You could make the same argument in favour of protecting access to the Keyboard.
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EU to Accuse Apple of Unfairly Blocking Third-Party Access to NFC Payment Technology on iPhone
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You could make the same argument in favour of protecting access to the Keyboard.
Lawsuits lead to fines. Fines fund lawsuits. And on it goes. The fines department of the EU Commission must be one of the most successful businesses in Europe by revenue.
Apple‘s revenue share of mobile app/game downloads is estimated to be about 70% of the global market.
Numbers for Apple Pay‘s share of mobile wallet transactions are harder to come by (accurately), but has been given as more than 90% in the U.S. Most probably lower in the EU. Yet even in Germany, the most populous EU country and an Android-leaning market, surveys show it on par with Google Pay as the most popular service by far.
So yes, they are a dominant player in mobile.
They haven’t. You’re obviously ill-informed how credit cards work.
Mastercard and VISA operate payment networks - but they do not issue cards to consumers and they aren‘t setting interest rates. They‘re merely licensing their brand and providing access to their networks. It’s the individual bank or credit card issuer (say, BoA, Capital One, Barclays, HSBC) that issued your card that sets their interest rates - and bears the risk of consumers failing on payments.
And yes, interest rates for credit cards are set in a competitive market. Again, that’s the point of EU regulation: To open up these devices to enable competition- and have a dominant player such as Apple charge competitive prices.
No, per this post, this is what I believe in:
https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...nt-technology-on-iphone.2343176/post-31063824
Extracts:
I would also dislike the same arm bending the other way around, this is a two way street.
This, in the food analogy, would give you not only your own physical plates and food recipes, but could create your own air around it, planes and trains for raw ingredients transportation, the farms where they come from, the stores to sell them all with the added key benefit: existing working ecosystems need not be touched.
Conveniently, I have been corrected before, DMAs here and there are actually not in favor of this, they are in favor of a very narrowly defined rules.
I think this is a key difference, yes, I’m not actually fully against “my phone I want to do anything I want with it” but it has to be a real endeavor for that, I’m willing to give a donation to such endeavors in its own separate development tracks.
But sometimes I think those that say they want the same won’t be willing to put their money where their mouth is, as people could even be using Android instead today -right now- yet prefer to get behind whatever government is saying.
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Sitting and watching from afar, let this experiment continue ?♂️
You missed out point no.2:
And to be able to piggy-back on Apple's infrastructure and force them to bear all the costs, while contributing absolutely nothing back to the platform.
Opening up NFC isn’t much piggy-backing on Apple’s infrastructure.
It‘s mostly making use of Apple’s developer tools (and maybe push messaging facility, both which they provide almost for free anyway) and Apple stopping to actively prevent businesses from accessing that hardware. And it’s very similar for the App Store. There isn’t really much of an excess cost borne by Apple.
Why not? For example, if I’m banking with a bank that provides an iOS app, I‘m more likely to buy an iPhone than if my bank didn’t provide that app. Availability of functionality and apps contribute to the platform by encouraging hardware sales.
That’s exactly what it is.
Spinning it any which way doesn’t take away from the fact that trying to regulate its use is overreach.
Do you really believe this has anything to do with hardware sales? How many more iPhones does apple have to sell before they are deemed a monopoly? How many more iPhones do you believe opening up the nfc chip will result in?
And many of us are fine with this approach on iOS. If it was that big of deal for people they would have switched to android. Even the people who use android by their own admission only a small subset sideload apps.
I’ll say it again, many of us are fine with this approach on iOS. There are people here who refuse to understand that.
What NFC features is Apple giving itself that it doesn’t provide 3rd parties via Apple Wallet? I think Baldi asked that question to someone else and maybe I missed the answer.
I will argue that there are the costs found with offering consumers a safe and trusted environment to transact with. If Apple continues to supply the ecosystem and related technologies that make an iOS transaction possible in the first place, but then at the last moment, customer payment is run through a third-party, that’s no different than someone jumping the turnstile to avoid paying for the subway.
What you are essentially asking is for Apple to subsidise everything using hardware profits. Your reasoning is that since the iPhone is so profitable, Apple can and should afford to pay for the associated costs of running the rest of its ecosystem out of pocket.
By this logic, I too can argue that Apple should run all their services at cost since they would in theory serve to sell more iPhones. For example, instead of paying 70% of apple music revenue to labels, why not make it 100%? Why not shell out 200gb of free iCloud storage for everyone?
What's missing in this discussion is the role that Apple plays in facilitating more app sales for the developer, by having aggregated the best customers in the world (thanks to the iPhone) and by providing a safe and secure environment to transact with (a curated App Store using iTunes), all of which have led to people purchasing more apps than they otherwise would have were they expected to leave the app store.
People talk about how much Apple owes developers for creating a vibrant app market that has helped to boost iPhone sales. I will also argue here that developers owe Apple just as much, if not more, for the role Apple has played in growing the overall app market pie, and for providing the tools and technologies necessary to allow smaller developers to compete on an even footing with the larger companies.
God knows that Google doesn't invest anywhere near as much effort or resources in maintaining their own App Store.
Basically the ability to support third party payment options.
Currently, Apple Pay is "open", and users do have choice, in the sense that you are able to add any credit card you want to it, but regardless of which bank you use, said bank still has to go through Apple Pay and pay Apple their 0.15% cut, something I know banks are interested in circumventing.
I imagine what companies would love to be able to do is be able to run their own payment option (eg: google pay, Samsung pay, grabpay, maybe even Stripe or PayPal) in place of Apple Pay, where they would then be able to charge these banks a cut.
Basically, they too want to get in on the action and be able to leverage Apple hardware and its user base for their own financial gain, while keeping all the profits for themselves.
