Apple's Browser Rules Stifle Innovation on iOS, Says UK Regulator

[MilaM]

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

The EU Commission likely deliberated more heavy-handed measures. Some of those discussions are available in publicly available documents.

If you use the Standard Oil example, what would that mean applied to Apple and Google? It means that you would have to unwind the vertical integration of these companies by breaking them up in a hardware division and a software division, and a services division, and possibly force them to sell some of those assets, and make the OS available to competitors. Then, and only then would there be real competition again and a chance for new competitors to emerge.

Now you don't need a lot of phantasy to see how difficult such an undertaking would be and how disruptive it would be for consumers and businesses.

I also don't agree, that the Apple and Google store compete against each other in a meaningful way. As an iPhone user you can't buy your app on the Google store and vice versa.

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.

Sounds great in theory. In the meantime thousands of companies have to rely on Apple and Google to reach their customers and provide services. Or do you expect a new music streaming service to first develop a whole new smartphone platform and OS, just to offer their services? It's completely unrealistic.

 

[mrochester]

The EU Commission likely deliberated more heavy-handed measures. Some of those discussions are available in publicly available documents.

If you use the Standard Oil example, what would that mean applied to Apple and Google? It means that you would have to unwind the vertical integration of these companies by breaking them up in a hardware division and a software division, and a services division, and possibly force them to sell some of those assets, and make the OS available to competitors. Then, and only then would there be real competition again and a chance for new competitors to emerge.

Now you don't need a lot of phantasy to see how difficult such an undertaking would be and how disruptive it would be for consumers and businesses.

I also don't agree, that the Apple and Google store compete against each other in a meaningful way. As an iPhone user you can't buy your app on the Google store and vice versa.



Sounds great in theory. In the meantime thousands of companies have to rely on Apple and Google to reach their customers and provide services. Or do you expect a new music streaming service to first develop a whole new smartphone platform and OS, just to offer their services? It's completely unrealistic.

The lesson should be, don’t create your business off the back of someone else’s business. Create your own. That applies in so many places.

One of the primary issues with creating a new platform is the lack of apps. We could create legislation to solve that.

 

[MilaM]

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.

The only way to achieve what you suggest, would be to outright ban the import of foreign made smartphone tech and IT services.

 

[surferfb]

Sounds great in theory. In the meantime thousands of companies have to rely on Apple and Google to reach their customers and provide services. Or do you expect a new music streaming service to first develop a whole new smartphone platform and OS, just to offer their services? It's completely unrealistic.

Except streaming services did arise without the need of a whole new smartphone platform and OS. Spotify followed Apple’s and Google’s rules and became the number one streaming music platform in the world. Despite Apple offering a competing product.

What you and other EU-defenders don’t understand is that forcing Apple to turn to Android lite isn’t going to increase competition or innovation. In fact, the loss of a competing business model will do the opposite. Less innovation and less competition.

 

[mrochester]

Except streaming services did arise without the need of a whole new smartphone platform and OS. Spotify followed Apple’s and Google’s rules and became the number one streaming music platform in the world. Despite Apple offering a competing product.

What you and other EU-defenders don’t understand is that forcing Apple to turn to Android lite isn’t going to increase competition or innovation. In fact, the loss of a competing business model will do the opposite. Less innovation and less competition.

As I said, the DMA just cements iOS and Android as the only possible smartphone OSes and ecosystems we’ll ever get. There will never be competition, because the regulations don’t foster such an outcome.

 

[MilaM]

What you and other EU-defenders don’t understand is that forcing Apple to turn to Android lite isn’t going to increase competition or innovation. In fact, the loss of a competing business model will do the opposite. Less innovation and less competition.

There can't be less competition than what we have now. Two ecosystems that crushingly dominate the whole business of app distribution on mobile platforms.

Your other statement is conjecture. In my opinions the duopoly is what hampers innovation.

 

[mrochester]

There can't be less competition than what we have now. Two ecosystems that crushingly dominate the whole business of app distribution on mobile platforms.

Your other statement is pure conjecture. In my opinions the duopoly is what hampers innovation.

The DMA will not allow any new competitors into the market. In fact the DMA does exactly the opposite and makes it impossible for any new competing OS and ecosystem to enter the market.

 

[MilaM]

As I said, the DMA just cements iOS and Android as the only possible smartphone OSes and ecosystems we’ll ever get. There will never be competition, because the regulations don’t foster such an outcome.

