Shades of the United States vs. Microsoft, an antitrust case that the government lost.
[text not included]
It didn't work 12 year ago, and it's hard to see how it's going to work today.[/I]
While your conclusion may turn out to meet the case, I am not sure that the DeWitt presentation of US vs Microsoft is truly accurate, although it is a matter of perspective. To my knowledge. the then President Bush was quite pro-business. This is not surprising because the bulk of political contributions come from companies. Microsoft lobby money is not an exemption.
The Justice Department did not pursue the case further, i.e., elevate the case to the US Supreme Court, as befits such landmark cases.
We have this idealism sometimes that the Judiciary system is impartial but the reality is that the judges are human -- they are as much subjective or biased, except they try to justify their decisions with what they believe the law actually meant.
Based on market share though, unlike the case of Microsoft at the time, except perhaps in the iPod market, Apple has a significant presence in mobile computing, but nowhere near a monopoly.
Somewhat. He uses "monopoly" when presumably he means "market power," which are not identical concepts, and implies that it's all about market share, which it is not. The bottom line is, it would be extremely difficult to demonstrate that Apple has the power to harm competitors in any unfair way (other than, you know, competing with them). To make matters worse for Adobe (assuming they have filed a complaint), Apple and Adobe aren't really competitors. Apple is not obligated to be accommodating to Adobe's wishes and desires.
I agree. What I find strange about this, and it's something I've raised in the past, is that if this is the case:
Quote:
To win a Sherman Antitrust case against Apple, the government would have to prove both that Apple's market share constitutes a monopoly ? itself not illegal ? and that it has abused that monopoly power in ways that damage its competition.
I don't understand why there is not a better definition of what a monopoly constitutes. Lets suppose Apple has 30% of the market for smartphones. To me, 30% doesn't sound anywhere near a monopoly, hence the second part of the above does not need to come into play at all.
Why don't they state what a monopoly is? I know that some of it comes down to how you define the market, but I would say you have a monopoly in the smartphone market if you have >75% of the market.
Do Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo, etc, allow for games to be developed in/with tools other than those furnished to said developers? I'm just curious...
Up until I read this I was against Apple on this. I had never looked at it like this, every console requires DEV machines, software etc.... and it has been proven before, developing for the PS3 is completely different then the Xbox 360. Now migrating from the PC to Xbox 360 seems to be pretty easy but that is because Microsoft is both. If a Dev wants to develop for all platforms (like the console devs do) then they are going to have to do the work (like the console devs do). The only issue is that none of the consoles have an overwhelming market share over another. I wonder if this would be a different situation if the PS3 was 90% market and everyone else was pulling up 2nd? Apple owns the App market, a market everyone wants a piece of. If Apple makes it more and more difficult to port to another platform, I see dev's just giving up on anything other than Apple since they are the biggest game in town and providing the most revenue. The issue with that is the little guy suffers, especially the up and coming App store, Apple will make it not worth anyones time to develop for them and squash competition. With the consoles, everyone is pretty much equal so the devs want to spread the wealth across all platforms to saturate the market. Develop just for the Apple App store and you already saturate the market, killing anyone trying to penetrate into it. I see both sides of the coin but I think Apple is in a very unique situation with how much market it actually owns with the App store. Even if Apple opened up the app store to all devices, up and comers will still have a very difficult time penetrating the App market.
While your conclusion may turn out to meet the case, I am not sure that the DeWitt presentation of US vs Microsoft is truly accurate, although it is a matter of perspective. To my knowledge. the then President Bush (the firts) was quite pro-business. This is not surprising because the bulk of political contributions come from companies. Microsoft lobby money is not an exemption.
The Justice Department did not pursue the case further, i.e., elevate the case to the US Supreme Court, as befits such landmark cases.
We have this idealism sometimes that the Judiciary system is impartial but the reality is that the judges are human -- they are as much subjective or biased, except they try to justify their decisions with what they believe the law actually meant.
Based on market share though, unlike the case of Microsoft at the time, except perhaps in the iPod market, Apple has a significant presence in mobile computing, but nowhere near a monopoly.
