Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Spotify Accuses Apple of Using App Store Approval Process as a 'Weapon to Harm Competitors'

marty11 said:
Spotify is a much superior music service and Apple must play shady like usual to compete. You all can argue fabboy style all day long. But the fact that Apple tried to price fix the service when Spotify offered the 0.99 promotion says it all. Apple is going to be fined big if they keep this up.
Click to expand...

Excuse me? Apple tried to price fix? Please show me where this occurred.
 
KALLT said:
My problem is the flat rate. I understand completely that Apple needs to recover the transaction costs, but these costs do not scale with the pricing of digital content itself.
Click to expand...

It's not a flat rate and is not meant to scale with the costs of the individual app. Apple's pricing is meant to scale with the cost of running the App Store. All of those free apps are costs for Apple as well.

I also think that Apple should offer a lower cut for those kinds of apps that they directly compete with.
Click to expand...
Ironically, that would be more likely to put them in antitrust territory by favoring certain apps.

Apple has a big reason to discourage users from using Spotify and that makes their policy dubious.
Click to expand...
Again, Apple isn't treating Spotify differently than any other app.

In my opinion, Apple should take a step back and encourage content diversity for the benefit of their own customers.
Click to expand...
:) As if there isn't already an abundance of content diversity on the App Store?!? :confused:

Don't forget, despite all of Spotify's hand-ringing and waffling, they still think the App Store's terms are good enough that they have chosen to accept them.
 
samcraig said:
On a renewal - that's pretty much exactly all they do. Which is why after YEARS - they are now lowering it to 15%. Which is still quite high for a credit card transaction. Since you like to talk retail (vs online) - If retailers were charged 15% for their credit card transactions, no store would accept credit cards.
Click to expand...

Still didn't respond to my point. Apple offers far more than just processing a transaction. So why are you trying to break this down into a simple transaction fee issue and compare it to credit card fees?
 
Apple is too restrictive and too greedy.

I was going to develop an app until I saw how much Apple would gouge me.

Also subscriptions? Never. If there was any real cost in continuing to use an app, maybe, but there isn't. Adobe does subscriptions and I'll be damned if I put out a penny of subscription money for an app that I find very useful every 6 months or so....to hell with them.

Also Apple doesn't allow other development systems...even superior ones. Smalltalk has some really wonderful child programming apps for teaching programming and such. Apple will not allow them because they are driven by the smalltalk engine.
 
  • Like
Reactions: ohio.emt and ramonabynes
alexgowers said:
I'm kinda on spotifys side. If apple offer the same product and are adding 30% to anothers, it's an anticompetitive issue for sure. I've always felt 30% charge to purchases to be excessive and cause potential issues like this. It should be allowed to offer ways to subscribe to the service without apple or at least offer links to them. If apple blocked payments through safari and only allowed apple pay it would be incredibly unfair, i don't see the apps themselves being any different to embedding a safari tab in an app anyway.
Click to expand...

Those people on Spotify's side fails to consider these pointers:
1) It costs money to maintain, update and process the apps store
2) Spotify has a choice to remove their app from app store.
3) Spotify has a choice to have an all-paid app to reduce unnecessary outlay on licensing from free usage
[doublepost=1467315324][/doublepost]
samcraig said:
On a renewal - that's pretty much exactly all they do. Which is why after YEARS - they are now lowering it to 15%. Which is still quite high for a credit card transaction. Since you like to talk retail (vs online) - If retailers were charged 15% for their credit card transactions, no store would accept credit cards.
Click to expand...

So who maintain the app store? Who is approving the updates? Who is building the security around the app store?
 
This is the bizzarro world that Spotify wants...

Store: Hi, welcome to the ACME store.
Customer: I would like to buy some widgets.
Store: Great! We have two options. Here's widget A, and widget B. Keep in mind though that you pay for widget A here. You get widget B completely FREE. Widget A offers more up front. You can get more for widget B, but you'll have to take the elevator to their store on the 8th floor and pay them directly for the additional features. We only stock, promote, and maintain their free widget here for free. We don't get paid for it at all.
 
  • Like
Reactions: EricTheHalfBee and waitandwait
John Sellers said:
Apple is too restrictive and too greedy.

I was going to develop an app until I saw how much Apple would gouge me.

Also subscriptions? Never. If there was any real cost in continuing to use an app, maybe, but there isn't. Adobe does subscriptions and I'll be damned if I put out a penny of subscription money for an app that I find very useful every 6 months or so....to hell with them.

Also Apple doesn't allow other development systems...even superior ones. Smalltalk has some really wonderful child programming apps for teaching programming and such. Apple will not allow them because they are driven by the smalltalk engine.[/QUOTE

Get smalltalk to build their own phone then
Click to expand...
 
JonneyGee said:
Sorry, Spotify, but if you don't like it, feel free to design your own phone and develop your own operating system.
Click to expand...

I agree Apple should have the right to do what it wants with its property, but its a crappy thing to do to consumers, and should be noted. If I were a streamer I'd opt for Spotify on principle. Apple's ecosystem lacks oxygen.
 
samcraig said:
For a renewal - what does Apple provide?
Click to expand...
At the risk of superseding your point... The price Apple charges does not need to be directly related to it's individual cost of each transaction, so the question is moot.