The DMA was created exactly because there was no hope for market forces correct the situation.

 

[mrochester]

The DMA was created exactly because there was no hope for market forces correct the situation.

And the DMA wont achieve that outcome either. Hence it’s crappy regulation. It could be useful, if it did the right thing.

 

[MilaM]

And the DMA wont achieve that outcome either. Hence it’s crappy regulation. It could be useful, if it did the right thing.

It won't, because it was not designed to create a new competitor. It was designed to let providers of third-party apps and services compete with Apple and Google on their platforms fairly.

 

[mrochester]

It won't, because it was not designed to create a new competitor. It was designed to let providers of third-party apps and services compete with Apple and Google on their platforms fairly.

Exactly. It doesn’t fix the problem of there being a duopoly, which is the actual problem.

 

[surferfb]

At its most charitable interpretation, the DMA
Is designed to turn iOS and Android into utilities that allow anyone and everyone to write apps on top of them. To increase competition ON the platforms not to increase competition WITH the platforms.

The problem is the EU Commission is in way over their heads and is now dictating to Apple how its OS must be designed. Do you really want government bureaucrats who can’t even do their job well enough to achieve the outcomes they want without it cheating (see declaring the DMA applies to iPadOS because we say so) overruling Apple’s engineers on how to design iOS?

 

[mrochester]

At its most charitable interpretation, the DMA
Is designed to turn iOS and Android into utilities that allow anyone and everyone to write apps on top of them. To increase competition ON the platforms not to increase competition WITH the platforms.

The problem is the EU Commission is in way over their heads and is now dictating to Apple how its OS must be designed. Do you really want government bureaucrats who can’t even do their job well enough to achieve the outcomes they want without it cheating (see declaring the DMA applies to iPadOS because we say so) overruling Apple’s engineers on how to design iOS?

The EU should stay out of product design and instead enact regulations that allow more products with different designs to emerge/exist and compete against the incumbents.

More products and a freer market as opposed to few products and a controlled market.

 

[MilaM]

At its most charitable interpretation, the DMA
Is designed to turn iOS and Android into utilities that allow anyone and everyone to write apps on top of them. To increase competition ON the platforms not to increase competition WITH the platforms.

I think this is a fair description and the desirable outcome. Make iOS more like macOS essentially.

 

[AndreeOnline]

In the meantime thousands of companies have to rely on Apple and Google to reach their customers and provide services. Or do you expect a new music streaming service to first develop a whole new smartphone platform and OS, just to offer their services? It's completely unrealistic.

What?

I expect them to develop their music service in any way they want, then offer it on 'the only universally free market' that is the internet and let anyone who wants to sign up for it there. Completely separate from any other company's approval or fees.

What—in the name of sweet Baby Jesus—does a music service have to do with developing phones and operating systems?

Alternatively, for a fee, they can opt to leverage the tools and reach of Apple's and Google's products and platforms.

It's only when they look at their offer like this: as a stand-alone product available via any web browser that they can truly judge the value of their product/service. If it's next to worthless without being in the App stores or as a native app—well, at least now you know the value of your core service.

It's the realization that your offer only makes sense in the context of working closely with Apple's or Google's services or products, that the fees to getting access to them should be the easiest money ever spent.

Fees of 15-30% aren't taken from developers. It's the 70-85% that is made available to them in a way that they would never have otherwise.

 

[I7guy]

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”.

(The bold)…Or more importantly if they deem it “important”. The law of the land shouldn’t be so full of holes of undefined terms like “important “.

 

[mrochester]

What?

I expect them to develop their music service in any way they want, then offer it on 'the only universally free market' that is the internet and let anyone who wants to sign up for it there. Completely separate from any other company's approval or fees.

What—in the name of sweet Baby Jesus—does a music service have to do with developing phones and operating systems?

Alternatively, for a fee, they can opt to leverage the tools and reach of Apple's and Google's products and platforms.

It's only when they look at their offer like this: as a stand-alone product available via any web browser that they can truly judge the value of their product/service. If it's next to worthless without being in the App stores or as a native app—well, at least now you know the value of your core service.

It's the realization that your offer only makes sense in the context of working closely with Apple's or Google's services or products, that the fees to getting access to them should be the easiest money ever spent.

