I'm not thrilled with their having to open up most of these areas, but it's doable. If the API's don't already exist (read: Private, for Apple's use only) they can be written - that's an item on the to-do list, but it's not crazy.

However, the Apple Pay & NFC stuff just rubs me the wrong way. The only reason they have been begging for this is the ability to collect more data about riders, which isn't necessary and probably would get sold to third parties for the purpose of serving ads and other services.

I want none of this and those firms can kindly fuck off right into the Sun.

Existing API's do the basics just fine.

Thank $deity the MTA didn't entertain any of this bullshit when they rolled out OMNY. Now if we could get NJTransit on board, we'd be all set.

I'd welcome a return to transit tokens. They were simple and easy to use, and could be easily shared with guests visiting town. And they couldn't be used to track anybody.

How does "pay for transit with NFC" work without the metro having access to the NFC hardware?

In Chicago you can put your metro card in your apple wallet and it’ll automatically use it on the public transit system even if you have a different default set. Not sure if apple is charging them fees or what, but it works pretty well for me.

Having worked on such systems, yes, Apple charges fees for that. Hefty ones.

IIRC, those fees are charged to the merchant in order to process transactions. Traditional credit cards are similar in theory. For example, American Express has long had the reputation that in addition to the cards people know (Green, Gold, Platinum, etc.) technically being "charge cards" that need to be paid in full each cycle, merchants pay a higher fee to accept them.

^ Offset of course by the fact that most customers have pretty good credit to begin with and probably spend more than your average Visa or Mastercard.

In addition, I would also expect them to be paying for integration into someone's payment infrastructure to provide other services - PayPal, Stripe, Square, and the like.

I think the complaint was about being able to use NFC hardware outside of Apple Pay.

See also, Aussie banks who wanted the same thing.

How anyone would ever think this is a good idea, with third parties having unmediated access to hardware has not thought this through.

The whole point of an NFC chip is to allow this sort of thing. I don't see how anyone can think it's a good idea to make Apple entitled to set arbitrary payment processing fees for all NFC payments on an Apple device.

It’s their platform. If you don’t like it, there’s the door.

I’m not opposed to regulations, but the EU should be careful not to be too permissive or specific, keeping in mind the limitations of doing either one.

See also: the EU directive about mandating USB-C ports. They claim the standard will be revised in response to market conditions on the ground, which is nice to hear, but governments are slow - often by design - and they will need to prove it before they can be trusted not to screw up.

My phone is nobody’s platform. It’s my phone. I paid for it. I demand the right to use someone else’s software on my device if that suits me better.

It’s not like apple subsidises the devices with income from the App Store fees. They’re just double dipping, and I’m glad the EU is slapping that down.

Again, it's not a huge leap to imagine someone (in this case, banks or transit authorities) using that unfiltered access to do something gross, like giving your data to an entity you've never heard of.

Using the official API prevents most of this misbehavior, which is why it doesn't bother me if Apple are jerks about enforcing compliance.

If you, or an app you use, feel like access is necessary, make your case to them. Repeatedly if neccessary. Software is nothing if not malleable and most of these areas are slowly opening up, as the company seems to have read the room on a few things and would like to get ahead before the law requires they do so.

On the other hand, especially with hardware that could conceivably track your location, I'm surprised that users - the knowledgable ones anyway at least - aren't up in arms about what access to raw data (e.g, not mediated by an API) by someone other than the platform vendor might mean for them.

I don't think it's necessary to pull an EFF move and demand everything be private, but this is one area that I suspect would meet the standard where people want the bar to be much higher about who gets access to data and what they are allowed to use it for.

I’m sympathetic to the privacy argument. But I’m suspicious.

Particularly after reading the memos which came out in the Epic lawsuit, I can’t tell how much all of this really is about privacy. Or how much privacy is just cover to take a cut of the profits of Netflix, Amazon and visa by controlling access to our phones.

The privacy argument probably has some truth, but it seems suspiciously self serving for Apple.

I think there’s plenty of ways apple could preserve my privacy without taking such extreme control of my device. A simple answer would be to give banks direct access to the NFC chips on the condition of user privacy. And cut them off if they violate that policy rule.

