Apple's Fines in Dutch Antitrust Case Hit 50 Million Euros

[I7guy]

I still maintain they had nowhere near the ecosystem Apple and Google have.
Third-party apps just weren't very important back then.
And even though their messaging platform was popular, only a minority had blackberry phones. Most people used SMS.

Ok we disagree on the importance of Blackberry.

Google's Play Store and Apple's App Store form a near virtual duopoly with similar (combined) marketshare.

If I were a regulator I would find out the barriers to entry and fix those barriers. Not force false competition. As it is there are literally dozens of manufacturers, plenty to choose from.

Oh, you shouldn't lump together all of the countries.
There are EU member states that have, for instance, flat income tax rates of 10% to 20%.

But, realistically, a smartphone, if you want to make online purchases with a bank card - and don't want to pay high fees for teller transactions. Plus, it's more secure.

Europe isn't the retail banking backwater for that is the US. Retail banking in the EU is years ahead technologically - and that is in large part due to heavy promotion of payment schemes, secure customer authentication and, yes, heavy regulation made by the EU.

The point is Apple while a pop-culture product, if they disappeared society would move on (aside from mourning a great american company). As I said before death and taxes are inevitable and this regulation is also. Doesn't mean it's good or even ok. And frankly if this backfires would be a good history lesson.

 

[Johns12]

Ok we disagree on the importance of Blackberry.

If I were a regulator I would find out the barriers to entry and fix those barriers. Not force false competition. As it is there are literally dozens of manufacturers, plenty to choose from.

The point is Apple while a pop-culture product, if they disappeared society would move on (aside from mourning a great american company). As I said before death and taxes are inevitable and this regulation is also. Doesn't mean it's good or even ok. And frankly if this backfires would be a good history lesson.

Unfortunately, whether it is good or bad, we probably will not learn from the history lesson. As with many things in life, we seem to make the same mistakes over and over.

 

[Sophisticatednut]

Ok we disagree on the importance of Blackberry.

Considering windows have 90%+ and Linux making up less than a few percent still makes up the backbone of the internet. Blackberry was important but still a close to a nobody in the end of the day.

They had max 3% market share of Mobile phones in 2009

If I were a regulator I would find out the barriers to entry and fix those barriers. Not force false competition. As it is there are literally dozens of manufacturers, plenty to choose from.

It’s not the regulators job to fix or remove barriers. It’s their job to keep balance in the market and make Sure companies don’t create artificial barriers and foster healthy competition.

The point is Apple while a pop-culture product, if they disappeared society would move on (aside from mourning a great american company). As I said before death and taxes are inevitable and this regulation is also. Doesn't mean it's good or even ok. And frankly if this backfires would be a good history lesson.

If apple disappeared nobody would care that much outside of shareholders and random hipsters untill someone else replaced them.

And no, nobody would care or believe it’s a great American company, it would just be thrown on the heap of other dead companies like Blackberry.

Regulation is a necessary thing when companies actively harm the market for their own benefits

 

[I7guy]

Considering windows have 90%+ and Linux making up less than a few percent still makes up the backbone of the internet. Blackberry was important but still a close to a nobody in the end of the day.

They had max 3% market share of Mobile phones in 2009

It’s not the regulators job to fix or remove barriers. It’s their job to keep balance in the market and make Sure companies don’t create artificial barriers and foster healthy competition.

If apple disappeared nobody would care that much outside of shareholders and random hipsters untill someone else replaced them.

And no, nobody would care or believe it’s a great American company, it would just be thrown on the heap of other dead companies like Blackberry.

Regulation is a necessary thing when companies actively harm the market for their own benefits

We can certainly disagree or agree on the importance of blackberry, what regulators should do and be focused on, what could happen if apple disappears, what’s your favorite ice cream, etc, etc.

 

[Sophisticatednut]

Yes, support the same standards because one existed first. But it took Apple to banish Flash on the iPhone for it to die. Because as a standard the world used, it sucked.

Something being common isn’t the same as being a standard. Flash just as IE was never a standard, just popular.

Some would say it's up to a company to develop a solution. And one that doesn't cost the others an arm/leg in fees to make it worth they're wild. AKA "free". Which is hard to do when you're trying to innovate and make money doing it. Otherwise, use SMS. It works everywhere. IF you want something different, use one of the many messaging platforms. Which in this instance you have a standard and choices.

That’s nether a standard or a choice. The issue is WhatsApp is becoming to big and harms the market. iMessage is equally big and harms the market and splitting the user base in isolated camps

None of which are being forced into changing how they do business so they work with each other. Part of which I say these rules are not fair. Make Apple bend but not anyone else.

