mobile phone manufacturers their nfc chip must be open. The US isn’t imposing idiotic regulations based on revenue etc etc.

Or maybe apple is in the right and countries hate the success.

I laughed at the second quote and thought you were making a joke, but then I read the first quote and realized you weren't.

This is the purpose of antitrust legislation. Putting aside the EU, in the US it's been around for 150 years. The purpose has always been the same. Look at the top 50 companies in market cap and then look at which ones have received antitrust or other competitive scrutiny from the US or EU. It ain't just Apple that has, and there are lots that have barely been touched. The differences are pretty clear.

Y'all need to stop making this about Apple. Not everything is someone taking a side on the holy war of Apple vs the world.
 
in 1990 Apple, Acorn and VLSI Technologies jointly formed a new firm called Advanced RISC Machines Limited. Apple invested $3 million to own 43% of the company. That investment was specifically to fund the design and development of the ARM processor.

So without Apple, no ARM so to speak.
The arm ISA was
in 1990 Apple, Acorn and VLSI Technologies jointly formed a new firm called Advanced RISC Machines Limited. Apple invested $3 million to own 43% of the company. That investment was specifically to fund the design and development of the ARM processor.

So without Apple, no ARM so to speak.
For arm6 and above. The ISA was previously developed by Acorn and the silicon partner was VLSI.


 
I laughed at the second quote and thought you were making a joke, but then I read the first quote and realized you weren't.

This is the purpose of antitrust legislation. Putting aside the EU, in the US it's been around for 150 years. The purpose has always been the same. Look at the top 50 companies in market cap and then look at which ones have received antitrust or other competitive scrutiny from the US or EU. It ain't just Apple that has, and there are lots that have barely been touched. The differences are pretty clear.

Y'all need to stop making this about Apple. Not everything is someone taking a side on the holy war of Apple vs the world.
The dma isn’t about antitrust, at least in my opinion.
 
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Let's say I owned a piece of property and setup a market and charged folks to sell their products, let's say 30% of sales. People are not forced to sell their product at my market. They can also go setup their own market.
Let’s you, together with your biggest competitor, own nearly all properties in the country, that millions of people depend on. And lots of business users - to whom you dictate your commission rate (or rent), rather than negotiating. You will be regulated or broken up by the government under antitrust legislation.

That line has traditionally been when a company reaches Monopoly power, and is using that monopoly power to stifle the market and competitors.
That’s exactly what Apple, Google, Microsoft and Meta have reached in their respective main markets.

Who'll get blamed when the iPhone's battery life tanks because a user set a chromium-based browser as the default? Not the browser developer, that's for sure.
Yes, the browser developer.

Just as Google and Firefox do get blamed for their resource usage today.
Not Microsoft and its Windows operating system.

Browsers and their impact on battery life are easy to test and compare.
Especially when you have such a controlled environment as iOS.

in actuality they're looking out of their users and user experience. 99% of iPhone users are better served with WebKit browsers for a whole host of reasons
Great - so when Apple make the best browser, there’s no need to to shut out competition!

The dma isn’t about antitrust, at least in my opinion.
It’s about ensuring fair competition in digital markets - and preventing operators of the largest platforms from abusing their market power on related markets.
 
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Yes, it’s not about the consumer, it’s about ensuring apple takes a hit in revenue and power in some fictitious wrapper called consumerism.
See above:
You’re overly fixated on Apple - while the DMA (and European antitrust regulation) affects lots of companies.

If they wanted them to just „take a hit in revenue“, they could‘ve done so more easily.

That allegation is nonsense anyway - why should the EU want one of the biggest companies in their market take hit in revenue? That means lower tax revenue.
 
I assume the US will allow foreign companies to operate within the US with no regard for US law?
I doubt it. Non-US tech companies pale in comparison to the US ones. If other regions would just develop their own tech like the US has, instead of depending entirely upon US companies, then perhaps they would have tech options more aligned with what they expect.

Still, every day is an opportunity for one of these also-ran tech markets to show the world what the full technical might of their region can do when brought to bear. Unfortunately for them, they see their technical future as riding on the backs of companies not based in their region. And, that is a DECISION those region’s governments have made willingly to put them in that position.
 
