EU Plans to Let Spotify Direct Users to Other Payment Options on iPhone

[fabbydabby1]

The only option is to sign up on Spotify's website.

There is no other way. Spotify is no longer letting people sign up through the App Store.

So that's why I'm confused when you say "choice"

Look I'm glad that Spotify will finally have a way to direct people to their website from inside the app. It'll be better for them than the current "You can't upgrade to Premium from inside the app" message.

But I'm still a little fuzzy on what you think the "choice" is here.

🤔

Because when this gets opened up & they are allowed to direct people to sign up through the app then there will be a choice.

 

[laptech]

I think the problem is the annual developer fee is not designed to cover those hosting costs. If people want the costs of running the App Store to be paid by the annual developer fee then they probably need to accept that the fee will be higher, which has the potential impact of reducing access for developers due to the barrier to entry being higher.

But that might be a compromise people are willing to take (although not useful if Apple don’t think that).

If you think it is a problem then it is a problem of Apple's doing because if you look at what the yearly fee pays for, not only does it pay for using many of Apple's app development software but also for hosting the app(s) in the app store.

I believe Apple change things not so long ago so that app developers of more substantial standing (big companies), pay a higher annual fee.

 

[scorpio vega]

This is a hysterical take. Spotify has paid Apple tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars over the years in subscription fees. And at this point, nothing is going to change that—the vast majority of Spotify users will continue using Apple's payment processing and Apple will continue to get their 30% cut. All this EU rule would do is allow Spotify to tell users they can sign up outside the app, and potentially link to that page. And in all likelihood, Apple will still find a way to charge Spotify for those signups.

And note that Apple will be required to do the same in the US once SCOTUS denies their appeal in the Epic trial.

They wont deny it.

It's a symbiotic relationship, or rather it would be if Apple didn't have their own damn competitor to Spotify! It's so obviously monopolistic behaviour that I can't believe we have been having this discussion for so long...

Yall keep accusing Apple of gatekeeping but isn't Spotify actually the dominant and more popular app than Apple music? So how is it unfair

 

[fabbydabby1]

I am only stating even putting a link in the app they will continue to lose money. it won't save them. besides everyone knows how to subscribe to Spotify now.

They are a business so they must have done market research.

 

[fabbydabby1]

Why is Apple a $3 Trillion dollar company? Because they continue to invest into building the best consumer experience, and customers are paying for that.

When you walk into a store and buy a jug of milk, has it not been marked up 30%-50% from the wholesale price? Should the store start demanding free milk from the farms?

Spotify is demanding a free platform from Apple. You can't see that?

Quick solution
Just don’t download Spotify

 

[fabbydabby1]

They wont deny it.

Yall keep accusing Apple of gatekeeping but isn't Spotify actually the dominant and more popular app than Apple music? So how is it unfair

Because Apple Music is not bound by the same conditions.

 

[fabbydabby1]

Technically Spotify is a company which main purpose is to earn money off others work.

All the stories of a billion streams giving $ 5 and 60 cents makes me wonder why people are in such a rush to defend them. I get Apple - they host their app and direct a TON of traffic their way - why should they do that free?

It’s not about it being free
It’s about price for in app purchase Spotify would charge £12.99
Apple Music is cheaper because it’s not bound by same regulations.

 

[Abazigal]

Looks like it will be in Spotify's favour. Apple will have to allow external payments

For all the good it will do Spotify. It won’t save them, because their problems run way deeper than simply trying to get around Apple's cut.

 

[fabbydabby1]

For all the good it will do Spotify. It won’t save them, because their problems run way deeper than simply trying to get around Apple's cut.

This is not about apples cut
It’s about a level playing field in regards to Apple Music.

 

[scorpio vega]

They have a developer program for $99 and an enterprise one for $299. Spotify likely pays for the enterprise one. There's about 494,000 iOS developers, so even if every one of them paid $99, Apple's getting about $49 million per year. That's not even counting Mac developers.

So now we are policing how much apple SHOULD or should not make? 49 million per year should be enough.

Let the market do it by itself.

Doesnt the market do this by itself with Spotify being the dominant music streaming service?

My god the eu is providing choice. You want to make apple more wealthy.

And you anti-apple people apparently want to work AGAINST apple.
I wouldnt call them dictators but they are definitely over stepping.

But that doesn’t mean they should profit off the monthly revenue of services offered by other companies.

If i discover the App through Apple (which is effectively hosting them) then yes a part of that profit should go to apple. Just like me searching through google gives google some data to mine and make money off me.

I have some android devices and I’ve been using Fdroid for years so far so good. I understand the risk but again I’m in favor of a third party app store preferably open-source oriented like Fdroid on the iPhone. Those who feel paranoid about it don’t have to use it. I prefer protecting myself instead of big tech pretending doing it for me.

Well thankfully most Apple users despise the Android way of things. Apple is a company for the masses so the mass would prefer the big tech to do it for them. Good try though.

Why would you hope that a business fails. Very strange behaviour.

Imagine being that much of a cheerleader for one of the worlds biggest corporations.

you mean the same way that people are hoping that Apple fails because of the big bad corporation is making money?

Er, no, it isn't.

Oh plz the EU does not give a damn about consumers Much like any government, they want to make some sort of profit.

 

[scorpio vega]

. I do think it is justified, but I doubt this would happen.

How would that be justified? You guys really want apple to fail lmfao.

