Insight Timer CEO Upset With Apple's Abrupt Enforcement of App Store Rules [Updated]

[AllenHenry]

"Plowman says that while he is frustrated, he believes Apple is willing to listen and that the company can be convinced to change. He asks that people share his story, but in a constructive manner."

Honestly, this sounds like the kind of thing someone would say in an abusive relationship. "I'm upset but I think they heard me and will change... so don't be too mean to them about the thing they're doing to me..."

 

[rp100]

Publish in the app store, Apple collects commission. Publish and distribute on your own platform, no commission charged. Enable side-loading, end of these squabbles.

Apple is absolutely gate-keeping and refuses to let their paying customers use their phones as they see fit. Apple has no problem allowing people to do whatever they wish with their Macs. But the iPhone? God forbid Apple stops sucking money out of our wallets long after we’ve paid $1000 for a computer in our pocket.

 

[SoldOnApple]

Maybe Timer should have given 100% of the tip to teachers.

Oh and I see they mean their own yoga teachers, rather than like a donation to like an elementary school teacher charity.

 

[Born Again]

Oh, the irony of the head of a meditation company getting frustrated!

There’s an app for that

 

[GermanSuplex]

Be one with the fee.

 

[@Brett]

It's almost as if one company shouldn't have this much control over digital commerce.

I would say perhaps this company should just charge more and pay their presenters more as opposed to tipping.

 

[@Brett]

Greedy greedy greedy. I wish Apple put half as much attention towards fixing their OS bugs as they do towards trying to bleed developers and users dry. I’m so disgusted by how greedy they’ve become.

So you are ok with a company not paying enough. Then asking paying customers to then tip?

 

[@Brett]

Dear EU please keep regulating the **** out of big tech

EU only cares about itself. And going after international corporations. We never see much about them going after companies in the EU.

 

[ArtOfWarfare]

AS IF some Yoga app is anything but random noise on Apple's bottom line.

It is clear that Apple wants control over their own application store. We can argue about whether you and I are better off, or not, with that policy by Apple.

But I can't blame Apple for simply wanting to control their own product.

Apple isn't making any part of this product!

Apple didn't make the app. Apple didn't make the website. Apple didn't recruit the teachers. Apple didn't run the session. Apple doesn't run the servers. Apple didn't do the marketing.

The only thing Apple did was make the receiving device, for which they already recouped their costs by charging a healthy 30% profit margin to the customer when they bought the phone! It's like Samsung demanding that Nintendo pay a 30% fee whenever a Switch is connected to a Samsung TV!

Apple enforces the fee via the App Store, through which no developer voluntarily distributes apps - Apple prevents consumers from receiving apps any other way.

 

[Force332]

Gotta keep that Services revenue increasing somehow.

In all seriousness, no matter who is actually in the right or wrong, I fear Apple’s relentless hard-nose approach to App Store fees and policies is going to hurt them in the long run.

 

[Mousse]

If Apple had took 30% from the start, I'd be on their side. They redefined the rules after the developer's client's have their procedures set and difficult to change.

"Plowman says that while he is frustrated, he believes Apple is willing to listen and that the company can be convinced to change. He asks that people share his story, but in a constructive manner."

Honestly, this sounds like the kind of thing someone would say in an abusive relationship. "I'm upset but I think they heard me and will change... so don't be too mean to them about the thing they're doing to me..."

 

[falainber]

In other words, an App provides more VALUE?

Exactly. And that which provides value is worth paying for.

Sure. It's worth paying for to app and content developer.

 

[deepspacecowboy]

So you are ok with a company not paying enough. Then asking paying customers to then tip?

Tipping is voluntary.

What’s not ok is Apple’s attitude that it’s entitled to a cut of everything that happens on their platform like some disgusting bridge troll. I’m honestly surprised they aren’t demanding 30% of revenue from films edited with Final Cut or albums produced with Logic. They make up arbitrary rules that take advantage of small developers while Amazon and Uber and others get a pass.

