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A comment on The level of Mac malware is not acceptable, says Apple exec at Epic trial. Parent comment

Re:The level of Mac malware is not acceptable, says Apple ex... by periheli0n on Thursday May 20, 2021 @10:47AM (#27221803)
Law of skewed distributions. A few apps, like Fortnite, generate huge amounts of revenue for the App Store (and for Epic in this case). Most apps are actually free or ad-funded and don't generate any revenue for Apple apart from the 100 bucks dev fee.

So it's fortnite and a bunch of other apps that make those 20 bn. Again, Fortnite alone made 300 M a year for epic, and 150M a year for Apple.

Actually I'd bet that the largest part of the revenue is generated by in-game purchases. Too easy to trigger addictive gaming with simple tricks like intermittent reward.

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Re:The level of Mac malware is not acceptable, says Apple ex... by kevingadd on Thursday May 20, 2021 @10:51AM (#27221862)
Game IAPs definitely have skewed distributions, but I think the exact numbers have significant impact on arguments made about how much of a cut Apple deserves or how much total profit is reasonable. If you're making arguments about that I think you need at least basic numbers to support them, and those numbers aren't here.

Apple and Epic both have those distribution numbers, and I wish those showed up in the trial. The distribution is going to vary wildly from app to app, and games like Fortnite allow you to earn currency in-game. While I know they are skewed from personal industry experience, any claim from me about the actual average would be complete speculation.

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Re:The level of Mac malware is not acceptable, says Apple ex... by periheli0n on Thursday May 20, 2021 @10:56AM (#27221932)
Yes, since Apple wouldn't release the numbers required we cannot do a proper analysis.

Personally I don't know anyone who spends huge sums on paid apps, but I know of cases where kids spend huge sums on in-game stuff on iOS.

So yes, it's based on anecdotal evidence, but I have yet to hear an account of someone who regularly spends more than a tenner per month (or even per year) on paid Apps.

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