[HN Gopher] ProtonMail CEO calls Apple's forced in-app purchases...
___________________________________________________________________
ProtonMail CEO calls Apple's forced in-app purchases 'Mafia
extortion'
Author : illuminated
Score : 512 points
Date : 2020-10-09 14:22 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.techspot.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.techspot.com)
| namanaggarwal wrote:
| What problem does Apple have with PWAs (apart from monetary ones
| ofcourse), how are they justifying not implementing features in
| browser for a good PWA?
| viktorcode wrote:
| They are far more interested in bringing media and privacy
| features to Safari. That's part of their business. Exactly like
| making web apps is part of Google's. Hence, the difference.
| pier25 wrote:
| IMO there is no real justification, but I've seen people from
| the Webkit team on Twitter claim privacy related issues.
| coder543 wrote:
| Agreed. PWAs added to the home screen should be able to at
| least have push notifications, and those notification
| settings should be able to be managed in the Settings app
| _exactly_ as if the PWA were an app installed through the App
| Store.
|
| It's absolutely not a privacy or security issue.
| nlitened wrote:
| My battery life and privacy.
| thewebcount wrote:
| And user experience. There are native parts of the OS for
| which there are no PWA hooks (and it would basically be
| reimplementing the entire OS in the browser to add them all).
| They want the experience on their devices to be the full
| experience, not the limited web experience you get with PWAs.
| coder543 wrote:
| A web app added to your home screen affects privacy _much
| less_ than a native app, since it is even more sandboxed and
| restricted, and it even affects battery life less in some
| areas due to these restrictions.
|
| Native apps can schedule background tasks, among other things
| that would impact your battery life and privacy.
|
| So... disagree entirely. Please provide concrete examples of
| how a native app is less capable of invading your privacy
| than a web app that has been added to your home screen.
|
| (Please keep in mind that home screen PWAs don't even have
| the same level of access to your Safari sessions that random
| websites have, which is why you have to log into PWAs a
| second time, even if you are already logged in using Safari.)
| x2f10 wrote:
| I read the article, but I'm still stuck on why Apple is asking
| for IAP to be included. Is the argument: "Hey, your app works
| with subscription services. You need to give Apple users the
| option to purchase via the App Store."
|
| If so, why doesn't Fastmail (from what I can tell) offer IAP?
| Isn't this the same idea?
| 1123581321 wrote:
| Don't they? They said in June that they'd planned to and were
| also asked to.
| https://mobile.twitter.com/Fastmail/status/12738002229893242...
| viktorcode wrote:
| The rules are simple: if you mention in your app about the
| premium service tier, then you have to offer it inside the app
| with built in purchases.
|
| Don't want to have IAPs? Don't mention the premium service you
| have for sale elsewhere. That's the option picked by many
| companies.
|
| So, in reality Apple doesn't force developers to adopt in-app
| purchases. They make them follow the rule I outlined here.
| croh wrote:
| Google/Apple should drop the percentage. 30% is too high.
| joshstrange wrote:
| Honest question, should Sony/MS/Nintendo also drop their
| percentage? How about the cut stores get to put products on
| their shelves?
|
| Because whenever I zoom out and look at more that just
| Google/Apple the more I see examples of this happening
| everywhere and I wonder why there isn't similar outrage. Like
| with the whole "FB mad that Apple wouldn't let them call out
| the 30% cut" thing, I mean Kroger isn't going to let a company
| print on their box "Kroger takes 30% of this sale"...
| criddell wrote:
| > should Sony/MS/Nintendo also drop their percentage?
|
| Yes.
|
| > How about the cut stores get to put products on their
| shelves?
|
| No.
|
| A digital store has an essentially unlimited capacity and
| carrying a new product involves doing a review and adding a
| new record in a database. Kroger, on the other hand, has to
| do this and manage limited shelf space.
|
| The limited resource in an app store is the slot in some
| promotion carousel. Go ahead and charge whatever you want for
| that.
| jwalgenbach wrote:
| Kroger buys wholesale, and sets the prices in it's store
| independent of what it paid (presumably they want a profit,
| but it could also be a loss leader). And there is no lock-in
| for a grocery store (i.e. I can buy the identical product
| elsewhere). This is a false equivalency.
| stale2002 wrote:
| Sony/ect don't have nearly the same market dominance over a
| huge industry, as compared to Apple.
|
| Apple has 50% of the entire US smart phone market.
|
| This is a significant larger amount of market power then
| those other situations.
| nomel wrote:
| I think his point is that every middle man is doing it, so
| it's more like 100% of the products you purchase
| indirectly.
| mhh__ wrote:
| Probably. Although it's worth saying that phones are the PCs
| of 10 years ago, whereas games consoles are still just games
| consoles.
|
| Consider that the profit margin for a train line might be
| something like a few percent, and that's for a capital
| intensive industry, these companies charge 30% for what?
|
| This is why they should regulate so that no product, where it
| can be reasonably applied, should have a single app store. If
| you want to pay more for a better service that's fine, but
| with no competition it's just a racket.
| viktorcode wrote:
| If you are a market leader in attracting developers and
| customers while keeping this commission, that is too low.
| api wrote:
| It's the price we all pay for ignoring user experience.
|
| This goes way back. Take this from the old jargon file:
|
| http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/P/point-and-drool-inter...
|
| From the earliest days of computing, hacker types have regarded
| ease of use and simplicity as indicative of stupidity and as a
| "dumbing down" of computing. This mentality survives to this day
| in the fetish that so many have for complexity and the fact that
| UI/UX is often the last thing to get attention in designs led by
| programmers.
|
| Apple meanwhile took the opposite stance. Computers should be
| easy to use. Complexity is bad, especially at the UI level.
| Things should "just work."
|
| Calling bullshit on the sentiment in that Jargon file entry above
| made Apple for a time the most valuable company on Earth.
|
| The tax we now have to pay to them is a dumb tax for the cult of
| complexity and "real men do it manually" bullshit. To break the
| App Store and Apple semi-monopoly, start not by criticizing but
| by _asking why it is so successful_. Only by answering that
| question will any challenger including FOSS be able to
| successfully compete with it.
| Barrin92 wrote:
| Apple is nothing else but the digital equivalent of a landlord
| extracting economic rents from everyone in the ecosystem. It's
| time to put an end to it, and while we're at it the same goes for
| all the other platform owners.
|
| We (in this case the EU) should give it the same treatment we
| gave credit card companies. Cap their rates at 1% or whatever so
| they can cover the operational costs of their stores, stop them
| from banning apps from their stores that aren't breaking any
| laws, and that's that. If they want to make more money for their
| shareholders they should actually build things rather than abuse
| their gatekeeper position.
|
| Just imagine if Microsoft had taken a 30% cut from every
| developer who ever compiled software for windows, or told them
| what software stack to use to develop their software. We'd have
| gone on the barricades immediately. Microsoft had to face
| scrutiny for bundling a browser, compared to what smartphone
| companies have done to their devices that was a joke
| draw_down wrote:
| > digital equivalent of a landlord extracting economic rents
| from everyone in the ecosystem.
|
| Ok, well, it's not illegal to be a landlord, nor immoral (as
| most people see it at least). So I'm not sure this is a very
| good argument.
|
| You could even say "they're as evil as Ticketmaster" and it's
| like... yeah well Ticketmaster continues to operate. You don't
| have to like them, basically no one does, but they're playing
| according to the rules of the game.
| jqpabc123 wrote:
| If you're an end user --- don't buy Apple.
|
| If you're a developer --- don't build for Apple.
|
| Problem solved.
| esarbe wrote:
| In theory; yes. In practice; not quite enough.
|
| Apple is doing everything it can to stop the customer from
| being informed. As a developer, you are not allowed to tell
| your customers how much of a cut Apple gets.
|
| This has to change.
| d1zzy wrote:
| When you will build your own piece of land from scratch then
| you also get to decide what laws govern it.
|
| The iPhone, iOS and the Apple Store exist because someone had
| the idea, will and spent tons of money building it. They aren't
| natural resources that Apple acquired and imposed on people so
| now everyone else has no choice but to pay the Apple tax.
|
| So I don't see how that analogy applies here.
| Barrin92 wrote:
| >When you will build your own piece of land from scratch then
| you also get to decide what laws govern it.
|
| I don't know where you live but where I do the government
| determines laws, on my property or otherwise. i can't just do
| what i want on my property just because it's my property.
| Neither my actual land or the digital land of the app store
| are some sort of extraterritorial space, we're not living in
| the Shadowrun universe
| zo1 wrote:
| What about the products of my labor that I create from
| scratch? Can I decide what laws govern that too? You know,
| like taxes?
|
| That idea went out the window a long time ago. Now we are all
| beholden to each-other and society on some level, so best we
| deal with it and solve these anti-competative issues and
| predatory platforms, otherwise let's agree that it's
| completely immoral and stop cherry-picking "moral rules"
| based on what we find useful at the time.
| rfw300 wrote:
| > Just imagine if Microsoft had taken a 30% cut from every
| developer who ever compiled software for windows
|
| Microsoft has the whole code-signing racket going on for
| Windows, but that's at least a flat fee in fairness.
| donmcronald wrote:
| Yeah. That's another good example of abusing a market
| position to limit options to incumbents. I'd love to have LE
| style domain validate code signing certificates.
| segmondy wrote:
| I agree with you, the say I have framed is.
|
| I say Cisco should charge for every packet that goes through
| their router that is involved in a Financial transaction. If
| you don't pay, they add you to a blacklist. It's feasible,
| router has a blacklist, Cisco checks if you make money, if you
| do, they shake you down, if you don't pay, they add you to the
| blacklist and router downloads and refuses to route your IP
| addresses. Sounds ridiculous, but it's doable. After all they
| are facilitating the transaction.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| > Apple is nothing else but the digital equivalent of a
| landlord extracting economic rents from everyone in the
| ecosystem. It's time to put an end to it, and while we're at it
| the same goes for all the other platform owners.
|
| And while we're at it, implement a Georgist tax scheme on
| landlords.
| ncr100 wrote:
| > Just imagine if Microsoft had taken a 30% cut from every
| developer who ever compiled software for windows
|
| How does this relate to this discussion?
|
| Just inserting "30%" into ANY financial transaction and drawing
| a comparison is a false equivalency.
|
| If I could, I would downvote this.
| kinkrtyavimoodh wrote:
| "stop them from banning apps from their stores that aren't
| breaking any laws"
|
| It's unlikely to happen in the US because one primary weapon of
| Cancel Culture is going for the financial jugular, by getting
| people they dislike banned from payment processing platforms,
| who all hide behind "we are a private entity" BS.
| ashtonkem wrote:
| I'm not comfortable having the US government tell Apple what
| entities they are obligated to do business with.
| iamdbtoo wrote:
| How is it BS for a private company to say they don't want to
| take money from a group like Stormfront?
| dpiers wrote:
| What about video game consoles? Early in a generation, they are
| sold at razor-thin (or negative) margins, with the expectation
| that the manufacturer will recoup losses from licensing fees
| over the life of the console and that costs will come down in
| later revisions.
|
| If manufacturers lose their substantial licensing fees, they
| would be forced to charge more upfront for the consoles which
| is objectively worse for consumers.
