The issue with Uber v. California is really an issue of materially new kinds of workforces requiring new and effective kinds of legislation.
We just need some responsible leaders to think a little bit, maybe the feds, other states, other countries, and make some simple legislation. There doesn't need to be a referendum, nor does the gov. need to 'negotiate' with anyone per se. Just find something that works for the new world and do it. Subject to change obviously.
They obviously knew that Fortnight would get banned from the Appstore, and it was a business decision for them to make.
However, it would have been reasonable for them to assume that they would maintain their ability to still develop UnrealEngine, so they can publish source code for other developers to publish games from their own accounts. That overreach was Apple's doing.
It appears that the courts agreed as well, requiring Apple to allow Epic to continue UE4 development, while maintaining the Fortnight ban.
They didn't go under when they had to start doing background checks in Austin. They don't go under when they have to pay benefits in Germany. This is a stunt to make another couple percent profit.
At the end of the day that's what this boils down to - they will make a little more money if they succeed, they will make a little less money if they don't, nobody is going under. They're using people's livelihoods as leverage so that they can make a couple percent more profit.
Say what you want about Epic, but they totally forced Valve to publicly commit to decrease it's cut for every big publisher out there without directly profi ting from it.
But yeab ofc it's poor Apple being forced to screw developers a bit less. Unacceptable!
Embrace that and you actually have a chance of real freedom. Being invisible is both a boon and a detriment; you occasionally get stomped on for no apparent reason, but it also means that the big players are unlikely to know (or care about) the moves that you do make.
Epic is doing the same thing with the Unreal Engine code. They deliberately violated Apple TOS knowing it would get the account banned, and then they try to leverage all those other developers who are going to lose iOS support against the big bad Apple who is taking away your livelihood, all so they can establish their own store and make a higher percentage of the revenue from the sales other people's work (to be clear: they already make money from the sales of games based on Unreal, they just want to make more).
It's not just Uber, it's part of a broader trend tech companies adopting this tactic. It's seriously disgusting, this is the lowest thing to come out of the Silicon Valley techbros in a long time.