[HN Gopher] Apple's 15% Deflection Tactic
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Apple's 15% Deflection Tactic
Author : lux
Score : 76 points
Date : 2020-11-18 22:23 UTC (36 minutes ago)
(HTM) web link (www.johnluxford.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.johnluxford.com)
| nickff wrote:
| I understand that 30% is big, and does have an impact on some
| business models, but it also acts to align the incentives of the
| platform-developer with those of the app developer. The fact that
| Apple makes a bunch of money off apps makes it beneficial for
| them to continue supporting the ecosystem, by providing APIs,
| functionality, and other support.
|
| What surprises me most about Apple's model is why they don't
| offer better support to developers. It seems that iOS the 'rich
| users', whereas Android has the 'cheap users', so Apple doesn't
| even bother improving the developer experience.
| lux wrote:
| Cost of framework development is a fair point, and they do
| continue to add things like ARKit, the Swift language, and a
| million new submenus in Xcode ;)
|
| But that's been true of all OSes for decades and doesn't make
| iOS specialized compared to macOS or any more deserving of 30%
| of every developer's gross profits.
| nickff wrote:
| I never said anything about compensating Apple for framework
| development costs; my point is about aligning incentives.
| giobox wrote:
| There have been measurable improvements over years to things
| like app review times etc, significantly so in some cases.
|
| Whether _any_ review process in a store the size of Apple's can
| justify taking 30% is not obvious to me. As size goes up, costs
| usually go down in a healthy market. The App Store is barely
| recognizable in scale vs launch day, but financial terms for
| developers have barely moved.
| nickff wrote:
| I have spent a bit of time thinking about this, and can't
| really come up with a way of calculating a 'justifiable cut'
| for Apple. Would it be their cost per average app? Should it
| be a fixed fee with a variable rate on top? Should they
| license access like the videogame companies used to? Won't
| these smaller profits further incentivize Apple to offer
| competing apps in every category, and dis-incentivize quality
| control of third party apps?
| ajharrison wrote:
| Do people think Apple is running a fucking charity?
|
| It's business. Grow up, deal with it.
| jimbob45 wrote:
| >Now that Microsoft and Apple have introduced app stores on
| Windows and macOS, they plan to slowly erode our freedom on PCs
| too so that they can reap the same financial benefits on our
| labour on all computing platforms
|
| I haven't seen any indication that MS is trending in this
| direction, nor could I envision how they would go about doing
| such a thing. Fuck Apple though. Rent-seeking scum.
| lux wrote:
| Right you are! My mistake on including them as an example
| there. I should fix that.
|
| Edit: While they're not taking the same fee (honestly, 5% is
| pretty great!), they are the original company recognized for
| their "embrace, extend, extinguish" strategy. I'm super
| impressed with Microsoft's turnaround on open source, but I'm
| still leery of them long-term, especially if leadership changes
| down the road.
| patrec wrote:
| He's not right. Windows comes with "telemetry" (read spyware)
| you cannot disable (unless you got a corporate version). Also
| UEFI has not exactly been without controversy.
| partiallypro wrote:
| What does collecting telemetry have to do with walled
| garden ecosystems that are used to squeeze every ounce of
| profit out of developers? Doesn't even makes sense.
| patrec wrote:
| So you think, sure Microsoft may lock users out of
| control their own computers when it serves their
| monetization interests but they would never do anything
| so crass as control third party developer access in order
| to squeeze profit out of them?
| BoorishBears wrote:
| https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2020/11/17/meet-
| the-...
| my123 wrote:
| That's an improved TPM/TPM successor. Those don't lock you
| out of anything Secure Boot wise, it's just not what
| they're designed for.
| BoorishBears wrote:
| By that logic T2 is also "just an improved TPM/TPM
| successor"...
|
| It's not hard to infer the direction that MS is going
| with this concept...
| jason0597 wrote:
| Have you forgotten about Windows 10 S?
| tomerico wrote:
| Microsoft is definitely doing maneuvers in that direction - see
| this for example https://www.zdnet.com/article/windows-10-to-
| permit-block-on-...
| modeless wrote:
| Windows 10 S is how they would do it. It's optional, for now.
| But that's mostly because it hasn't been successful. If
| Microsoft was able to get more apps on the Windows Store, I
| have no doubt they would introduce Windows 10 S devices that
| can't be unlocked to full Windows.
| post_break wrote:
| If I make $0 a year I should be able to put the app on my phone
| without having to pay as well. And not just for 7 days and have
| to resign it every 7 days.
| andrewjl wrote:
| > General computing platforms should be protected from such
| predatory practices by manufacturers through strong government
| regulations.
|
| I find it much more plausible that any regulations will end up
| entrenching market incumbents and closing off potential avenues
| for disruption. In other words, this can only make the situation
| worse or keep it somewhat the same, it won't make it better.
|
| > Stifling innovation isn't good for anyone, and as more and more
| people become software developers, this really just hurts the
| small guys ... Indie developers need protection from monopolistic
| and anti-competitive practices from larger players in the market
| through strong government regulation, not a discount on their
| first $1m in sales.
|
| Indie developers aren't the only stakeholders here, platform
| users are as well and any regulation will need to take into
| account their needs and interests. In purely numerical terms, the
| latter group outnumbers the indies by 100x or more. Whose needs
| will any regulation give more precedence?
|
| The top concern amongst tech users today is security, whether its
| security of personal data or more diffuse sense of security
| concerning the integrity of public discourse conducted online.