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Colossus, Acorn, RiscOS, BASIC, ARM and the WWW pass you by?

A few more here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_British_innovations_and_discoveries
And today:
171 and 334

It appears that Colossus, Acorn, RiscOS, BASIC, ARM and the WWW passed the UK by. I mean, sure, scoring 4 touchdowns in a single game at Polk High is something to be proud of, but one mustn’t rest on one’s laurels.
 
That line has traditionally been when a company reaches Monopoly power, and is using that monopoly power to stifle the market and competitors.

Apple is not a monopoly, by any stretch of the argument.
Apple hasn’t even taken actions that monopolists are known to take. They haven’t bought cell phone vendors and shuttered the businesses, they haven’t forced applications to be exclusive to iOS, they haven’t forced cell phone providers to ONLY sell the iPhone. All they’ve done is made a device that they predicted a profitable portion of the population will prefer and procure and, for making a device that many UK citizens actually enjoy using, the regulators are like “We’ll have none of that!” And, really, the UK wouldn’t even be in this position if they had made different choices when Apple showed up with the iPhone and then the App Store. Their own bad decisions put them in their current position.

EDIT: I should also add, they’ve even progressively made it easier to switch from their platform, which might not suit a user’s needs, to one that may suit a user’s needs far better. That is, quite literally, anti-monopolist.
 
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Darn European Union punishing Apple! How dare they!... oh wait xD
I can see where folks may get confused. :) When the EU wants to “control US companies that don’t have monopolies in those regions”, it’s translated as “Gatekeeper”. For the UK it’s translated as “Strategic Market Status”. It also has an alternate meaning, which is “we quite literally cannot do any better and can’t be bothered to try, as, while it’s something we like to pretend is important, it’s not important enough to simply create our own technology like China and the US have done.”
 
Whatever your take on this is, not allowing non-webkit browsers is wrong. Plus there is no need for this limitation except Apple's desire to rule the world.
IF Safari browsing is a part of Apple’s master plan to rule the world, someone should probably let them know their plan is failing horribly. Worldwide marketshare hovering around 20-30% these many years after making the iPhone and setting Safari as the only browser on it… I feel like there’s a gap in their “rule the world” strategy that they haven’t sussed out, yet.
 
..and Japan as they now require 3rd party app stores. India is looking into similar regulations, too.
India dropped their challenge mainly because Apple’s market share is 3 to 4 percent there, and they couldn’t even build a case for it being a “gatekeeper” or even remotely “strategic”. It appears it’s one of those rare places in the world where, if people don’t like a thing or feels the cost is not worth the value, they just won’t buy it.

And, India, like other regions serious about using home grown tech (not the UK and not the EU), are developing their own smartphone and OS. There’s still a long road ahead, but their government sees being tied to US companies for such a pervasive tech serious enough to take steps to do something about it.
 
And, India, like other regions serious about using home grown tech (not the UK and not the EU), are developing their own smartphone and OS.

The quality will be as good as their roads and full of spyware. Journalists and critics often get bullied and murdered in that so called democratic country either by the state or by religious extremists employed by power.

The abuses and corruption are so high there it makes western corruption look tame by comparison. Within 10 years India will be sanctioned even by all its neighbour countries. They will simply close the doors to the chaos coming from there. The amount of cyber crime and theft is already intolerably high but politicians there and in the US are being funded by this theft. The cyber crime will go so high with this crypto friendly Trump government that many targeted countries will have no choice but to demand India be physically cut from the internet.
 
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Whatever your take on this is, not allowing non-webkit browsers is wrong. Plus there is no need for this limitation except Apple's desire to rule the world.

I can argue that this is one way Apple ensures that web content remains compatible with their own mobile browser. Which is aligned with my own interests as a user who is deeply invested in the Apple ecosystem.

Apple is not going to rule the world given their current market share. Rather, they are doing what it takes to ensure a great user experience within their platform, by decreeing that developers have to adhere to their standards.

Or would you all prefer that third party browsers all end up switching to chromium and further entrench Google’s dominance in this space instead?

