Judge in Upcoming Epic v. Apple Trial to Limit In-Person Attendees

[Rob_2811]

On the other hand it’s all or nothing?

Yes it is.

Using an argument that 'we are protecting you' for ultra restrictive practices when in reality Apple often fail to identify scams on the App Store is highly disinegnuous.

The App store rules exist largely to further Apple financial interests not to protect iOS users from harm.

 

[Rob_2811]

They have really taken you in. Epic just does what their Chinese masters TenCent tell them, and there is nothing that TenCent cares less about than fairness and dignity for all developers. All they care about is selling worthless digital rubbish to impressionable kids at a maximum profit.

Sounds like the kind of thing Apple makes a most of their App Store revenue from.

 

[GeoStructural]

On the other hand it’s all or nothing?

No, but it defeats the "App Store is unbreakable and Apple protects us" defense.

They have really taken you in. Epic just does what their Chinese masters TenCent tell them.

Let's not talk about fandom, we are on MacRumors.

 

[I7guy]

Yes it is.

Using an argument that 'we are protecting you' for ultra restrictive practices when in reality Apple often fail to identify scams on the App Store is highly disinegnuous.

The App store rules exist largely to further Apple financial interests not to protect iOS users from harm.

I call that binary thinking (or absolutist thinking), but that’s me.

 

[tongxinshe]

Go Epic! Thanks for fighting the fight, for the fairness and dignity of all developers big and small, and for an OS that allows installing everything we want, as it should be.

All manufacturers should get their deserved fairness and dignity to sell their products in all supermarket and department stores without a fee! Go GeoStructural, the whole world thank you for fighting that fight as well!

 

[I7guy]

No, but it defeats the "App Store is unbreakable and Apple protects us" defense.
[…].

I disagree. If a majority of the apps are “safe”, apple is within its right to advertise it. It’s interesting the types of thinking that goes on in the forums.

 

[subi257]

And it will soon be called iOS, if common sense and fair regulations are applied.




Sorry it hurt you, I know it must be difficult but just as you can I also can share my opinion on this forum.

Personally don't feel hurt and you said, everybody is entitled to their opinions. I wonder what the percentage split is between the "gamers" and the rest of the iOS users that don't game? I suspect that the portion that would like the Apple app store to stay secure is larger. Plus, I suspect that eventually Epic will get out of the games arena and more more into the much higher profit broadcast television arena. If you watch Weather Channel and see all of the green screen sets, that is done by a company called Zero Density (www.zerodensity.tv) using the Epic Unreal Engine 5. There is so much more to be n=made there.

 

[I7guy]

All manufacturers should get their deserved fairness and dignity to sell their products in all supermarket and department stores without a fee! Go GeoStructural, the whole world thank you for fighting that fight as well!

There is android for that, if one so wishes.

 

[subi257]

All manufacturers should get their deserved fairness and dignity to sell their products in all supermarket and department stores without a fee! Go GeoStructural, the whole world thank you for fighting that fight as well!

Really? supermarkets and department stores...any retail stores don't pay a fee, but they buy at wholesale price so that the store can make the percentage on the retail side. If the wholesale price is too hight relative to what the store can sell it for, the store won't buy it. So there is competition between stores...except on products that the manufacturer locks the price where it cannot be discounted from MSRP. On some products there is so little profit that I don't personally see how they make any money...I went into Home Depot the get an RCA "Y" cable....it cost $1.19! are they making 1 penny? between manufacturing, packaging, shipping, import duties, distribution. A friend of mine used to have a franchise selling Martin's potato bread, he was given a strict window when it can be delivered, if he's late, they will not accept the product. They tell him how much shelf space he gets and where it goes.

There should be no fight, you (Epic) agreed to the terms of the contract, you have to accept them. When the contract expires you can re-negotiate. The reality is all of the technology is changing the game and it is going to be an interesting future in that respect. I would think there is going to have to be a new paradigm in the future....maybe Apple creates a parallel app store and has pricing scale based on sales volume and they still do the vetting of the software/apps and you the user can chose to sign...like the "game store" where it keeps critics apps...financial, personal data apps...(life & health apps/data) sandboxed off.

 

[segfaultdotorg]

Boooo! Televise it like the OJ Simpson trial!

 

[Abazigal]

Go Epic! Thanks for fighting the fight, for the fairness and dignity of all developers big and small, and for an OS that allows installing everything we want, as it should be.

