Maybe the problem is not that Apple is going to finally bring RCS to the iPhone in 2024. Maybe the problem is that only Apple can bring RCS to the iPhone platform, instead of letting whatever app users choose provide RCS functionality on the iPhone platform, whether or not Apple thinks RCS is ready.
Why should that be a problem? Only Google (Messages) is allowed to use RCS on Android. No third party messaging service is allowed to bring RCS to Android, except Samsung by way of a special deal with Google. So why should the DoJ blame Apple for not allowing any third party to bring RCS to the iPhone platform, when Google has not allowed any other messaging service to use RCS on Android? At lest not the proprietary Google RCS that most telecoms have already agreed to use.
Yeah, after 5 to 6 years of investigating Apple for antitrust, this is what they come up with? This utter amateurish dreck? It was going to be a hard set of complaints to lay as it should not take 5 to 6 years to develop a set of cogent antritrust arguments, but this is what they come up with?
Just read pages 62 to 70 or so on the market construction, if you can call it that. That fact that I had to get to page 62 to read it was a bad sign. The market at which the Apple iPhone has a monopoly on and what they claim Apple is abusing is "performance smartphones". It's mentioned 43 times in the DOJ complaint. So the market is not the smartphone market in the USA as a whole, but one of expensive smartphones. They didn't even have the guts to say what dollar amount this "performance smartphones" market started at. Then, they seem to interchangeably use revenue share and market share. Never mind that they never actually stated what Apple's actual unit share in this "performance smartphones" market is. They may have, I just couldn't tell if some number was revenue share or unit share or what ever share.
The only good thing on the DOJ side is that judges are also human, and you never know what sort of craziness they have.
It’s a hack job. Apple didn’t break the law, doesn’t have a monopoly, and hasn’t done anything unethical.
The garland “points” are easily refutable (except the streaming gaming one, which has some merit. It’s more smoke and mirrors to appeal to uneducated idealists of the public who hear words like “closed vs open” etc and side with those against the supposed “closed” side - while the government abuses its power to force an issue they’re on the wrong side of.
I agree. I was watching that guy listing the points one by one and I am like, hey moron, those things have been adjudicated already , why are you people wasting tax payer money like this?
Joe Biden needs to go. I am sorry but I am not usually political but this guy is ridiculous
This started two years into the Trump administration.
And it was dead when San Jose court decided for Apple but brought back when Biden appointed the socialist Kanter . Did you even read the article above?
Considering that I wrote it, yes, I did. The DoJ didn't stop after the trial. It may have slowed, but didn't stop.
Epic v. Apple was ruled on in September 2021. Kanter was appointed on November 2021.
I read up on Kanter after seeing your article here. This is 100 percent Kanter, the guy is a communist socialist if you read what he has wrote in past.
Anyways, you can defend Biden if you want to but I have a right to my position as well . Or do I?
You are absolutely entitled to be uninformed and stupid. You can even air out your uninformed statements, because for the time being we’re still in a democracy. You better pray Biden gets reelected if you want that to continue.
Praying for Biden to be re-elected is like praying for the world to collapse. If he gets re-elected his VP will be president within a year (I pray Harris isn’t his VP). Joe’s running a hard race until November. He has no plans to be in the White House for a full four years.
If DOJ is looking for a REAL monopolistic practice involving Apple, look no further than the auto industry. GM has already blocked CarPlay in all its products going forward, and many others have hobbled it—in my new Hyundai I can use it by plugging in my iPhone, but cannot access some other built in features simultaneously. With my old Bolt I can do both, and it’s wireless. Now, they are practicing navigation monopoly.
GM's decision is not an anticompetitive practice. That's just them designing their vehicles as they see fit. If CarPlay is the most important feature to you, get a different car.
There is the bad option of buying a 3rd party CarPlay unit, but you do what makes you happier. GM has decided not to support CarPlay. That's their right. Get a different car next time. That's your right.
Now, if you want to complain about autos, complain about auto insurance. Auto insurance may cost more over 10 years than your car itself. And you are legally required to buy in order for you to drive in the USA.
My point was that Apple is being less recalcitrant than GM, and yet is being sued. If Apple’s defense is as you say, (paraphrasing) “we are designing our phones as we see fit, if you don’t like it get a different phone, that’s your right” How do you imagine the court and the EU will receive that?