Then you’re just an idiot then. This includes android and Meta as well. Nothing in the bill is apple exclusive.

When businesses refuse to cooperate they can be forced to do so. That is why ISP’s are cheap and provide great services because they can’t lock people in and prevent customers from fleeing shop immediately. Imagine if comcast was forced to cooperate with other competitive companies, suddenly they would be forced to provide good services.

That’s how we have it in Europe.

SMS. SMS. SMS. One more time, SMS.

Then they will all implement SMS support then. That just means apple must allow competitive SMS applications on the store. Because currently I can’t get sms in any app but the standard iMessage app

And they should be allowed to keep innovating and not stop on one port type because some well informed/educated group of people in the EU say so.

That is exactly how it is right now. The market just need to negotiate a standard. The regulatory text is technology agnostic in how it’s written

Minority Report. Pre cog. Cause we know you're going to go bad at some point.

That’s just a brain dead take. I can explicitly said they hate stopped BEFORE IT BECOMES A BIG PROBLEM.

In EU we try and fix the leaking pipe before it becomes a big problem

Or do you only fix your leaking pipes when they burst an cause expensive damage to the foundation of the house? After all, it’s not guaranteed that the pipe will bust, it could even grow nice flowers in the cracks

Its why they will never be what the US is. If the people of the EU didn't like Apple, we wouldn't be having this conversation. In fact, they like them so much...

the reason is we don’t want to be like USA, and never wanted to in the first place. In EU companies are largely funded by banks and growth isn’t always the most important part compared to stable growth or reassurance before a random business gets Lorna’s to crash the market again.

I think they both are doing the same thing, in varying dumb ways.

That shows you have no clue how it works.
USA= politicians making laws over things the barely knows and interrogating people over things they don’t even have the competence to ask. You elect people with zero qualifications outside of a useless law degree and popular vote

EU= employee civil servants make laws and regulations in their area of expertise and then allow politicians review it and argue their interest. Must have 100% support of parliament to be allowed to work

 

[Sophisticatednut]

We can certainly disagree or agree on the importance of blackberry, what regulators should do and be focused on, what could happen if apple disappears, what’s your favorite ice cream, etc, etc.

That’s why we should try and use objective measurements and criteria.

Objectively speaking blackberry was not important as 97% of people didn’t use it. The 3% that did use was just 20% of the smartphone market of 2009.

Regulators in USA and EU are like night and day when it comes to competence, accountability and goal.

I think USA needs to restructure the law and regulations you have to make it easier and more efficient to do what you want to do

 

[I7guy]

That’s why we should try and use objective measurements and criteria.

Objectively speaking blackberry was not important as 97% of people didn’t use it. The 3% that did use was just 20% of the smartphone market of 2009.

Regulators in USA and EU are like night and day when it comes to competence, accountability and goal.

I think USA needs to restructure the law and regulations you have to make it easier and more efficient to do what you want to do

Objectively speaking apple is a minority, then, not a gatekeeper, which is a made up definition to ensnare large tech. Saying 97% didn’t use blackberry is meaningless. 97% of corporate employees in NYC? 97% in the United states?

As I said before like death and taxes this law will come, doesn’t mean to have to endorse it.

The EU will reap what it sows. Good example is the state of manufacturing in the US.

 

[AppliedMicro]

The EU will reap what it sows. Good example …

…are the cheap, fast and secure cross-border payment systems they have.

EU regulation mandated accessibility and interoperability. And thanks to that consumers like me can make cross-border bank transfers for free. Even instant payments are free (or maybe 1-2 EUR at other banks). 20 or 30 USD for a wire transfer? No, thanks.

EU regulated the (virtual) gatekeeping duopoly of Mastercard and VISA and enacted caps on their interchange fees for consumer cards. Thanks to that, many small business enjoy much lower card acceptance costs. And card acceptance has improved drastically for consumers. Who also benefit from the banning of the practice for surcharging.

 

[Sophisticatednut]

Objectively speaking apple is a minority, then, not a gatekeeper, which is a made up definition to ensnare large tech. Saying 97% didn’t use blackberry is meaningless. 97% of corporate employees in NYC? 97% in the United states?

97% of the phone market globally. Same was true for USA and EU.
Objectively speaking EU care if the core platform have

• about revenue (16billion euro?) in EU
• Users 45million monthly active users in EU
• And 10.000 active businesses in the core platform. In EU

Black berry was never close to such numbers combined. Apple have 30-50% of the phone market( smartphones AND dumb phones) depending if it’s EU or USA

As I said before like death and taxes this law will come, doesn’t mean to have to endorse it.

