teejay2012

Apple should have remedied the anti steering, as this was the ONE point that they lost on in US federal court with the Epic case. So it was not going to go away in the EU either. Why Apple resisted goes along with their naturally obstructive nature I guess. But the EU claiming this harms EU companies like Spotify when 99% of their paid users signed up through the web seems a stretch. Apparently signing up on the web is not a closely guarded secret. No. The real issue for the EU is that Apple still insists on charging 'something' for  subscriptions regardless of the path and the EU want it to be 'nothing'. That is also a stretch but the EU will still keep fining Apple. I had wondered if there will be an EU court pathway for an appeal like as in the Irish-Apple tax case, where EU regulators lost?  As for some comments here that Apple should 'just leave' the EU, why would you want that if you owned an iPhone? That would be a disaster imo for users and Apple. I suspect they actually do not own an iPhone and have no standing in this debate, except to stir the pot with hyperbole and illogical comments.

I would be looking to Apple for AI 'on the device', which I know would be much more limited than what Google could offer on their massive servers. Maybe it will just be Siri 2, that we had all hoped would already be here. There will be a trade off on performance vs security, and I hope Apple gets the balance right.

Vestager uses a lot of 'we feel' and 'we are concerned'. Fortunately EU courts are more about the letter of the law than interpretations and I hope this will be like the Apple-Irish tax case. Still this has got to be painful for Apple and the other companies she has targeted. It also makes me wonder how much of this could have been avoided by changes in Apple policies and behaviour years ago, or if this was always going to be a 'EU vs US tech companies' showdown.

Mike Wuerthele said:

bulk001 said:

Only time will tell if you are right. Why don’t you reschedule this post for an update in 2 years. Personally my money is on the DOJ who, you know has actual lawyers and stuff, as opposed to two writers of an Apple blog. 

It literally says in the article that we talked to DC antitrust lawyers.

Two years is optimistic. I'd be surprised if this was done in five -- which is also addressed in the piece.

Mike, I think your article and use of antitrust lawyers sources is excellent. And much appreciated by those of us who were mostly fuming.  However your warnings on political references in the comments are at ends with an action brought by the DOJ that is almost entirely political. As you correctly conclude Apple has already made most of the changes. What else is left but the politics?

The latest that I have read is that Apple will not be allowed to notarize any app from an alternative app store. Hands off completely? Call me crazy but that sounds like the EU commission will take some responsibility for app safety. I would think, if this is true, that Apple will need to change the warranty on iPhones, to exclude coverage on phones that have installed malware that have damaged the phone or caused any security issues. Of course iPhones can be reset (in most cases if not bricked) but you would really need to trust the developer and the alternate app store. No thanks for me.