I don’t think it’s a coincidence that apple’s chosen solution just happens to be the one which maximises their profit.

The testimony I recall from the Epic trial was pretty clear - Cook & Co. see this as a point of differentiation that helps them sell hardware.

After all, Google can't really do the differential privacy stuff to the extent Apple does due to their reliance on ad revenue - which is only so targeted because they collect it in the first place, giving their Ads customers (businesses) more opportunities to sell to.

Netflix wants to build viewer profiles of its users, so gathering that data in a way that they can ID helps; Amazon will do similar things to suggest purchases based on your history.

As a card provider for the general public, Visa kind of has to play ball and even then, their customers are merchants and financial institutions that issue cards.

Given enough size - think FAANG, or really any financial institution - Apple probably can't reject them for shady behavior, but can always work to build guardrails to prevent the worst offenders from going off.

> Again, it's not a huge leap to imagine someone (in this case, banks or transit authorities) using that unfiltered access to do something gross, like giving your data to an entity you've never heard of.

So you would also approve government entity to control what you do in your house, just to make sure you don't do something gross? If not, why you want some private company to control a phone you bought and own?

So the OS updates each year are free labour? The constant research as well? Okay…

How about the fact that you knew about the restrictions before you bought the product?

I feel you are in the wrong here. You knew the contract conditions and still signed it but because you don’t like it you want to change it. Well I like it so why is your view stronger than mine? Keep in mind you do have the option of Android and with this law you are taking away my right to choose a completely closed garden. Something I actually enjoy - I’m not just playing devil’s advocate here

As I see it, the $1000+ I paid for my phone more than covers the cost of Apple’s R&D, and a few years of software updates. Apple’s balance sheet bears this out too.

> You knew the contract conditions and still signed it

I didn’t sign a contract. I bought something with my money. I don’t have an ongoing business relationship with apple. But apple still thinks they’re in the right to control what I do on my own hardware.

And wow do they make a lot of money inserting themselves into my financial transactions. All in the name of privacy I hear. Suuuureee.

Apple is cleverly using the iPhone as a moat to stop banks and other companies from competing with them on software for their devices. They know nobody else has the expertise and deep enough pockets to compete on hardware - and they’re using that to milk as much money through software as they can get away with. It’s just the same as what Microsoft did bundling IE with windows - except way worse because apple doesn’t even let you install anything else.

It’s a terrible deal for consumers and the EU is right to slap them down for it.

> It’s their platform. If you don’t like it, there’s the door.

It's my phone, I should be able to do everything with it, if they don't like it they don't need to sell it in EU.

ummm?? government is slow then what is Apple? with its bs expensive cable that is like a decade behind with its USB2 speed? its 2022 every other phone has fast transfer rate

Why can't Melbourne Trams use the standard contactless payments that everyone else already uses?

Yeah this doesn't make sense to me. I've used my iPhone with NFC to pay for transit in multiple cities in multiple countries, I don't see any reason Melbourne Trams can't implement it too.

Because it requires the devotion of Apple's resources to supporting non-Apple things. It will necessarily degrade certain experiences away from those that Apple would provide without the regulation.

>Because it requires the devotion of Apple's resources to supporting non-Apple things.

Oh no, one of the richest companies on the planet might have to spend a tiny bit more on making things better for everyone.

The absolute horror!

It will be worse for me, a long time customer, at the benefit of you, possibly not even a customer?

Or, looking at it another way, it will not cause Apple's loyal customers to switch to a competitor, but it might attract potential new customers.

Why do there need to be new customers? If you didn't like the product before, you can look elsewhere (or look within). Seems pretty messed up to ruin the experience for those who have been enjoying the products as is for years.

How would opening up the API and payment system ruin the product? I want to buy audible books from the audible app on my phone but I can’t do that. I want to subscribe to Netflix from my phone but I can’t.

Seems to me that opening this stuff up would make our phones better, not worse.

Ah, yes, if only Apple Computer could have borrowed the wisdom of the famously prescient and tech literate European Union, it might have seen its way to these changes and new customers alone.

We live in a society. People who don't do business with a company nevertheless get a say in how that company does business.

It will be better for me, a long time customer, what now?