Agree

The EU will reap what it sows. Good example is the state of manufacturing in the US.

It’s a great example of how not to do legislation. EU have a much bigger industrial manufacturing or manufacturing over all than USA

 

[Sophisticatednut]

The EU will reap what it sows. Good example is the state of manufacturing in the US.

It seems EU is indeed reap what it sows and it’s a bountiful harvest.

To get a sense of the magnitude of the difference these days, total U.S. exports of manufactures—as a share of U.S. GDP—are smaller than Germany’s trade surplus in autos. Admittedly, Germany does specialize in autos, and it is a uniquely manufacturing heavy economy.

But it is still a huge difference.

Europe hasn’t adopted the “design it here, make it abroad” model in quite the same way as U.S. business. Julius Krein writes "United States industry is losing ground to foreign competitors on price, quality and technology. In many areas, our manufacturing capacity cannot compete with what exists in Asia." Judging from the export data, U.S. industry also has had trouble competing with Europe.

Source :

When it Comes to Exporting (Manufactures), Europe is Now the One from Mars

Manufacturing exports are about three times more important to the euro area than to the U.S. economy.That's largely because the U.S. now exports very few manuactures.And China's imports of manufactur…

www.cfr.org

 

[Sophisticatednut]

…are the cheap, fast and secure cross-border payment systems they have.

EU regulation mandated accessibility and interoperability. And thanks to that consumers like me can make cross-border bank transfers for free. Even instant payments are free (or maybe 1-2 EUR at other banks). 20 or 30 USD for a wire transfer? No, thanks.

EU regulated the (virtual) gatekeeping duopoly of Mastercard and VISA and enacted caps on their interchange fees for consumer cards. Thanks to that, many small business enjoy much lower card acceptance costs. And card acceptance has improved drastically for consumers. Who also benefit from the banning of the practice for surcharging.

We are leading in fraud prevention as well and security quality for the consumer, Eau forced security to be adopted such chip and pin, deprecating magnetic cards as obsolete etc etc decades ahead of the US with the help of intelligent policies with an holistic view.

 

[I7guy]

…are the cheap, fast and secure cross-border payment systems they have.

EU regulation mandated accessibility and interoperability. And thanks to that consumers like me can make cross-border bank transfers for free. Even instant payments are free (or maybe 1-2 EUR at other banks). 20 or 30 USD for a wire transfer? No, thanks.

EU regulated the (virtual) gatekeeping duopoly of Mastercard and VISA and enacted caps on their interchange fees for consumer cards. Thanks to that, many small business enjoy much lower card acceptance costs. And card acceptance has improved drastically for consumers. Who also benefit from the banning of the practice for surcharging.

Perfect example of what should be regulated. Proprietary software, app stores etc. Other than the protections the law affords currently, keep the government out and let the consumers vote with their $$$.

 

[I7guy]

It seems EU is indeed reap what it sows and it’s a bountiful harvest.
View attachment 1989243

To get a sense of the magnitude of the difference these days, total U.S. exports of manufactures—as a share of U.S. GDP—are smaller than Germany’s trade surplus in autos. Admittedly, Germany does specialize in autos, and it is a uniquely manufacturing heavy economy.

But it is still a huge difference.

Europe hasn’t adopted the “design it here, make it abroad” model in quite the same way as U.S. business. Julius Krein writes "United States industry is losing ground to foreign competitors on price, quality and technology. In many areas, our manufacturing capacity cannot compete with what exists in Asia." Judging from the export data, U.S. industry also has had trouble competing with Europe.

Source :

When it Comes to Exporting (Manufactures), Europe is Now the One from Mars

Manufacturing exports are about three times more important to the euro area than to the U.S. economy.That's largely because the U.S. now exports very few manuactures.And China's imports of manufactur…

www.cfr.org

Correct. The US due to a lot of factors has lost much large manufacturing capacity and the ability to innovate within it's borders over the last many decades.

 

[I7guy]

97% of the phone market globally. Same was true for USA and EU.
Objectively speaking EU care if the core platform have

• about revenue (16billion euro?) in EU
• Users 45million monthly active users in EU
• And 10.000 active businesses in the core platform. In EU

The EU as is said before, imo, will wind up as 2nd class technological citizen. Heavy handed regulation (such as the AT&T break-up as an example, didn't really end up as a bonus for consumers) imo, doesn't work well for consumers in the long haul.