Not everything that is good for the developer is necessarily good for the customer.
 
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[Applied Micro is responding to my comment that Apple isn't a Monopoly]

That’s exactly what Apple, Google, Microsoft and Meta have reached in their respective main markets.

This point is so pivotal to the arguments that EU/UK et al supporters make, and yet they miss the mark so widely that I can only suspect they aren't really interested in having a rational discussion. To continue to suggest, against all relevant evidence, that Apple is a Monopoly is to lie about the facts.

I get that you're proud of your Country, and you want want want more more more regulations, and that you think that the EU will save save save you from evil evil evil. But please use terms in their proper sense. If you simply plan to ignore the commonly held definitions of basic terms, then why even discuss the issue with other people? Just claim that your faith in the EU is religion-like, and stop trying to pretend to make a rational argument.
 
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Exactly my point. Instead of mandating much more drastic measures, like breaking up Apple or Google, maybe it's more reasonable to look at the problem and craft legislation that facilitates competition on the platforms. Time will tell which approach will result in the best outcome 🤷‍♂️.
The issue, though, is that it appears the focus is WHOLLY on trying to facilitate competition on platforms owned by non-governmental entities rather than by fostering and supporting competition at the hardware/OS level. The solution for prior monopolies wasn’t to implement a process where Standard Oil becomes the “standard” with everyone taking advantage of the fact that Standard found the oil, drilled for the oil, obtained the oil, trucked or piped the oil to distribution places, then create competition among people selling Standard Oil. That just leaves Standard Oil in the position of power they had. Instead, they made it so that the things Standard Oil were doing to restrict the creation and growth of other oil companies were ended, allowing the desired competition for the collection and distribution of oil.

The Google Play store exists as competition to the Apple App Store due to the hardware and OS that was built to provide a different user experience (and Apple was in no position to hinder the creation of or restrict the growth of the Google Play store, unlike Standard Oil), which gave Google a huge market advantage over the iPhone resulting in it’s commanding worldwide marketshare. If Google had been required to facilitate competition on top of Apple devices that would have meant that Apple’s iOS becomes the OS the majority of mobile phone owners are using, on devices created OR having their hardware defined by Apple, requiring Apple designated or approved development tools and ZERO ANDROID.

The “golden egg” is “new technology that challenges the status quo and drives adoption”. Because the EU and the UK have no leaders that understand, or have even worked to provide incentives to create and grow, companies that make devices and services that delight billions of folks, they believe the solution is to ”kill the goose”… stagnating tech in their regions by requiring competition to occur ON TOP OF OLD TECHNOLOGY. THAT is what’s killing innovation, that’s what stifles the creation of any NEW technology for those regions. I predict that, instead of trying to do anything in the VR/AR space, they’re just waiting to see who becomes successful in order to label them a “gatekeeper”. Thing is, now that these companies know the stance of these regions, they WILL be altering how they release any new technology into that region (and we’ve already seen that start). And, any new upstart companies with compelling tech from India, China, or the US? They may release in those regions, but I would be surprised if they didn’t curtail the number of units they shipped to those regions to avoid being labeled a “gatekeeper” (will it work, though? The iPad does not meet the quantitative metrics for being a “gatekeeper”, but they labeled it one anyway!).
 
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Or maybe apple is in the right and countries hate the success.
100%. In the structure that the EU has created and the UK wants to emulate. There’s really no way to put it, the legal structure they put in place penalizes a company that sees success in the region. If I have a small company that has created a product and connected services, say, an AR monocle, that I have tightly integrated from hardware, software, OS, app store, proprietary wireless tech that means having a compute device in your pocket doesn’t affect refresh rates, etc. etc. I know it’s going to be successful when introduced into the EU. I also know that I’m likely going to have to make it work with third party app stores, third party controllers, third party software stacks, allll of that, I’m going to avoid entering the EU for as loooooong as possible. Because, according to their current legal framework, whether or not something is designated as a “gatekeeper” comes down to “whether they want it to be a gatekeeper or not”.
 