| manfredo wrote:
| Consoles are much, much narrower in use than smartphones.
| Most consoles have a few thousand titles, if that. By
| comparison the App Store had millions of applications. And as
| you point out, manufacturers are building these consoles at a
| loss. Apple builds it's phones at a profit. Getting a game
| approved for sale on a console is much more involved than
| releasing an App on the App Store, and involves significant
| manual review not just of the quality of the game but also
| the content.
| inopinatus wrote:
| And yet even then, console games such as MMOs are not
| required to actively mislead the consumer about their
| account management options.
| tedunangst wrote:
| Can't wait for Apple to cut the App Store back to a
| thousand apps so they qualify as a console.
| vlozko wrote:
| There's no legal way to define the boundary between what's
| classified as a computer vs a console. Game consoles have
| apps that are traditional to a computer, such as streaming
| video and even video editing. Portability isn't a reliable
| indicator as you have systems like the Switch.
|
| Nor is it realistically possible to create legal guidelines
| based on profit margins. I don't see how it makes sense to
| apply a different set of rules on devices that are sold as
| a loss and make up for it in software sales vs the inverse
| or even both being profitable.
| itake wrote:
| Apple does a manual review of the quality of their apps as
| well as their content (e.g. if you own a social app that
| allows users to publish images, they will verify there are
| no adult images being published and there are systems in
| place for banning these images.)
| GloriousKoji wrote:
| Everyone here seems to be obsessed with the fact that a
| console is a "computer" in the turing machine sense but the
| fact is that people buy consoles with the strong primary
| purpose of entertainment.
|
| Smart phones and tablets have gotten to the point where
| they are expected to be able to do hundreds of different
| things, with some peoples livelihood dependent on it.
| ulucs wrote:
| Unless they are Nintendo, where they make money on both
| console sales and licensing fees.
|
| Microsoft also appears to have solved that issue with their
| game pass opening and many game studio acquisitions.
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| Would it be objectively worse for consumers? You buy an
| expensive machine once every ten years and then the games
| would be more reasonably priced for that whole time? How can
| you say with certainty that would be worse?
| apsanz wrote:
| Would consumer really be objectively worse? The small margins
| are only early in a generation that last 7 years. The hard
| core gamers will need to pay more to get a console but the
| consoles would quickly drop in price. Also, the games would
| likely be much cheaper.
| missedthecue wrote:
| There is a benefit. The prevention of side loading limits
| malware. Windows is ridden with malware.
| croh wrote:
| Google/Apple should drop the percentage. 30% is too high. Store
| is a kind of ecosystem which based on the mutual benefits of both
| Apple and Devs. Devs helped to accelerate their products. Having
| billions in reserve, they should not hurt this relationship.
| monadic2 wrote:
| I'm willing to negotiate. Starting offer: fuck your payment
| processor entirely.
| d1zzy wrote:
| > 30% is too high
|
| What determines what is too high here? If it's about the cost
| of it (it costs Google/Apple much less money to build and
| maintain an ecosystem so they can "afford" to do it) wouldn't
| that imply that there is a huge market opportunity for someone
| else to build their own ecosystem and charge less? But maybe
| because that doesn't happen is proof that it may not be "too
| high".
| nvrspyx wrote:
| > imply there is a huge market opportunity for someone else
| to build their own ecosystem and charge less?
|
| Hmmm. Let's see what one would need to do at a bare minimum:
|
| - start manufacturing phones
|
| - build own OS (or fork Android)
|
| - develop own SDK
|
| - develop own online store infrastructure
|
| - manufacture other devices (e.g. Apple) and/or develop other
| services (e.g. Google) to complete "ecosystem"
|
| The barrier to entry in developing a mobile (and beyond)
| ecosystem is astronomical when competing with either Apple or
| Google. It's practically impossible to break into a multi-
| trillion dollar market when it's siloed to two multi-trillion
| dollar corporations.
| donmcronald wrote:
| And it barely makes a difference. You'd still need to deal
| with Apple and Google. There's no way to get enough
| competition into the mobile OS market to make it healthy.
| They need to be regulated with a big stick.
| viktorcode wrote:
| That actually pretty good explanation why mobile stores'
| commissions won't be reduced any time soon.
| viktorcode wrote:
| I don't think they have shortage of developers wishing to sell
| through their stores. So, there's really no incentives to cut
| the commission.
| traveler01 wrote:
| Well, true that's kinda how Mafia works.
| ProAm wrote:
| It's protection money. Apple is 'protecting you' from bad
| actors.
| drummer wrote:
| Apple is 'protecting' you from what they are going to do to
| you if you don't do what they want and pay. Much like the
| government and IRS.
| ProAm wrote:
| > Much like the government and IRS.
|
| ...and the mafia.
| drummer wrote:
| Many people still don't realize government and IRS are
| the mafia, believe it or not.
| Sargos wrote:
| I wish Apple would protect me from Apple
| d1zzy wrote:
| Except the Mafia hasn't built from scratch the neighborhood it
| asks "protection money" from, it already existed there and they
| pushed out anyone able to stand up to them and started
| enforcing their rules over the people already living there.
| Also comparing an organization that terrorizes, mauls and
| murders people in real life living in their home neighborhood
| to a company that imposes strict rules to ensure they get a cut
| of every sale on their own digital platform seems far fetched.
| dingaling wrote:
| Well one could say that all those mafiosi keep the
| opportunistic criminals out of the neighborhood and make it
| safe for the law-abiding businessman and resident.
|
| So in essence yes, they built the society by providing a
| predictable and stable order. Follow the rules and you'll be
| fine and will be safe from arbitrary crime. A form of
| societal curation, one might say.
|
| And they need paid to keep maintaining this service, and 30%
| doesn't seem too high does it? For the benefits they provide?
| Just don't try to fiddle your accounts to hide any other
| income you have, or try any other tricks; you might find your
| contract terminated.
| adventured wrote:
| > Also comparing an organization that terrorizes, mauls and
| murders people in real life living in their home neighborhood
| to a company that imposes strict rules to ensure they get a
| cut of every sale on their own digital platform seems far
| fetched.
|
| It's not far fetched, it's moronic, immature and quotable
| clickbait trash. The CEO is trying to get attention by saying
| something blatantly extreme. It's perfectly representative of
| the age we live in, where people lack self-control and
| routinely throw outrage tantrums like they're children and
| desperate for attention at all times.
|
| He might as well have declared that Tim Cook is a murderous
| despot, just go ahead and leap to the finish line for that
| mental train of stupidity.
| fareesh wrote:
| Are food ordering apps in the US also forced to use IAP?
| diegorbaquero wrote:
| I am sure if Apple dropped the percentage to single-digit, no
| developer would argue the value that IAP provide, the problem has
| always been the exorbitant 30%.
| fermigier wrote:
| This reminds me of a very different time...
|
| In 1997, then CEO of Sybase Mitchell Kertzman said in an
| interview with the French trade magazine 01 Informatique:
|
| "Q: When you launched Jaguar CTS, a middleware tool competing
| with a Microsoft product, you received a rather explicit phone
| call... A: It was the Mafia! When I hung up, I realized that I
| had just received a phone call from the godfather who forbade me
| to sell drugs on his territory. And you know, Microsoft people
| behave like the Mafia: they don't have to break your leg, they
| just have to threaten you."
|
| Source (in French):
| http://bat8.inria.fr/~lang/hotlist/free/abuse/mafia/kertzman...
| brobdingnagians wrote:
| Does he mean that Microsoft literally called him and told him
| not to use Jaguar CTS? Would that be telemetry phoning back
| when competing products were used? I'm a bit confused by the
| word choice there.
| pjc50 wrote:
| He meant when he started selling it he got a phone call
| telling him not to do so from Microsoft.
| bitL wrote:
| It seems like completing the Mafia trilogy games is a
| prerequisite for being a CxO...
| huhtenberg wrote:
| Back in the early '00s there was a popular legend in the
| startup circles that you don't want Microsoft to be interested
| in what you do.
|
| The legend went that if Microsoft liked you and decided to
| acquire you, they would give you a binary choice between a low-
| ball offer and a lawsuit based on their patent portfolio.
| gherkinnn wrote:
| Oh. Never got it as a child, but the Simpsons hat a bit about
| just that: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=H27rfr59RiE
| whaaaaaaaaa wrote:
| ProtonMail charges a lot for their services and they have no
| problem with that. I don't see why Apple shouldn't get their cut.
| ProAm wrote:
| Apple should not charge a user for access to their own device.
| A user has paid for their device in full and should own it. A
| software company (ProtonMail) wants to sell the user software
| to use on their device. There is no need for Apple to be in the
| middle of this transaction, especially at 30% of any money
| trading hands. I have no problem with Apple charging 30% to be
| on the AppStore, but vendors should be allowed to install
| software via 3rd party stores or direct B2C.
| addicted wrote:
| Is Protonmail taking a cut out of any transactions that may
| happen over your email?
| whaaaaaaaaa wrote:
| No. But I feel robbed when I have to pay $8/mo for an extra
| virtual email box.
|
| Sidenote: Apple also doesn't take a cut of any payments that
| I send with my iPhone.
| hundchenkatze wrote:
| Then you should feel robbed when $2.40 of that goes to an
| unrelated company.
| whaaaaaaaaa wrote:
| It's not like I want to build my own smartphone ecosystem
| or an encrypted email service.
|
| So I pay and get on with my life. No one forces me to do
| this.
| hundchenkatze wrote:
| No one forces you to shitpost with a throwaway either,
| yet here we are...
| NikolaeVarius wrote:
| Is someone making you use ProtonMail?
| whaaaaaaaaa wrote:
| Is someone making ProtonMail use AppStore?
| djfdat wrote:
| Yes, the large number of users that expect it to work
| natively on their primary computing device.
| politician wrote:
| Yes.
| celsoazevedo wrote:
| Unlike macOS, Windows, Linux, and Android, there's no
| other way of installing apps on iOS. You have to use the
| App Store.
| whaaaaaaaaa wrote:
| Can't ProtonMail do a web based mobile client?
| celsoazevedo wrote:
| You can't do a proper web app on iOS because
| Safari/Webkit doesn't support what you need to do it
| well: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14864131
|
| This wouldn't be a problem if you could install Firefox,
| Chrome, etc, but on iOS browsers can't use their
| engine... they're essentially Safari with a different
| skin on top.
|
| I think complaints from devs/services make less sense on
| Android. Almost everyone uses Google's Play Store, but
| you can install an app manually like you do on your phone
| or even use a 3rd party store. If you don't like Chrome,
| you can install Firefox. If Google bans VPNs in China
| (like Apple did), users can sideload the app.
|
| On iOS, for devs, it's either the App Store and Apple
| rules or you're out of the platform. For users, it's what
| Apple allows... and many of their rules aren't there to
| protect users.
| kinkrtyavimoodh wrote:
| YES. That is precisely what the 50 threads on HN on this
| topic in the last two months have been about.
|
| There is no realistic / reasonable way to distribute an
| iPhone app outside the app store.
| whaaaaaaaaa wrote:
| Why buy an iPhone then?
| mthoms wrote:
| You seem to think Apple's cut is coming out of ProtonMail's
| profits. It isn't, it's coming out of users pockets (via higher
| prices). From the article:
|
| >Yen says the company was forced to raise its prices since the
| 30-percent commission that Apple takes completely ate away
| ProtonMail's profit margins.
