It was just a particularly stupid thing to say when the App Store Review guidelines used to explicitly say they would retaliate -

"If your app is rejected, we have a Review Board that you can appeal to. If you run to the press and trash us, it never helps."

It is absolutely part of Apple's culture. They publicly said so and were really proud of it!

And just like every other bully, they are also cowards. Because running to the press is exactly the only thing that works for most people. As long as you are able to get enough traction with the press, your issues will magically get resolved.

Standing their ground and refusing to succumb to blackmail is not the same as retaliation.

> Standing their ground and refusing to succumb to blackmail is not the same as retaliation.

Lol, that is the most backward fanboy reading of that sentence possible.

Someone asked higher ups whether they should start bullying Netflix. Next, Apple started trying to placate Netflix by fixing issues and making things possible that they wanted.

Doesn’t sound like bullying to me.

I think the main point here is not what happened in Netflix's particular case.

Has Apple behaved differently in other cases?

Maybe Apple realized Netflix is too big to bully?

Apple AirPods alone generate as much revenue as the whole of Netflix.

"Big" doesn't always mean revenue. In this case means eyeballs, market share, whether it's a leader in its niche (it is), public opinion, etc.

Netflix is huge.