Epic is not doing this for the benefit of consumers or developers. They just want to burn down the whole App Store model for their own financial gain.

 

[easy4lif]

gotta ask, is fortnite still popular. couldn't it survive well enough on every other platform its on.

 

[subi257]

That's all great, none of it has anything to do with Apples anticompetitive behaviour though.

You are talking about Apples aribtary nonsense as if its the law. It isn't, that is why regulators exist to ensure companies with huge scale like Apple aren't abusing their position.

Nothing 'fair or dignified' about Apples rent seeking.

That is a separate argument. The argument at hand is that Epic signed a contractual agreement and then blatantly, publicly violated and then complained. That sounds to me like they are also being as greedy as many other corporations of all flavors.

I wonder.. and I will state up front that I am not a gamer, so, I wonder if their sales has been waining and they are trying to prop it back up by offering a lower price by going around the app store? Some of the game developers are out of their F'n mind at the prices that they expect people to pay for a game..ish. I see word games and puzzle games asking for 6.99 per month...really? I think if that is what you need to survive and be profitable, you are in the wrong business, or need a better business plan.

 

[subi257]

gotta ask, is fortnite still popular. couldn't it survive well enough on every other platform its on.

That is exactly my question. Has their sales on this game dropped to the point that they are trying to prop up sales by offering it to the consumer at a lower and still hold their same profit.

 

[I7guy]

Epic is not doing this for the benefit of consumers or developers. They just want to burn down the whole App Store model for their own financial gain.

It does seem to know there is an appeals path in the process, that is available to both sides if needed. Maybe even up to the SCOTUS.

 

[I7guy]

Yes it is.

Using an argument that 'we are protecting you' for ultra restrictive practices when in reality Apple often fail to identify scams on the App Store is highly disinegnuous.

Can you quantify often. The app store has been in existence quite a while with millions of apps. In that context, what is often?

The App store rules exist largely to further Apple financial interests not to protect iOS users from harm.

I understand that's your opinion (it's become a meme at this point), but my opinion is the app store is a bridge between developers and users. It both provides a management environment for developers while providing a management structure to identify as much malware as possible, protecting users from rogue apps.

The way I said it is closer to the reality.

 

[GeoStructural]

Epic is not doing this for the benefit of consumers or developers. They just want to burn down the whole App Store model for their own financial gain.

And Apple is not doing this for the benefit of consumers or developers. They just want to keep the App Store model for their own financial gain.

 

[WiseAJ]

And Apple is not doing this for the benefit of consumers or developers. They just want to keep the App Store model for their own financial gain.

Why can't it be both? By doing it for the benefit of the consumers and developers it gets them financial gain (the model is clearly working far better than Androids)

 

[Bandaman]

...and your opinion differs from many of us who want to retain the current App Store where we can be pretty sure we aren't downloading malware. Have you tracked the sheer number of Android app's that have been found forwarding user information from Android devices to corporate and individual websites?

After 40 years using everything from mainframes, through mini's, micro's, Windows, and Mac systems, I truly appreciate the approach and care that Apple take with iOS. Clearly you don't, so why not just switch over to one of the many Android devices readily available?

Seems like half of the apps on the Play Store have some kind of malware in them. There was also a study showing that 85% of Android apps send data to Google. Why people want iOS to be like Android in this regard is honestly beyond me. I am absolutely not rooting for Epic ... and the only reason they're in this trial to begin with is because Epic blatantly violated Apple's terms of service.

Edit: I meant send data to Facebook. I'm sure 100% of data is being sent to Google.

 

[Bandaman]

And Apple is not doing this for the benefit of consumers or developers. They just want to keep the App Store model for their own financial gain.

It may not be a benefit to you, but it is a very big benefit to many others.

 

[Abazigal]

And Apple is not doing this for the benefit of consumers or developers. They just want to keep the App Store model for their own financial gain.

But of course.

And how does Apple earn money ultimately? By making great products that customers are willing to pay a premium for, made possible by their control over hardware, software and services.

Of which the App Store is one way of controlling this unique user experience for me, the end user.

Which means that even if Apple’s key overriding goal for keeping the iOS App Store model the way it is is for profit, its incentives are still pretty much aligned with those of the consumers. Such as myself.