CGC
Uh, no. The first complaint against Microsoft was filed in 1992 with the FTC. When the FTC deadlocked it was taken up by the Antitrust Division of the DoJ which pursued the case vigorously for many years, all the way to the Court of Appeals, where the government won on the Findings of Fact but the remedy (as proposed by Judge Jackson) was thrown out. By then it was 2000, George Bush (the younger) was in office and the government and Microsoft were entered into a Consent Decree process to hammer out a new remedy. The Bush administration snatched defeat out of the jaws of victory and settled for a far milder remedy than Judge Jackson's original plan.
I agree. What I find strange about this, and it's something I've raised in the past, is that if this is the case:
I don't understand why there is not a better definition of what a monopoly constitutes. Lets suppose Apple has 30% of the market for smartphones. To me, 30% doesn't sound anywhere near a monopoly, hence the second part of the above does not need to come into play at all.
Why don't they state what a monopoly is? I know that some of it comes down to how you define the market, but I would say you have a monopoly in the smartphone market if you have >75% of the market.
This (the definition of a monopoly) can get complicated. In the 1960-1980s IBM had 97% market share of mainframe computers... it was found that they had attained this through fair and excellent marketing and support of superior products... They had done nothing illegal.
At the other end, a merger between Von's and Shopping Bag (small supermarket chains) was disallowed... Even though the merger would only give them 7% of the market, it was found that it tended towards a monopoly.
After years of litigation, IBM signed a consent decree for a case claiming illegal tie-in of IBM accounting Machines requiring IBM punched cards. IBM had argued that they could only warrantee their machines if they used only IBM authorized supplies. This has a ring of familiarity
I've over-simplified the above... but the anti-trust, restraint of trade laws are open to wide interpretation.
...maybe they could get creative and bring the case against Apple in LA criminal court-- with Judge Lee (from the OJ trial). Of course, his honor would use a promenently-displayed, thinly-disguised iPad... ...and the attorney for the defense would win the day with the assertion: "if it doesn't fit [Cocoa Touch], you must acquit!"
This (the definition of a monopoly) can get complicated. In the 1960-1980s IBM had 97% market share of mainframe computers... it was found that they had attained this through fair and excellent marketing and support of superior products... They had done nothing illegal.
At the other end, a merger between Von's and Shopping Bag (small supermarket chains) was disallowed... Even though the merger would only give them 7% of the market, it was found that it tended towards a monopoly.
After years of litigation, IBM signed a consent decree for a case claiming illegal tie-in of IBM accounting Machines requiring IBM punched cards.
I've over-simplified the above... but the anti-trust, restraint of trade laws are open to wide interpretation.
...maybe they could get creative and bring the case against Apple in LA criminal court-- with Judge Lee (from the OJ trial). Of course, his honor would use a promenently-displayed, thinly-disguised iPad... ...and the attorney for the defense would win the day with the assertion: "if it doesn't fit [Cocoa Touch], you must acquit!"
.
I personally feel the only solution here is to get Steve Jobs up in front of Judge Judy!
I don't understand why there is not a better definition of what a monopoly constitutes. Lets suppose Apple has 30% of the market for smartphones. To me, 30% doesn't sound anywhere near a monopoly, hence the second part of the above does not need to come into play at all.
Why don't they state what a monopoly is? I know that some of it comes down to how you define the market, but I would say you have a monopoly in the smartphone market if you have >75% of the market.
The word monopoly isn't much used in actual antitrust law because its definition is not really applicable. By the dictionary definition, actual monopolies rarely occur. A company has to have the demonstrated ability to harm competition and it has to be demonstrated that they have actually used that ability to harm competition. The point is, there's no arbitrary threshold or market share test applied.
Why don't they state what a monopoly is? I know that some of it comes down to how you define the market, but I would say you have a monopoly in the smartphone market if you have >75% of the market.
This about the App store not smart phones. If we took out all the comments referencing smartphones and monopolies, this thread would be one page.
Sure, I said smartphone as an example, but I meant whatever market is applicable, smartphone, app store, condoms, whatever, I would have thought it possible to put a number on when you would be coming into the focus of the anti-trust laws, though understand from Dr. Millmoss' posts that the language is not actually about monopolies.