If DOJ is looking for a REAL monopolistic practice involving Apple, look no further than the auto industry. GM has already blocked CarPlay in all its products going forward, and many others have hobbled it—in my new Hyundai I can use it by plugging in my iPhone, but cannot access some other built in features simultaneously. With my old Bolt I can do both, and it’s wireless. Now, they are practicing navigation monopoly.
GM's decision is not an anticompetitive practice. That's just them designing their vehicles as they see fit. If CarPlay is the most important feature to you, get a different car.
There is the bad option of buying a 3rd party CarPlay unit, but you do what makes you happier. GM has decided not to support CarPlay. That's their right. Get a different car next time. That's your right.
Now, if you want to complain about autos, complain about auto insurance. Auto insurance may cost more over 10 years than your car itself. And you are legally required to buy in order for you to drive in the USA.
My point was that Apple is being less recalcitrant than GM, and yet is being sued. If Apple’s defense is as you say, (paraphrasing) “we are designing our phones as we see fit, if you don’t like it get a different phone, that’s your right” How do you imagine the court and the EU will receive that?
Yes, I know. It is still fine for GM to do that. The EU will and the DOJ will be fine with it because it is perfectly legal.
It's truly difficult to make sense of any of this as it mostly about feelings, and will come down to how well the judge slept and how well the lawyers interact with the judge.
The US DOJ vs Apple court case hinges on how the market is defined. Apple wants it to be the worldwide phone market. The US DOJ wants to be the phones in the USA that cost $430 or more, as narrowly as they can possibly make it so that Apple can be declared a monopoly. Once they are declared a monopoly, what was perfectly legal and legitimate for a company when they made less money can be declared something they can't do after that declaration. After that, a lot of discussions on consumer harm. Apple can provide remedies after all said and done, and move on.
Who decides the market definition? Well, the feelings of the judge or the jury. Lawyers and executives are paid big bucks to deal with it. Expect, a lot of decisions that will be totally nonsensical.
Us? Just do what makes you happy. It may be that you have to ignore this news to be happy. I know that I will probably unsubscribe from several podcasts because it will be tiring to hear from Apple tech mediarati on it, who just love their developer friends. For some strange reason, the Apple tech journos think their developer friends are more important than customers.
This anti Big Tech push from western governments has certainly been crazy strange. These politicians are largely attacking companies who people largely love.
A few comments on here including the article writer referring to the fact this was started under the Trump administration hmmm, was Merrick Garland in charge of the DOJ under trump? and why has it taken until the presidential re election year, to actually indite Apple, with old information which was gathering dust? This is clearly a political driven law suit, after plenty of lobbying by Apple's competitors and Biden needing to deflect attention for a while. Garland's case has no merit in law and it will fail, it's just posturing at tax payers expense, whilst real crime increases daily in the US, thieves go unpunished and businesses are closing in may inner city's!
If DOJ is looking for a REAL monopolistic practice involving Apple, look no further than the auto industry. GM has already blocked CarPlay in all its products going forward, and many others have hobbled it—in my new Hyundai I can use it by plugging in my iPhone, but cannot access some other built in features simultaneously. With my old Bolt I can do both, and it’s wireless. Now, they are practicing navigation monopoly.
GM's decision is not an anticompetitive practice. That's just them designing their vehicles as they see fit. If CarPlay is the most important feature to you, get a different car.
There is the bad option of buying a 3rd party CarPlay unit, but you do what makes you happier. GM has decided not to support CarPlay. That's their right. Get a different car next time. That's your right.
Now, if you want to complain about autos, complain about auto insurance. Auto insurance may cost more over 10 years than your car itself. And you are legally required to buy in order for you to drive in the USA.
My point was that Apple is being less recalcitrant than GM, and yet is being sued. If Apple’s defense is as you say, (paraphrasing) “we are designing our phones as we see fit, if you don’t like it get a different phone, that’s your right” How do you imagine the court and the EU will receive that?
Speaking of legalities and GM. Now that it has been revealed that GM has sold user driver data, likely unknowingly from drivers and what it meant, to data brokers and insurance companies, I definitely think the gov’t should pass a law to make that illegal, GM should be fined by the government in the billions of dollars and a class action lawsuit should start post-haste.
