Top Stories: Epic Games Victory Over Apple, iPhone 17 Rumors, and More

[MacRumors]

There's a major shakeup for the App Store in the U.S. this week, with Epic Games winning a major victory that is forcing Apple to make immediate changes in how it works with developers seeking to offer alternative methods for purchasing in-app content and subscriptions.

This week also saw fresh rumors about the iPhone 17 lineup, while Dan and Hartley talked through all of the current Apple Watch rumors on this week's episode of The MacRumors Show, so read on below for all the details on these stories and more!

Epic Games Wins Major Victory as Apple is Ordered to Comply With App Store Anti-Steering Injunction

In a sharp rebuke, Judge Yvonne Gongalez Rogers ruled this week that Apple has been in "willful violation" of her 2021 ruling in the court battle between Apple and Epic Games, with Apple continuing to engage in anti-competitive behavior by limiting how developers can link to alternative to Apple's in-app purchasing system and charging significant fees even on purchases made outside of Apple's ecosystem.

Apple is going to appeal, but in the meantime it must immediately cease charging commissions or fees on purchases made outside of apps and may not restrict developers' abilities to promote alternatives to users.

Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney says the company intends to bring Fortnite back to the U.S. App Store next week, and has offered a "peace proposal" that would see Epic drop additional litigation on the issue if Apple extends the changes required by the ruling worldwide. Epic is also going to launch Epic Games Store Webshops that will allow other developers to deploy digital storefronts outside of the Apple's App Store.

iPhone 17 Pro's Scratch Resistant Anti-Reflective Display Coating Canceled

While Apple was reportedly aiming to bring an anti-reflective display coating to the iPhone 17 Pro models this year, a reliable source now tells MacRumors that the plan has been canceled for now as Apple ran into difficulties scaling up the process for the millions of devices it will need to produce.

Apple has brought anti-reflective nano-texture display options to several recent products like the MacBook Pro and iPad Pro, but so far the iPhone has been limited to a fingerprint-resistant oleophobic coating that still leaves the glass fronts of the devices susceptible to glare.

All iPhone 17 Models Again Rumored to Feature 12GB of RAM

We're expecting at least some iPhone 17 models to see an increase in RAM to 12GB from the current 8GB, and a new rumor claims that the increase will extend to all four models in the lineup.

Apple had originally been thought to only include the higher RAM amount in the iPhone 17 Pro Max, though analyst Ming-Chi Kuo indicated last week that it will extend to not only the iPhone 17 Pro and the "iPhone 17 Air," but potentially even the base iPhone 17 if supply chain issues can be overcome. This week's rumor from Digital Chat Station on Weibo claims this will indeed be possible.

Google CEO Suggests iOS 19 Will Feature Built-In Gemini Integration

While ChatGPT is currently the only third-party AI service integrated into Apple Intelligence on iPhones, Apple has reportedly been open to adding other services, with Google Gemini regarded as the most likely future addition.

As part of an ongoing antitrust trial against Google, its CEO Sundar Pichai confirmed that he has held discussions with Apple CEO Tim Cook about Gemini integration and he hopes a deal will be reached by the middle of this year. That timing would set the stage for the inclusion of Gemini in iOS 19, set to be introduced at WWDC next month ahead of a public launch in September.

The MacRumors Show: Apple Watch Series 11, Ultra 3, and SE 3 Rumors

On the latest episode of The MacRumors Show, Dan and Hartley discuss what to expect from the 2025 Apple Watch lineup when new models launch in the fall, with updates for the standard Apple Watch, high-end Apple Watch Ultra, and low-end Apple Watch SE all expected.

They also look at the latest rumors about iPadOS 19, where a macOS-style menu bar is expected to appear on-screen when the iPad is connected to a Magic Keyboard. The iPhone could also be getting a Stage Manager-like feature when connected to an external display.

MacRumors Newsletter

Each week, we publish an email newsletter like this highlighting the top Apple stories, making it a great way to get a bite-sized recap of the week hitting all of the major topics we've covered and tying together related stories for a big-picture view.

So if you want to have top stories like the above recap delivered to your email inbox each week, subscribe to our newsletter!

Article Link: Top Stories: Epic Games Victory Over Apple, iPhone 17 Rumors, and More

 

[SoldOnApple]

Steve Jobs would throw the lawyers into a tank of water and point out if there were visible bubbles then they still had air in their lungs they could have made extra arguments with in court.

 

[Jpcope]

So can I sell my stuff on eBay with a separate link for payment? Or maybe I can go to a bookstore and pay the author directly instead of the store. Or how about I can go to Walmart and buy Nike shoes but pay Nike directly instead of Walmart. This ruling makes no sense and is a slippery slope. If developers are not happy with the 30% than tough ****. I thought the US was a free market, not a place where government dictates how much you charge

 

[Old Smuggler]

Be careful what you you look for, because you might not like what you find.

 

[Lodovik]

The battle of the Tims is over and the dark side prevailed. Now Epic can get its own 30% cut on their own store.

 

[sw1tcher]

So can I sell my stuff on eBay with a separate link for payment? Or maybe I can go to a bookstore and pay the author directly instead of the store. Or how about I can go to Walmart and buy Nike shoes but pay Nike directly instead of Walmart. This ruling makes no sense and is a slippery slope. If developers are not happy with the 30% than tough ****. I thought the US was a free market, not a place where government dictates how much you charge

Not really fair comparisons. The only thing stored on Apple's App Store is the Spotify app itself. Once the Spotify app is downloaded, the content (music, podcasts, audio books, etc) is pulled from servers that Spotify owns or from servers of cloud service providers Spotify pays for.

With your bookstore and Walmart examples, the books and Nike shoes are stored in the buildings of each respective retailer who has to pay for all the overhead costs (i.e. utilities, rent, insurance, etc.) themselves.

If all the music, podcasts, audio books, etc that subscribers access through the Spotify app was stored on and serverd to subscribers from Apple's servers, then you'd have an equal comparison.

 

[Catastreon]

Not really fair comparisons. The only thing stored on Apple's App Store is the Spotify app itself. Once the Spotify app is downloaded, the content (music, podcasts, audio books, etc) is pulled from servers that Spotify owns or from servers of cloud service providers Spotify pays for.

With your bookstore and Walmart examples, the books and Nike shoes are stored in the buildings of each respective retailer who has to pay for all the overhead costs (i.e. utilities, rent, insurance, etc.) themselves.

If all the music, podcasts, audio books, etc that subscribers access through the Spotify app was stored on and serverd to subscribers from Apple's servers, then you'd have an equal comparison.

Even though Apple doesn’t serve Spotify’s content, it provides the foundation—the OS, the tools, the marketplace, the trust, and the user base. That’s what Apple is monetizing. Letting developers bypass Apple’s payments system effectively guts the entire model and opens the door to freeloading on Apple’s decades of investment. Apple built and maintains iOS and the App Store. It provides the SDKs, APIs, security, and infrastructure that enable Spotify to exist on the platform at all. Without the App Store and iOS, Spotify doesn’t have access to that premium mobile customer base.