Apple and Google stores are classic rent seeker behavior.
Deny them profit.
You don’t have to use the Google store though.
Apple forces you to the their app store, and they have a huge list of requirements they impose on apps to which dicks around developers
You don’t have to use Google’s store, but they’ve done a lot of anticompetitive shenanigans to snuff out competition and ensure they remain the dominant storefront.
After Google saw how much money Apple was making, they seemed to immediately regret having Android be an open platform. It was a convenience when they acquired the product early on because they could bring it to market quickly, but they’ve done everything in their power since then to close it up.
There are so many android devices out there that don’t even use the Google Play store…
In fact, you’re not even allowed to use Google services and play store in China and I thought Samsung ships their own store don’t they?
Windows uses Amazon appstore for Android too
A lot of Android roms likely use different app stores too
In contrast, Apple has 1 store. And when pebble was released before their own watch, they delayed adding the app to the store 3 weeks which basically killed them.
You can also disable play store on pixel phones (I just checked).
Short of advertising competing app stores front page or offering to install them, not sure what else they can do?
Not only do they force you to use the App Store, developing an app for iOS is a nightmare. Without special tools you must have a mac and a $100/yr apple developer license.
After having to deal with that shit at my old place of work I’ve moved to never touch app development again.
Yep. Totally agree.
I only ended up with a Mac because edge kept hijacking my chrome tabs every reboot
But, it costs far more than a PC, and honestly, the hardware capabilities are worse
At least the M3 chips I think now have ray tracing. But still no nested VT so I can’t even run the windows android emulator in parallels
Also, I keep coming across weird Mac os bugs with windows handling and device handling
I actually used to sell them. And got in an argument with a national sales manager over running windows on them. Apple released boot camp a week later and suddenly he returned to repeat the same arguments I used against him. Never got an apology
I don’t think this difference matters that much in Patreon’s case. Convincing users to sideload an app on Android is likely much harder than just getting them to visit the Patreon website on their phone and subscribe to users that way. Heck, they could probably make the mobile site virtually identical to the app anyway.
Yeah, you don’t have to, but then nobody is getting your app. Most people don’t have other stores and will look at you weird if you mention side loading. Samsung/Galaxy Store maybe, but even Samsung users mostly don’t use it.
So technically your don’t have to use it and your app is obtainable without it, but If you want to actually reach some users, you have to be on Google Play.
Google search was just declared a monopoly, when there are obviously other searched engines anyone can use. If that’s a monopoly then Google Play is a bigger monopoly.
On Android you can distribute your app through the Play Store without being forced to use Google’s in-app purchases. For example: Patreon.
You’re not wrong about Google Play, but Apple’s behaviour is objectively worse.
The “platform economy” is just another term for digital landlords.
Fuck 'em.
If digital platforms didn’t add any value, every android app would just be available for sideloading on the dev’s website. Not that I agree with Apple’s pricing tactics, but running and moderating a marketplace isn’t free
Landlords don’t create the value themselves, they are an intermediary for value.
Platforms don’t create the value themselves, they are also an intermediary for value.
The value app stores provide is reach, but they don’t get that value without the developer’s effort. The only thing they provide is the network effect, which is nothing more than a consequence of making themselves the default option for users of these phones.
For the same reason that landlords don’t provide inherent value, but still capture so much of the housing market, platforms don’t provide inherent value, but still capture so much of the app market.
They push out competition. If a landlord buys a house, there’s one less house for someone to buy. If an app store brings in another user, there’s one less user that will use other means to acquire an app.
I myself primarily use alternative means of installing apps. Direct APK downloads, or F-Droid. The only reason these exist is because the apps I use are specifically targeting a privacy-conscious user base that is likely to be using alternative means to acquire apps in the first place.
Because these platforms immediately monopolize user acquisition by bundling themselves with the OS, they directly fight any pressure to use alternative means, which makes most app developer efforts to create alternative means not worth the time.
App stores can and should be free. Without an app store, Apple and Google would have barely any market for their phones.
These platforms exist to give the hardware & OS itself value. The only reason these fees exist is because they are monopolies.
Yeah, I actually think this policy is 100% correct and, if more services did this instead of eating the costs, we could have a real discussion about the harm caused by arbitrary fees.
It will likely result in Apple seeking a special deal with Patreon to avoid this mess though. It’s really not a good look for Apple especially as they cater themselves to the creatives market.
Being as this is very similar to the apple epic legal fight that epic lost earlier this year, I doubt apple will make a deal. My understanding is that patreon can cave, choose to pay 27% commission, or make their own store.
Though skimming the news around epic’s attempts to make a store, you “can” make a store in compliance with EU and UK laws, but apple made it kinda impossible to actually do and epic is fighting it in court again?
So patreon seems to have read the lay of things and said I guess we just have to make the best of a shitty situation and communicate everything to try to limit the pain.
It’s almost like apple feels like they have the power to do whatever they want because they’ve created a market where they don’t have competition…
Until recently, apps were not even allowed to charge less outside their apps than on the app store or to link to outside stores.
This is a given for many kinds of services. Always purchase subscriptions on another device or direct through their website - never use your Apple devices’ app store.
I’m just worried for the content creators on patreon. Their choices are a significant reduction in income, jacking up prices and pricing out some of their patrons (thus reducing their income), or if patreon pulls from apple there’s a significant reduction in visibility and additional hurdles (thus reducing income).
So it seems that no matter the outcome, creators suffer the consequences of the Apple tax.
Fuck apple. Rotten to the core. Class action lawsuit in the very least.
Vote. We need House, Senate, and President to not be corporate fascists so that we can impeach at least 2 or 3 supreme court judges, replace them with rational human beings, reverse the overturning of Chevron Deference, and then let a stronger FTC gut these fucking companies.
Self dealing, competition buying, corporate fascists. The lot of them.
What we can work on is awareness. If iOS users are aware, they can choose to simply go to the website directly and make the purchase, instead of using the app. They can still use the app for consumption.
Yep, that’s what everyone I know with Apple devices have always done. I used to have a Nexus 7 (rip) and an iPhone, and the prices on the App store were always higher than the prices on Android Market (rip).
I’m wondering why it’s being pointed out now by everyone, but I’m not gonna complain if it leads to some sort of price parity regulation across platforms.
It’s all about trust. The problem is that people trust Apple not to steal your credit card information and to honor subscription rules etc. You probably trust the independent platform a bit less, such as many of those scammer platforms who might even charge people more than they should by “mistake”, then have an awful process to get reimbursed etc.
In that sense, most people will always prefer Apple to manage these things. Everything’s then in one place, and you trust that once you cancel it you won’t be charged again.
As an example, I had a Netflix subscription and after I cancelled it, I’ve got 2 or three emails saying “Thank you for reactivating your subscription” which I didn’t do. I suspect they make some pop up that my mom tapped without noticing, but that definitely shouldn’t happen without my password. I could only solve the problem by adding a second payment method (which doesn’t work) and only then it allowed me to delete my previous credit card data.
Someone’s looking to get in on some anti-trust action.
I thought Apple’s app store practices were found to be legal in the Epic Games trial? (unlike Google’s)
Which is kinda ridiculous since Apple’s practices are what Google does but worse.
To paraphrase an analysis that I read awhile ago, Apple’s practices were found to be legal because Apple applied the rules unilaterally whereas Google would make backroom deals to alter the rules on an app-by-app basis.
Please take this with a grain of salt because 1) IANAL and 2) it is the middle of a workday break and I didn’t take the time to search for a source, just basing this off of memory.
If you want I can research this after work to provide sources and update my comment.