I know that some auto insurance companies offer reduced prices on premiums if the insurer uses their app to track driving habits. Ok, people should do what they think is good for them. You do you as some say.
But the automaker selling your driving data to data brokers and insurance companies? Definitely never buy a vehicle from them.
There needs to be a law against this as every single thing with cellular modem, WiFi and GPS can potentially collect and sell that data. Too bad our gov’ts are so anti-public good.
This is why breaking Apple’s privacy stance is so crazy. Letting a 3rd party have your SMS and Messaging information? Yeah, sounds like spam and scam city coming because 3rd parties will sell your data. I like to think I’m very careful with not letting me email out, but it very easy to slip up, and sooner or later, you will start getting email ads all over the place.
Just think about it. I grew up at time when email spam filters were not necessary. Now? Email is useless without them. Who companies have been born to filter out scam and spam emails from your inbox. And I bet some of these companies play both ends. There’s injustice with that.
Maybe the problem is not that Apple is going to finally bring RCS to the iPhone in 2024. Maybe the problem is that only Apple can bring RCS to the iPhone platform, instead of letting whatever app users choose provide RCS functionality on the iPhone platform, whether or not Apple thinks RCS is ready.
Why should that be a problem? Only Google (Messages) is allowed to use RCS on Android. No third party messaging service is allowed to bring RCS to Android, except Samsung by way of a special deal with Google. So why should the DoJ blame Apple for not allowing any third party to bring RCS to the iPhone platform, when Google has not allowed any other messaging service to use RCS on Android? At lest not the proprietary Google RCS that most telecoms have already agreed to use.
The difference is that if you wanted, and you licensed RCS from GSMA, you could develop your own RCS messenger on top of AOSP and put it on your Android device. Google won't let you distribute your app on the Google Play Store, but they won't stop you from doing whatever you want outside of the Play Store. Nor will Samsung or OnePlus or Motorola. If you have an iPhone, you really don't even have that option.
Joe Biden needs to go. I am sorry but I am not usually political but this guy is ridiculous
This started two years into the Trump administration.
Otoh, a second Trump term might keep DoJ too distracted with prosecuting his enemies to pay attention to this.
Lol that might be a good reason to vote for Trump. But I doubt he will do it because he never did it to Hillary after talking about it in 2016.
But that was before the current guy is trying to put him in jail for 900 years, so we will have to see and frankly, I cannot blame him lol…
Apple stock was down 5 percent today on this news, good time to think about getting in.
Is it Biden who is trying to put Trump in jail? Or is it Trump's criminal activities that will be the reason he see's the inside of a jail cell. Biden has nothing to do with Georgia's case against Trump, for example. The man has done this to himself.
If DOJ is looking for a REAL monopolistic practice involving Apple, look no further than the auto industry. GM has already blocked CarPlay in all its products going forward, and many others have hobbled it—in my new Hyundai I can use it by plugging in my iPhone, but cannot access some other built in features simultaneously. With my old Bolt I can do both, and it’s wireless. Now, they are practicing navigation monopoly.
GM's decision is not an anticompetitive practice. That's just them designing their vehicles as they see fit. If CarPlay is the most important feature to you, get a different car.
There is the bad option of buying a 3rd party CarPlay unit, but you do what makes you happier. GM has decided not to support CarPlay. That's their right. Get a different car next time. That's your right.
Now, if you want to complain about autos, complain about auto insurance. Auto insurance may cost more over 10 years than your car itself. And you are legally required to buy in order for you to drive in the USA.
So you're saying that Apple SHOULD have the right to kick Epic off the Apple platform. Because that's what you just argued for.
If DOJ is looking for a REAL monopolistic practice involving Apple, look no further than the auto industry. GM has already blocked CarPlay in all its products going forward, and many others have hobbled it—in my new Hyundai I can use it by plugging in my iPhone, but cannot access some other built in features simultaneously. With my old Bolt I can do both, and it’s wireless. Now, they are practicing navigation monopoly.
GM's decision is not an anticompetitive practice. That's just them designing their vehicles as they see fit. If CarPlay is the most important feature to you, get a different car.
There is the bad option of buying a 3rd party CarPlay unit, but you do what makes you happier. GM has decided not to support CarPlay. That's their right. Get a different car next time. That's your right.