Black berry was never close to such numbers combined. Apple have 30-50% of the phone market( smartphones AND dumb phones) depending if it’s EU or USA

Agree

It’s a great example of how not to do legislation. EU have a much bigger industrial manufacturing or manufacturing over all than USA

 

[Sophisticatednut]

The EU as is said before, imo, will wind up as 2nd class technological citizen.

There’s zero evidence for second class technological citizens will be the case in EU. Honestly looking at the data shows the opposite in many way comparing USA and EU and it’s growing.
USA might be the inventor or seller of some technological solution. But EU overall is the one adopting them across the board. Hence you can look at our financial sector and the security that is used is barely a thing in USA because of short term costs.

But the future in EU because of the long term benefits, ironically saving everyone money.

Correct. The US due to a lot of factors has lost much large manufacturing capacity and the ability to innovate within it's borders over the last many decades.

A lot of factors from self inflected regulatory wounds. And still we have about the same amount of regulations and observe the opposite developments.

Heavy handed regulation (such as the AT&T break-up as an example, didn't really end up as a bonus for consumers) imo, doesn't work well for consumers in the long haul.

That’s great example of the US government not knowing what it’s doing using popular demand as a measuring stick. But EU did something smarter, demanding cooperation between the firms instead of breaking things apart.

Giving us cheaper internet, greater services, healthy competitions etc. etc.

Not all regulations are fundamentally bad.

 

[djphat2000]

Something being common isn’t the same as being a standard. Flash just as IE was never a standard, just popular.

Every webpage worth its salt had flash on it. It might as well had been a standard.

That’s nether a standard or a choice. The issue is WhatsApp is becoming to big and harms the market. iMessage is equally big and harms the market and splitting the user base in isolated camps

Everything is becoming too big in the EU. How about choosing not to use the damn thing?

Then you’re just an idiot then. This includes android and Meta as well. Nothing in the bill is apple exclusive.

I'll be that then.

When businesses refuse to cooperate they can be forced to do so.

EU sucks. Forced to do so. Why can't you force a business to exist? Would get the job done better no?

That is why ISP’s are cheap and provide great services because they can’t lock people in and prevent customers from fleeing shop immediately. Imagine if comcast was forced to cooperate with other competitive companies, suddenly they would be forced to provide good services.

I wouldn't call it in "locked in". I don't know where you get that from. I can leave my ISP when I want. Where I live, I can choose between Altice or Verizon. It would be nice to have more choice of course. But, that is due to lack of infrastructure (more fiber on those poles and or underground).
In the US you can be locked out of competitive ISP's by the town you live in, or county (good old gov't) or because other companies don't want to run the cable/fiber. As it may not be profitable for them in many places. Elon's Star Link may help there, but at a high price. Your other options are cellular 4/5G. Again, depending on where you live.
I don't think we need them to Co-Operate with each other as much as compete against each other. More options, then just 1 or 2.

Then they will all implement SMS support then. That just means apple must allow competitive SMS applications on the store. Because currently I can’t get sms in any app but the standard iMessage app

Where do you live Mars? I just did a search for SMS and a list of apps show up. Lots with those IAP too.

That is exactly how it is right now. The market just need to negotiate a standard. The regulatory text is technology agnostic in how it’s written

So what happens when I invent something new? If it doesn't follow the standard, then I shouldn't proceed? We can't all conform to "a" standard. A new design may require a new plug or even the lack of one. A new protocol may not conform with established ones. Standards have they're place, but leave room for improvement.

That’s just a brain dead take. I can explicitly said they hate stopped BEFORE IT BECOMES A BIG PROBLEM.

In EU we try and fix the leaking pipe before it becomes a big problem

Right. OK. I'll not go there. Current events speak very loudly for themselves.

Or do you only fix your leaking pipes when they burst an cause expensive damage to the foundation of the house? After all, it’s not guaranteed that the pipe will bust, it could even grow nice flowers in the cracks

More akin to a hot water heater in the US (to put it more on the correct context). We "should" change them ever 10 years or so. Preventative, as they will eventually break. Some last 15 or more years, but why take the chance.
Within this particular issue with Apple. That doesn't apply in my very honest opinion. No different than picking up someone off the street for the possibility of Jay Walking. Or they could rob a store.

the reason is we don’t want to be like USA, and never wanted to in the first place.

Ok.

In EU companies are largely funded by banks and growth isn’t always the most important part compared to stable growth or reassurance before a random business gets Lorna’s to crash the market again.

Yes, completely different from how it works in the US.

