In my opinion not in this specific case. As an iOS user I WANT a system where everything conforms to certain guidelines. I do NOT want to fiddle with some weird custom in-App payment dialog which does it's own thing again.
It'll be interesting to see how this court order will be "implemented", my guess is that not much will change for now.
Apple couldn’t previously require payment flow through Apple’s payment systems, as evidenced by apps like Audible where you have no purchasing in the app and just have access to the content that you purchased through their website. Since Apple couldn’t outright force app vendors to monetize through Apple payment channels, their cudgel has been to ensure that app vendors have no way to link to external purchase options in the app, and hope that this was inconvenient enough for app vendors that they would choose to integrate with Apple’s payment channels. And it worked for most, but not all of them. Some apps, like Audible, just chose to live with having no way to sell anything from the app.
If Apple can’t even do that, they lose the ability to provide for their customers a consistent payment experience across apps.
https://www.theverge.com/2020/10/8/21506995/apple-forced-in-...
> “They stumbled upon something in the app that mentioned there were paid plans, they went to the website and saw there was a subscription you could purchase, and then turned around and demanded we add IAP.”
> Today, Apple confirmed to us once again that the rule is more lenient than it sounds: “free apps acting as a stand-alone companion to a paid web based tool” don’t need to use IAP as long as the apps themselves don’t offer purchases, and as long as the apps themselves don’t ask users to make purchases outside the app.
And developers will have the right to offer a cheaper non-centralized in-house IAP payment system, of course.
Apple pay is like a credit card, usable like one. IAP is the method by which apple forces app developers who sell through their app to pay the apple tax.
Depends what you mean. The subtlety that is always lost in these conversation on HN is how deep does the competition have to go? I don't think anyone seriously argues that iPhones do not have viable competition in the smartphone market. And yet, if I as a consumer want to use a smartphone which places strong restrictions on third-party developers (which is one of the most significant reason I use iPhones and recommend them to friends and family), somehow those restrictions are considered "anti-competitive." If these restrictions are lifted or prohibited, that clearly removes one of the key differences between iPhones and their competitors (mostly Android phones), and it baffles me that this could be construed as a more competitive smartphone market for consumers.
Malware isn't under the probe here; IAP is. Apple's behavior has been objectively awful specifically concerning the subject being discussed. Broadening the argument to Apple's desirable curation process is a misrepresentation of the issue.
People will continue to be able to enjoy the convenience of Apple IAP. Savvy users might seek better prices externally - but convenience does hold immense value. Developers can now also, as a pertinent example, ask for donations for open source projects without being taken down.
Had third party app stores/sideloading been allowed to happen as epic demanded, that would have made it impossible for any app sufficiently large enough to demand it from their users.
The risk here was very much a return to the Google/FB “gift cards for root access” scheme, minus the gift cards of course, if they had prevailed they would have just blocked web access to iOS and just demanded you root yourself for them if you want to use their service.
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/01/facebook-and-google-...
Mayne then we would have PWAs that work the same way everywhere.
The existence of competition might even motivate Apple themselves to adopting new video codecs and image formats that weren’t invented inside of Apple Hq.
The plaintiff here is a developer, not a fan of any specific device.
"Just don't develop for the phone, then."
Great, who's going to pay out the lost sales?
Also, assuming I "just don't buy an Apple device," I can [legally] develop an app on my Windows or Linux device?
Only Google?[1]
In addition, there's a very steep slippery slope in use here. It is currently possible to sideload on Android, and has been since day one, and yet we don't see the kind of end result you have predicted.
[1]: https://www.macrumors.com/2021/05/06/apple-hulu-special-api-...
> Apple's behavior has been objectively awful specifically concerning the subject being discussed.
Certainly not objectively. I would very strongly prefer an Apple ecosystem with no in-app purchases at all!
But it's not guaranteed to be, which is a huge loss for the app store IMO.
* lower IAP to 15% with an option to pay a higher dev license fee to lower it to maybe 7-10%.
* require that any IAP has an _option_ to use Apple’s IAP system within day 20% of the offsite price
* physical goods stay on the same system, but potentially offer some kind of carrot to implement Apple Pay
Besides, isn't the competition here what we want? Apple IAP are still easier, and probably will convert at a higher rate than pushing a user outside the app to do the payment on a website, so there's still incentives for developers to use them. If Apps switch away from IAP, then Apple is incentivised to actually compete (imagine that!!) and make something better that developers actively want to use.
It says something about the state of competition where Netflix can just say "no, we no longer want people to sign up on an iPhone and give us money". That says they don't think IAP is good, and Apple should actually work on building something that companies want to use.