Fees of 15-30% aren't taken from developers. It's the 70-85% that is made available to them in a way that they would never have otherwise.

Yes the open web is the alternative to selling your products and services.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

If you use the Standard Oil example, what would that mean applied to Apple and Google? It means that you would have to unwind the vertical integration of these companies by breaking them up in a hardware division and a software division, and a services division, and possibly force them to sell some of those assets, and make the OS available to competitors. Then, and only then would there be real competition again and a chance for new competitors to emerge.

That would absolutely NOT be what it mean if one understood what, in actuality, Standard Oil was doing.

It would mean you stop Apple from buying smartphone companies then shuttering them. It would mean you stop Apple from undercutting competitors in the smartphone market (via offering hardware at less than cost) forcing other hardware vendors to go out of business. It would mean killing all exclusivity deals that Apple had created in order to ensure that most apps would ONLY appear on Apple devices. It would mean that you would stop Apple from strong arming carriers into not carrying any other cellular phones. Anyone that actually looks at the details of Standard Oil, these are the actions Standard was taking in order to maintain their market position.

and possibly force them to sell some of those assets

AND, if what the EU and the UK wants is to privatize what exists, make it a government program that’s practically free for developers and customers to use, then what they should do is offer those companies a fair price for those technologies (since they obviously can’t build their own), fork it into something that’s EU/UK only and let the EU/UK try to iterate on the hardware, develop the OS (including security patches/bug fixes), design and deploy the EU/UK App Store.

Sounds great in theory. In the meantime thousands of companies have to rely on Apple and Google to reach their customers and provide services. Or do you expect a new music streaming service to first develop a whole new smartphone platform and OS, just to offer their services? It's completely unrealistic.

Why do those companies rely on Apple and Google? Because Apple and Google FORCED companies in those regions to use them? OR, is it because the regulatory framework that exists in those regions to ensure that no company gets too large drove any companies actually capable of handling all the complex hardware and software needs of those entire regions OUTSIDE those regions? Don’t blame Google and Apple for a situation that shortsighted regions created. Similarly, expecting Apple and Google to resolve a situation not created by them is also unrealistic.

ONLY if a new music streaming service wants to have 100% control over how their software is distributed. (The iPod existed because Apple wanted control over how their music was distributed, same with the iPhone. They tried working with Motorola with the ROKR but realized if they wanted iTunes on a phone to be what they wanted it to be, they’d have to make their own).
I’m not the first to say that creating hardware that works well with a service is an easy or simple task. It takes years and years of iteration, and there will be some failures and missteps along the way. BUT, if a company has a vision that aligns with what consumers want, there is literally nothing that can keep it from paying off in the end. Are there a lot of companies that really have no desire to put in that level of effort? ABSOLUTELY! And most of those companies understand that there are unavoidable costs when piggybacking on someone else’s hard work.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

What you and other EU-defenders don’t understand is that forcing Apple to turn to Android lite isn’t going to increase competition or innovation. In fact, the loss of a competing business model will do the opposite. Less innovation and less competition.

Another thing their shortsightedness forces them to refuse to see… the majority of the profits their companies make on mobile purchases in the EU/UK is via the iPhone, it’s not even close. This is primarily because the iOS makes pirating JUUUUST onerous enough for most to decide that paying is worth avoiding the headaches. If they get what they want and make the iPhone Android, those profits that went along with that way of providing services will evaporate as well.

The EU and UK developers will end up doing what they do on Android in the region, fill the apps with ads. Fortunately for them, if they have anything of value to sell digitally outside the region, they’ll be able to do so knowing they’re going to see profits from that deployment.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

The only way to achieve what you suggest, would be to outright ban the import of foreign made smartphone tech and IT services.

Which is what they should do IF they seriously felt US companies were so disastrous to the region. The obvious reason why they don’t is, that they can’t ban US tech. They have no world class IT infrastructure, brain trust or innovative thinkers/entrepreneurs left in the region because they drove them all out. And, their actions these days all but guarantees that any groundbreaking tech is going to surface outside those regions.

 

[MilaM]

Which is what they should do IF they seriously felt US companies were so disastrous to the region.

Nobody (serious) in the EU wants to kick out US Big Techs. We are 95% happy with the products. The DMA only corrects some especially competition unfriendly practices.

 

[MilaM]

I expect them to develop their music service in any way they want, then offer it on 'the only universally free market' that is the internet and let anyone who wants to sign up for it there. Completely separate from any other company's approval or fees.

