News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by Hamuko on Thursday January 25, 2024 @01:32PM (#39132900)
Why wouldn't YouTube just distribute through App Store like normal? It's not like they are paying Apple per download there.
Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by axlee on Thursday January 25, 2024 @01:34PM (#39132928)
I think Apple will be a lot more hurt by not having Youtube on their devices than the other way around. Youtube is ubiquitous and has no alternative. If I was Alphabet, the price would be 0.
Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by halostatue on Thursday January 25, 2024 @02:31PM (#39133991)
Not likely. I haven't had YouTube installed on my device in 18 months (mostly because of Google's insistence on using it as an authentication verifier).

I don't miss it.

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by hot_gril on Thursday January 25, 2024 @01:53PM (#39133323)
I still don't get the point of that app, aside from a few misc features like Chromecast. YouTube works in-browser.
Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by babypuncher on Thursday January 25, 2024 @02:02PM (#39133480)
YouTube works in browser, but the native iOS app offers a much more polished experience than the mobile web UI, especially for actually browsing the library.
Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by hot_gril on Thursday January 25, 2024 @05:00PM (#39135980)
I'm not so sure about that because it gives them more ways to bother you about stuff.
Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by babypuncher on Friday January 26, 2024 @06:04PM (#39150033)
How so?
Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by hot_gril on Friday January 26, 2024 @07:39PM (#39150995)
It can ask for permissions like push notifications, I can't install ad-blockers on it, and they otherwise get more control over it. They even seem to intentionally treat web users a little better, cause I just got a full-sized homepage ad in the app for TikTok of all things, with a download button. The site doesn't have that, and I made sure to disable my blocker. Maybe they consider app users more captive of an audience, or they simply bring changes to it first that are generally about further monetization.

Not a huge deal though. In the past, pre-iOS-10 Safari was immune to the "no background playback" rule the app had, and before that, the site had no preroll ads while the app did, so it was a clearer difference.

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by JumpCrisscross on Thursday January 25, 2024 @01:36PM (#39132966)
> Youtube is ubiquitous and has no alternative

If it isn’t on iOS it isn’t ubiquitous. It’s left the highest-earning viewers on the table.

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by radicalbyte on Thursday January 25, 2024 @01:45PM (#39133132)
If Roblox, Youtube and Netflix went Android only then I'd be replacing all of our iPads with Android Tablets post-haste.
Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by JumpCrisscross on Thursday January 25, 2024 @01:46PM (#39133151)
> if Roblox, Youtube and Netflix went Android only then I'd be replacing all of our iPads with Android Tablets post-haste

Sure. Most wouldn’t. YouTube and Netflix would lose tens of billions of present value overnight. Hell, Apple might capture a good fraction of that surplus.

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by realusername on Thursday January 25, 2024 @02:02PM (#39133487)
Yeah sure, people will give up on YouTube and Netflix to use iOS, that's not going to happen. They'll suffer through using Safari to access those and that'll reduce the perceived value of iOS devices for future purchases since it will be seen as clunky and not seamless.

Not being able to use YouTube properly is also one of the reasons (among others) of why Windows mobile failed.

Youtube is a monopoly and there's no way around it.

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by JumpCrisscross on Thursday January 25, 2024 @02:07PM (#39133568)
> people will give up on YouTube and Netflix to use iOS, that's not going to happen

People will swap phones to watch short-form videos? (But not the young; they’re on TikTok. Nor anyone in other streaming demographics.)

> Youtube is a monopoly and there's no way around it

Wat. Where are you getting this? Spotify has better churn statistics than YouTube.

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by realusername on Thursday January 25, 2024 @02:22PM (#39133839)
Tiktok is additional to Youtube, it doesn't replace it. Teens are using both TikTok and Youtube. They are different formats.

Youtube Shorts is there especially because it's a different market that they want to capture.

> Wat. Where are you getting this? Spotify has better churn statistics than YouTube.

Unless you live in the few countries where YouTube has a competitor, they have a 100% market share on this kind of format.

Youtubers don't even bother to republish the video somewhere else because they know themselves that its a monopoly.

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by JumpCrisscross on Thursday January 25, 2024 @03:14PM (#39134578)
> they have a 100% market share on this kind of format

YouTube videos being the format?

Google owns YouTube. Google pays Apple tens of billions to keep its search front and centre. If Google thought YouTube had the leverage you do, wouldn’t you think they’d try swinging that around?

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by realusername on Friday January 26, 2024 @12:14AM (#39139176)
> YouTube videos being the format?

Youtube is the TV of the 21th century, it's not only the format but what you find there which is unique.

> If Google thought YouTube had the leverage you do, wouldn’t you think they’d try swinging that around?

Because there's no competition between both companies? Why would they do that? Google is pretty happy about their current position.

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by threeseed on Thursday January 25, 2024 @03:24PM (#39134734)
YouTube is not a monopoly especially globally.

In fact in countries like Japan and South Korea nobody was using it until the last year or two.

This idea that any mobile device will fail unless it has X app is baseless. Everyone has a different set of X that is important.

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by axlee on Thursday January 25, 2024 @06:07PM (#39136712)
Youtube is somewhere between number 2 and 5 in traffic ranking in Japan. What are you on about?
Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by realusername on Friday January 26, 2024 @03:54AM (#39140274)
Yeah sure there's a few countries where it's not the case, that's why I mentioned that but it's rare.

People can usually replace the app X with an app Y but there's a few apps which are categorically needed on a phone otherwise it hurts the phone itself. Banks & government apps are part of those and Youtube is one as well.

Those are the ones really preventing a third company to join in.

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by unethical_ban on Thursday January 25, 2024 @01:53PM (#39133322)
YouTube's dominance is due to a network effect and the complexity of monetizing and moderating video hosting.

If YouTube pulled itself from iOS devices, a shell company of Apple's would create a competitor in three months.

It would be more likely that Google bundled Chrome and YouTube into one app.

Hell, maybe they'd do that with mail and calendar as well.

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by throwaway918274 on Thursday January 25, 2024 @01:43PM (#39133100)
> Core Technology Fee — iOS apps distributed from the App Store and/or an alternative app marketplace will pay €0.50 for each first annual install per year over a 1 million threshold.

It's for everyone, app store or not.

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by mikeocool on Thursday January 25, 2024 @02:01PM (#39133457)
You can stick with the existing terms, or switch to the new ones (which is when the core technology fee kicks in) -- you only have to switch to the new ones if you want to use your own payment processor or distribute on another app store.

So they've basically made distributing popular free apps on an alternative app store really unappealing.

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by warp on Thursday January 25, 2024 @02:19PM (#39133795)
No, you can choose to stay on the current terms.

"Developers can choose to adopt these new business terms, or stay on Apple’s existing terms. Developers must adopt the new business terms for EU apps to use the new capabilities for alternative distribution or alternative payment processing. "

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by yardstick on Thursday January 25, 2024 @01:47PM (#39133180)
Yeah apparently they will be according to the article…

“ iOS apps distributed from the App Store and/or an alternative app marketplace will pay €0.50 for each first annual install per year over a 1 million threshold.”

Re:Apple announces changes to iOS, Safari, and the App Store... by HDThoreaun on Thursday January 25, 2024 @01:37PM (#39132986)
The .5 euro fee is for all apps, no matter where theyre downloaded.