As much as we deny it, companies only tend to get that big through anti-consumer behaviour, walled gardens, vendor lock-in, etc.
When your life's purpose revolves around the absolute power your dream requires, of course you will defend it. The fact that allowing other companies to behave this way makes it harder for you to do well is irrelevant, because you need that power for when you're in their place.
Of course the truth is that smart contracts are close to useless without human intervention (see: the oracle problem), their inability to be changed is more problematic than useful because humans make mistakes writing them or change their mind later or are forced by law to change it, and Apple's app store system is already riddled with exceptions for entities that even Apple can't deny too many wishes (see: exceptions for Amazon) and weird constructs that draw artificial, blurred and very much human-defined lines in order to fix contradicting or nonsensical rules (see: the so-called "reader" app exceptions). But all of this is easily ignored when necessary to construct a seemingly contradiction-free world view and picking a "side". Also a very human imperfection...
As an Apple user, the whole point here is that it's not an open system.
I just can't get riled up over a developer not following the rules of a platform. I use Apple because the Apple ecosystem is valuable to me - the store, the SSO, the Apple ID, the UI/UX, the hardware - all of it. I don't care about Epic or any other developer that doesn't want to play nice with that ecosystem. Those kinds of developers don't have any value to me.
It's too simplistic and disingenuous to present it that way. Last month there was Fornite in the App Store and no option to sideload.
Right now I count 34 Adobe apps in the Apple's phone App Store. I'm very confident if this precedent is set Adobe will have their own app store and very likely will not have anything but a placeholder in Apple's App Store.
I want an iPhone primarily _because_ the App Store is the only place to get apps.
> which of course led to hundreds of fake and infected apps on the net, harming users.
> If you just want to play Fortnite on your iPhone and don't care about the App Store then the latter option is a better.
Not unless you get a Fortnite that has an ad at the bottom of the screen and ships as much PII as it can to some third-party company, or offers 2x v-bucks and steals CC info.
The app stores are facilitating that in a way though. They're keeping the users as dumb as possible and not making any effort to differentiate between legitimate or malicious apps that are sideloaded.
If it were a matter of going to epicgames.com, clicking "Install for Android", and confirming a prompt that says "You're about to install an app from epicgames.com", I think it would be a lot easier to train users to understand that.
It's not that simple. Right now when I look at the apps on my phone, I have a very, very high confidence that they are not malware. It's not 100% though - right? Because I have to trust some entity. I choose to trust Apple. If apple opens up side loading of apps, I have _much less_ confidence that when I look at my phone, the apps are not malware.
Unless I'm enrolling in an MDM, I implicitly trust everything on my device.
> This would all go away if Apple simply made it a setting to allow other IPAs
Again I think you're missing the point. Do you know how _awesome_ it is as a user that Apple manages my payment method and paying for random apps, and random subscriptions is managed by my Apple ID? I don't have to hunt down 'unsubscribe' emails, or call any phone numbers, or any of that garbage - I go into the control panel and click a button and now I'm no longer paying for that subscription. Allowing that stuff to happen outside of Apple would be a huge _negative_ for me.
> Keep the garden if you want it. Don't enable outside installs.
The wall around the garden is important. Sure, I could get my leg amputated in the street by a doctor with tools from my garage - but I'd rather have that done in a hospital where ingress and egress are more controlled and contamination is less likely.
> The difference here is Apple doesn't give you a choice.
Maybe the difference here is I made my choice already - I picked Apple. I don't want to have to think about every little feature and whether or not it increase my exposure to risk. If you value all that other stuff, go play in the Android world. I don't, so I don't even think about it until these threads come up.
> Even if the developer does all the legwork to build a payment system (for example, they have a web app as well) and market the app on their own, they have to give Apple their cut. You don't get a choice and neither does the developer.
You're conveniently omitting a huge feature of having Apple manage all of that stuff: _Apple manages all of that stuff_, not Epic or the kid that implements the next subscription-based flappy bird.
Just like you say "we can use Android" why can't we say "you can just stay on the app store"?
The fact that is impossible to side load apps is a feature to me. If Apple enables you and others to side load apps, it removes a feature and something I value.
I am using Android as I've been for the last couple of years for this hackability, but i rely more on F-Droid than Play Store.
I understand both Apples and Epics point of view, standard consumer would probably be hurt by Epic getting their way while HN crowd would benefit (possibly short term only) from Epic getting their way.
One thing to keep in mind is that there's a reason why Apple is doing this, and it rhymes well with what every single person i know says about the iPhone. It's simple, it just works, you know how to use it, It's convenient. All these things sound like things one can only achieve in a walled garden.
Apple does what's best for their shareholders, and what's best for their shareholders is if people stay happy with their iPhones and keep purchasing them. I'll stick to Android and all the associated spyware until there's a proper opensource alternative for day2day use and some decent music streaming service available.
