This type of comment is everywhere on the Internet and completely predictable.
As an American I think regulation should only be enacted when absolutely necessary, and these laws seem anything but necessary. I’ve rarely seen convincing cases of innovation being stifled or people being harmed by Apple’s walled garden approach. It’s clearly not a market failure because (1) it is extremely profitable and (2) it is not a monopoly. As you can see in this thread, tons of people prefer differently, and those people can buy Androids. I also don’t like how this EU legislation mainly targets American companies.
Forcing Apple to allow other voice assistants will only strengthen Google and Amazons dominance in the voice assistant ecosystem.
Forcing messaging apps to allow cross compatibility only will give them more of my unencrypted messages.
I could go on, but I’m very curious what all of these “massive goods” that I’m not seeing are.
You don’t personally have to benefit from this legislation, you can stay in an “official” configuration until the day you die. For some of us, this opens the door to have a FOSS App Store, or custom apps without having to rebuild them once a week.
If Microsoft continued its monopolistic practices, it's very likely that the iPhone that you like so much now won't be existing today.
I don't even know what to say to this. Backwards thinking? Apple employee speaking? I seriously wonder why you would use this argument.
The default remedy isn't break up, it's 10% of the total worldwide turnover (20% for repeat offenders). The EU can very much fine Google or Apple (and already did so).
If break-up is not possible, retricting or prohibiting access to the EU market is quite possible.
Edit: also, on my dealings with Google, I am contracting with Google Ireland Limited, a company that the EU can break up.
I wouldn't call it a market failure, there's plenty of benefits with wall gardens and it's not done solely for profit. BUT there's also drawbacks and places where walls don't make sense.
Not being able to install arbitrary apps from various app stores provides security, UX consistency, and stability of the software. But there's also drawbacks for things like privacy or abusive censorship or copyright policies.
Given the benefits/drawbacks, the best solution is to have options in the marketplace. If you prefer having more control, don't mind sacrificing deep horizontal product integration, or doing the leg work to make it ideal (doesn't need to always 'just work' predictably), etc, then you should have the option to use an OS/device that offers that.
Personally I'd rather see Google make Android more flexible (for ex: making Google Play Services less restrictive) rather than forcing every OS to be like Android.
But I'm not sure how that could be done via restrictive policy without throwing the baby out with the bath water (other than targeting monopolistic behavior like preventing choice in browsers). Otherwise taking a more-freedom approach would be best, maybe by investing in open platforms, investing in public relations campaigns to make people understand why lack of choice is bad or a consumer-friendly 'open platform' label to guide shoppers, incentives like small tax breaks for offering more open platforms, etc.
For Apple, they could offer a stripped down iOS (like a server edition of a desktop) without all of the services and side-loading restrictions, without having to ditch the current approach that people like.
Do you realise the irony of arguing for free market and a walled garden (not a free market)- simultaneously?
You can't have it both ways, pick your poison
Do you think free-markets means corporations also need to run their business operations and products/platforms like a market? Because that's not what that means. (Even if it did ideological purity is dumb)
Inversely governments forcing companies to all operate with the same business model is not on a free market.
The only thing that would prevent a walled garden from operating in a free market is if Apple et al was a monopoly/oligopoly and you had no other choices. I've already said antitrust laws for things like browser choice is one of the better solutions than the one proposed.
If you want to sell an app, you have to deal with rules of App Store or Play Store, or Windows Store. You can't even sell pornographic apps - this is the definition of an unfree market.
Android has those options. Please point me to this great privacy and security conscious competitor to Google Play Store.
- smartphones
- desktop/laptops
- music and video streaming
- App Store and payments with Apple Pay
- chip design
- physical stores
All of those could stand on their own.
Edit: I'm not saying that the EU can break them up but Apple is not a company with a single field where breaking it up is impossible. I misread the parent a bit.
Perhaps they might pull a China and require them to open a 51% EU-owned subsidiary to do business here, which would then be subject to all sort of restrictions including company size.
As a EU citizen, I would absolutely love it. But I suspect that the EU is bound by many more and much more comprehensive free-trade treaties than China is, and such a draconian approach would require many of them to be renegotiated or exited outright.
How would you approach this otherwise? The EU probably can't break up Google or Apple (how would this even look like?) and the walled gardens are clearly a market failure, including apples fat margins. You mention details, but regulation can be well made and just continuing the status quo is also bad. All regulations open up questions but it's not the wild west here, we have rules and they regulate the economy, even for big multinational giants like apple. Sometimes companies even get nationalised (or nationalised companies get sold)!