The status quo remains.

> It will be worse for me, a long time customer, at the benefit of you, possibly not even a customer?

It wouldn't necessarily make things worse for you though.

By the time we'll find out it will be too late. I'm not interested in finding out.

Apple has a bajillion dollars and cheats their own engineers.

> Apple is the world's largest technology company by revenue, the world's largest technology company by total assets,[454] and the world's second-largest mobile phone manufacturer after Samsung.[455][456]

> In its fiscal year ending in September 2011, Apple Inc. reported a total of $108 billion in annual revenues—a significant increase from its 2010 revenues of $65 billion—and nearly $82 billion in cash reserves.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Inc.#Finance

And then...

> In re: High-Tech Employee Antitrust Litigation (U.S. District Court, Northern District of California 11-cv-2509 [10]) is a class-action lawsuit on behalf of over 64,000 employees of Adobe, Apple Inc., Google, Intel, Intuit, Pixar and Lucasfilm (the last two are subsidiaries of Disney) against their employer alleging that their wages were repressed due to alleged agreements between their employers not to hire employees from their competitors.[11][12] The case was filed on May 4, 2011 by a former software engineer at Lucasfilm and alleges violations of California's antitrust statute, Business and Professions Code sections 16720 et seq. (the "Cartwright Act"); Business and Professions Code section 16600; and California's unfair competition law, Business and Professions Code sections 17200, et seq. Focusing on the network of connections around former Apple CEO Steve Jobs, the Complaint alleges "an interconnected web of express agreements, each with the active involvement and participation of a company under the control of Steve Jobs...and/or a company that shared at least one member of Apple's board of directors." The alleged intent of this conspiracy was "to reduce employee compensation and mobility through eliminating competition for skilled labor."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L...

and that was a decade ago? what's your point? that the entire tech industry was colluding on salary and comp?

> and that was a decade ago?

And do you really think they've "seen the light" since then?

> the entire tech industry was colluding on salary and comp?

And BTW it pretty much was the entire tech industry, it came out in the court proceedings: "Dozens" of other major tech companies were involved. Pando Daily had good reporting but they closed but you can still read up on it through the Archive.

- - - -

The OP said:

> Because it requires the devotion of Apple's resources to supporting non-Apple things. It will necessarily degrade certain experiences away from those that Apple would provide without the regulation.

The first point (about Apple's war chest) is that they have plenty of resources.

The second point (about how they conspired to cheat their own engineers despite having more money than Scrooge McDuck) is just to remind everyone that these are amoral money-grubbing bastards who will do pretty much anything they think they can get away with to make a buck.

The idea that opening up their walled garden to competition will "degrade certain experiences" is laughable.

I kinda get your point that Apple will have to devote some more resources, but it will only be slightly more: All the API are already there and being used by Apple apps privately and they just have to make it open to everyone. That's not really a huge overhead for someone of Apple's size - they'll just need to publish / update documentation and increase their developer support teams and that doesn't cost 10's of millions of dollars (which is again peanuts for Apple).

Private apis are nothing like public. You can’t just document them and toss em out the door because Private means you can change and break them every release without concern because you control all the consumers. You can also start using incomplete ones before the contract is solidified. Public means they are in use and shouldn’t change much, and if you do you need to announce a deprecation and then slowly deprecate. Not that apple has to do that but generally that is the rather large difference and you know the moment they break one everyone will be scream at them for that.

This is really not how it works. Private APIs are usually poorly designed for general use — safeguards for excess power consumption, etc, often don’t exist.

Many things will need to be rewritten; this legislation will result in significant delays in shipping new end-user features, if Apple doesn’t simply pull out of the EU, since the EU is demonstrating with this legislation that they don’t care about end-user privacy/security.

> This will have an extremely high cost to Apple if it’s implemented.

Come on, do you really expect us to be sympathetic to a trillion dollar company if its profit margin reduces? (Which any way may not happen - realistically, they'll just pass on the cost to us consumers).

How? If someone installs different app store and it breaks, they just don't handle the requests regarding 3rd party apps, just like now. What extra resources you're talking about

I'm a hedge fund lawyer that carries an iPhone 8 and a ThinkPad.