There's a big different between a device used almost entirely or gaming and a device through which almost all personal communication, news, banking, payments, e-money, travel plans, plane and train tickets, medical services, political planning, etc. happen.
A smartphone has pretty much become essential for life. A game console has never been that.
If there are going to be mandated limits, they should apply to all companies which build hardware and charge platform access fees to software developers.
Why not?
Do these new rules include the Android Play Store? Does it include the Apple TV app store? Does it include the Play Store when purchased on a television running Android? Imagine if Mattel creates a new ultra-low cost video games console; should these rules apply to them? What if their console happens to run Android? What if their games console runs Android and the Play Store? What if apps bought on their game store can also run on a phone?
Ultimately it ends up just warping the market and adding yet more complexity into business—and complexity benefits powerful established players over new entrants.
Is this a proven or unproven assumption?
But I must ask: have you ever seen A Government? That's a serious question. Look at any large Government around the world and look for any complex legislation that involves a relatively new business sector or financial instrument. Much of it is obviously terrible, or will turn out to be terrible, or is occasionally so terrible that it creates ripple effects which trigger financial crisis.
Australia launched a new economy-wide GST in 2000 which did many things, and one of them was a massive transformation of the cereal bar/museli bar/granola bar marketplace—changing recipes and picking new market winners—because Governments are terrible at writing legislation.
There has been plenty of that in the last few years, especially regarding Steam fees. Large game producers complain a bit less because their IP is so valuable they can get deal.
Also, I don't understand why Apple apologists think the console market is a good defense of Apple behavior. Every time someone talks about it, all I can hear is it's high time to make a precedent because the situation is also terrible in this other related market.
Where was the game publishers' outrage? Where was the game developers' outrage?
Gaming console makers and game developers have way better relations than Apple and the people developing for the App Store. And the game console makers' cut isn't just pure greed. Sony took an estimate loss of $240-$300 on every PS3 sold at launch just in order to widen out the install base.
Also, if Sony took a loss on the PS3 to get a wider base isn't that dumping?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sega_v._Accolade
> Gaming console makers and game developers have way better relations
Let's set aside the unproven assumptions; so your logic is that if you're a nice platform monopolist, you can charge arbitrary platform access fees. But if you're a bunch of meanies, different laws shall apply to you. I'm sorry, I was under the misapprehension that you were making a serious point.
> Sony took an estimate loss of $240-$300 on every PS3
Now I know you're not being serious. Such behaviours are anti-competitive as it would be exceedingly difficult for a new market entrant to compete with such artificially low console prices. What you're saying is that the US Government should enact laws which favour dumping and loss-leader activity. Ridiculous.
You're not entirely wrong:
https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/10/07/report-steams-30-cut...
> One source explained that although Steam only takes 30%, other fees and deductions mean they are usually collecting closer to 65% on their end, while they say console sales return much closer to the full 70% but are stingier with refunds and the like.
> Another source also stressed that just because a retailer takes 30% doesn’t mean the developer of the game actually gets the other 70%, saying publishers often earn between 30-70% of a sale themselves depending on the deal that has been struck. There are also engine licensing fees to consider (games that use Unreal have its 5% fee waived if they are sold on the Epic Store), taxes, and other costs not factored into what many people assume the actual creator of a game earns. One source said their takeaway from a physical retailer at the end of the day is often between just 10-15%.
You know, maybe this doesn't have to end with Apple. The Google Play store charges a 30% service fee as well. Maybe the entire pricing system of the industry is fucked, and worth further scrutiny. Furthermore, it's been repeatedly brought up in the discourse over the publishing industry's recent lawsuit against Internet Archive that the industry standard for book publishing are contracts where the publishers pocket 75% of book sales, while the author retain the rest. Meanwhile, you hear horror stories out of the music industry where artists are paid a pittance. This can be an endemic problem that's afflicting multiple industries at once. Maybe we can confer our righteous indignation both at Apple, and the rest. And maybe we ought to figure out a better way to help creators, whether app developers, game developers, authors, or musicians, get the pay they're due.