|
| Now multiply the 30% increase times every (paid) app on your
| phone.
|
| (NB: I'm not against Apple making healthy money from the App
| store but 30% is just gouging IMHO)
| rickyc091 wrote:
| A Plus plan is currently $5/mo through their web. If you purchase
| an annual plan it's $4/mo ($48).
|
| From what I can see, you can only purchase an annual plan on iOS
| for $60/mo. They also have fine print that states that Apple
| takes a 30% fee.
| pier25 wrote:
| The walled garden could have worked if Apple had acted as a
| benevolent dictator. Instead, it degraded into a despot and it
| will face the consequences of this.
| ramenandtrance wrote:
| I think this is what happens when we have a "feudal system".
| People have given over control to a few feudal lords. We
| increasingly don't control our infrastructure or data. We are
| seeing the consolidation of power into the hands of a few
| powerful organizations. Once you get locked into your walled in
| garden, it's difficult to leave, be this for developers or end
| users, and these organizations know it.
| toastal wrote:
| Let's just use PWA! Oh wait, no push notifications, proprietary
| asset properties, and other crippled feature sets on iOS? Guess
| that option is out too.
| coder543 wrote:
| You want an email app to be able to have notifications?!
|
| -- Apple, surprised pikachu face, probably
|
| It has been over 5 years since Chrome for Android added support
| for push notifications.
|
| Apple needs to stop dragging their heels here, since they are
| clearly using every excuse in the book not to let users receive
| notification from apps outside the app store purely because it
| benefits them financially to do this, in a manner that is very
| anti-consumer and anti-developer.
|
| Users don't have to be assaulted with drive-by notification
| requests. Safari can require that PWAs only be given the chance
| to receive push notification permission _after_ being added to
| the home screen. It 's not rocket science. SpaceX landed a
| rocket booster almost 5 years ago, and they've gone through the
| certification process to send astronauts to the space station,
| and they're well on their way to making their next-gen Starship
| platform orbital. But Apple can't figure out a way to support
| APNS for PWAs. It's _just too hard!_ Apparently.
|
| If PWAs supported APNS, Apple would have a significantly more
| defensible anti-trust position, but Apple has shown that they
| just have no interest in making things easier for themselves --
| let alone their users or developers.
|
| Apple also supports PWAs so poorly that the new App Library
| feature doesn't even properly support them. PWAs have no option
| to be removed from the home screen and left in the App Library,
| unlike all other apps, and iOS 14 is the first time that there
| has been any distinction between PWAs and regular apps as far
| as the home screen is concerned. This is without even
| discussing the lack of widget support for PWAs, which would
| legitimately be challenging for Apple to support well, unlike
| APNS.
|
| I say all of this as someone who really likes iPhone, and is
| frustrated that Apple seems to be doing everything possible
| this year to push me back to Android.
|
| _Just add APNS support to PWAs that have been added to the
| home screen, Apple!_ And please don 't wait another 5 years to
| do it.
| pier25 wrote:
| > _If PWAs supported APNS, Apple would have a significantly
| more defensible anti-trust position, but Apple has shown that
| they just have no interest in making things easier for
| themselves_
|
| I've been wondering about this for the past couple of weeks.
|
| Is Apple really so blind that they don't see they are digging
| themselves into a hole?
|
| If iOS had first-class support for PWAs they could probably
| keep running the AppStore in any way they wish.
| oscargrouch wrote:
| "Its for your own safety kiddo. Those stuff are dangerous and
| will harm your device"
|
| When companies use the same logic of spreading fear to
| manipulate and ultimately control as the war on terror/war on
| drugs from Bush/Nixon, you know something is really wrong.
| qwertox wrote:
| To be fair, push notifications from websites can be harmful
| if the user doesn't understand them.
|
| I know of a person who just clicked the "allow notifications"
| in order to not get bothered by the popup, and then they
| started getting notifications with sex offers and stuff like
| that. The website which triggered them was
| https://open4u.co.uk, which was prominently recommended by
| Google due to its positioning in the search results.
| rewq4321 wrote:
| The user agent gets to choose how the permission requests
| are shown - that's not part of the spec. For example, they
| can choose to ignore permission requests until the user has
| interacted with the site for a significant amount of time.
| They can make the permission prompt more explicit and
| "scary". They can choose to only allow notifications after
| the site has been added to the home screen.
|
| This is not a question of safety at all - Apple has control
| over how many people get tricked via their control over the
| permission prompt.
| birdyrooster wrote:
| How can one be forced to include in app purchases? This seems
| worded strangely. Maybe I missed the paragraph explaining how
| Apple did this.
| viktorcode wrote:
| One can't, and wasn't.
|
| If you read carefully, you may reconstruct the actual issue and
| the store policy:
|
| Either Proton mail removes mention of their premium service
| from the app (and the app can still provide this service to
| anyone paying outside of App Store) or they keep it and then
| provide in-app purchases.
|
| They clearly decided to use IAPs. If you ask me, this is a
| smart move, as many customers won't be bothering with other
| payment options.
| TonyTrapp wrote:
| Quite simple: You are not allowed to push any further updates
| until you either 1) allow the subscription to be purchased
| through Apple or 2) make your service completely free so no IAP
| is required.
|
| Apple has been rejecting app updates for lesser reasons.
| 188201 wrote:
| In addition, Apple doesn't want the app to lay out the fact
| that the extra customer will pay is an Apple tax, and ban the
| app because the app show "unnecessary information" to Apple
| customer.
| barake wrote:
| They tell you to add IAPs that are to their liking, or you're
| out of the store for violations of the App Store Review
| Guidelines.
| mthoms wrote:
| Before: One could subscribe _only_ over the web.
|
| After: You _can_ subscribe in-app (in addition to online) and
| Apple takes a cut of that purchase. You aren 't allowed to
| mention anywhere in the App that there are alternate (perhaps
| cheaper) purchase methods.
| bsg75 wrote:
| I'm actually happier to pay a small premium for IAP based
| subscriptions because of the cancellation options.
|
| Having been subjected to asinine "retention" policies that make
| ending a subscription service an onerous and time consuming
| process (ex: NYT), and having seen first hand how a company
| purposefully makes subscription cancellations difficult, being
| able to open a single interface and click `Cancel` is a massive
| UX benefit.
|
| I'm not debating if a 30% cut is reasonable, but in the drive to
| move everything to a subscription model, I have started avoiding
| services without an IAP option.
| glasss wrote:
| It's awful that in today's world, a feature of a platform is
| that they don't partake in a particular scummy business
| practice. It's a shame that we even have this issue.
| r00fus wrote:
| Blame the "no regulation" crowd for that. Well functioning
| regulation and consumer protection is what promotes good
| things by forcing bad actors to get in line.
| gowld wrote:
| There's no guarantee that regulation is good regulation.
| baq wrote:
| And there is no guarantee that bad regulation is worse
| than no regulation.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| Very true, which is why a smart merchant won't push their
| luck by abusing their customers.
|
| Turns out a lot of them, such as the NYT, aren't that
| smart.
| jungturk wrote:
| In theory, a competitive market could achieve the same
| goals, but in practice, it seems like marketplaces often
| need some regulatory nudging to get over the humps.
| r00fus wrote:
| Completely unregulated free markets lead to extremes like
| slavery and leaded toys.
|
| Regulatory practices can be abused or coopted (leading to
| regulatory capture) but that shouldn't mean we shouldn't
| keep pushing.
|
| Would you frequent a completely unmoderated online forum?
| We all know how chatroulette turned out...
| fatbird wrote:
| Every time we say "in theory a competitive market could
| achieve the same goals," we find that the entrepeneurs
| don't have the same goals. The problem isn't the
| mechanism of capitalism, it's the naive belief that
| consumer goals and seller goals are aligned.
| devilduck wrote:
| In my experience the no regulation crowd is the same as the
| "I should be able to monetize in any way possible no matter
| how gross the practice is" and they generally think other
| people are stupid and are willing to take advantage of that
| ocdtrekkie wrote:
| And honestly, I have no problem with Apple even insisting there
| be an Apple IAP model (like they require "Sign in with Apple"
| offered alongside alternatives). Because choosing to pay the
| Apple tax is perfectly fine, especially if you feel it provides
| you benefits.
|
| The issue is Apple's requirement that you can only use IAP,
| cannot offer alternative, cheaper, prices, cannot direct people
| to your website to sign up for things, and cannot even disclose
| what portion of the bill goes to Apple.
|
| Your post _proves_ Apple could still make money with offering
| it as an _option_ for informed users. But Apple is being a
| bully and a thug by disallowing alternatives, and actively
| preventing app developers from telling people about them.
|
| What Epic did with Fortnite should be the gold standard: Buy
| direct or pay through Apple. The latter providing potentially
| better privacy/security and user experience at a price premium.
| gshulegaard wrote:
| I somewhat disagree. I think the gold standard would have
| been for Fortnite to simply increase the prices of IAP
| purchases on iOS devices to pass the 30% on to consumers who
| choose to use iOS IAP.
|
| I can't seem to find a rule that says pricing must be the
| same for IAP as elsewhere in current guidelines:
|
| https://developer.apple.com/app-
| store/review/guidelines/#sub...
|
| That seems like the best of both worlds in the sense that as
| a user you can choose to purchase in iOS for convenience or
| go to Fortnite elsewhere and purchase there for cheaper. This
| move just seems like Epic wanted to pick a fight, they
| weren't actually interested in offsetting the Apple cut.
| ocdtrekkie wrote:
| I think there's something inherently unethical about Apple
| making it against the rules to let people know they're
| paying more to buy it on Apple though.
| vlozko wrote:
| That's like Apple selling their watches in a Target store
| and on their box advertise lower priced wrist bands on
| apple.com on the box. No way would Target tolerate that.
| punitxsmart wrote:
| Lower price on apple.com ? Hahaha...good one!
| inopinatus wrote:
| I think it's more like Target dictating what marketing
| materials may not appear _inside_ the box, because this
| happens after you already have the app.
| wycy wrote:
| > ex: NYT
|
| NYT is a great example of this. It took me multiple attempts
| over a span of 2 days to cancel my NYT subscription. There have
| been a few times since then when I've been tempted to re-
| subscribe (their election results tools are great), but
| remembering how hard it was to unsubscribe, I don't think I'll
| go back.
| whakim wrote:
| I find it absurd that subscription services don't offer a
| "Cancel Subscription" button somewhere. That being said, it's
| also absurd that I have to pay Apple a 30% premium for this
| "feature."
| abawany wrote:
| You know, this hasn't been my experience. The ability to get
| CS via chat to work on subscriptions stops/cancels has worked
| for me, albeit with a non-blocking wait. Edit0: wanted to add
| that my subscriptions (personal, gift) were done via PayPal
| (pre-approved payments) so I could cancel via there as well
| but the NYT chat/cs worked fine for me.
| tzs wrote:
| Mine was by credit card. I called the support number, got
| picked up quickly, told them I didn't have enough time for
| it and wanted to cancel. I also made it clear that I just
| wanted to cancel my newspaper subscription, not my
| crossword subscription, and mentioned that I realized I
| would no longer get 1/2 off on the crossword puzzle
| subscription.