If it makes you feel any better, I have never, ever, felt "locked down" in the Apple ecosystem. We must live very different lives because I never think about my phone - I think about messaging people, sending emails, looking something up on the web, getting directions, etc. Things I like and enjoy using are there and amazing. I don't have to worry about scummy devs like Epic, or side-loading malware because it's cool, or jailbreaking so I can put drop shadows on random things. If you need those features you should have picked a device that supported those features. I don't, so I don't care about things like that because they bring me no value.
Managing your devices and apps is expensive in terms of time and attention costs. It's not worth it to me.
> Also as a developer deploying anything Apple-related is a pain.
I would challenge this or at least dismiss this as an opinion - I have apps in both the iOS and Android stores and deploying on iOS is a breeze compared to Android.
What makes them scummy? They want to make money without paying Apple's 30% (for what? hosting the app would cost Epic very little, payment processing costs < 3% from anywhere).
> side-loading malware because it's cool, or jailbreaking so I can put drop shadows on random things
The whole point is that you shouldn't need to side-load or jail-break anything. You can put any app you want on your pc or linux machine. And no, we aren't all operating with tons of malware on those machines.
> they bring me no value.
Do you pay for any apps? Wouldn't them costing 20% less bring you value in a very literal, "more money in your bank account" sense?
> I would challenge this or at least dismiss this as an opinion - I have apps in both the iOS and Android stores and deploying on iOS is a breeze compared to Android.
This is simply not true. It's not a matter of opinion, there are fewer steps/fields to fill out and less time involved in deploying an Android app. Android also charges less.
Breaking the TOS
> They want to make money without paying Apple's 30%
Too bad, that's what it costs to play in the Apple ecosystem.
> (for what? hosting the app would cost Epic very little, payment processing costs < 3% from anywhere).
Surely you think there is more to the management and delivery of app bundles to millions of people, right? You're reducing the value provided by the App Store too a ridiculous level.
> The whole point is that you shouldn't need to side-load or jail-break anything.
I agree! I don't need either of those things.
> You can put any app you want on your pc or linux machine. And no, we aren't all operating with tons of malware on those machines.
Great, keep up the good work.
> Do you pay for any apps? Wouldn't them costing 20% less bring you value in a very literal, "more money in your bank account" sense?
Not if the cost is letting more garbage from Epic/EA/Origin/Zynga/whatever into the App Store and on my device.
> This is simply not true. It's not a matter of opinion, there are fewer steps/fields to fill out and less time involved in deploying an Android app.
How is it not a matter of opinion? If I counted the number of clicks/fields/pages/panels/etc for getting an app onto an Android or Apple device, my anecdotal experience tells me that it's about half the effort to distribute an Apple app. But anyway, this metric is silly and ultimately doesn't matter to me so I'm not going to argue with you about it anymore.
> Android also charges less.
Cool; I see about 2-3x more money on iOS apps vs their Android ports. The difference in the $99 vs the $25 is made up in no time and it's a rounding error to any enterprise listing apps.
Do you think that the Apple ecosystem could get better? Surely, there are improvements that would be a net positive for you?
Now, what if what Epic is doing results in an improvement in the Apple ecosystem?
Ultimately, you can only say that this case has no value to you if you can reason that there is no way that it will make things better for you, and that's a very tough thing to prove without a crystal ball :)
Still, you certainly don't have to put all that much thought into this. At the end of the day, there are far more important things in life.
You're inverting the relationship. These things have value because I don't have to care about side loading garbage IPAs or devs injecting malware, etc. etc. I don't care about sone random developer's "improvements". Just give me what I paid for and that's all I care about.
Hint: Part of what I pay for is: "play nice with apple, because that's what I expect."
The user experience of installing from their app store and using their sign in method is so much better than the experience of installing from the web and signing in via other methods. It frustrates me that the entire industry failed to create a suitable sign-in option and Apple felt they had to step in to create something with good UX while respecting users' privacy.
I'd love for the iOS ecosystem to open up more, but I also know it would be exploited easily and create an industry-wide race-to-the-bottom for UX and privacy.
You won't expect the single-parent-of-two type of developer to even hope of touching Apple. That sort of developer has no alternative but to keep paying the Apple 'tax'. It's no different than general purpose extortion.
Epic caused their own pain here, sure but What other way can we actually get a semi open platform that we're not being taxed on? Why can't we as users and developers have options on iOS? I think that if an operating system allows third party apps they should be _legally_ required to allow other app stores, sideloading of programs without penalty for doing so, or both. That goes for any platform, developed at any time by anyone.
I have been completely at a loss for anyone defending Apple while hoping that Epic loses their fight. The first makes sense but the second is absolutely baffling.