| It's very hard to imagine any kind of regulation protecting indie
| devs without also introducing regulations on the distribution
| process itself, in order to protect end users. The only thing
| harder to disrupt than a commercially dominant player is a
| commercially dominant player ensconced in a complex regulatory
| regime. This is not a reality that indie developers or myself
| (personally), particularly like, but it's the reality we have.
| Ignoring it won't make it go away.
| pryelluw wrote:
| I just want to be able to run and distribute my own apps. It's
| ridiculous and just plain criminal that this is not possible.
| Apple does not own my device and does not get to dictate what I
| do with it. Phones are so locked down that they are a real threat
| to personal computing and software engineering. The day where
| apple stops indies from publishing apps is near.
| benbristow wrote:
| > Apple does not get to dictate what I do with it
|
| Sounds like they already do...
| echelon wrote:
| This is where antitrust attention needs to be laser focused.
|
| Our freedoms are at stake, and this should be our rallying
| point.
|
| The iPhone is a general purpose computer (email, photos,
| dating, payments, reminders, docs, web, games, etc.) and
| computer manufacturers cannot control the only means to run
| software.
| threeseed wrote:
| We've been seeing these blog posts for over a decade and this
| doesn't offer anything particularly new.
|
| It would be nice to see one that actually offered constructive
| and workable legal solutions other than "make iPhones general
| computing devices" even though the concept has no meaning in law
| and would bleed into other industries.
| lukifer wrote:
| > bleed into other industries
|
| And what would be so bad about this exactly? The comparison is
| oft made with closed stores for gaming consoles; but I don't
| see why regulating console manufacturers to require side-
| loading or third-party stores would be such a bad thing.
| There's no law of the universe which dictates that their
| business model be per-unit loss-leaders for game revenue
| splits.
| judge2020 wrote:
| In my opinion, it's an issue with the way it's being
| portrayed - not mentioning consoles, smart TVs, etc. can lead
| a reader to think that Apple is alone in these practices,
| when mentioning the other devices might provide more
| perspective.
| lux wrote:
| My point was to collect the arguments in one place (to clarify
| my own thinking), and that we need to establish that legal
| definition already. We've run the "unregulated app stores"
| experiment for long enough, now it's time to do the work of
| defining these things and regulating them properly.
|
| I'm interested in the bleed into other industries though, and
| would love some examples. It's important that laws be general
| enough not to be too targeted against particular actors but
| also to avoid side effects that adversely affect others in the
| process.
| reaperducer wrote:
| _to clarify my own thinking_
|
| If it was just to clarify your own thinking, then why did you
| submit it to HN?
| lux wrote:
| Essays by definition are to clarify one's own thinking. Why
| does anyone share them with others? Because we think they
| contribute something of value to others.
| causality0 wrote:
| We need digital consumer rights laws. Badly.
| matsemann wrote:
| _but you pay for the distribution / tools / OS etc_ is a common
| sentiment I see here. No, the yearly fee should pay for that, and
| the user for the OS. And anyways, what if I don't want to, why
| cant I distribute it myself?
| jjtheblunt wrote:
| Is the cold rational Apple answer that you signed a contract
| when enrolling as an Apple Dev?
| damnyou wrote:
| A contract can be declared null and void in court if it is
| against public policy. The goal should be to make Apple's app
| store model against public policy.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| > The goal should be to make Apple's app store model
| against public policy.
|
| Policy should not be written to attack an individual
| company that for some reason you've got a beef with.
| Retric wrote:
| If developers, customers, and Apple is worse off by doing
| so, then that seems like an idea driven by ideology not
| rationality. A large annual developer fee for example would
| dive many developers out of the Apple ecosystem which is
| bad for everyone.
| judge2020 wrote:
| Because Apple decided that only software they approve of can be
| used on their machines unless the user explicitly allows
| software Apple hasn't accepted (via ctrl-click). On iOS, Apple
| made the decision to make it so users can't make that decision.
| Users still end up paying $500-$1400 for phones that run this
| software, so the 'free market' has decided that users want a
| software model like this (otherwise Android would be an even
| bigger player in the US than it is now).
| st3fan wrote:
| I have mixed feelings about this ... the yearly fee is $100 - i
| feel that is very much out of balance with what you get back in
| terms of cloud services, distribution, marketing, reach, etc.
|
| The danger of saying 'the developer membership should account
| for that' is that they will actually run the numbers and come
| back with MUCH higher yearly fees that simply push many small
| devs out.
| chrisseaton wrote:
| $100 seems like basically zero for an app developer. Half an
| hour's billable work. Seems completely insignificant?
| mikepurvis wrote:
| I feel like the $100 is just supposed to be a token amount to
| provide a speed bump for tire-kickers, spammers, etc.
|
| If they were serious about it as a revenue stream, it would
| make sense to go with something more like the UE4 model,
| where it's free up until the point where you're a big fish,
| and then a more aggressive fixed fee kicks in.
| callalex wrote:
| It's funny how, as someone who builds cloud services, I
| thought your statement was going in the opposite direction
| until the end. $100 will buy a _ton_ of hosting that is more
| than adequate to run most indie app downloads for a year.
|
| The counterpoint to my claim which you stated is that the App
| Store also provides reach and marketing, which are quite
| pricey. I agree that they are expensive services, but can you
| even name one example in the past 5 years (literally about
| half the life of the ecosystem) where the App Store promoted
| an indie developer into success?
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(page generated 2020-11-18 23:00 UTC)