|
| He cancelled the newspaper subscription, and then told me
| that I was mistaken about no longer getting 1/2 off on the
| crossword puzzle subscription. I'd only go back to full
| price on that if I let it expire and then re-ordered. As
| long as I have the subscription on auto-renew and those
| payments go through, it will stay at 1/2 price.
| gnicholas wrote:
| Many local libraries offer NYT subscriptions through their
| portal. I think they only last for a year, so you have to
| renew them each year, but it's better than having to worry
| about cancellation.
| reaperducer wrote:
| This is a good tip.
|
| In several cities where I've lived, your library card would
| grant you online access to dozens or hundreds of newspapers
| from around the world. Some you could even download to your
| iPad to read later.
| lasftew wrote:
| It might help to set your billing address to some random
| place in California. It worked for me a few days ago when I
| canceled my WSJ subscription, a "Cancel subscription" button
| magically appeared in the settings that wasn't there before.
| buzzert wrote:
| I immediately tried to cancel my subscription after
| discovering that they will still show ads even if you paid
| for the content.
| JonLim wrote:
| Am curious: what made it so difficult to cancel /
| unsubscribe?
|
| If you subscribed with a credit card, did the option of
| chargebacks ever come up? (Asking because these sorts of
| situations seem perfectly in line for disputing with your
| credit card provider.)
| iav wrote:
| Chargebacks are way harder in real life than people think.
| It took me multiple calls, emailing evidence/screenshots,
| and months to get a $300 charge back processed. That was
| for a completely fraudulent charge at a bar. The way it was
| explained to me, banks will only process a chargeback when
| you have provided evidence of trying to contact the
| merchant and they refused to provide a refund and couldn't
| show a valid contract supporting the charge. So in this
| case you couldn't just charge back NYT just because their
| cancelation policy is slightly burdensome. And they don't
| stop that business from charging you again, so even if you
| can charge back a charge, it doesn't solve the issue of
| canceling the subscription.
| rurp wrote:
| I've only made a few chargebacks but each time it was
| really easy. I've never had to provide any sort of
| documentation and have gotten the money back quickly each
| time.
|
| The most recent time was with a company that wouldn't
| honor their refund policy. They were awfully rude over
| email so I made sure to take screenshots of the policy on
| their website in case they disputed the chargeback and/or
| changed the wording on their site. Turns out, there
| wasn't even an option to upload that information when I
| filed with my credit card, and I won the case without
| doing anything further.
| scrose wrote:
| Maybe it depends on your bank? I've had to do a couple
| chargebacks on Chase CC's in the $200-300 range and I
| just had to click a button in their web portal.
|
| It was more difficult for me to get reimbursed when I
| tried depositing $300 in a Chase ATM and then it crashed
| halfway through. But that just involved a 2 minute phone
| call to resolve
| yardie wrote:
| Chargebacks only delay the inevitable. If the card is still
| in use they'll simply try again at the next billing cycle.
|
| I had an Amazon subscription charge I could not track down
| for a year. Every month I would call Amazon, who's CSR
| couldn't find it, and then my bank to reverse the charge.
|
| Found out I had Amazon Premier still signed up on Amazon
| IT. The card worked globally but subscriptions displayed
| locally.
| misnome wrote:
| Had similar problem with The Times in the UK, but it seems
| it's pretty common for newspapers.
|
| The online subscription could only be cancelled by
| telephone, on a phone line with small and inconvenient
| windows of opportunity, with long waits. When you get
| through, you have the normal retention/upsell attempts, and
| then are told that it will take at least two months to
| process your cancellation, and that you will continue to be
| charged in the meantime.
|
| It was easier to cancel my card, at which point they
| somehow managed to withdraw access as soon as the first
| billing failed.
| ticviking wrote:
| Usually I respond with where is that in your contract? If
| it isn't there with my signature I will be charging those
| two months back.
| hatchnyc wrote:
| Same experience here. I've cancelled all subscriptions that
| use this tactic and made myself a promise to never
| participate in implementing such a system.
|
| Whenever I subscribe to any service on Apple I will
| immediately unsubscribe. If I find myself wanting to use the
| service again after it expires it's a simple tap to
| resubscribe. I think I actually end up with more
| subscriptions this way, but at least I know I'm getting use
| out of all of them. I wish I could a similar setup for all
| subscription services.
| dboreham wrote:
| Big companies tend to be run by psychopaths who think it is
| ok to make it impossible to cancel a subscription.
| FpUser wrote:
| It took me ages (more than a year I think) to unsubscribe
| from AWS. Luckily since we've deleted all the contents
| the fees were pretty nominal but still ...
| [deleted]
| reaperducer wrote:
| _It took me multiple attempts over a span of 2 days to cancel
| my NYT subscription_
|
| I've had to cancel the Times a couple of times over the
| years. Telling them that I lost my job only got one offer to
| extend at a discounted rate. But what really worked well was
| this:
|
| NYT: "Can I ask why you want to cancel your subscription?"
|
| Me: "No."
|
| It's not on their script, so the operator just took care of
| it immediately.
|
| On the plus side, at least you can speak to a human being at
| the Times pretty quickly. Good luck getting through to anyone
| at the Albuquerque Journal in under three days ("It looks
| like you're calling from a cell phone. Let's continue this
| conversation by text!").
| blago wrote:
| I saw that coming and turned the tables on them by initiating
| a payment dispute and a merchant block with my CC company
| after I realized that the NYT is wasting my time
| intentionally.
| macjohnmcc wrote:
| The process to unsubscribe should be no more onerous than the
| process to subscribe. The NYT falls flat on this one
| intentionally I'm sure.
| dsissitka wrote:
| I'm not sure if it's still the case, but...
|
| If you change your address to an address in California you're
| given the option to cancel online.
| ksk wrote:
| No reason to think that this UX can't be duplicated in non-
| Apple app stores. It only artificially looks like that because
| Apple forces users and devs to only use their store. If users
| don't trust other App stores, they can simply avoid using them.
| Millions of people trust non-apple online stores with their
| money. Apple doesn't have a monopoly on good customer service
| either.
| lisper wrote:
| 30% is not an amount I would consider a "small" premium.
| bsg75 wrote:
| > I'm not debating if a 30% cut is reasonable
| lisper wrote:
| Neither am I. I'm debating whether it is _small_.
|
| > I'm actually happier to pay a small premium
| stefano wrote:
| The premium is actually higher than that. For $100, the
| developer gets $70. Which means the premium is $30 on a $70
| base price, i.e. a ~42% higher price. That's a very steep
| price for easier payment cancellation.
| systemvoltage wrote:
| It is the percentage of the market price that the customer
| paid, not what developer got. You're twisting this.
|
| Think about it this way - if Apple was not in the middle,
| the developer would have received $100. So it is 30% less
| than what they would have received without Apple cut.
| donmcronald wrote:
| They meant the user pays a 42% premium. If the developer
| needs to earn $70 they need to charge $100 on the App
| Store which is a 42% increase for the user. So if you're
| talking about passing along those costs it's +42% on
| every purchase.
| athms wrote:
| >if Apple was not in the middle, the developer would have
| received $100.
|
| You are never going to get 100% because of payment
| processing, license management, and content hosting
| costs. If not Apple, then somebody else. You can have a
| payment processor and manage the licensing and hosting
| yourself. Or, you could use an all-in-one vendor, but you
| will still be paying 10-20%.
| justaguy88 wrote:
| Being able to easily click 'cancel' is worth every penny
| lorthemar wrote:
| While I don't have any data on it. I think that retention
| tactics that drag out the process might be more harmful in the
| future. Especially in terms of brand image. I might be
| cancelling the service for a short while or I might be
| switching companies/priorities. If the cancellation process is
| tedious, I won't feel like returning to that service.
|
| In terms of the argument here, it feels like Proton Mail is
| trying to mirror Spotify's argument. The only problem is that,
| Spotify was a direct competitor to Apple Music. This is
| entirely different. Apple is providing a marketplace for apps,
| and many companies like Proton Mail are actually exploiting the
| system.
|
| The only fault here is Apple's approach to the issue. But in
| this specific case, I don't think there's any mafia action
| going on unlike the whole Spotify drama.
| bsg75 wrote:
| > I think that retention tactics that drag out the process
| might be more harmful in the future.
|
| I agree, but the case I directly observed was when the only
| focus was on the current period. What happened in the current
| month or quarter was the only concern. Long term effects were
| "too complex to worry about". This form of business myopia is
| all too common.
| TheRealPomax wrote:
| This is the opposite argument to what the problem is right now.
| It's not that IAP is bad, or that it shouldn't be available.
| It's that there's no alternative permitted _in addition to_
| Apple 's IAP model. You're not even allowed to HINT at the fact
| that you might have alternative ways to pay for the things you
| want to pay for. Even if your name is
| hugeservicethateveryoneknows, you can't tell people that you
| have a website where they can manage their account.
|
| IAP is great, and setting rules such that if apps offer IAP,
| they have to at least offer the platform's own payment service
| as initial and preferred choice, is perfectly reasonable. But
| it's extortion if you own the entire ecosystem and promise to
| ban anyone who wants to offer additional, alternative means of
| account/service management for a product/service that you have
| no business ownership of.
| pwinnski wrote:
| This seems like a pretty large misreading of the situation.
|
| Yes, the most disagreeable thing about Apple's IAP policies
| is where they forbid links to alternative purchase pages. But
| it is also the smallest of the current complaints.
|
| It's not "additional" means of purchases many companies are
| pushing for. They want to be able to avoid offering Apple's
| IAP whatsoever.
|
| I mean, ProtonMail did not have IAP in their app at all, but
| offered options to pay for their service on their website.
| Apple insisted, as you suggest, that they "at least offer the
| platform's own payment service as initial and preferred
| choice," and now ProtonMail is saying that is "Mafia
| extortion."
| whakim wrote:
| Yep. Having gone through multiple review cycles with Apple,
| they'll look for any hint of a way that a user might wind
| up paying through a different mechanism and force you to
| excise that. A great example we faced was a feature that
| was only offered on the web (it didn't make sense on a
| phone), and we weren't allowed to link to it or mention it
| (even though you got access with an in-app subscription)
| because someone might go check it out on the web and
| subscribe via the CTA on the page.
| rockostrich wrote:
| Yea, I have trouble understanding how this is any different
| than how people purchase things in person. When you go to
| Best Buy and buy a TV they obviously aren't going to let
| the TV manufacturers advertise that you can buy the TV for
| cheaper directly from the manufacturer.
|
| Obviously it's not a 1-1 comparison, but Apple is giving
| the apps a similar platform to sell their product.
| IneffablePigeon wrote:
| Well, a slightly flawed analogy is that you bought a Best
| Buy house and the only way to get a TV is to get it
| through Best Buy.
|
| It's the fact that not only are Apple providing a
| platform to sell the product, they're also the only
| distribution method for the product and are slowly
| clamping down on the loophole of providing a "free" app
| that requires a subscription bought elsewhere.
|
| To continue the flawed analogy, the Best Buy houses are
| clearly the best houses in most other respects in the
| opinion of a lot of people and it's hard for the market
| to apply pressure about this one specific limitation.