Now, if you want to complain about autos, complain about auto insurance. Auto insurance may cost more over 10 years than your car itself. And you are legally required to buy in order for you to drive in the USA.
So you're saying that Apple SHOULD have the right to kick Epic off the Apple platform. Because that's what you just argued for.
Oh, absolutely. What made you think I didn’t support that action? I even think they should have not reversed themselves on the Epic Sweden account. It should have stayed revoked. They should have just said the account approval was an automated approval, and made by mistake. They at least have the right of association.
It’s probably a bad business decision, but it is their right.
It’s the same with Epic. They are free to revoke anyone’s Epic account, for anything. I bet a lot that is in their EULA. If someone was caught cheating in Fortnite, well, yeah, account should be revoked. If Epic caught an Unreal engine licensee cheating on Epic’s cut, obviously that licensee should be cut off.
Maybe the problem is not that Apple is going to finally bring RCS to the iPhone in 2024. Maybe the problem is that only Apple can bring RCS to the iPhone platform, instead of letting whatever app users choose provide RCS functionality on the iPhone platform, whether or not Apple thinks RCS is ready.
Why should that be a problem? Only Google (Messages) is allowed to use RCS on Android. No third party messaging service is allowed to bring RCS to Android, except Samsung by way of a special deal with Google. So why should the DoJ blame Apple for not allowing any third party to bring RCS to the iPhone platform, when Google has not allowed any other messaging service to use RCS on Android? At lest not the proprietary Google RCS that most telecoms have already agreed to use.
The difference is that if you wanted, and you licensed RCS from GSMA, you could develop your own RCS messenger on top of AOSP and put it on your Android device. Google won't let you distribute your app on the Google Play Store, but they won't stop you from doing whatever you want outside of the Play Store. Nor will Samsung or OnePlus or Motorola. If you have an iPhone, you really don't even have that option.
That is not correct. The RCS that Google is pushing the telecom to use is Google proprietary version of RCS. Which most of the telecoms have agreed to use. That can not be licensed out without Google permission. And it doesn't matter that developers that wants to bring (Universal Profile) RCS to Android don't have to use the Google Play Store to get their app on to Android. What matters is that Google has not yet released any API for RCS on Android. So there is no way for any developer to bring RCS to Android users unless Google releases the API to do so.
RCS is an over 15 year old technology. Cross platform messaging services like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Signal, Telegram and others are using much better tech. The only reason for RCS is to replace SMS (and MME) that is still the messaging standard for telecoms. Which is about the only messaging protocol that it's better than. Even if a message service wants to use Universal Profile RCS, they might be able to so, but it won't work for sending or receiving messages from the telecoms that are using Google RCS. The RCS message would just default to SMS.
Not 100% sure about this, but If a developer develop their own RCS app on top of AOSP, wouldn't that mean that in order for others use it, they would need to install that version of the Android fork? In other words, the app would not work on Samsung phones because Samsung phones are not using the version of Android fork that you developed your RCS app on top of. Now, this can be done by a phone maker like Huawei, that might want to use Universal Profile RCS for a messaging service for all the Huawei phone users. But they would not be able to message any other Android phones. Much like iMessage on iPhones.
So for a developer that wants to have an app that uses RCS, to work on all Android phones, Google would need to release the API to do so. And they haven't yet. But if Apple gets Universal Profile RCS working on iPhones, then Google might be forced to release the API so other developers can use Universal Profile RCS to message iPhone users.
If DOJ is looking for a REAL monopolistic practice involving Apple, look no further than the auto industry. GM has already blocked CarPlay in all its products going forward, and many others have hobbled it—in my new Hyundai I can use it by plugging in my iPhone, but cannot access some other built in features simultaneously. With my old Bolt I can do both, and it’s wireless. Now, they are practicing navigation monopoly.
or the Telcos who've held up adopting anything like RCS or iMessage with threats using a bunch of low and fringe utility patents.
Joe Biden needs to go. I am sorry but I am not usually political but this guy is ridiculous
This started two years into the Trump administration.
It’s irrelevant when it started. Investigation of a potential issue is completely acceptable. One could reasonably argue, which you have done yourself, that the act of kicking off and investigation has resulted in some improvements being made.
The act of charging is the problem here and that is a decision made under the Biden administration. As you point out the grounds are mostly baseless but it’s been done for clearly political reasons that the Biden team consider beneficial to them.