That allegation is nonsense anyway - why should the EU want one of the biggest companies in their market take hit in revenue? That means lower tax revenue.
You’d have to ask Vestager that one. She’s gotten more and more chatty after she realized she was going to be booted regardless of what she says and she said that, if they force third party app stores, then a company having to support their own store PLUS third party app stores, that it should put a dent in their profits.
 
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100%. In the structure that the EU has created and the UK wants to emulate. There’s really no way to put it, the legal structure they put in place penalizes a company that sees success in the region. If I have a small company that has created a product and connected services, say, an AR monocle, that I have tightly integrated from hardware, software, OS, app store, proprietary wireless tech that means having a compute device in your pocket doesn’t affect refresh rates, etc. etc. I know it’s going to be successful when introduced into the EU. I also know that I’m likely going to have to make it work with third party app stores, third party controllers, third party software stacks, allll of that, I’m going to avoid entering the EU for as loooooong as possible. Because, according to their current legal framework, whether or not something is designated as a “gatekeeper” comes down to “whether they want it to be a gatekeeper or not”.

Agree wholeheartedly. At the end of the day the DMA and similar regulations will prevent consumers from being able to express preferences for integrated business models, ironically reducing choice. They say they want “competition” but by that they mean “everyone has to offer the same features and just compete on price”. Which will actually reduce innovation and consumer choice - the opposite of what the EU is claiming to want.

Par for the course for the EU Commission, whose big successes in regulating tech to date is making browsing the web much more annoying by forcing every site to inform anyone who visits that cookies exist and the Crowdstrike fiasco.
 
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The issue, though, is that it appears the focus is WHOLLY on trying to facilitate competition on platforms owned by non-governmental entities rather than by fostering and supporting competition at the hardware/OS level. The solution for prior monopolies wasn’t to implement a process where Standard Oil becomes the “standard” with everyone taking advantage of the fact that Standard found the oil, drilled for the oil, obtained the oil, trucked or piped the oil to distribution places, then create competition among people selling Standard Oil. That just leaves Standard Oil in the position of power they had. Instead, they made it so that the things Standard Oil were doing to restrict the creation and growth of other oil companies were ended, allowing the desired competition for the collection and distribution of oil.

The Google Play store exists as competition to the Apple App Store due to the hardware and OS that was built to provide a different user experience (and Apple was in no position to hinder the creation of or restrict the growth of the Google Play store, unlike Standard Oil), which gave Google a huge market advantage over the iPhone resulting in it’s commanding worldwide marketshare. If Google had been required to facilitate competition on top of Apple devices that would have meant that Apple’s iOS becomes the OS the majority of mobile phone owners are using, on devices created OR having their hardware defined by Apple, requiring Apple designated or approved development tools and ZERO ANDROID.

The “golden egg” is “new technology that challenges the status quo and drives adoption”. Because the EU and the UK have no leaders that understand, or have even worked to provide incentives to create and grow, companies that make devices and services that delight billions of folks, they believe the solution is to ”kill the goose”… stagnating tech in their regions by requiring competition to occur ON TOP OF OLD TECHNOLOGY. THAT is what’s killing innovation, that’s what stifles the creation of any NEW technology for those regions. I predict that, instead of trying to do anything in the VR/AR space, they’re just waiting to see who becomes successful in order to label them a “gatekeeper”. Thing is, now that these companies know the stance of these regions, they WILL be altering how they release any new technology into that region (and we’ve already seen that start). And, any new upstart companies with compelling tech from India, China, or the US? They may release in those regions, but I would be surprised if they didn’t curtail the number of units they shipped to those regions to avoid being labeled a “gatekeeper” (will it work, though? The iPad does not meet the quantitative metrics for being a “gatekeeper”, but they labeled it one anyway!).
The DMA will also further entrench the existing incumbents. Not only does it give iOS and android the ‘seal of approval’ it discourages any other company from ever creating a new OS and ecosystem because they know how the EU will treat them if they become too successful.

Look at payment networks like Visa and Mastercard. They have been regulated for years yet not a single viable competitor has emerged despite all the regulations. That market is stagnant and uncompetitive precisely because of the regulations. The smartphone OS and ecosystem market is going the same way due to the EUs poorly crafted legislation.
 
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