| Whether that's fine or not is basically the philosophical
| argument being had.
| ksec wrote:
| Except in that real world, you only have two choices,
| Best Buy or Walmart ( iOS and Android ).
|
| The problem and complain is much more complex once all
| these additional factors comes into play. It isn't so
| much a problem if we look at it in isolation. As in your
| Best Buy example, which I agree is perfectly valid.
| pier25 wrote:
| The huge difference is you can buy your TV from many
| places (BestBuy, Target, Walmart, Amazon, etc) but you
| can't sell your iOS app outside the AppStore.
| zamadatix wrote:
| It's not a 1-1 comparison only because it sidesteps the
| crux of the debate completely and focuses on the strawman
| portion. What's argued as anticompetitive against these
| app stores is the integration of consumer devices with
| storefronts not that independent storefronts exist and
| don't advertise other storefronts.
| zamadatix wrote:
| That's not what Apple insisted, if you have IAP you can't
| have a button below that says "or buy direct 30% cheaper".
| It's either IAP or no mention of payments.
| pwinnski wrote:
| ProtonMail had no IAP in their app at all, but offered
| paid subscriptions on their website. Apple insisted that
| they offer IAP in the app, and ProtonMail is upset. Here:
|
| > "Out of the blue, one day they said you have to add in-
| app purchase to stay in the App Store. They stumbled upon
| something in the app that mentioned there were paid
| plans, they went to the website and saw there was a
| subscription you could purchase, and then turned around
| and demanded we add IAP. There's nothing you can say to
| that. They are judge, jury, and executioner on their
| platform, and you can take it or leave it. You can't get
| any sort of fair hearing to determine whether it's
| justifiable or not justifiable, anything they say goes.
| We simply complied in order to save our business."
|
| Yes, as I said, ideally Apple would allow other forms of
| payment alongside IAP, but that's not even the issue
| here. The issue here, as I said, was that ProtonMail was
| trying to avoid implementing IAP at all.
| NeutronStar wrote:
| > The issue here, as I said, was that ProtonMail was
| trying to avoid implementing IAP at all.
|
| Show me Apple forced everyone to use IAP before
| ProtonMail included the link to their website on their
| app and I'll agree.
| zamadatix wrote:
| Yes, ProtonMail's ideal is no IAP. That doesn't mean the
| "Mafia Extortion" isn't related to the above. It's
| perfectly possible for ProtonMail to be angry about more
| than 1 policy at a time and at varying levels
| accordingly.
|
| It's also possible for 2 people to read the same thing
| and come to different conclusions so please don't imply
| others must have misread something to have disagreed with
| you. Not only does it not move the conversation forward
| any it's needlessly insulting.
| simion314 wrote:
| The problem is bigger then that. Apple takes a 30%
| cut(and the fanboys will say it is legal and fair and
| theoretically Apple could make it 99% and should still be
| legal) and on top of that cut they are forcing you not to
| inform the customer about alternatives, YES Apple
| prevents you to be informed by better reals and deciding
| for yourself what is better, so you could say that Apple
| is protecting you because you are too stupid to decide or
| you can just be honest and say it is just for money and
| Apple protects their budget.
| pwinnski wrote:
| Yeah, Apple's practices are far from ideal, your insults
| aside, but I'm not sure how much of that is relevant
| here. On this thread at least, nobody seems to have
| mentioned percentages but you.
| fakedang wrote:
| I don't see how any of that is not relevant here.
| simion314 wrote:
| This is false, at the moment I wrote this comment the
| "Apple tax" was mentioned a lot. IMO the fact that is 3%,
| 30% or 99% is irrelevant . What is important is that
| Apple uses it's dominance to remove choice from users.
|
| I am sorry if fanboy will hurt someone feeling, but if
| for example: Google (or Apple) would have a new rule that
| if you want your website to be opened in Chrome(or
| Safari) and not marked as malware you have to include
| Google Pay(or Apple Pay) and remove the Visa/PayPal and
| all the other payment options and some person would say
| "this is exactly what we wanted, no more choices - force
| everyone to a Google(or Apple ) tax , this choices are
| overwhelming my poor brain then tell me the correct
| adjective to describe this person that thinks removing
| choice and forcing the big coorporation way is the best
| thing.
| anticensor wrote:
| Cut >50% and it's now a extortion with no further
| analysis. And extortion is illegal in any civilised
| state, including USA.
| athms wrote:
| >Cut >50% and it's now a extortion
|
| Extortion (or blackmail) has a legal definition and this
| isn't it. In California (where Apple is incorporated and
| headquartered), the statute states:
|
| Extortion is the obtaining of property or other
| consideration from another, with his or her consent, or
| the obtaining of an official act of a public officer,
| induced by a wrongful use of force or fear, or under
| color of official right.
| snomad wrote:
| It sounds like they weren't taking any payments via
| phone. Purchase only happened on the web, and Apple
| reviewers found text that led to web.
|
| It would be one thing if they were selling phone and
| skipping Apple that way. But if their are no phone
| payments, and only non-obvious links, it should not be
| required (or maybe I am misinterpreting this)
| inopinatus wrote:
| It may be ProtonMail's situation but speaking as a
| consumer, far from being the smallest complaint; my
| _largest_ complaint is that Apple intentionally require
| third parties to mislead me about my options.
| Hermel wrote:
| And your reading of the situation lacks one crucial piece
| of information: Apple does not allow app authors to forward
| the "Apple tax" to the user. For example, if a newspaper
| subscription costs 300$ on the website, the publisher must
| not charge more than that in the app store event though he
| only gets 210$ after the "Apple tax".
| pwinnski wrote:
| That has not been true since 2011, nine years ago!
|
| https://venturebeat.com/2011/06/09/apple-backtracks-on-
| in-ap...
| toyg wrote:
| As your sibling comment demonstrates, Apple will try and
| try again to reinstate that policy. One way or the other,
| they'll squeeze developers until the last ounce of profit
| goes to Apple. They are the supermarket chain of software
| now, and that's what supermarket chains do.
| pwinnski wrote:
| I don't think this is true.
|
| Look, Apple does all kinds of terrible things, and I
| definitely think the government ought to take action
| against them.
|
| But Apple one time, in 2011, announced that they were
| going to put in a rule that you couldn't charge a
| different amount _outside_ the App Store than _inside_ ,
| and when furor erupted, they never implemented the
| policy. That's it. One time, never actually in practice.
|
| They are still 100% terrible with this nonsense about not
| being allowed to link to or even _mention_ alternative
| forms of payment, but let 's focus on what they actually
| do that's bad, rather than what we imagine they might
| like to do in alternate realities.
| [deleted]
| Spivak wrote:
| I mean if you're going to hang Apple for crimes they
| haven't committed yet then you could at least be more
| creative about them.
|
| Apple is going to force all apps that offer messaging as
| a feature to integrate with iMessage!
|
| Apple is going to force companies with an iOS app to turn
| over 30% of their total gross revenue! And it's additive!
|
| If you don't buy an iCloud subscription Apple is going to
| randomly delete some of your alarms!
| enragedcacti wrote:
| This isn't actually the case. That policy was part of a
| set of changes that were meant to go into effect in July
| but that Apple rolled back. You're allowed to charge a
| different price but you can't tell the user that they can
| get it cheaper elsewhere or that you're paying 30% to
| Apple.
| walterbell wrote:
| Yes, Apple subscriptions are a reliable way to signup for HBO
| or Showtime to binge-watch a specific show. Signup and
| immediately cancel the subscription, that gives you 30 days to
| watch. No further payment management actions needed.
| macjohnmcc wrote:
| It is funny that if you sign up for a 7 day free trial of
| Apple TV+ that if you cancel immediately before the end of
| the 7 days your trial is up immediately as well.
| mynameisvlad wrote:
| But that's a free trial. If you sign up for an Apple TV+
| subscription and immediately cancel, it does the same thing
| as any other subscription.
| mudetroit wrote:
| Free trial is a bit different then what the parent was
| describing though. Which is paying for a month and turning
| off auto-renew effectively.
| walterbell wrote:
| Also applies to 1-year Apple TV trial.
| jaywalk wrote:
| Rules for thee...
| systemvoltage wrote:
| I think HN discussions have always been focusing on
| developer/business side of things but people don't realize that
| users - they don't care what happens in the backend. They care
| about the experience and Apple delivers, and then some.
|
| I think Apple's 30% can be debated but a vanishingly small
| slice of users know this and care about it, millions of users
| just want to do their thing with beautiful ease and experience.
| donmcronald wrote:
| I find it so weird because retail seems to be a huge race
| towards the lowest quality due to demand for the lowest
| prices. If you put 2 identical products in the retail world
| and charged +42% for one of them no one would buy it. My
| impression is that it's tough to sell a much better product
| at higher prices.
|
| The only way I can make it work in my mind is that from the
| users' perspective there are no alternatives. IE: They don't
| know it's 30% off at the store down the road.
| mindvirus wrote:
| I wonder if there's a startup in that. Imagine a site where you
| pay a small premium and they manage your subscriptions -
| handling payment, cancellation and so on for you. You can see
| all of your subs, maybe even compare deals and stuff
| foofoo4u wrote:
| You may be interested in https://privacy.com/. I use it for all
| online subscriptions. It allows me to block all transactions,
| which brings me back control of what I am paying for.
| andrewmunsell wrote:
| Why not just use temporary card numbers, a la Privacy.com (I am
| not affiliated with them, just a user)?
|
| I've taken to using Privacy/temp card numbers for all
| subscriptions. They have strict spending limits set and if
| needed, I'll deactivate the number.
|
| Sure, someone probably _could_ send your "debt" to
| collections, but will they?
| varispeed wrote:
| I believe that in many countries it is now illegal practice to
| make cancellation difficult.
| forty wrote:
| I feel it's the contrary. We are generally happy to refund
| customers that are not happy with our service, but the app
| store is the only payment system where we cannot refund them (I
| don't really know what the UX looks like on the customer side,
| but I think they have to contact Apple to ask for the refund
| and it's not always as easy as it should to get the refund)
|
| Note that things might have changed since I worked on this
| stuff.
| drtz wrote:
| I can confirm it's not straightforward to get a refund from
| Apple for an App Store purchase, it was for me at least.
|
| In the most recent case I tried to request a refund
| immediately after buying an app, only to get a vague and
| unhelpful error message. After a little Googling I learned
| that you have to wait a period of a few hours before
| requesting a refund. Of course I forgot to go back and
| request the refund later so I ended up paying for an app that
| didn't do what I expected it to.
| fakedang wrote:
| It's the same for Android too
| forty wrote:
| No, I believe we can refund ourselves payments on the play
| store (or at least I'm pretty sure we at least used to)
| fauigerzigerk wrote:
| If you are happy then many others will be happy as well and
| Apple should be able to compete on merit.
|
| I'm all for mandating an IAP option. But forcing apps to keep
| customers in the dark about other, cheaper options borders on
| deception.
| Spooky23 wrote:
| There's a lot of drama associated with this stuff. 100% of
| nothing is less than 70% of something.
|
| When I was in college I interned at a company that negotiated
| retail placements for stuff like software. The 30% slice is a
| much better model than the terms our customers were stuck with.