We may may never know what a Trump administration would have done once the investigation completed - though if he wins in November we may find out if it’s withdrawn.
My simple points are as follows: 1. The act of investigating a potential charge, regardless of administration, was a reasonable decision. Investigations are not evidence of wrongdoing. 2. The decision to charge was a Biden administration one - and it’s a(nother) bad decision from the current administration.
If DOJ is looking for a REAL monopolistic practice involving Apple, look no further than the auto industry. GM has already blocked CarPlay in all its products going forward, and many others have hobbled it—in my new Hyundai I can use it by plugging in my iPhone, but cannot access some other built in features simultaneously. With my old Bolt I can do both, and it’s wireless. Now, they are practicing navigation monopoly.
GM's decision is not an anticompetitive practice. That's just them designing their vehicles as they see fit. If CarPlay is the most important feature to you, get a different car.
There is the bad option of buying a 3rd party CarPlay unit, but you do what makes you happier. GM has decided not to support CarPlay. That's their right. Get a different car next time. That's your right.
Now, if you want to complain about autos, complain about auto insurance. Auto insurance may cost more over 10 years than your car itself. And you are legally required to buy in order for you to drive in the USA.
My point was that Apple is being less recalcitrant than GM, and yet is being sued. If Apple’s defense is as you say, (paraphrasing) “we are designing our phones as we see fit, if you don’t like it get a different phone, that’s your right” How do you imagine the court and the EU will receive that?
Speaking of legalities and GM. Now that it has been revealed that GM has sold user driver data, likely unknowingly from drivers and what it meant, to data brokers and insurance companies, I definitely think the gov’t should pass a law to make that illegal, GM should be fined by the government in the billions of dollars and a class action lawsuit should start post-haste.
I know that some auto insurance companies offer reduced prices on premiums if the insurer uses their app to track driving habits. Ok, people should do what they think is good for them. You do you as some say.
But the automaker selling your driving data to data brokers and insurance companies? Definitely never buy a vehicle from them.
Since upwards of 80% of car manufacturers share an/or sell driver data to 3rd parties, which ones would you buy?
Maybe the problem is not that Apple is going to finally bring RCS to the iPhone in 2024. Maybe the problem is that only Apple can bring RCS to the iPhone platform, instead of letting whatever app users choose provide RCS functionality on the iPhone platform, whether or not Apple thinks RCS is ready.
Why should that be a problem? Only Google (Messages) is allowed to use RCS on Android. No third party messaging service is allowed to bring RCS to Android, except Samsung by way of a special deal with Google. So why should the DoJ blame Apple for not allowing any third party to bring RCS to the iPhone platform, when Google has not allowed any other messaging service to use RCS on Android? At lest not the proprietary Google RCS that most telecoms have already agreed to use.
The difference is that if you wanted, and you licensed RCS from GSMA, you could develop your own RCS messenger on top of AOSP and put it on your Android device. Google won't let you distribute your app on the Google Play Store, but they won't stop you from doing whatever you want outside of the Play Store. Nor will Samsung or OnePlus or Motorola. If you have an iPhone, you really don't even have that option.
That is not correct. The RCS that Google is pushing the telecom to use is Google proprietary version of RCS. Which most of the telecoms have agreed to use. That can not be licensed out without Google permission. And it doesn't matter that developers that wants to bring (Universal Profile) RCS to Android don't have to use the Google Play Store to get their app on to Android.
The DoJ complaint doesn't say anything about Google's fork of RCS, nor even about interoperability with Google's fork of RCS. The complaint is specifically about how Apple undermines third-party messaging apps. All of the discussion of the pains of Google licensing and interoperability between different carriers is interesting, but it's irrelevant to the DoJ's complaint against Apple.
If DOJ is looking for a REAL monopolistic practice involving Apple, look no further than the auto industry. GM has already blocked CarPlay in all its products going forward, and many others have hobbled it—in my new Hyundai I can use it by plugging in my iPhone, but cannot access some other built in features simultaneously. With my old Bolt I can do both, and it’s wireless. Now, they are practicing navigation monopoly.
GM's decision is not an anticompetitive practice. That's just them designing their vehicles as they see fit. If CarPlay is the most important feature to you, get a different car.