The fees Apple charges are meant to maintain the whole App Store. Apps that charge money subsidize the free apps. I haven't seen any evidence that Apple has ever exceeded single digit profit margins with the iTunes Store.
 
waitandwait said:
Those people on Spotify's side fails to consider these pointers:
1) It costs money to maintain, update and process the apps store
2) Spotify has a choice to remove their app from app store.
3) Spotify has a choice to have an all-paid app to reduce unnecessary outlay on licensing from free usage
[doublepost=1467315324][/doublepost]

So who maintain the app store? Who is approving the updates? Who is building the security around the app store?
Click to expand...

What would happen if developers all decided to not charge for their apps but instead make their apps subscription based and not give Apple any money at all except for their $99 developer fee.

Not at all a likely scenario. However Apple's "cost of doing business" is exactly that. I do not begrudge Apple for wanting to make as much profit as they can from their app store. However, they do need to be careful and consistent. And they aren't. I don't think you or anyone else can really argue that.
 
  • Like
Reactions: ohio.emt
Shaun said:
Everyday in so many ways Apple is turning into Microsoft and trying kill off any competition. Very sad.
Click to expand...

Apple has almost always been worse than MSFT. There was an opening for licensed clones, but they were snuffed. Apple won't let other companies make music players that sync with iTunes, even though Apple has chucked the iPod Classic. I've been a Mac user since 1984, but I look for opportunities to support companies outside of the Apple prison.
 
  • Like
Reactions: ohio.emt
Hello Walmart? I would like to put my product on your shelves, but I don't want you to sell it. I just want to have the product there with a telephone next to it so that people can call and order it directly from me instead. That way I'll make 100% of the money and you'll make nothing. Totally cool with you? Ok great doing business with you.
 
BaldiMac said:
At the risk of superseding your point... The price Apple charges does not need to be directly related to it's individual cost of each transaction, so the question is moot.

The fees Apple charges are meant to maintain the whole App Store. Apps that charge money subsidize the free apps. I haven't seen any evidence that Apple has ever exceeded single digit profit margins with the iTunes Store.
Click to expand...

Does Apple break out profit margins for the iTunes store? If not, how could you see any evidence?
 
oneMadRssn said:
I wrote this in another thread yesterday, but I think it illustrates why what Apple is doing with Spotify is patently unfair and anti-competitive:

Imagine this:
  • A landlord owns a strip mall and leases one store to a store owner that wants to sell widgets, where the store owner has to give the landlord 30% of all sales. The widget factory charges $1.
  • Scenario 1: The store owner marks the widgets up to $2.50, where $0.75 (30%) goes to the landlord and $0.75 is net profit to the store owner.
    • This is fine.
  • Scenario 2: The landlord opens up his own store right next door to the store owner and sells the same widgets for $1.75. The landlord still makes $0.75 from each widget sold.
    • This is now not fine. It is mathematically impossible for the store owner to compete with the landlord. If the landlord charges less than $1.43 for the widgets, the store owner cannot possibly make money under the circumstances.
    • It doesn't matter to the landlord if the store owner goes out of business. If either the store owner or the landlord make a widget sale, it's all the same to the landlord.
    • By acting as both a store and landlord, he has an unfair advantage. Typically, tenants of malls write language into their leases that prohibit the landlord from doing this. They can do this because there are thousands of commercial areas in the U.S. There are only 2 "digital" commercial areas of any value, and they don't negotiate. Instead, they offer unreasonable contracts of adhesion.
Click to expand...

I think this misses the fact that the store owner also has stores in other strip malls that don't have these fees. If the store owner only had the one store and that was it, it would be unfair, but there are other areas (Android, the web portal, etc) available. The store owner isn't forced to use this one particular strip mall.

I feel like Spotify is just complaining because iOS represents a huge, lucrative client base that is willing to spend money and AM is taking part of the pie they want for themselves.
 
BaldiMac said:
At the risk of superseding your point... The price Apple charges does not need to be directly related to it's individual cost of each transaction, so the question is moot.

The fees Apple charges are meant to maintain the whole App Store. Apps that charge money subsidize the free apps. I haven't seen any evidence that Apple has ever exceeded single digit profit margins with the iTunes Store.
Click to expand...

The reality is - Apple knows the App Store doesn't even need to be profitable. It's nice that it makes money. But WITHOUT it, they would have no product to sell. And I am not suggesting they don't charge for their services. But until they announced that they were cutting their take on renewals down to 15% - I thought 30% was way too high.
 
samcraig said:
What would happen if developers all decided to not charge for their apps but instead make their apps subscription based and not give Apple any money at all except for their $99 developer fee.

Not at all a likely scenario. However Apple's "cost of doing business" is exactly that. I do not begrudge Apple for wanting to make as much profit as they can from their app store. However, they do need to be careful and consistent. And they aren't. I don't think you or anyone else can really argue that.
Click to expand...

So in what way Apple is not consistent? Netflix did not complain. HBO did not complain.

Why don't people point fingers at Spotify's failed business model?
 
  • Like
Reactions: newyorkone
i understand taking a cut from an app itself or the first time you subscribe maybe but not a subscription itself to be honest
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back