Perhaps, but fundamentally it's best for Apple to be working on innovation rather than regulations...UNLESS they are are close to being a monopoly. Which they are not. Not even close.
Again, it doesn't matter. The law is set. Apple can comply or pull out of the EU and forgo all that revenue. They have chosen the money and thus complying vs. exiting and not complying. We can write this 1000 times but
Apple chooses to comply.
This is a princple that is larger than the specific person-hours it takes to comply with the rulings of the EU. It's about the fundamentals or market economics. I agree that monopolies need to be regulated. But IOS has about 25% marketshare in the EU. Let's put that number on the table to moderate this discussion.
I've not once called iOS a monopoly. It is NOT a monopoly.
Again, it doesn't matter. Modern GOV gets involved long before business attains monopoly control. GOV has taken action here. Apple is complying with the law. We can debate philosophy and business terms/degree and similar but this is all already set and decided. And Apple is rolling with it.
You and I would agree if that's as far as you're going. But your arguments go farther than this. Of course Apple will make the necessary business decisons here. But those have zero to do with morality or monopoly or the rigteousness of the EU.
I've written nothing about morality, monopoly or righteousness.
The ONLY metric here is wise business decisions, which in turn serve the consumers who are making those decisions.
We agree here. Where we disagree is how we each determine how consumers are best served.
Capitalism works best with abundant competition so that customers can shop around to get the products or services they want for the lowest price. As that ability "thins out", there is increasing opportunity for customers to be exploited.
Capitalism fails when the advantages are stacked overwhelming for
either side... such as allowing any company to have a lone "company store" model where they are the ONLY source of anything... or to drive a company out of business by forcing them out of any way to make money at all.
Capitalism is made worse when customers themselves start prioritizing maximizing for the sellers even above their own interests. It's not our job as customers to maximize any companies revenue & profit. That's THEIR job. Seller should strive to make as much as they can and buyers should try to get as much as they can get for their money. To some degree, both parties are at odds. However, when capitalism is working correctly, they both can bargain to something "in the middle." That's impossible in lone company store models. There is no bargaining potential or "shopping around" potential. One store has one price and you take it or leave it.
But you seem to make your arguments as though "harming Apple" is an impossibility. That governments always act rationally and in the best interest of consumers and countries. Is that your position?
No. I wish GOV was not involved in this at all. Apple is much smarter in matters such as this than bureaucrats can be. However, I also wish Apple would have recognized how this always goes throughout all of history and proactively evolved how they conducted this portion of their business so that GOV wouldn't have decided they needed to take this action. Apple could have complied in a better way to meet the objectives of the law while still being as favorable as possible for Apple too.
As Apple climbed into being "King" of the capitalism game... AKA "richest company in the world"... the scrutiny by GOV would be much greater than 2010 Apple or 1996 Apple or 1986 Apple.
Proactively address this issue or GOV will certainly come. Apple chose to just keep exploiting the company store lock and GOV came. There will only be more GOVs to follow unless Apple decides to evolve this business practice elsewhere. It's how this
ALWAYS goes.
Please. Really? MS had about 95% of the marketshare world wide of operating systems, and was leveraging that 95% in ways that monopolies leverage their power. Really? You're going to argue that MS was not a monopoly?
Once again, I didn't say Microsoft. I focused on IE and its relative bite of internet browser space. I see that as a pretty good analogy to Apples bite of App Store space. Neither IE then nor iOS now is a monopoly in their respective spaces. Both IE then and iOS now is only trending towards becoming too dominant of those respective spaces.
IE competing with Netscape most notably, AOL, and a number of smallish browsers then. iOS competes most obviously with Android but there are a number of smallish players too.
As it always goes in history, GOV had to step in to proactively deal with IE growing dominance before it got out of hand. And here's GOV stepping in and proactively dealing with iOS "Company Store" dominance before it gets out of hand.
I am quite thrilled that IE didn't get to inherit near complete dominance of web browsers. It would be quite unfortunate to be dealing with IE on modern day Apple hardware because they basically rule/control web browsing in 2025.
I agree they were a monopoly, but I have no illusion that IE was going to dominate the world nearly 30 years later.
Not the world, web browsing.
And much of the analysis of the outcome of that legal trial seems to think it made almost no difference in how the computer industy has played out since that time.
IE quickly faded and much competition arose. Web programmers had to put up with oddball IE code additions for the next 12+ years (special code to work with lingering IE 6 and below users) but IE losing the emerging lock led to rich browser competition. Robust browser competition has led to impressive modern browsers- be that Safari, Firefox, Chrome and many others... all pushing each other to get better and better.
When one of anything becomes the dominant dog, there's little competitive pressure to improve. IE 2025 might not be much better than IE 2015 which might not be much better than IE2005 had IE been left unchecked by those GOV actions.
But, to imply that Apple's 25% of marketshare in mobile operating systems is comparable to MS 95% dominance
Not a word about that. I offered the analogy of IE growing dominance in browsers relative to the iOS App Store growing dominance of mobile app stores.
...well...if you're arguing from a religious point of view,
Not a hint about religion.
then I'll understand better. But factually, you're skating on thin ice.
through your judgement. No surprise.
Apple is not CLOSE to being a monopoly.
Correct.
Right. Apple should be supported in it's competition with Android, not penalized. Your position makes zero sense. Android is the dominant player.
Not in the way that I'm discussing... but you are running off on tangents into whole operating systems and that only if something is a monopoly before anything be done, etc. I don't have such extremist views... nor need extremist examples.