There is the bad option of buying a 3rd party CarPlay unit, but you do what makes you happier. GM has decided not to support CarPlay. That's their right. Get a different car next time. That's your right.
Now, if you want to complain about autos, complain about auto insurance. Auto insurance may cost more over 10 years than your car itself. And you are legally required to buy in order for you to drive in the USA.
My point was that Apple is being less recalcitrant than GM, and yet is being sued. If Apple’s defense is as you say, (paraphrasing) “we are designing our phones as we see fit, if you don’t like it get a different phone, that’s your right” How do you imagine the court and the EU will receive that?
Speaking of legalities and GM. Now that it has been revealed that GM has sold user driver data, likely unknowingly from drivers and what it meant, to data brokers and insurance companies, I definitely think the gov’t should pass a law to make that illegal, GM should be fined by the government in the billions of dollars and a class action lawsuit should start post-haste.
I know that some auto insurance companies offer reduced prices on premiums if the insurer uses their app to track driving habits. Ok, people should do what they think is good for them. You do you as some say.
But the automaker selling your driving data to data brokers and insurance companies? Definitely never buy a vehicle from them.
Since upwards of 80% of car manufacturers share an/or sell driver data to 3rd parties, which ones would you buy?
There's the 20%. Don't buy nor use the vehicles' navigation and connected features. Buy old. I'm thinking of reducing the number of cars I have.
Then, congress should write a law banning the process. Wishful thinking, but everything starts as wishful thinking, no?
Comments
Lol that might be a good reason to vote for Trump. But I doubt he will do it because he never did it to Hillary after talking about it in 2016.
But that was before the current guy is trying to put him in jail for 900 years, so we will have to see and frankly, I cannot blame him lol…
Apple stock was down 5 percent today on this news, good time to think about getting in.
madness
It's truly difficult to make sense of any of this as it mostly about feelings, and will come down to how well the judge slept and how well the lawyers interact with the judge.
The US DOJ vs Apple court case hinges on how the market is defined. Apple wants it to be the worldwide phone market. The US DOJ wants to be the phones in the USA that cost $430 or more, as narrowly as they can possibly make it so that Apple can be declared a monopoly. Once they are declared a monopoly, what was perfectly legal and legitimate for a company when they made less money can be declared something they can't do after that declaration. After that, a lot of discussions on consumer harm. Apple can provide remedies after all said and done, and move on.
Who decides the market definition? Well, the feelings of the judge or the jury. Lawyers and executives are paid big bucks to deal with it. Expect, a lot of decisions that will be totally nonsensical.
Us? Just do what makes you happy. It may be that you have to ignore this news to be happy. I know that I will probably unsubscribe from several podcasts because it will be tiring to hear from Apple tech mediarati on it, who just love their developer friends. For some strange reason, the Apple tech journos think their developer friends are more important than customers.
This anti Big Tech push from western governments has certainly been crazy strange. These politicians are largely attacking companies who people largely love.
This is clearly a political driven law suit, after plenty of lobbying by Apple's competitors and Biden needing to deflect attention for a while.
Garland's case has no merit in law and it will fail, it's just posturing at tax payers expense, whilst real crime increases daily in the US, thieves go unpunished and businesses are closing in may inner city's!
There needs to be a law against this as every single thing with cellular modem, WiFi and GPS can potentially collect and sell that data. Too bad our gov’ts are so anti-public good.
It’s probably a bad business decision, but it is their right.
It’s the same with Epic. They are free to revoke anyone’s Epic account, for anything. I bet a lot that is in their EULA. If someone was caught cheating in Fortnite, well, yeah, account should be revoked. If Epic caught an Unreal engine licensee cheating on Epic’s cut, obviously that licensee should be cut off.
The act of charging is the problem here and that is a decision made under the Biden administration. As you point out the grounds are mostly baseless but it’s been done for clearly political reasons that the Biden team consider beneficial to them.
We may may never know what a Trump administration would have done once the investigation completed - though if he wins in November we may find out if it’s withdrawn.
My simple points are as follows:
1. The act of investigating a potential charge, regardless of administration, was a reasonable decision. Investigations are not evidence of wrongdoing.
2. The decision to charge was a Biden administration one - and it’s a(nother) bad decision from the current administration.
Then, congress should write a law banning the process. Wishful thinking, but everything starts as wishful thinking, no?