|
| In some cases, software people lose more in the channel for
| commercial software as well -- companies like SHI skim the
| cream for doing almost nothing. I can say as someone running a
| big enterprise org that there is no chance in hell that I'm
| wasting time negotiating terms with little companies, but
| Apple's App Store model makes it possible to buy stuff.
| donmcronald wrote:
| > When I was in college I interned at a company that
| negotiated retail placements for stuff like software. The 30%
| slice is a much better model than the terms our customers
| were stuck with.
|
| When I was in middle school a computer costed as much as a
| small car. Times change. Physical distribution of most
| software is dead and the associated costs are completely
| different now.
| gowld wrote:
| That's great. Apple's great app store should compete in a
| free market for all stores, and you can enjoy shopping there.
| Spooky23 wrote:
| Great point, that has had a huge impact on the quality and
| pricing of applications on the Android platform.
| gogopuppygogo wrote:
| Agreed. Channel margin can exceed 30% commissions for
| enterprise SaaS.
|
| I see more of an issue with Apple telling Telegram how to
| moderate their platform than with the high fees for
| distribution on the platform.
| nathankunicki wrote:
| The main problem there is you are not able to pay a premium for
| IAP subscriptions. Apple mandates that functionally equal
| options cost the same inside the app as outside, despite Apple
| taking the 30% cut for IAP.
| gingerlime wrote:
| > Apple mandates that functionally equal options cost the
| same inside the app as outside
|
| Do they? I heard it before, but when I tried to search the
| developer guidelines, I couldn't spot anything specific about
| this.
| e40 wrote:
| Regarding the NYT: either use paypal, so you can cancel their
| ability to charge, or a CC with virtual CC numbers (e.g. Citi).
| That way, you can't be charged unless you want it.
| dtech wrote:
| In the EU consumer protection law mandate this. You have to be
| able to cancel in all the same ways that you can sign up. The
| most common way to pay subscriptions is with SEPA direct debit,
| and banks have to let you revoke those authorizations even
| retro-actively for 90 days.
| Someone wrote:
| I don't think stopping automatic payments automatically
| cancels the subscription. It just stops the money flow, but
| keeps you liable for the payments.
|
| It means the company has to make an effort to get money
| flowing again, though. Many will know that's not worth it and
| stop the service instead.
|
| (Corrections welcome)
| whatatita wrote:
| I think a biggissue in this space is how dated the US banking
| industry is. They trail behind in so many ways that are anti-
| consumer and then they're used to justify draconion mafia
| moves like this one from Apple.
| 02020202 wrote:
| that is a lot of crap. sing up for
| internet/telephone/television/... over email or online form
| and then try to cancel it the same way. go ahead, try it.
| i'll wait here.
| consp wrote:
| Signing up for shady services which clearly void the law is
| not the same as not having any rules.
|
| The directives mostly concern draconian "send us a passport
| copy and cancellation letter" when you signed up online or
| via phone. Those are no longer allowed in most EU
| countries. If they do not comply you are free to cancel
| your subscription via the bank/creditcard by revoking their
| SEPA permission and reporting them to your local
| responsible authority.
|
| edit: Both my mobile phone, internet and television service
| I can cancel directly online without problems starting next
| month. You cannot cancel yearly services unless specified
| in the first year but after that it is a monthly thing.
| ascagnel_ wrote:
| US consumer laws have been woefully inadequate for decades,
| and this is another instance where they're lacking. You can
| issue an individual chargeback if you happened to use a
| credit card, but that can have adverse effects on both you
| and the merchant. If you used an ATM/bank card, your bank may
| go to bat for you, but there's no guarantee.
|
| I'm in the same boat re: Apple/Google subscription options.
| They don't have a vested interest in keeping you attached to
| a single subscription, so they'll keep the cancellation
| option easy in favor of keeping you in their ecosystem.
| TillE wrote:
| Good luck cancelling pretty much any service in Germany
| without literally sending them a letter in the mail,
| regardless of how you signed up.
| kuschku wrote:
| I don't know when you last tried to cancel anything, but if
| you cite the court case from 2017 on this, pretty much
| every service is very quick to accept your cancellation via
| email ;)
| Semaphor wrote:
| By now it's law (unless I'm misremembering badly) that you
| need to be able to cancel the same way you signed up. So
| unless you signed up via a letter, you'll be able to cancel
| without one, even in Germany.
| Daniel_sk wrote:
| Germany is very specific in many of these things and the
| rest of EU is different :-).
| misnome wrote:
| Right, but that contradicts the parent assertion that
| it's outright illegal. FWIW I'm not sure I buy that -
| there are way too many services and companies, large and
| small, that don't have this symmetry of subscription.
| tpxl wrote:
| It's an EU directive.
| Daniel_sk wrote:
| SEPA direct debit? First time I hear that anyone is using
| this for subscriptions, aren't you from Germany? :-) SEPA
| direct debit is also used here (Slovakia) but usually to pay
| for internet/phone/electricity/ and other bills, you
| basically give them a mandate to draw up to a certain amount
| and you can revoke it anytime. Debit (or less common credit)
| cards are I think pretty common for subscriptions but I
| haven't heard about any shady tactics of preventing you from
| unsubscribing, I guess that's because all of that is
| regulated. And in worst case I guess I could call my bank.
| sascha_sl wrote:
| ProtonMail complaining about extortion? That's rich. I was a
| visionary user for 2 years, and then decided to move somewhere
| where IMAP/SMTP was a bit easier to do than to run a piece of Go
| that somehow still required half of Gnome to run.
|
| The experience was full of dark patterns. There is simply no way
| to terminate at the end of your billing period (and I had an
| annual subscription). If you have custom domains, you lose them
| immediately upon clicking the unsubscribe button, as do you lose
| your only way to properly move data off the service (as they have
| still no export feature)
| shmerl wrote:
| All this can be solved once and for all by requiring Apple to
| allow alternatives stores. They got away with this anti-
| competitive junk for too long.
| kmbfjr wrote:
| What? No. Alternative stores will want to be installed by
| default, and then we're off to the bloatware races.
| rgbrenner wrote:
| In August Wordpress complained about the same thing... and Apple
| apologized and changed the policy:
| https://www.theverge.com/2020/8/22/21397424/apple-wordpress-...
|
| Protonmail brings up a 2018 incident that has already been
| addressed by the new policy. What point does this article serve?
| I think it's just free and easy publicity for ProtonMail.
|
| If they had spoken up earlier, maybe they could have been the
| reason for change instead of WordPress.
| viktorcode wrote:
| That is an incorrect conclusion.
|
| Apple apologised that the language of App Store guidelines
| wasn't clear enough. The policy in question hasn't been
| changed.
|
| The changes to App Store guidelines were announced in June,
| before the situation with Wordpress. Those changes were
| published in August.
|
| Wordpress changed their app to follow the policy by removing
| the mention of their premium service.
|
| Sadly, the Verge doesn't make any of it clear.
| pier25 wrote:
| > _maybe they could have been the reason for change instead of
| WordPress_
|
| I seriously doubt Apple would have listened to ProtonMail. Look
| what happened to HEY.
| holidayacct wrote:
| Forced in-app purchases are just a vector for governments to
| figure out who is using protonmail and how. They are better off
| avoiding apple as a platform if they don't understand why in app
| purchases are a bad idea given protonmail's business model.
| s17n wrote:
| All that Apple is really accomplishing is to ensure that the only
| viable business model will be ads.
| viktorcode wrote:
| That's how Google's Play Market operates. Apple can afford to
| run premium store, as no side loading means no piracy.
| quest88 wrote:
| They knew about the cut before writing their iOS app.
|
| Edit: I was wrong; misread.
| sebastien_b wrote:
| But nothing said they _had_ to include in-app purchase in their
| app; then suddenly, after being in the store 2 years already,
| Apple said they had to (and hence Apple would get a cut).
| Pick-A-Hill2019 wrote:
| A direct quote from the CEO appears to say otherwise -
|
| "Out of the blue, one day they said you have to add in-app
| purchase to stay in the App Store. "
| quest88 wrote:
| Oh whoops you're right. I misread, thanks!
| newbie578 wrote:
| Another thread where people will fly to defend Apple and explain
| how it's circumstances are similar to PS and Xbox and no one is
| coming after Sony, yet everyone conveniently decides not to
| compare Apple to early 2000s Microsoft which is basically a
| mirror situation.
|
| I guess people "expect" stuff like this from Apple which is the
| reason we are not allowed to criticize them, yet if Microsoft
| came out and said Steam breaks their "arbitrary rules" (well they
| are Microsoft rules, you need to respect them duuh) and kicked
| Steam off the whole Windows platform, all hell would break loose,
| people would be screaming for heads to fall..
| skc wrote:
| The big difference is Apple products are quite literally
| beloved.
|
| It must feel quite strange to be asked to adjudicate over such
| complaints when you yourself actually love the products of the
| company you're supposed to make a ruling on.
| [deleted]
| newbie578 wrote:
| I bet there were people who loved using Bell System and
| people who enjoyed using IE over Netscape, yet we are not
| judging them based on how loved they are, but are they
| playing fair, and Apple since it's rise has been anything
| but.
| setpatchaddress wrote:
| Phone service in the US prior to 1983 certainly wasn't
| adored by users in the way that Apple products are. It
| wasn't universally reviled, but consumers didn't love it.
| This SNL skit was not unpopular:
|
| https://vimeo.com/355556831
|
| If you want your arguments to be effective, it may be best
| to stick to analogies that you have personal experience
| with unless you've read deeply enough to understand the
| cultural context.
| newbie578 wrote:
| I didn't say all people loved Bell Systems, I said there
| were people (some people doesn't mean 100%) who loved
| Bell Systems, just like there are people today who hate
| using Verizon and love using it.
|
| And Apple is not universally loved also, no matter how
| much you adore them, there are people who don't.
|
| This youtube parody was also not unpopular:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyTA33HQZLA
|
| And there are plenty of videos similar like this. We can
| both cherry-pick like this, and my point still stands, I
| am not arguing which monopoly is loved more, I am arguing
| what is FAIR before the court of law, not how much
| developers enjoy WWDC and their Macs.
| viktorcode wrote:
| When Apple kicks Steam from macOS no one will be defending
| them. That is as close as your comparison can get.
| d1zzy wrote:
| I don't need XBOX or PS5 to defend Apple. I will defend the
| rights of any non-monopoly (Apple doesn't have a monopoly on
| the phone market) that created their own hardware, software
| platform and digital market from scratch, to define their own
| rules governing said digital market whatsoever.
|
| However, do not confuse defending Apple's right to impose their
| rules with "liking" or "approving" what they do. Just because I
| believe Apple is in full rights to do all of this I do not like
| it so as I consumer I vote with my wallet, which is my right to
| do so just as is their right to impose rules on their platform.
|
| A lot of the people riling up against Apple seem to want to
| have the cake and eat it too. They want partake in the value of
| the Apple digital platform (both as consumers and developers)
| but then they want to force Apple to play by their own rules,
| not Apple's rules. That doesn't seem right to me plus it's just
| contradictory as it's very likely that Apple being able to
| enforce their own rules is what created the value of their
| platform anyway.