You omit one very important point that companies like VISA and American Express do set: that 2-3% transaction fee. If I try to use my credit card for a transaction, some companies refuse to eat that cost. Add 3% to my bill for using a CC.
You expect anyone to feel sorry for VISA or anyone else for Apple taking a cut of that for using Apple’s platform?
Opening NFC for developers to develop competing (payment) apps is more like a car manufacturer providing a repair manual to independent repair shops - and refraining from actually hindering them to do repairs on their own.
It‘s not as if you brought your car to the independent repair shop, and they‘d be „using the manufacturer’s infrastructure“ by carrying the repair in the manufacturer‘s workshop - or calling their support line to guide them through the necessary or difficult repair steps for free.
Every such requirement - e.g. providing a manual or specialised proprietary tools - can of course be somehow construed as „use of someone else‘s infrastructure“. But there’s a large difference between the two. Providing others the ability to develop and market their own solution or service (and, yes, maybe also using something that you’re giving away for free anyway, such as a push notification service) is a far cry from piggy-backing in infrastructure.
Spinning it that way doesn’t make your personal opinion a fact.
You are of the opinion that this is regulatory „overreach“.
Others may come to a different conclusion.
There isn’t one that’s right or wrong as a matter of fact.
Not much with regard to why and how they should be regulated. (I‘ve myself stated their market shares for software and services above).
But as an example how how developers “contribute to the platform”, even if their apps are distributed and selling/providing services without an Apple tax slapped on them. Microsoft has also been very successful with that business model.
No it’s more akin to Honda being forced to open up their ecu.
Nor does it make your opinions facts.
Yes, there are those who believe one way or another way.
Microsoft has a near monopoly within the desktop market, healthy share of the server market and much of the productivity market. And none of the cell phone market. Apple has a minority share of the cell phone market a minority share of the computer market . Bit of a difference.
Access to NFC hardware without going through Apple Pay for which Apple charge a commission for any transaction.
- Today: Every mobile NFC-enabled card payment has to go through Apple Pay, for which Apple charges a commission on every virtual card and transaction.
- Opened up: Someone else can develop their own NFC payment app that can directly talk to the NFC hardware / driver, without being forced to pay commission to Apple.
? Apple is still free to offer a better, less development-intensive, “turn-key” solution (Apple Pay) at competitive prices.
VISA doesn’t set those fees (their own fees are much smaller). The acquirer sets these merchant fees for card acceptance. And again, there are competing acquirer with different pricing models and levels - there is competition among them.
(at least in a four-party system such as used by VISA and Mastercard, as opposed tomthree-party systems employed by American Express).
Now Mastercard and VISA did and still do set the “interchange” commission that the card issuer was to receive on consumer card payments. And that’s what the EU capped at 0.2 (debit) or 0.3 (credit cards) percent, along with prohibiting other anticompetitive practises by these card schemes by introducing an EU regulation. In the wake of that, card acceptance has greatly increased for consumers and costs of card acceptance for merchants decreased.
Definitely not. I welcome that regulation and don’t consider it overreach, but that’s just my opinion.
They do have a majority share of the mobile app market.
And a virtual duopoly with Google (Play Store) at that in many jurisdictions.
Also, Apple have a majority share of the market for mobile phone payments.
Bit of a difference.
That is exactly how I understood it. Emphasis on 3rd parties want to cut Apple out of their racket and keep the profits.
Other people keep mentioning competition. It’s not really about competition leading to other new features at all then. It’s just about payment processing. And about keeping the profits entirely to themselves.
That is exactly how I understood it. Emphasis on 3rd parties want to cut Apple out of their racket and keep the profits.
Other people keep mentioning competition. It’s not really about competition leading to other new features at all then. It’s just about payment processing. And about keeping the profits entirely to themselves.
Didn't think that would be hard. The obvious example being single use devices such as printers, copiers, etc.
Exactly.
Sure, someone may come up with other interesting features that use NFC (also non-payment ones - Apple has opened up NFC access for these quite a but already). But if we’re honest, the current fight is about NFC access for payment services more than anything else.
And yes, since payments aren’t pretty standardised and casual everyday transactions, it’s not about features but rather commissions/fees - and profits.
Again, competition is not only about features but also pricing. And EU legislators are very much concerned with having a modern, secure, low-cost and competitive payment service market with in Europe.
The EU is looking to preserve profits for those companies. It’s not about competition to benefit consumers at all.
Apple Card is required to go through Apple Wallet just like every other card. As far as we know there are no secure and documented APIs for developers to access the NFC chip for payments other than Apple Wallet.
I think it's wrong to demand Apple build something to benefit its competitors without compensation.
They already do.
But, as I described, there is a choice. Your argument is that everything needs to be available everywhere in order for real choice to occur. When I go to an ice cream shop, the available flavors are listed. Just because a flavor I like is not available does not mean choice does not exist. The Apple ecosystem exists with limited choice. If one does not like those options, there are other places one can go.
Ah yes, while you are at it let's have PLS code in it as well, since, after all, it is also a "digital device". Your beating around the bush proves my point exacly - no other OS or ecosystem has such a tight lockdown as Apple/iOS.
Right. Whether it comes or not, in my opinion, it’s overreach.
They have a minority share of the cell phone market. Now imo, apple should not be penalized because their apps are better than androids and sell in bigger numbers.
So what? There was no legal barriers stopping anyone of the dozens of manufacturers from opening their cell phone App Store. The barrier is popularity, and consumer choice which should never be regulated due to that.
Really I thought android was the clear winner in the mobile app payment space. Unless one is counting $$$ and not transactions.
There’s always a difference.