You can bet that they already collude to maintain the status quo in their common interests.
Google loves its Apple and vice-versa. Apple if only for the cool ca. 10 billions / year for Google Search baked in iOS.
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UK Begins Market Investigation into Apple and Google's Mobile Dominance
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You can bet that they already collude to maintain the status quo in their common interests.
Google loves its Apple and vice-versa. Apple if only for the cool ca. 10 billions / year for Google Search baked in iOS.
I subscribed to the Atlantic, and I try very hard not to give the App Store any money at all, so I did it on their website.
It was three clicks to cancel it, and very easy to do.
If I buy an app that does not do what they advertised it I can ask for a refund and my credit card will refund it if they refuse as quickly as Apple do.
All these things are achievable and easy for customers who live in countries with functioning customer protection laws.
This sort of collusion is a criminal offense in pretty much every western nation (including the US) so that would be a good way for Tim to serve hard time.
It really isn't.
If a country wants to punish both Apple and Google because they can't compete with their own tech, then they should both defend themselves and ask the US government to defend them.
Right now, Europe is protectionist. They do not want to compete. They want to punish foreign companies in favor of local ones.
I believe you can still change what search engine you use for Safari... but the default is Google. However, what I don't know is if Google Search is used for everything else within the actual iOS or not.
There’s still plenty of debate on what government is / should be. Government should be first and foremost about monopoly on the legal use of force, cartels are more about economic control. The two have always been intertwined, but I think history shows us it does not turn out well when one side controls both money and force. See communist economies, the drug cartels, etc.
This is why I make the comparison to Snow Crash. I do not want companies to have the legal force to own sovereign territory with not only total economic control but also power over life and death.
Representative government with the power to set rules for but not entirely control the economy seems to be the best combination we’ve found so far.
So, allowing powerful tech companies to band together and dictate laws with the threat of withholding crucial technology does not sound like a good scenario to me.
For profit consumer oriented companies should be bound by the laws of where they do business. But if government creates an environment that is a no-win situation for profit companies that provide crucial tech are under obligation to decide if they want to do business in that location. And government has to evaluate what it is that is making the companies unwilling to continue to do business in that location. If government wants to regulate companies out of existence after the fact, that's on government, not on the companies.
You can't use 3rd party rendering and js engines though. What I'm getting at, is the freedom to install browsers that then make web apps first class citizens.
With Apple, they are always going to be funnelling people to make apps as apps need to be distributed on the App Store and if they're paid, Apple gets their cut.
Re. 3rd party payment systems. True enough with the web. But of course, it doesn't include gaming in app payments etc.
Don't get me wrong - the App Store is fantastic in its convenience and in its early days, it was incredible as installing - and paying for - software was fun and trustworthy. Where it never quite was previously.
I just think it's time for Apple to loosen its grip. I would even prefer Apple to manage this themselves, than be forced to it.
But it seems that they're going to fight regulators to the end on every front and find that even though they're a mega-corp, they are still not bigger than governments.
Apple keeps track of where you tap while browsing the App Store
Apple has always stood for privacy as a “human right” while the company has never liked the idea of having...
9to5mac.com
Report casts doubt on Apple's claim that iCloud user data is anonymous
Researchers spot ID numbers in user data sent to Apple, in a fresh blow to the company's privacy claims.
www.macworld.com
Best argument why we should regulate anticompetitive conduct of gatekeepers now.
Not in 10 or 20 years when they've become even more powerful.
Europe isn't punishing Apple. They're investigating their behaviour and regulating anticompetitive practices.
If you read the original macrumors article, the UK will be investigating "how Apple restricts cloud gaming through its App Store."
👉 It's no one else but Apple that doesn't want to compete with their App Store on cloud gaming apps.
Competing is building a better, more attractive (Apple Arcade) product.
Shutting the cloud gaming competition out by by preventing them from streaming (basically) video to their apps isn't - that's the antithesis of competition. And neither is it about favouring local companies, when the biggest cloud gaming providers Google, Microsoft and Nvidia and even Epic aren't European companies.
Or you know, they can compete.
It's Apple's store. They can do what they want. If they don't like it, they can release it on Android.