Exactly. Apple has a 25% market share in the EU (and without googling, I'm assuming it's similar in the UK).
From 5% to 25%. OK. That can be considered FARRRRRRRRRRRR. But it's not a monopoly. That's the only fact that matters here.
Correct. This is not about "monopoly" just as IE was not a browser monopoly.
Success at capitalism is not the measure. Monopoly is the measure. Is Apple a monoply? No. Are they close to being a monopoly? No.
Correct. But GOVs don't wait until ANY of them become a full monopoly anymore. If they wait that long, all competitors are gone and to fix the problem is farrrrrrrrrrr more complicated than heading it off early... while there are still opportunities to try to stimulate competition.
Apple is not a monopoly in any single aspect of their business. Meaning they didn't get to where they are through monopolistic practices.
you can go on and on and on and on and on and on about irrelevent measure. Are they even close to being a monopoly? No.
They are not a monopoly. You can go on and on and on trying to bend what I'm offering into these extremes. If I was making such points, I would agree that I make no sense. But you're the one wanting to paint this as me claiming monopoly, etc. Those are your words, not mine.
You mean the quest to be a successful business? That's not the measure. Are they a monopoly? No. That IS the measure. You're trying to invent some new standard here.
Doesn't matter. History is clear that as ANY company starts getting too much dominance over a market, GOV must step in. It is usually a "last resort" move when GOV no longer sees the natural forces of normal competition able to rise up and balance it out. In this case, competition in selling iOS apps is nill because Apple is the lone Company Store for iOS apps. So GOV decided that Apple has too much dominance over that space. Since "normal competition" within the space of selling iOS apps was impossible, GOV decided to act to force some room for others to sell & distribute iOS apps in the EU.
In broad strokes, more competition selling ANYTHING tends to be better for customers than any lone, company store model. When there is just one supplier of anything, that seller almost always exploits the dominance.
Whether this law helps EU customers or not is still to be determined. But again, I don't see very many EU people griping about this law... only most people OUTSIDE the EU who are unaffected by an EU law. If I could see a lot of your kind of extremism from many EU people, then your takes would carry more weight for me. But due to the lack of passionate gripes about the law by EU people, I assume EU people may be happy to have more choices of where to get iPhone apps instead of only 1 source... or appreciate the fundamental capitalism advantage of at least having POTENTIAL to "shop around" vs. only being able to buy software from ONE store.
But, for example, AI. That's the biggest emerging power in computational economics. Apple is absolutely failing in that regard. No need for government help to regulate it. Apple has simply not performed well in this market.
No need for GOV to be involved in this either if Apple would have evolved their business practices so that they were not flexing their dominance of this particular niche. Unfortunately, Apple showed only signs of pursuing "another record quarter" vs. evolving in ways that created more opportunity for the customer end of the bargain.
Nothing against Apple. That's what ALL of them do when they get a lock on a market. They maximize that lock to maximize their growth. It's all about THEM. When that gets too big, GOV has to step in. It's the SAME story EVERY time but none of them seem to learn from that sameness. Instead, it seems to be a "make all we can", "protect this easy money for as long as we can", "fight-fight-fight" until finally complying because the rest of the money that can be made is greater than what they lose by eventually complying.
Before Apple grows from 25% to 30%? That's nowhere near a monopoly. And Apple's global marketshare has been decreasing.
this is the last time I'll write this: Apple is NOT a monopoly. And this law is not about them being a monopoly.
I have never, not once, been loyal to Microsoft. Even though I lived about 3 miles from their campus at the time.
In the prior response to this suggestion that GOV should have stepped in to deal with IE rapidly growing dominance in the browser space you wrote...
I didn't welcome that outcome.
...which implied you were NOT in favor or GOV stepping in to deal with IE's growing dominance. Else, if you were against letting that run unchecked then, this is quite similar to that now. The underlying brand is the favorite instead of the favorites big competitor... but the fundamentals of the situation is VERY SIMILAR.
Yes it is. Gov is demanding that consumer choice be ignored. So I'm supposed to forget what my choice is, in lieu of YOUR choice.
Nope. AGAIN, this has NOTHING to do with ruling
your choice. This law is about businesses. Its implementation creates more places to buy iOS apps. More places to buy anything tends to stimulate competition to work in favor of customers. More places to buy facilities customers being able to shop around. In those benefits, there are CHOICES of where to buy.
However, EU people NOT wanting such benefits are not blocked from buying apps in the Apple App Store. Anyone in the EU happy with the Apple App Store can proceed as if this law does not even exist at all.
One last time: DO YOU LIVE IN THE EU?
If not, this EU law has no effect on your iOS app buying "choices" whatsoever. I live in Florida. This EU law has no effect on my iOS app buying "choices" whatsoever.
If this is terrible for EU Apple people- which are really the only people that should have much say since this is only relevant to how THEY get to buy apps- they can vote OUT representatives who support this law and replace them with representatives who will repeal this law. I just don't see much of your kind of takes from EU people. Are there likely some? I would guess so. But the LOUDEST of these anti-EU-law people seem to be people who do not live there and thus are making enormous mountains out of molehills that basically have nothing to do with them, wherever they live.
Why do I participate in such discussions when I don't live there? I'm
envious of their greater freedom of choices from where they get their iOS apps. I have the ability to like and care about Apple and like and care about Apple customers too. I like win:win for both ends of the proposition.