If you're a nice platform monopolist, you're not charging arbitrary, excessive platform access fees. You can have a monopoly on a platform, charge fees and still act in a way that makes those fees seem reasonable.
Sony for example seems to have a pretty positive relationship with its developers. Here's for example something I found related to the PS4 dev kits:
>Although this $2,500 price [for a PlayStation 4 dev kit] is being cited in development circles, the game-makers we spoke to all said that Sony had lent them dev kits for a limited period of one year, for free. As of right now, there are no dev kits being sold. Sony is sending whatever it has available to favored developers. "All the indies I know got them for free," said one developer. "Sony has been amazing about kits and development thus far."
>Another developer said that Sony is focused on loaners, rather than collecting fees. "They are handing them out like candy," he said.
There's also various accounts of Sony providing support for its developers, including launching a $10 million fund for independent developers.
https://sonyreconsidered.com/playstation-commits-10-million-...
If Sony and the like were every bit as bad as Apple, Google, Steam, etc., I'd imagine we'd hear a lot more negative stories about them. I tried to find stories of Tim Sweeney talking shit about Sony's cut, but couldn't really find any. Only really found things like this:
>“We’ve been working super close with Sony for quite a long time on storage,” he says. “The storage architecture on the PS5 is far ahead of anything you can buy on anything on PC for any amount of money right now. It’s going to help drive future PCs. [The PC market is] going to see this thing ship and say, ‘Oh wow, SSDs are going to need to catch up with this.”
Maybe developers are more forgiving towards platform fees when they feel like they are working together with the charging company rather than against.
>Such behaviours are anti-competitive as it would be exceedingly difficult for a new market entrant to compete with such artificially low console prices.
Sure. But it also works out in game developers' favor. Console makers are cutting the cost of the device to reach a larger install base, which then increases the potential customer base for game publishers and developers.
>What you're saying is that the US Government should enact laws which favour dumping and loss-leader activity.
I'm not.
> you're not charging arbitrary, excessive platform access fees
What's your legally enforceable definition of arbitrary? What's your legally enforceable definition of excessive? How do they apply to Apple and not to (for example) the Steam store?
> Sony for example seems to have a pretty positive relationship
Emphasis on "seems". These relationships involve very aggressive NDAs which would have a chilling effect on developers speaking out. Not to mention most developers will work for very large companies who would frown upon freelancing their opinions about a corporate relationship that is responsible for 50% or 100% of the developer's revenues.
Compare that to the App Store, where a million rando developers have paid their $99 and are complaining because Apple won't publish their malware or torch app.
> There's also various accounts of Sony providing support for its developers
There are (relatively speaking) an extremely tiny number of game developers on these platforms, and a lot of potential upside in landing exclusives, so you can expect such largesse and personal treatment from Sony and Microsoft.
> including launching a $10 million fund
For the video games industry, $10 million is crumbs. No, it's fractions of crumbs. No, it's atoms. I haven't looked into this PR exercise aka "fund" beyond the link you offered, but how much do you want to bet that access to that fund requires a period of console exclusivity in return?
> I'd imagine we'd hear a lot more negative stories
Again, the number of console publishing licenses is relatively tiny.
> But it also works out in game developers' favor.
Does it? Or does it just lock out new entrants in the hardware space? If Sony and Microsoft were unable to sell consoles at a loss, perhaps new market entrants would be able to create new console platforms of similar quality, and compete for developers by offering better financial terms.
I'd also like to take this opportunity to remind everyone that the same is true for games on the Xbox, PlayStation and nearly every mainstream games console for the past thirty years. Pretty much every games console software title included a healthy cut for Nintendo, Sega, Microsoft, or Sony. And if you didn't have the explicit blessing of these companies, you couldn't publish your games at all. Period end.
Where was your outrage then?