They are not selling the product through Apple and there is no space occupied.
Or do you think eBay, TripAdvisor or Lufthansa are selling through Apple?
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FTC Looking Into App Store Rules Regarding Subscription Services
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They are not selling the product through Apple and there is no space occupied.
Or do you think eBay, TripAdvisor or Lufthansa are selling through Apple?
when I look I see a space being filled, else there'd be a blank space, nothing, but when I look they are there, all courtesy of apple. They exist in that space due to apple.
They are using an Apple service, using resources and features of that service and are charged for it on the same terms as anyone else who uses this service. It's not like Apple is discriminating against Spotify here, because the same terms apply to everyone else..
People using high street shops is a false analogy. There is no 'up the road' in Apple's ecosystem because there is only one place to buy apps - the App Store.
A better analogy would be a big city where there is one central shopping mall for everything. The owners of the mall make the rules, and can evict you at their discretion if your shop doesn't follow them. I reiterate that nowhere else with a roof is allowed sell clothes in this entire city. Should the shop assistant be allowed to point out that the street vendor outside sells it for cheaper?
I'm not a mathematician, but it would be hard for someone not to with these figures (As of January):
http://www.macobserver.com/tmo/arti...ut-more-than-10-billion-to-developers-in-2014
This is false, both exist because the ecosystem. Pull out the apps and there is no iPhone or iPad I'd there are other ecosystems with the apps.
Is symbiotic, not parasitism
No ones forcing them to not use google or windows and put their stuff on there.
What you sound like you want is a return to before iPhone where apps were on the net and you went and found them and installed them. I remember that world. It was a pain in the ass and resulted in feeling untrustworthy of sources of where the apps were.
App store ended that nightmare.
Thats not true. People are free to put their apps on google or windows and sell them there. Your analogy doesn't make sense.
Apple wants to keep its house clean and bug free. Just like a good party/resturant/club keeps things in order to ensure a certain level for its customers.
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The problem is that on iOS devices, they are forced to use Apples payment system is they were to offer purchases of media in-app. On this one I'm on the side of Spotify/Amazon/etc. The developer allows for the 30% "fee" on the app, that's fair as Apple are handling the servers and payment system to put the app onto the device. From that point on, Apple systems are not required. They do not host the media being purchased, nor the rights thereof, nor are their servers or bandwidth used to transfer the media file from the sellers servers to the buyers device. They belong to the provider (be it Amazon, Netflix, Spotify, whoever). Apple have already had their cut by means of the 30% fee and the developer fee. There is no reason why developers should be forced to use Apple's payment system if they have an alternative.
I hadn't realised the bit about physical sales being exempt from the Apple levy. That really does show up the fact that the argument often used about "Oh, it's all for the user's security, so they don't have to use their credit card data in the wild, just trust Apple with everything". If it's good enough to be able to spend hundreds of pounds/dollars/euros on physical goods without having to rely on Apples payment system, then it's good enough to allow suppliers to use their own payment system for digital media.
Just because they know the rules beforehand does not make the practice legal in the eyes on government antitrust.
Remember when they got Microsoft for putting their browser bundled with Windows? Competing browser knew this was the "rules" that Microsoft had set.
Not saying it's legal or not, I am not an antitrust lawyer or investigator, but there are a lot of things that Apple are doing that is borderline antitrust in my eyes, looking at past issues that they have done.
From my view, I do see antitrust violations with competing paid services. They provide an in-app purchases in their own product, yet they levy a fee of 30% of subscription costs for same thing to competitors. It's not a matter of "they know the rules".
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That fee would suffice if you are not charging iPhone users for your product.
If you want space on any storefront (virtual or not), you must pay for it. If Apple ever decides to sell the iPhone on Amazon, they'll have to pay Amazon commission. That's how it works. It's ridiculous that were having this as an argument. I do agree that 30% is too high, but arguing about eliminating the fee entirely is disingenuous.
I'm sure this has nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that the big banks, which we all know of their influence in Washington, such as Goldman Sachs are heavily involved with Spotify now, to the tune of $500m in the most recent round of funding earlier this year.
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And if the group organising the markets and ground, one week turn up selling the same goods as you for the same price while taking your 30%..... Issue maybe? I would feel hard done bythey can use your 30% to undercut you
Yeah but then what's next? Are we going to make Kindles illegal because bookshops are suffering? If I owned a book store id feel hard done by.
Apple are in a position where they can compete. Should the government have stopped them spending revenue from their products on advertising the Watch, as a startup wouldn't have had $1 million to spend on advertising?
What about Google advertising the Nexus and Chrome on their homepage? Or when you search for App Store you get a Google ad for Google Play?
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Retail clothing stores have a 100% mark-up to cover losses due to shoplifting. What's the difference - other than a lower cost of doing business.
Yes they selling through Apple and they are occupying space if they are on the appstore and charging customers through the appstore.
The appstore is a virtual storefront and all those selling through it are occupying space in that storefront.
eBay charges everyone the sells through them, why shouldn't apple?
In fact, Orbitz and the likes charge airlines a fee if their tickets were discovered and ordered through their site.
It's still symbiotic. Apple has payed 70% of charges collected...to the tune of billions of dollars per quarter. How is that not symbiotic?
And your argument about ecosystem doesn't hold water. Phones existed without an appstore and plenty of them were sold. Apple sold the first iPhones without the appstore. People will still be buying phones in droves without or without the appstore. The experience wouldn't be as nice but no one would really notice since the appstore wouldn't be in existence. And touch screen smartphones would still be leaps and bounds better than what it replaced.
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Not sure if this analogy works because Google also has a store and so does Microsoft. No one is forced to use Apple's store.
Spotify could've very well charged the same on their website as on The App Store and made extra money. Or just stop allowing people to pay through the App Store like Amazon did with comicsology
The problem is that Apple prohibits any mention of being able to subscribe outside the app store from within your app.
Does Google Play sell iOS apps? Does Microsoft sell iOS apps? No. Even supposing their apps were just as good, you'd still need to replace your phone to take advantage of them. And wasn't the whole point of this to save money? There is a lot to like about the iPhone. Jumping ship from the Apple ecosystem is a very drastic solution to what should be a very small problem.
Spotify is been charging me the full amount even when I subscribe straight from their website. If they really mean to give a discount then I should have had while I'm with them. Now that I left because of Apple Music and now they're crying babies. They just broke Apple's TOA I hope they suffer from consequence from being greedy. They're going downhill anyway they ruined their Mac App too no more lyrics. Stupid Spotify!
What are you talking about?
App makers can simply disable in-app subscriptions, take subscription via web and keep all their money.
Your analogies are half-baked at best.