| newbie578 wrote:
| I respect your opinion and you have the right to defend any
| non-monopoly or even a monopoly, that is your basic human
| right, just know that Apple is not a non-monopoly, we are not
| looking and talking about worldwide market share, since Apple
| is based in the U.S. and answers to the U.S. courts, so you
| have to look at the U.S. market share, which quite in fact to
| no one's surprise is monopolistic (over 50%)
|
| . See Hayden Publ'g Co., Inc. v. Cox Broad. Corp., 730 F.2d
| 64, 69 n.7 (2d Cir. 1984) ("[A] party may have monopoly power
| in a particular market, even though its market share is less
| than 50%."); Broadway Delivery Corp. v. UPS, 651 F.2d 122,
| 129 (2d Cir. 1981) ("[W]hen the evidence presents a fair jury
| issue of monopoly power, the jury should not be told that it
| must find monopoly power lacking below a specified share.");
| Yoder Bros., Inc. v. Cal.-Fla. Plant Corp., 537 F.2d, 1347,
| 1367 n.19 (5th Cir. 1976) (rejecting "a rigid rule requiring
| 50% of the market for a monopolization offense without regard
| to any other factors").
|
| And even IF Apple has not the dominant market share (which it
| does), it can still be engaged in anti-competitive practices,
| which it is currently being trialed for.
|
| And last but not least, we (be it me as a consumer, Epic as a
| company, or Spotify) are not asking Apple to play by our own
| rules, but by the rules of LAW.
|
| I feel like a lot of people are missing this point, this is
| the reason Epic is taking Apple to court, not because it
| won't play to Epic's rules but because of free market rules
| on which this country has been built.
| varispeed wrote:
| I hope that the model Apple is using will be made illegal, most
| likely in the EU first. But I am concerned that if you have a one
| trillion dollars, they you pretty much can do anything you want,
| as with such money you can buy any decision. Apple should be
| forced to allow 3rd party app stores in their ecosystem. There
| are many other things Apple is doing wrong and all we can do now
| is to raise awareness about their shady practices. I am proud
| that I pretty much cured everyone in my circle from buying any
| Apple products.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| > I am proud that I pretty much cured everyone in my circle
| from buying any Apple products.
|
| And buying what instead?
| bitL wrote:
| There are luckily some options for high-end now like ASUS
| ProArt and similar.
| toiletfuneral wrote:
| lol
| kinkrtyavimoodh wrote:
| Potentially unpopular opinion here on HN, but Android.
| esarbe wrote:
| Not unpopular, but it just won't work; Google has already
| indicated that it also is going to want a 30% cut. And
| side-loading is not really an option for the average
| consumer.
|
| The problem of rent-seeking by monopolists will just go
| away by itself.
| forty wrote:
| You can just side load an other store, then install from
| there, which I think is acceptable UX since you really
| just have to install the store once.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| And that avoids the rent-seeking problem... how?
| manfredo wrote:
| You can side load apps. You don't need to go through
| Google Play.
| [deleted]
| whimsicalism wrote:
| But, correct me if I'm wrong, vendors aren't allowed to
| bundle other app stores into the home screen if they want
| to use the Play store.
|
| That seems like classic rent-seeking.
| manfredo wrote:
| But the point is, you can just download a .apk file and
| install like like you would on a desktop. You can even
| download a .apk file that installs an alternative app
| store. You do have to click through a couple screens with
| scary warning messages, but it's a much, _much_ softer
| lock-in than Apple & the App Store.
| DenseComet wrote:
| Well that's just the idea. In reality, most people only
| install apps from Google Play, and Google has decided
| that it also wants to enforce a 30% cut [1]. Sideloading
| provides an option, but for most developers, its not a
| realistic one (See: Epic putting Fortnite onto the Play
| Store after trying to get people to install by
| sideloading).
|
| [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/28/technology/google-
| play-st...
| manfredo wrote:
| Sideloading amounts to downloading a .apk file and
| clicking yes on the prompt to install it. It's no more
| difficult than installing applications on Windows. I know
| firsthand that elementary school children are capable of
| sideloading apps.
|
| IIRC Google offered Epic more favorable rates after it
| released Fortnite through side loading. Presumably this
| indicates that sideloading was a success and Google
| didn't want Epic to set a precedence that bypassing the
| Play store is feasible.
| ajb wrote:
| Despite all this, I currently have more respect for Apple's
| ethics than most other companies - _currently_. But if their
| incentives continue to lead them in this direction, Apple will be
| the Oracle of 2025. They should actually welcome regulation in
| this area, because its difficult for a company to change its own
| incentives.
| hollander wrote:
| I hope they will complain about this with the EU. Maybe the EU
| can stop this nonsense.
| Pick-A-Hill2019 wrote:
| [1] might bolster their chances
|
| <<Context>> former Apple executive says the Cupertino tech
| giant uses its "arbitrary" App Store policies "as a weapon" to
| restrict competition.
|
| [1] https://www.techspot.com/news/87038-former-app-store-exec-
| te...
| kmbfjr wrote:
| I'm sure there will be an EU mandated change that results in an
| extremely shitty user experience.
| znpy wrote:
| Afaik ProtonMail is based in Switzerland, thus they might not
| be able to involve the EU.
| Pick-A-Hill2019 wrote:
| Correct. But all it needs is for one company that is (or has
| offices in) the EU to to set a precedent.
|
| The US is also making rumblings and I had high hopes when I
| started reading the senate report [2]that began
|
| "Nearly a century ago, Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis
| wrote: "We must make our choice. We may have democracy, or we
| may have wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we
| cannot have both." Those words speak to us with great urgency
| today."
|
| However the conclusions (page 375 for the impatient) left me
| underwhelmed although their comparison to the early heydays
| of the railroad empire made me chuckle.
|
| [2] https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/7222836/Invest
| iga...
| vulcan01 wrote:
| If you scroll to the very bottom of https://protonmail.com,
| you'll find that "This project is supported by the European
| Union's Horizon 2020 program".
|
| I'm not sure whether Swiss companies can apply to this grant,
| but it does seem like ProtonMail have some sort of
| relationship with the EU.
| heimatau wrote:
| > Maybe the EU can stop this nonsense.
|
| IMHO, they are the only entity that has the guts to do
| something substantial. I'm in the States. It's clear that DC
| doesn't care but some activists are trying to shift the public
| perception. It would be better served to focus on the EU's
| public perception as well (primarily).
| marcrosoft wrote:
| Ha, the same group that is responsible for accept cookie
| popups?
| Barrin92 wrote:
| It's the companies who are responsible for the cookie popups
| because it's the companies who choose to shove tracking down
| our throats. The annoying popups are the consequence of that
| asinine behaviour. What on earth makes you think that the
| entity who merely made that privacy violation _visible and
| explicit_ has done anything wrong here?
| ksk wrote:
| Yeah, who needs warning labels on products?! People ignore
| them anyway.
| offtop5 wrote:
| I actually like Apple's walled garden. If you want a phone which
| allows you to run random binaries found on the internet, buy an
| Android phone.
|
| I recently started submitted apps to the iOS store and I found it
| very much fair. I don't have to worry about scailing servers to
| host my .ipas, users are ensured I'm not going to try and hack
| their phones.
|
| I do think Apple should allow apps to clearly state they charge
| more due to Apple policies. But it's like if you come into
| Apple's house , you need to respect Apple's rules.
|
| I guarantee you within days of allowing 3rd party App stores
| users would be getting their IDs stolen and blaming Apple
| londons_explore wrote:
| Most Mafias want an 80% cut, not a 30% cut...
| simonh wrote:
| I have no problem with Apple's basic approach with the App Store,
| they provide a service and are entitled to charge for it.
|
| I do think they have gone too far with some of their practices
| though. This sort of shake down of free apps is over-reach and
| I'm glad they have revised the App Store guidelines. I hope this
| sort of arm-twisting doesn't happen in future.
|
| It is a tricky issue. As I said it's their product their rules,
| but those rules do need to be clear, be fair and be impartially
| applied. I really don't want to see heavy handed regulation in
| this area, which could be incredibly damaging.
| kmbfjr wrote:
| Not only that, but they are charging entrepreneurial rates for
| something that is now, a very mature business.
|
| Apple's woes on this matter are largely Apple's creation.
| However, if developers want to accept payment outside of
| Apple's App store, then they should be prepared to pay
| elsewhere. The argument that the hardware purchase pays for the
| app store is bunk in my opinion, the hardware purchase pays for
| the hardware and the OS.
| SN76477 wrote:
| Apple's walled garden is great for me as a consumer.
|
| I trust it I know the billing is simple I know apple stand by the
| transaction
|
| In the age of click bait and the information wars it is
| refreshing to trust the computer in my pocket.
| dmitryminkovsky wrote:
| Guessing this is a hugely unpopular opinion here:
|
| A mafia engages in racketeering/extortion. They take a game
| that's fair, and make it unfair. Instead of creating value, they
| steal it. Without the mafia, people would retain more value for
| themselves.
|
| Apple, on the other hand, created and maintains an enormous
| platform. Without Apple, the App Store would not exist. The rules
| are posted to a webpage and are applied more or less equally to
| everyone. All the transactions that occur in this App Store are
| value they enable to exist. Without Apple, instead of creating an
| app you would have to create an app and the platform and
| distribution mechanism etc. The cut they take, in light of this,
| seems more than reasonable to me.
|
| The hate Apple gets here and other places seems really misplaced
| to me. They're not a common carrier. They're not a monopoly.
| They're not even close to being a monopoly. They're a huge
| company, but there is plenty of competition out there. I don't
| understand why people act like they can't make the rules of their
| platform. Much less why people would say they are a mafia.
|
| Concretely about this post: it seems really naive!
|
| > "Out of the blue, one day they said you have to add in-app
| purchase to stay in the App Store. They stumbled upon something
| in the app that mentioned there were paid plans, they went to the
| website and saw there was a subscription you could purchase, and
| then turned around and demanded we add IAP.
|
| This sounds like a child making up a story for the principal.
| Come on... really? Proton mail is a huge thing. Apple's rules are
| public and easy to understand. How is it that I can understand
| the App Store rules but Proton Mail cannot? Apple want their cut!
| They don't want a mechanism to side step or encourage users to
| side step that cut. It's so simple.
| MagnumOpus wrote:
| You aggregate Apple the platform creating hardware and OS
| company with Apple App Store which extorts rents due to
| dominant market position on the Apple hardware far
| disproportionate to the value that it adds. (If it added that
| much value that 30% of revenues for every app that can be
| downloaded from there was fair, then they would have to
| prohibit other app stores.)
|
| The App Store is not necessarily linked to the hardware (just
| as IE isn't linked to Windows, to show a similar antitrust
| issue), so Apple forcing the exclusive App Store platform
| contracts on users and value creating content companies looks a
| hell of a lot like a racket.
| throw0101a wrote:
| > _Without Apple, instead of creating an app you would have to
| create an app and the platform and distribution mechanism etc._
|
| And? As Brent Simmons of NetNewsWire _et al_ observed:
|
| > _We started selling over the web in the mid '90s._
|
| * https://www.forbes.com/sites/robpegoraro/2020/07/29/what-
| tim...