It would have been fine if Apple didn’t offer a rival music app which had a huge competitive advantage. But alas Apple played the greed game, as did a Microsoft in its long history.

Google also offers an inferior music streaming service and is doing shady stuff with Spotify to avoid their fee by paying google directly. But somehow apple is wrong for charging a 30 percent fee lmao

 

[scorpio vega]

It’s about a level playing field in regards to Apple Music.

Except Spotify is literally the dominant player so it is not hurt. You can find Spotify eveyrwhere(even down to windows phone).

 

[scorpio vega]

Because more can actually come to the parties and not let ourselves be sold out and ruled by corporations.

I forget you guys feel so left out due to blue bubbles.

 

[fabbydabby1]

Except Spotify is literally the dominant player so it is not hurt. You can find Spotify eveyrwhere(even down to windows phone).

It’s about cost for example the 10.99 price of Apple Music.

 

[scorpio vega]

Europe is where Innovation goes to die due to overzealous regulation taking the power of choice from consumers and placing power in the hands of government.

 

[AppliedMicro]

developer program is $99. Several hundred million copies of the app is downloaded per month. Barely covers Apple's cost.

Apple deliberately set the developer subscription fee very low.

They‘ve been free to set other prices for that. But making it free resulted in the iOS platform becoming very popular with developers and end users due to the large selection of apps offered, and Apple making billions in hardware sales.

assuming 100 million of the 500 million are iOS users, we're talking 15 petabytes of bandwidth Apple has to pay every update, or about $770k. they release update once a week, so that's $3 million per month going by standard S3 prices. Spotify doesn't offer IAP so Apple is losing money just for hosting Spotify.

Apple deliberately chose to cover hosting and bandwidth for free.

Then there is App Store review process, free unlimited MapKit usage (which google charges thousands per month for), free backend/database usage, and so on.

Apple chose to offer these services for free, included with they yearly developer subscription.

They‘ve been free to set other prices for that. But making it free resulted in the iOS platform becoming very popular with developers and end users due to the large selection of apps offered, and Apple making billions in hardware sales.

So Walmart can put up signs in Costco that it is cheaper to buy the product at Walmart?

It’s not like putting up that sign in the store.
It’s more like including a piece of paper or a sticker in a product‘s product box, that refers you to the supplier’s web site to buy further accessories or consumables.

 

[AppliedMicro]

Europe is where Innovation goes to die due to overzealous regulation taking the power of choice from consumers and placing power in the hands of government.

Restricting channels through which consumers can conveniently buy services (in-app) isn‘t empowering consumers‘ choice. Quite the contrary.

If Spotify can direct customers to their web site or in-app, to conveniently buy a subscription as an alternative to more expensive in-app purchase through Apple, that increases consumers‘ choices.

 

[scorpio vega]

Not me uninstalling Spotify though because this is ridiculous

 

[Abazigal]

They‘ve been free to set other prices for that. But making it free resulted in the iOS platform becoming very popular with developers and end users due to the large selection of apps offered, and Apple making billions in hardware sales.

Yes, but isn't the point that Apple deliberately set those at a very low rate precisely because they expected to earn it back from the more successful developers?

 

[arobert3434]

Meanwhile TikTok takes a cut of 50% of every viewer-to-creator payment. 50%. Not a single complaint as far as I can tell.

 

[Steve121178]

Apple has had it's way for far too long. It's now a size as a company that's too big to ignore and their constant rules to lock down everything over the years is now coming back to haunt them. Bit by Bit, the EU is now going to force Apple to comply, and ironically it's being met by a wall of silence from both the White House & rest of the world because I would imagine it's hard to feel sorry for a company worth $3trillion.

For now Apple's cash held outside of the US is safe but I'd imagine the EU/US will soon attempt to force Apple to bring it back onshore causing billions to go into treasuries on both sides of the Atlantic.

The EU already closed Apple's illegal 'tax saving' scheme in Ireland. It's still not fully concluded but Apple thinks they are above paying taxes. It won't be too long until Apple are forced to write that $13billion cheque to pay what they tried to avoid.

Apple tax: iPhone maker and Government suffer major setback in €13bn EU case

Opinion of key advisor to European Court of Justice comes months ahead of final ruling on world’s biggest antitrust case

www.irishtimes.com

 

[Steve121178]

Meanwhile TikTok takes a cut of 50% of every viewer-to-creator payment. 50%. Not a single complaint as far as I can tell.

They can do what they want in their own app.

 

[AppliedMicro]

Yes, but isn't the point that Apple deliberately set those at a very low rate precisely because they expected to earn it back from the more successful developers?

They set the rate years before subscription pricing was introduced.
A $5 one-time purchase was also considered a pretty expensive iOS app to buy for the first few years.
Pricing of apps was in micro-transaction territory back then.

 

[uptownjimmy]

It’s freeloading because they are using Apple’s platform and don’t want to pay Apple to use that platform. The only reason this is happening is because Spotify just wants to make more money themselves.

Agreed. It's a heck of a choice to do anything to help Spotify horde more money while they continue to steal from artists. Spotify would be crushed like a bug in any sane society.

 

[DEMinSoCAL]

so Spotify gets to freeload off of Apple's success.

stupid move, EU.

Why do you care one way or the other if Spotify users can choose to use Apple or someone else? Isn't that what competition is all about? Are you a proponent of stifling competition? As it is now, Spotify doesn't offer ANY purchases in their app, so in reality, isn't Spotify (and millions of other apps that don't charge anything in the app) "freeloading"?