Netflix, like Kindle & Spotify are "Reader" Apps which pay 0% Royalty.
[1] https://www.apple.com/ios/app-store/principles-practices/#:~...
All the "reader" designation does is allow this off-site option to exist at all, still with the restriction that you are not permitted to even imply that you can sign up elsewhere.
The only thing this does is make the customer experience worse. Now we have a Netflix app that can't tell you how to sign up, and a Kindle app that can't sell books. The alternative is the customer has to pay more, or the company has to eat the cost. Nobody wins except Apple, but you could make the argument that they're harming their own platform with this stuff.
That's it, for now. Epic is trying to set themselves up as publisher like Steam. Once they can get first-party status as an app store on iOS their tune will change.
This is about money, and one way to make money is to get people hooked on your product then jack up the price.
How does Epic store become first-party, they get bought by Microsoft? I don't get what you are claiming
I suspect that where the line is drawn depends on what benefit you feel you get from one side of the line versus the other.
Nipping it in the bud was wiped clean off the table the moment Trump won the Republican Party presidential nomination for a second term..
As far as I'm concerned, now, it's a complete free-for-all.
But this is the worst/dumbest/most off-topic reply to a comment I have ever read on this site, and maybe the entire internet. I regret having had to read it.
> And Epic doesn't even provide quality control, a discovery mechanism, or payment processing.
Apple takes 30% off all purchases upfront, and maybe they'll cut you a deal if you're Netflix-size.
On top of that, Apple's "quality control" allows through scam apps with scam IAPs, while they will reject your well-established app if you don't change the wording for your IAP copy for the second time in one year.
Or if you have no presence, they may well just reject you for not meeting the ambiguous minimum functionality requirements or for functionality they don't want users to have access to. After you've already paid them $99 for the privilege of being rejected, of course.
And then on top of that, Apple's "discovery mechanism" puts other people's ads above your app when people search specifically for the name of your app.
Epic, however, takes 5%..... after you pull in $1mil in revenue. That's it.
Do you really not see the glaring issue with your comparison here?