(1) There isn't anything wrong with that. (2) Also as a end user I am licensed to use software, not APIs.
(1) Well, there is. Its a practice frowned upon and in certain cases illegal.
(2) No way apps can work without access to OS APIs. Without apps, the device does not actually work. Splitting between the two its nothing but a splitting air exercise.
As and end user I don't care who gets the money If I don't get it. I don't care about developers. They are only a mean to and end.
Well that is your stance. But as a customer I do care to whom the money goes to. For instance, when I buy a device from Apple I do expect the money to go to Apple as I expect their product and services to improve, maybe not all but very much the lion share. It is just not me that thinks that way, Apple is paying Foxconn, the company does expect some money to go to enabling better work conditions at it reflects in the quality of their products. If that was not the case, they would not buy from them probably …. When I buy a diamond I do expect not to be a blood diamond hence not going to bad people …
I’m a consumer not a consumerist.
I do care about property rights. Microsoft should be able to fully control their property. So should Apple.
So do I. There are 3 properties at stake that belong to different business entities. The device you have bought, Apple technology and services (sold and licensed) … and the devs digital services and apps (dev technology, sold and licensed). The problem at hand is when ones property intertwines, intersects with others properties … each ones full control stops in those intersections.
The cases of contention lately are about these intersections within the Apple ecossystem considering their market power and their policies.
If Microsoft doesn't want to be in the App Store, there should be no way for Apple to force Microsoft to sell its software there. Microsoft just said no, and Apple had no way to compel them.
Well, Microsoft does want to serve their customers using whatever devices with apps as it seams. They also have multiple apps in the App Store. It also seams that customers want to use MS digital services in the devices they bought, including iOS. Not just MS, … Spotify, Google, Epic …..
So it is not so much that Apple is compelling anyone not use Apple tech quite the contrary if you look around. But that through their tech its seams that its cherry picking fences between customers devices and third party tech, ways of payment and so on, forcing business models to third parties, all arguing publicly that such measures are down to security and privacy issues, not $$$.
For instance when you buy a device and license its OS you agree with licensing agreement. Yet this agreement and governance policies changes unilaterally by software companies during the lifetime of the devices and businesses around them. So you are in the weak position of either accept your property to be devalued to yourself or accept the new agreement. The same with when say you license the user an API … it may change after you invested building the software, so either face the loss or agree … Those unilateral changes may devalue your property greatly after the fact in ways not agreed initially …
This flexibility is very important for the software market to work … of course changes in agreement are necessary to adapt with the flow of reality, improved procedures, yet it can be easily abused to force ones $hand$ over the others in the intersection. Hence watch dogs are necessary as it may be considered an unfair business practice.
Here is an actual example … demanding each third party game stream to be deployed separately as an app is quite a new requirement as it seams in the App Store, its unprecedented. They did not require that to either Spotify or Netflix (When Spotify started Apple was not in the audio streaming business). No customer or developer ever signed such constraint when they trained, bought or develop their app for their customers devices. The end result is customer don’t have access to these apps, they need to use a web browser, yet they payed 1k plus for the device … so on and so forth.
This would not be so much of a problem if iOS market share was 10%, but at 50% holds some power over the intersection of multiple properties it may be. A lot of money invested by customer in devices and by third parties in creating apps and digital services for their customers.
Its a very complex subject matter, the intersection of properties.
Anyway, a bit tired of this subject. It will all be sorted out in time. No worries.