Apple used to be an innovative forward thinking company that delivered great products and didn’t need to nickel and dime their user base. Now their products are boring. Their OSes are all buggy as 90s Microsoft. Their new “spatial computer” is a dull, uninspired piece of overpriced kit. But they are laser focused on extracting as much as possible from their users and developers because that’s the ONLY part of their business that’s seeing any meaningful growth. Gee, I wonder why?

Today’s Apple has lost all of the magic. I’ve been a customer since the early 80s. The current C suite is full of unimaginative, uninspiring, hypocritical dolts. But yeah for that 45% profit margin, right? And their fanbase just keeps cheering them on…just like all the 90s Microsoft fans. Todays Apple is gross.

 

[Kevin2055]

Apple has frustrated another app developer with arbitrary enforcement of its App Store rules, with Insight Timer CEO Christopher Plowman this week taking to LinkedIn and speaking with TechCrunch to complain about a frustrating experience with the App Store review team.

Insight Timer is a meditation app that is subscription based. Customers pay $60 per year to access guided meditations, yoga classes, and other teacher-led courses. In addition to the subscription fee, Insight Timer accepts tips for teachers, which is what is at the heart of the dispute.

In 2022, Insight Timer started allowing app users to provide their teachers with digital donations or tips, and these donations were not initially subject to Apple's 30 percent fee on digital goods per Apple's App Store rules. Apple approved 47 Insight Timer updates that had the tipping functionality, but late last year, Apple's review team decided that these payments weren't considered tips, but digital goods purchases, which subjected them to the App Store in-app purchase fee.

App Store rule 3.2.1 vii says that apps can allow users to give a gift to another individual without using in-app purchase, so long as the gift is an optional choice and 100 percent of the funds go to the receiver of the gift. This was the case with Insight Timer, as it was not taking a cut of tips, but the individual to individual wording is what became murky, as well as an addendum to that rule that says a gift "connected to or associated at any point in time with receiving digital content" requires in-app purchases.

Apple took issue with Insight Timer accepting tips for live events and meditations, deciding that this money was for digital content. Plowman did not agree with Apple's assessment, and spent months negotiating. Apple did agree to allow tip links on teacher profile pages that are not subject to a 30 percent fee, but donations from live events and meditations are not considered tips. Apple's reasoning is that a one-to-one donation is a monetary gift, but a workshop or class with at least two people is digital content that's subject to a commission.

Plowman suggested that the meditation and yoga experiences are no more digital than renting an Airbnb or taking an Uber, and Apple does not collect fees from these kinds of purchases.

Of the $60 subscription fee that customers pay, Apple collects 15 to 30 percent. The remainder is split between Insight Timer and the teachers that participate on the platform, with each getting a 50 percent cut. Insight Timer earned $20 million in subscription revenue in 2023.

Apple required Insight Timer to comply with the App Store rules to submit further app updates, with a February deadline. Insight Timer complied this week, submitting an update that eliminates the tipping feature except on teacher profiles.

Plowman says that while he is frustrated, he believes Apple is willing to listen and that the company can be convinced to change. He asks that people share his story, but in a constructive manner.

Article Link: Insight Timer CEO Upset With Apple's Abrupt Enforcement of App Store Rules

I don’t like tipping culture anyway. These days tipping seems like tax.

 

[Manzanito]

The tipping culture is out of control anyway. Now, you have to tip virtual instructors.

You don’t have to.

 

[tobybrut]

This is one of those cases where Apple should have just left well enough alone. In the end, the money was going to the teachers only and not to the company, so it shouldn’t have mattered what the lawyers thought. This isn’t a case where lawyers had to get involved at all, and I’ll bet that’s who stuck their noses in. Who’s going to sue if Apple didn’t charge their 30%? Sometimes lawyers overthink things and overcomplicate stuff.

 

[bluecoast]

Apple’s greed knows no bounds.

 

[coredev]

They absolutely will not change unless forced to by law.