For example, Apple’s control over the App Store is what allows it to force developers to implement features like “sign in with Apple”, privacy nutrition labels and dropping support for IDFA, all of which serve to offer consumers more choice and better privacy. And this is possible only because of the control that Apple exerts over the App Store and consequently, all developers, because not everything that’s good for the customer is necessarily good for the developer, and vice versa.

At the same time, the removal of the 30% App Store commission is not going to result in lower prices for me as the consumer, because software has zero marginal costs and it is assumed they are already priced at revenue-maximising levels anyways. It also means lower revenue for the App Store, which in turn means fewer resources and incentives to maintain the App Store, which I would argue is still a powerful equalising force that allows smaller developers to compete on a more even footing with the bigger ones (and notice how it’s the bigger developer companies like Epic and Basecamp who are pushing for this).

At the end of the day, if Epic gets its way, all that will change is that they will be able to run their own App Store on iOS and charge other developers a fee for hosting their apps.

Epic is not doing any of this to empower developers or benefit consumers. There is virtually zero reason for me to root for Epic in any of this knowing fully well their motivations, and when there’s nothing in it for me. Heck, I see only downsides!

And it’s also telling that nobody has been able to convincingly make a case here for Epic either, beyond some very vague and airy-fairy concepts of “freedom” and “that’s the way it should be”.

 

[sw1tcher]

Apple can do what they want, they are a private company.

Not if what they're doing violates the law. Anti-trust?

...and your opinion differs from many of us who want to retain the current App Store where we can be pretty sure we aren't downloading malware. Have you tracked the sheer number of Android app's that have been found forwarding user information from Android devices to corporate and individual websites?

After 40 years using everything from mainframes, through mini's, micro's, Windows, and Mac systems, I truly appreciate the approach and care that Apple take with iOS. Clearly you don't, so why not just switch over to one of the many Android devices readily available?

If there's another app store or a way to install apps outside of Apple's app store, it doesn't mean you have to get the app through them. Don't feel comfortable getting an app from the developer or another app store? Then get it directly from Apple.

Clearly you don't like having options and competition.

That's not how it should be. If you want to do that, start your own company...but I am sure you would take the same stand as Apple is taking. Not trying to be an ass, but Apple is a private company (in the sense that it is not government) It is their system, their hardware, etc. Epic signed a contract with Apple (which, most likely, made them the multi million dollar company that they are) and now they are violating the contractual agreement. I think cost wise, there should be a sliding scale based your sales on the app store. Epic seems to have an issue with Google too as it seems that Google is not happy with them going around the agreed contractual rules either.

This is not about "fairness and dignity" as there is not much fairness and dignity is signing a contract and then violating it when you not longer like it.

Lie I said, I'm not trying to be a D**k here, just talking about "fairness and dignity" If you sign an agreement and no longer like, then approach the other party and try to renegotiate the agreement. Or leave the store. Working in television alone with some IT server stuff, I will say that I can't even begin to comprehend the cost of running Apple's app store, Google's play store or Amazon's AWS. It's got to cost 100's of millions per year between hardware, engineering and utilities.

Violating a contractual agreement.... You mean like that time Apple reneged on their Qualcomm contract and continued to use and benefit from Qualcomm's patents without paying them? Is that the kind of "fairness and dignity" you're referring to?

Qualcomm sues Apple over 'breached' mobile chips contract

Apple is accused of leaking Qualcomm tech knowledge to competitor Intel

www.itpro.co.uk

Epic breaches contract with Apple? Epic is evil.

Apple breaches contract with Qualcomm? Qualcomm is evil.

🤦‍♂️

 

[ArtOfWarfare]

That OS already exists, its called Android.

Not just Android. Also macOS, Windows, and Linux.

There's no other platform that has tens of thousands of programs for it where all of them are gated by a single company the way iOS is.

 

[Michael Scrip]

Not just Android. Also macOS, Windows, and Linux.

There's no other platform that has tens of thousands of programs for it where all of them are gated by a single company the way iOS is.

So should iOS be forced to open up and be like every other platform?

Or should they be allowed to do their own thing?

 

[GeoStructural]

And how does Apple earn money ultimately? By making great products that customers are willing to pay a premium for, made possible by their control over hardware, software and services.

I would not call Ping, Apple TV plus, HomePod, News, Fitness and Siri particularly “great” products or services.