What you said doesn’t answer my question.. I think you haven’t understood... I can buy a prime subscription on the amazon app directly. However, that subscription doesn’t get counted as an in app purchase. It’s like a product sold on the amazon app. Whereas on the Netflix app, the subscription is counted as an in app subscription.
It’s just that amazon sells it like any other product on their store and not through apples distribution.. but if that’s the case, how come they can sell a subscription but Netflix can’t get away with it?
Another question arises too.. Apple doesn’t take 30% cut if it’s not an in app purchase, amazon sells its own products and acts as an agent website, but Apple doesn’t get a cut.. similarly, Facebook here is acting as an agent, but apple is getting a cut.. why’s that?
Ok, in that case, I am not 100%, but here are a few ideas:
1) Prime is NOT primarily a media subscription service, but still a delivery service. Apple's rules on taking a cut only seem to apply to services which deliver electronic media (and, thus, compete with Apple.)
2) Since the Amazon App is a shopping App and not a media delivery App, it bypasses the rules. For example, it appears I can easily buy a Kindle book in the Amazon App, but I can NOT buy the book directly in the Kindle App.
Other than that, I can't say the exact reason. But, as we know, Apple's App Store rules are NOT consistent and even handed.
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Yes, perhaps for some developers it is a decent arrangement. However, there is a tipping point. For feature-rich apps that rival desktop counterparts, it isn't such a good deal. The time and money spent to develop such an app is significant. Apple taking a 30% cut of all sales means that it will take a long time, if ever, for the developer to recover the cost. That's not to say that desktop-quality iOS apps don't exist, but that the current arrangement is holding things back.
It's a moot point anyways because it is a walled garden. Want to sell an app for iOS, you MUST go through Apple. There is no other choice. In contrast, for macOS where there IS a choice (app store or developer's site), the macOS app store isn't as robust.
I think, more importantly/frustratingly, is that Apple also wants 30% (lowering to 15% after the first year) for payments for which they provide no additional service. Once a user has downloaded the Netflix App, what value does Apple add to justify taking a huge margin? (It is reported that Spotifys gross margins are less than 30%, so every subscription sold through Apple is automatically a loss.)
For the initial App purchase, 30% is reasonable. However, taking 30% on purchases where they provide no backend services hurts the developers (and put them at a competitive disadvantage as compared to Apple's offerings.)