That shows you have no clue how it works.
USA= politicians making laws over things the barely knows and interrogating people over things they don’t even have the competence to ask. You elect people with zero qualifications outside of a useless law degree and popular vote

You give them too much credit.

EU= employee civil servants make laws and regulations in their area of expertise and then allow politicians review it and argue their interest. Must have 100% support of parliament to be allowed to work

You still give them too much credit.

 

[AppliedMicro]

Where do you live Mars? I just did a search for SMS and a list of apps show up. Lots with those IAP too.

Maybe not on Mars. But on a planet where SMS is a standardised service - and SMS received through that standardised protocol over the mobile network can only be accessed and read through Apple's built-in messaging app. Not through third-party apps (save for the limited access for two-factor authentication codes recognised that Apple provides).

The fact that some apps on the App Store advertise with the string "SMS" doesn't mean that you can receive normal SMS through them.

 

[I7guy]

There’s zero evidence for second class technological citizens will be the case in EU. Honestly looking at the data shows the opposite in many way comparing USA and EU and it’s growing.
USA might be the inventor or seller of some technological solution. But EU overall is the one adopting them across the board. Hence you can look at our financial sector and the security that is used is barely a thing in USA because of short term costs.

But the future in EU because of the long term benefits, ironically saving everyone money.

This will wind up by not saving anybody money. It will be, imo, a race to the bottom for revenue, scam and copyright apps. It's a clear socialist move of give it to the people.

A lot of factors from self inflected regulatory wounds. And still we have about the same amount of regulations and observe the opposite developments.

Just not great technical developments. Nothing of great technical consequence comes from the EU, imo, partly because of what is said down below.

That’s great example of the US government not knowing what it’s doing using popular demand as a measuring stick. But EU did something smarter, demanding cooperation between the firms instead of breaking things apart.

Giving us cheaper internet, greater services, healthy competitions etc. etc.

Not all regulations are fundamentally bad.

But, imo, this regulation is fundamentally flawed.

 

[djphat2000]

Maybe not on Mars. But on a planet where SMS is a standardised service - and SMS received through that standardised protocol over the mobile network can only be accessed and read through Apple's built-in messaging app. Not through third-party apps (save for the limited access for two-factor authentication codes recognised that Apple provides).

The fact that some apps on the App Store advertise with the string "SMS" doesn't mean that you can receive normal SMS through them.

Well, getting an SMS sent to any number seems like it does the job to me.

 

[AppliedMicro]

Well, getting an SMS sent to any number seems like it does the job to me.

Receiving SMS is half of the fun.
Arguably the more important half of SMS functionality.

 

[adib]

One of the things I like about iPhone is not getting spam messages or calls from infected iPhones. On the other hand I would really love to get a fully featured game emulator that takes full advantage of the processing power of my iPad and iPhone.

Spam messages and calls are already happening. For example, I frequently get spam in iMessage, even without these "alt-store" rules. And for calls to such extent that I configure my phone only to ring on known phone numbers.

 

[adib]

Unfortunately, the more recent ruling by the ACM makes this much harder. Apple wanted developer to offer two distinctly different versions of the app, which would be relatively easy for Apple to track. The ACM wants developers to offer a single version that offers, inside the app, two different ways to make in-app purchases. Apple would have to monitor actions that take lace inside the app themselves in order to track alternative payment transactions. In order to do this, Apple would have to violate all of the privacy strictures that they claim to defend and are one of the key parts of their product differentiation.

Allowing 3rd party app stores would solve this. The catch is that developers would need to provide two separate apps for the respective stores, like what Apple offered initially.

 

[@Brett]

Spam messages and calls are already happening. For example, I frequently get spam in iMessage, even without these "alt-store" rules. And for calls to such extent that I configure my phone only to ring on known phone numbers.

In regards to the spam messages. The carriers have a huge part to play. Here in Australia Telstra turned on a spam filter at the carrier level
And I have not received a spam message since. Others may have different tales in regards to that. And yes to silencing unknown callers is a good feature.

 

[adib]

In regards to the spam messages. The carriers have a huge part to play. Here in Australia Telstra turned on a spam filter at the carrier level
And I have not received a spam message since. Others may have different tales in regards to that. And yes to silencing unknown callers is a good feature.

Carriers control regular SMS (i.e. the "green bubbles"). In contrast, Apple controls iMessage (the "blue bubbles"). I was referring to the iMessage spam I've been getting quite frequently within the last two years.

Here are two examples. Notice that the messages are almost identical but come from different addresses. I deliberately do not censor the senders' identities, being spammers.