|
| He says they'd give up 5% to a payment processor, not 30%. John
| Gruber:
|
| > _To omit the fact that there was -- dating back to the
| mid-'90s, well over a decade before the iPhone App Store -- a
| thriving market for software sold directly over a thing called
| "The Internet" is sophistry. Most Mac software is still sold
| and distributed this way_ today. _If App Stores are so great
| why is most Mac software sold outside the Mac App Store?_
|
| *
| https://daringfireball.net/2020/07/parsing_cooks_opening_sta...
|
| And you don't have to build it yourself, as there is now SaaS
| for all of this, and I'd hazard to guess that they'd be less
| that 30%. For example the Carbon Copy Cloner folks redirect to
| a third-party:
|
| * https://bombich.com/store
|
| And even if they took 30%, you'd still have the freedom to
| write apps the way you want and not be beholden to Apple's
| guidelines.
| Drew_ wrote:
| Apple has 100% market share of iOS application distribution and
| therefore has a monopoly on this market. In this position they
| can freely and arbitrarily govern what is and is not acceptable
| iOS software as well as how much it costs to produce and
| distribute iOS software with absolutely no competition that
| could benefit participants in this market. Allowing Apple to
| continue exercising absolute power over iOS software
| distribution does nothing but bolster Apple's revenue and hurt
| iOS software consumers and producers by limiting options and
| driving up costs.
| forty wrote:
| > They're not even close to being a monopoly. They're a huge
| company, but there is plenty of competition out there
|
| What's the competition for iOS app distribution? There might be
| competition on the customer side, but as far as I know there
| are none for the software/app vendors, which is why they can
| dictate their rules and choose the price (and it's not like
| customers have each a bunch of smartphones with different OSes,
| and you could say "Apple sucks so I'll make an Android app
| instead")
| kmbfjr wrote:
| What's the competition for clothing distribution inside a
| Macy's? I mean, c'mon, it is _their_ marketplace.
|
| Apple's customers have willingly chosen this, it wasn't
| forced upon them.
| secretsatan wrote:
| From the article : Apple responded, saying that free companion
| apps to paid online services are no longer required to have in-
| app purchases as of September 11, 2020. As long as paid upgrades
| are not offered through the app and it has no notifications to
| customers about an external subscription service, everything is
| fine.
|
| So....
| whatatita wrote:
| What's the "So.... [sic]" supposed to convey?
| isoprophlex wrote:
| Not a protonmail user, but fastmail, which is in a similar boat
| i guess.
|
| I _really_ hope this means fastmail won 't be forced to start
| billing through IAP. Apple gets enough of my money already, and
| I don't want it eating up fastmails profit margins, as I think
| they offer a stellar product.
| politician wrote:
| If I were Protonmail, I would just start emailing customers
| about the subscription service instead of baking into the app.
| Maybe delay the campaign until after the app is accepted. This
| policy from Apple is ridiculous.
| toddh wrote:
| They can also change it back any time they wish and on an app
| by app basis.
| jm4 wrote:
| So... Apple has a say in how or when a company communicates
| with its own customers inside of an app the company developed
| and customer chose to use simply because that app is running on
| an iPhone. This is asinine.
| everybodyknows wrote:
| Right, but notice the poison pill: "... no notifications to
| customers about an external subscription service".
|
| Protonmail has a free tier, subject to resource limits:
|
| https://protonmail.com/pricing
|
| What should the app do when those limits are hit that Apple
| could not choose to call a "notification"?
| powersnail wrote:
| Considering it's protonmail, email them the notification.
| coder543 wrote:
| That's exactly the problem. Apple doesn't want any
| notification of this to be visible to the user in the app.
| The fact that the app handles the user's email isn't
| guaranteed to be a relevant distinction to the random
| reviewer who is tasked with reviewing the app.
|
| Apple has not spelled out clearly that this is okay for
| them to do, which means that it is a risk.
|
| The user would be receiving a literal iOS notification
| _from this app_ that talks about upgrades available outside
| the app.
| powersnail wrote:
| I don't believe Apple can dictate what ProtonMail is
| sending to its user via email.
|
| Requiring no app generated notification has a clear line.
|
| Requiring no email, which is a general mean of
| communication, has too big an implication. What about
| sending a text? Or a mail? Or to a secondary email?
|
| I'm not a lawyer, but such a clause in contract would be
| deemed rather unjust, wouldn't it?
|
| It feels like a lawsuit waiting to happen.
| coder543 wrote:
| > It feels like a lawsuit waiting to happen.
|
| Lawsuits against Apple's App Store policy enforcement are
| already in progress, but Apple has the best lawyers money
| can buy, and rulings are years away.
|
| If a substantial part of your business risked being
| terminated at the click of a button by some unelected
| person that you have never met, with no proper way to
| appeal such an unjust decision, you'd probably think
| twice about doing something that could be misconstrued as
| intentionally violating App Store Guidelines too.
|
| I blame Apple for the lack of clarity both in their rules
| and their enforcement. I don't blame ProtonMail for
| trying to adhere to Apple's arbitrary rules that often
| make little sense.
| powersnail wrote:
| At least part of the job of those lawyers is to tell
| Apple to not fight unlikely battles; or at least I hope.
|
| Apple wasn't crazy enough to go after Amazon Kindle app
| for asking the user to buy ebooks on Amazon.com, which
| bypassed Apple's system.
|
| Probably---hopefully---they aren't crazy enough to fight
| a email client for sending emails regarding upgrade
| plans.
| deleuze wrote:
| Absolute 0% of those lawyers jobs is to tell Apple to not
| pursue litigation. Do you understand what the point of
| litigation is for a company this size? They have over
| $100 billion in cash, even the most expensive lawyers
| salaries is a drop in the bucket. They can afford to drag
| a company like Protonmail through the mud for decades if
| they want to.
| cma wrote:
| > I don't believe Apple can dictate what ProtonMail is
| sending to its user via email.
|
| They already supposedly went after apps that linked to a
| privacy policy on their main website because the main
| website itself had premium options for sale. If you can't
| link to legal policy etc. because it might be a level or
| two of indirection from offering a premium service for
| sale through the site you have to do something like a
| special site just for Apple users. I can totally see them
| going after email and arguing Proton mail could hide
| those notification emails from iOS users if they contain
| links to premium.
| danijelb wrote:
| When I was using a trial of Hey email, I received an
| email about trial expiration and a link to upgrade to
| paid plan if I want to continue using it. When clicking
| the link, it opened in the in-app browser and you could
| enter your credit card details right inside. Idk if
| that's permitted by Apple or not, but if not, then Hey
| was lucky Apple didn't notice it.
|
| However, I don't see how that can be solved. An email
| provider has every right to send an email to a customer
| informing them about anything, including a trial
| expiration and if that email contains a link, it is
| handled like a link from any other email in the app. It
| would be really silly for Apple to ask the provider to
| censor their user's inbox and hide a particular email
| they received.
| coder543 wrote:
| > It would be really silly for Apple to ask the provider
| to censor their user's inbox and hide a particular email
| they received.
|
| I agree completely. If Apple agrees, they should spell
| this out clearly in their terms.
|
| As it is, Apple gets to selectively enforce this whenever
| they want, which is unfair to both app developers and
| users.
|
| One likely danger of spelling this out from Apple's point
| of view is that someone might say the same thing about
| other messaging services besides email. Take Facebook
| Messenger, for example. Imagine that Facebook started
| offering a paid upgrade to Messenger. Why should Facebook
| Messenger care on which platform you're receiving an
| internally-generated call to action to upgrade to some
| hypothetical paid plan? It's not like they were
| _intentionally_ targeting Apple users in this
| hypothetical scenario, and it should be their right to
| not have to censor messages they decide to send to their
| users just based on the platform being used. It 's
| (hypothetically) just a regular Facebook Messenger
| message, after all, generated by some marketing system
| completely disconnected from both the app and the
| messaging platform!
|
| One thing that confounds the issue for ProtonMail
| specifically is that the app _only_ works with
| ProtonMail, and ProtonMail is operating both the frontend
| and the backend. It 's not like the Gmail app that also
| lets you use other email accounts with it as a general
| purpose email client. This is why I chose Facebook
| Messenger as an example -- it is a messaging platform,
| but both the frontend and backend are operated by
| Facebook.
| comeonseriously wrote:
| Sounds like a notification.
| qwertox wrote:
| Isn't it normal for an email client to show a new-mail
| notification with the subject in it? Would it then depend
| on the wording of the subject?
| cma wrote:
| I believe it isn't OS-level notifications they are
| talking about, it's any notification in the app.
| nvrspyx wrote:
| From the article, emphasis mine:
|
| > Out of the blue, one day they said you have to add in-app
| purchase to stay in the App Store. _They stumbled upon
| something in the app that mentioned there were paid plans_ ,
| they went to the website and saw there was a subscription you
| could purchase, and then turned around and demanded we add IAP.
|
| It's apparently not just "no notifications". Below is the
| actual Apple guidelines. Notice that it is not "notifications",
| but "call to action". In practice, it may be "slightest hint".
|
| > Free apps acting as a stand-alone companion to a paid web
| based tool (eg. VOIP, Cloud Storage, Email Services, Web
| Hosting) do not need to use in-app purchase, provided there is
| no purchasing inside the app, or _calls to action for purchase
| outside of the app_
| lc9er wrote:
| Not necessarily related, but I'm subscriptioned and incremental-
| purchased out. Any time I see "In-App purchase", I immediately
| skip the app.
| simonh wrote:
| I do sympathise, but IAP can be implemented in useful ways. For
| example games with DLC such as extra campaigns or game modes.
| I'm a big fan of a war game on iOS that offers additional maps
| as IAPs. Unfortunately most IAPs are in the form of pay to win
| crap like gems and coins, but it doesn't have to be that way.
| mcintyre1994 wrote:
| The App Store also shows the list of IAPs for an app so you
| can distinguish between the add-on and garbage style before
| installing.
| joshstrange wrote:
| ^This.
|
| When I see "This app has IAP" or whatever the copy is I
| just scroll down and see if the IAP looks like:
|
| * 1 month subscription
|
| * 1 year subscription
|
| * Lifetime subscription
|
| OR
|
| * Full Unlock
|
| OR
|
| * Level pack 1
|
| * Level pack 2
|
| * Level pack 3
|
| OR
|
| * 10 gems
|
| * 20 gems
|
| * 30 gems
|
| ...
|
| If it's one of the first 3 then I'm more than happy to get
| the app. I don't mind paying through IAP to unlock the full
| app, pay for a subscription (within reason), or get more
| content. I am completely uninterested in using a fake
| digital currency inside your app. Doing that tells me
| everything I need to know about the app and the
| developer(s) behind it.
|
| In my book every "free-to-play" game that monetizes like
| this (even if they try to say they aren't "pay-to-
| win"/"pay-to-play") is trash. I don't want to hear "It's a
| fun game and you don't have to pay to enjoy it/play it",
| that's bullshit. I've yet to play an example of such a game
| that didn't (eventually) make the game
| unplayable/unbeatable without paying.
| LockAndLol wrote:
| No matter what Apple does, people will say they're right to do
| so. The biggest fuck you that app devs can show to Apple is to
| develop exclusively for Android. Then add a notice on their page
| WHY they won't develop an iOS app. Maybe even a hip hashtag like
| #AppleMafia
|
| Voila. If you're treated like shit in a store, don't use the
| bloody store.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2020-10-09 23:00 UTC)