Apple isn't breaking any laws. What UK will do is create new laws specifically against Apple. This is an example of protectionist policies.
Not quite. All carriers were open to talks with Apple to offer the iPhone. But ALL except for Cingular demanded control over the preinstalled apps, contract pricing, and carrier branding on the device. Just like they had overevery other phone on the market at the time.
Apple refused. Cingular likely tried but in the end agreed to Apple’s demands. Would Apple have stuck to one carrier if all had agreed? Who knows?
Much of the talk about Apple failing is from other phone makers since the (public) time to market was so short, mobile phones are hard, Apple was jumping into a very mature market, and Apple was clear that they and not the carriers would control the user experience.
Personally speaking, I think it will depend on whether you are speaking as an American or as a citizen from another country.
If I were a member of the US government, I feel there is value in the overwhelming majority of the mobile market being concentrated in the hands of two American companies (especially when it comes to sanctions). In this regard, I think it’s about time the US government stepped in to intervene with the EU’s investigation of Apple’s supposed monopoly power. I also personally disagree that Apple is a monopoly in the convention sense of the word, but the distinction may not matter to a country that is not the US, who would naturally be unhappy with having to go through Apple in order to reach their own citizens.
Apple was fortunate that Cingular was hungry and wanted to do something that set them apart from other carriers. When you consider that their profits from SMS texting on folks that bought these new phones dropped precipitously, they had to either be wise, hungry, or a little of both to not ONLY lose money on SMS, but also lose money on data charges as well. Ended up being a good deal for them overall because people were willing to switch carriers to get the iPhone.
Good point why we should regulate their conduct now. 👍 With specific laws, if necessary.
They could - but miss out on the economies of scale and network effects of being on both of the two dominant platforms. Which work out not only in favour of thousands of developers but also millions of users.
If not, we or they should make them.
No it‘s not. They aren’t limiting imports from other countries. It‘s not about limiting sales either.
👉 If anything is protectionist, it’s Apple’s App Store store policies.
Which not only prohibit outside sales but now also streaming „outside“ content to apps on their devices. Governments are and have been investigating whether they should remove such protectionist barriers from the market.
that is all bs. Apple makes the iphone so they can decide what they want to let run on it. if u not happy with what runs on it buy a android. thats wat is competition called and not what is allowed to run on iOS.
And that is undesirable since there are so few App Stores and mobile operating systems that dominate the market.
Competition is about what’s allowed to run on iOS.
Apple themselves are positioning and advertising their App Store as a global marketplace that is competitive between developers. And that’s what it is. Apps and developers are competing for users and heir money.
Very true. I’d bet several someone’s at Cingular lost their jobs over that deal, too. Just too different from the practices of the day.
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The timeline here is incorrect, Eric Schmidt stayed on Apple’s board for another two years after Android’s first public beta release, leaving meetings whenever there was a potential conflict of interest.
Only when the FTC raised concerns regarding the ties between both companies, he resigned in 2009.
Shortly afterwards Arthur Levinson, who had also been serving both boards for years, gave up his seat at Google’s.
The US gov are probably going to sue Apple aswell
Feds are thinking about an antitrust case against Apple
The company “abused its market power to stifle smaller tech companies,” advocates say.
Looks likely after they intervened in the Epic appeal
U.S. antitrust officials ask to join arguments in Apple appeal
Officials from the U.S. Department of Justice have asked to take part in oral arguments next month in "Fortnite" creator Epic Games' appeal of a court loss against Apple Inc , according to court documents filed Friday.
The US gov are probably going to sue Apple aswell
Feds are thinking about an antitrust case against Apple
The company “abused its market power to stifle smaller tech companies,” advocates say.www.theverge.com
Looks likely after they intervened in the Epic appeal
U.S. antitrust officials ask to join arguments in Apple appeal
Officials from the U.S. Department of Justice have asked to take part in oral arguments next month in "Fortnite" creator Epic Games' appeal of a court loss against Apple Inc , according to court documents filed Friday.www.reuters.com
Looks like the US government is too divided to see the bigger picture as well. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
exactly thats competing within the Apple Market. Now if they want competition against apple there is android since Microsoft wast able to push their Windows Mobile junk