And why would they? It's their business model. It went to court already, and Apple won.
So it is not only their business model for a long time now, it is also battle tested.
Copied by other companies as well.
Anyone bringing their digital goods to Apple's platform should know this by now.

 

[cupcakes2000]

Yeah, I see the tipping system as a way for employers to guilt trip customers into picking up the slack for not paying their employees a fair wage. It’s a smoke screen they can hide behind.
And I don’t buy that tips is good way to motivate a worker to do a good job. If employers want to make it a commission-type job, that’s fine, but employers pay commission, not customers. Customers rate by either bringing their business or not.
Employers should take responsibility, pay employees a fair wage and charge customers what it costs.

Well that seems very much like a US type of issue. Some countries have ‘meddling governments’ which ‘over regulate’ and make ‘arbitrary rules and laws’, leading to employers being forced to pay their workers a fair minimum wage.

AS IF some Yoga app is anything but random noise on Apple's bottom line.

This attitude right here is very much the problem.

 

[AlmightyKang]

I'm a little fed up of the whining from people here about Apple. I'm not apologising for them at all. In fact I think they are bastards, but that's not the problem really.

The problem is that people consciously chose to build a business inside a walled garden and are now bitching about the fact that the rules changed. This was and always is an aggregate business risk if you build on someone else's land and should have been part of the initial risk assessment that was done. If this is not a tenable business risk, you should not be building your product in the garden. If it is, you should shut up and write off the costs. The universe does not really care about your existence or your poor choices, they only care about the up front cost presented to them by the garden owners.

I a principal shareholder on a product which could have ended up in this space. But we looked at it and did a proper risk assessment and decided that the best approach was to push it to the web and allow people to consume it with a browser. We did that, it worked, we made a crap load of money. There is no 30% cut for any vendor.

I have little sympathy here.

 

[SanderEvers]

Honestly I agree with Apple here. A class is not a "gift", it's content. Paying money for content is never a tip. Otherwise the entirety of Patreon and Onlyfans (etc) is a tip as well. It's not, these are companies that profit from offering services and/or content.

So if there are rules about paying for digital goods it should apply. Donating to someone's personal profile can indeed be seen as a tip, which Apple agrees with.

 

[boss.king]

And why would they? It's their business model. It went to court already, and Apple won.
So it is not only their business model for a long time now, it is also battle tested.
Copied by other companies as well.
Anyone bringing their digital goods to Apple's platform should know this by now.

Why are you explaining the thing I said back to me? Did you not read the post you’re quoting?

 

[paul4339]

Honestly I agree with Apple here. A class is not a "gift", it's content. Paying money for content is never a tip. Otherwise the entirety of Patreon and Onlyfans (etc) is a tip as well. It's not, these are companies that profit from offering services and/or content.

So if there are rules about paying for digital goods it should apply. Donating to someone's personal profile can indeed be seen as a tip, which Apple agrees with.

Agree, Amazon Twitch does the same,
You can subscribe to live or recorded content, and they take 30%; you can also “tip”, and then they take 50%. YouTube Live takes 30% of their optional Superchat “tips” that they collect on behalf of creator.
Although not exactly the same as this case, the principle is the same - it’s not whether the payment is optional or not optional for the content.

 

[Lioness~]

I had the IT app many years, the subscription and partly liked it, but the app became more and more like social media, so I throw it away and continued my meditation without tracking and timer a few years - perfectly fine with it. But I missed having a good timer that synced with all devices in the end. Not that it affeckted my meditation and yoga habbits, but I missed the timer and its tracking and separation of each habbit in the app.

So last week I downloaded the Insight Timer again, to just use the timer, which is just great and it synchs between devices, all for free.
People can tip on IT’s events, but no need to. I think IT’s policy is fair, and Apple is as always and more and more greedy fkrs.

 

[Abazigal]

They absolutely will not change unless forced to by law.

Which implies that whatever Apple is doing now is not against the laws as they are currently written.

But yes, I agree that Apple will give up their 30% cut only kicking and screaming. The sooner we accept this, the sooner we can all stop acting shocked and outraged whenever something like this happens.