If they can't make 30% on the app store they'll go do something else which will make them 30%+ and leave it to rot. Because 5% or 10% is a commodity business and they can do better than that.
* a market that is so large that in a bunch of area it is basically not limiting - Apple has an influence on that but capturing so much value on 3rd party apps should not be warranted IMO, otherwise it would be warranted for them to also capture a big part on most of software for MacOs sales (esp. since the configuration by default is now quite secure so the argument that the App Store for iPhone is so valuable because it is curated is getting weaker) and for MS to capture a big part on most of software sales for Windows (and maybe give some crumbs to PC hardware manufacturers)
* the success of 3rd party apps, most of which has not much to do with Apple
And you are paying for the cost of the channel i.e. customer acquisition.
You can't just "show an online ad" and expect to be successful.
When you look at an airline that's about to fly a plane with twenty empty seats, do you say "sheesh, it's totally unreasonable that seat is selling for anything more than zero, it costs the airline nothing to have someone sit in it, the greed is mind-blowing"?
Maybe you do?
Which is why you don't have to let a monopoly/oligopoly set the price at will, they need to be regulated. Smartphones are becoming essential tools in many people's lives, and there are only 2 main providers; they need to be regulated. You can argue at the exact regulation but this Apple move has proved beyond doubt that we (as a society) need to impose tough regulations on them; because by themselves, they're not going to be reasonable, they're looking to extract maximum feasible rent.
Even monopolies are generally allowed to set their own prices; it's only the point at which there's abuse that there's a regulatory concern. The argument that Apple is looking to "extract maximum feasible" rent is undermined a bit by some facts I discuss in one of my comments elsewhere in this thread.
So yeah, as long as there's state intervention in the free market let the state regulate bad actors. I would be glad if it all went away but reality is that we have to live with this system.
This is basically the core question in Epic vs Apple, wherein the court has ruled that "iOS Customers" is not the relevant market to consider.
On your second part: one of the defining qualities of a retail store experience is, in my experience, that no-one is allowed to compete with the owner of the store. No-one would say it is uncompetitive that the owner of a supermarket doesn't allow you to put your own goods on their shelves.
Presumably your point is really that Apple's App Store is such a large fraction of the total smartphone app market that it has, and uses, monopoly pricing power in abusive way. That's a more interesting point.
The fact that's interesting to me is that, as far as I know, since Apple created the App Store, it has always charged 30% (modulo the recent small business program); from the very beginning when the market was practically non-existent, with no guarantee of success, up until today. So despite the fact the market has grown from nothing, Apple hasn't sought to increase their fees.
Also, look at comparison points. If you look at PC video games, those can often be bought in physical form, downloaded direct from their publishers, etc. etc. I mean to say there is no restriction on alternative sales channels. Nonetheless, a huge number of game developers choose to sell on Steam; where, coincidentally, the store cut is also 30%. They complain about it, but they do it.
I didn't say that's not what determines a price.
> When you look at an airline that's about to fly a plane with twenty empty seats, do you say "sheesh, it's totally unreasonable that seat is selling for anything more than zero, it costs the airline nothing to have someone sit in it, the greed is mind-blowing"?
No. Plane tickets are quite cheap regardless when you consider the amount of force involved in lifting that much weight into the air across the planet. Even when it's more expensive, I'm saving a ton of time compared to if I drove my car across country and back, making even pricier tickets worth it. In fact, the way I look at it, a plane with a bunch of empty seats is a good thing because that allows people to make last-minute travel plans. If one had to reserve a plane ticket months in advance, that'd be pretty lousy.
So perhaps that was just a bad example.
Here's the flaw in your oversimplifying of the argument. The price being as simple as what the buyer is willing to pay for is only adequate when you ignore the seller's level of monopolism and the market incentives that drive the buyer to taking it in the rear. Apple not only dominates a massive percentage of the mobile phone market, but they along with Google have created systems where your digital service is unlikely to be successful unless you play their game... because they are oh so concerned about the safety of the end user. And app that's not found in the App Store is never going to reach widespread use because even Android users don't really want to use apps their friends who have iPhones can't interact with them on. Even if you host binaries on your own site, good luck having iOS users figure out how to side-load the app or even have the courage to do so.
Would you be fine if your bank just ripped off 1/3 of your income? After all, what are you gonna do? Use cash for everything and be closed off from the modern economy? Sure, you can do that. But does that mean that this hypothetical banking system isn't ripping you off regardless of if you choose to pay it? It's a large amount of value that the buyer earned that the seller arguably didn't earn. In the case of Apple, they effectively get a 30% share in every company that hosts an app in the App Store because at any moment Apple can just say "nah" and delete the app.
But sure... let's have a society where everything's a free-for-all and we don't regulate scams and ripoffs because the buyer was willing to pay for it.
EDIT: I now realized what I said was on the snarky side... I changed it but left some of it and hope you're not personally offended or anything.
Supposedly I did work to earn a profit, but clearly not so much work that I shouldn't thank whatever system I'm subject to for the privilege of... making a transaction that barely involved said system, if at all.
5% or even 10% would be more acceptable. But 30%? lol For what? There's no way the vast majority of that cut is necessary for Apple's financial operations or for them to make a reasonable profit. How some people can't see this as greed is mind blowing. Where do they draw the line?