Great idea. In fact, this is what the news we are commenting on is about. Safari and WebKit are making it very difficult to create web-apps that are able to compete with native apps.

Did you know, that in a knee-jerk reaction to the DMA, Apple even announced to completely scrap the feature where Apps could launch straight from the home screen (PWAs to be exact). They quickly reversed that decision, because they realized how such a move makes them really look bad.

 

[surferfb]

Nobody (serious) in the EU wants to kick out US Big Techs. We are 95% happy with the products. The DMA only corrects some especially competition unfriendly practices.

I think you’re seriously underestimating how radical the DMA is. If they had just made it about the App Store and default apps, I’d still be against it, but not vehemently so (you don’t see me complaining about Japan’s law, for example).

But the anti-integration provisions are straight up crazy. Any API or feature Apple gives itself it has to give to others if asked? Bonkers!

 

[Unregistered 4U]

What?

I expect them to develop their music service in any way they want, then offer it on 'the only universally free market' that is the internet and let anyone who wants to sign up for it there. Completely separate from any other company's approval or fees.

What—in the name of sweet Baby Jesus—does a music service have to do with developing phones and operating systems?

Alternatively, for a fee, they can opt to leverage the tools and reach of Apple's and Google's products and platforms.

It's only when they look at their offer like this: as a stand-alone product available via any web browser that they can truly judge the value of their product/service. If it's next to worthless without being in the App stores or as a native app—well, at least now you know the value of your core service.

It's the realization that your offer only makes sense in the context of working closely with Apple's or Google's services or products, that the fees to getting access to them should be the easiest money ever spent.

Fees of 15-30% aren't taken from developers. It's the 70-85% that is made available to them in a way that they would never have otherwise.

On top of what you said, I was unaware until recently that there’s a growing digital music player market that essentially takes where the iPod left off (once Apple switched to the iPhone) and is continually pushing portable music players in directions that Apple were never interested in. Connectors that Apple never had, like the quarter inch headphone jacks and capable of impedance levels to drive high end gear that Apple’s devices were never able to drive without attachments. Equalizers, raw audio quality and capacities far beyond anything Apple ever made.

So, quite literally, if a music service was VERY concerned about making sure their digital product made it to their users in the highest quality possible (and perhaps, creating a baseline product to build from), the current situation actually provides an enterprising company an opening. That, perhaps like Apple, they could then parlay into ever more performant devices capable of providing features some future phones couldn’t even dream of. The company would have to be willing to put in the money and time and willing to maybe have a couple failures, but the upside is enormous.

The fact that this is hypothetical only and that the largest music service in the world is content with just being a bullet point on someone ELSE’S product is a problem with that company, not with Apple or Google.

 

[surferfb]

Did you know, that in a knee-jerk reaction to the DMA, Apple even announced to completely scrap the feature where Apps could launch straight from the home screen (PWAs to be exact). They quickly reversed that decision, because they realized how such a move makes them really look bad.

That is not what happened. Apple thought the DMA required them to kill PWAs, because the law is terribly written.

The other change that suggests Apple is in unofficial contact with the EC regarding compliance is the “never mind” on PWAs. Beta versions of iOS 17.4 in the EU changed Home Screen web apps into bookmarks that open in a new tab in the user’s default browser. Apple made this change not because they want to “kill” web apps, but because they were under the impression that the DMA required them to either (a) have no Home Screen web app support at all in the EU, or (b) allow all third-party rendering engines to save PWAs to the Home Screen using their rendering engines. Option (c) — the status quo, WebKit-only PWA support on the Home Screen — is seemingly disallowed under the DMA, as it would constitute preferencing WebKit over third-party engines. Apple doesn’t have a system in place in iOS to allow third-party rendering engines to save web apps to the Home Screen, so, alas, (a) it was — no more PWAs in the EU. The DMA is not clear about much, but it is seemingly clear that gatekeepers cannot preference their own web browser or rendering engine. Allowing PWAs — but only via WebKit — is, obviously, showing preference to WebKit. Apple’s initial decision to remove PWAs in the EU sucked, but that’s because the DMA sucks, not because Apple hates or fears web apps. But I think what happened is that when the EC realized the DMA was going to result in a worse PWA experience, they let Apple know that WebKit-only PWAs would not be penalized.