"It will focus on whether the policy, which took effect last month, kills competition by forcing programmers to choose between developing apps that can run only on Apple gizmos or come up with apps that are platform neutral, and can be used on a variety of operating systems, such as those from rivals Google, Microsoft and Research In Motion."
I'd like to see how you can easily write code that runs on both Android, Microsoft (C# + Silverlight on WinMo7) and RIM (whatever they use, C/C++ ??) once only.
This is just utter BS.
Seeing as none of those three platforms have any real common (or even similar) language, form-factor, runtime environment you'd have to more than likely write the core code in C or a "C-like" language to port it and then write the custom UI code separately for each platform (as is the case with MonoTouch). More than likely the common language for the backend would be C/C++ as it would be the most portable. And that is fully supported by the iPhone SDK.
The fact that developers can choose between developing apps that can run only on Apple gizmos or come up with apps that are platform neutral implies that this doesn't warrant anti-trust investigations as there is significant (more than 60% of the smartphone market) alternatives for developers to code for. None of which could be written for using a single codebase.
This would be rather irrelevant if it ever amounted to anything, and it would surely also preclude any company from vertical integration in the future once they get past a certain size.
Pure BS!
And to all people saying this is about the App Store. I don't see how, nothing has changed about the App Store. And besides, there aren't many Flash games on the store currently. There are plenty of other places to peddle there Flash crapware, more places than the iPhone/App Store reaches even.
Yeah, but this is about the iPhone/Apple and Steve Jobs, so facts don't count.
Freedom is just a perception that people have to make them feel happy. There hasn't been any freedom for hundreds/thousands of years. As people we like to fool ourselves into thinking we have more freedom than we do.
The freedom here, is to take your flash app and either rewrite it, or bugger off and develop for another platform(s) which do actually have greater market share than just the iPhone.
Yeah, but this is about the iPhone/Apple and Steve Jobs, so facts don't count.
Freedom is just a perception that people have to make them feel happy. There hasn't been any freedom for hundreds/thousands of years. As people we like to fool ourselves into thinking we have more freedom than we do.
The freedom here, is to take your flash app and either rewrite it, or bugger off and develop for another platform(s) which do actually have greater market share than just the iPhone.
Doesn't it seem odd that this outrage wreaks of disinformation on the political landscape?
They seem to be attempted surgical strikes hoping facts don't arrive to stamp down the rhetoric.
The Macrumors site is rife with people who don't know LLVM, don't get your assertions or my own that cite facts over rhetoric.
These pockets that come in just rambling with no facts hopefully are paid shills to do so, or these people truly have no lives.
You can? I gather that Adobe hasn't been able to get Flash working on any cell phone platform tells me not.
The Flash plugin working on any mobile platform is irrelevant. There is an important distinction between Apple not allowing the Flash plugin in the iPhone web browser and Apple blocking 3rd party development tools, naming one is grounds for an antitrust inquiry and the other isn't.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Onhka
Interesting. I just got a car that is completely metric. Now I can't use all the tools I have on it. Maybe there should be an inquiry on the car manufacturers as well.
You miss the point.
Quote:
Originally Posted by quinney
Ok, write it for iPhone and then bitch to Adobe, because they don't have a cross-platform tool to port iPhone apps to other platforms.
I lol'd Do you even know what the inquiry is about?!?
Antitrust law doesn't forbid exclusive, 100% dictatorial control over your own products, platform or stores. Apple retail stores sell only Apple computers yet HP can't sue Apple on antitrust or competitive grounds for refusing to sell HP computers in them. This basic, commonsensical tenet seems to escape most posters.
Antitrust law kicks in when a company has monopoly control over the RELEVANT MARKET, not just the company's own product. Microsoft wasn't determined to be a monopolist because it had 100% control over Windows; it was a monopolist because courts determined Windows so dominated the market for ALL operating systems that control over Windows was de facto monopoly over the entire OS market.
People who say Apple's complete control over its own app store is by itself illegal simply don't know antitrust law. Of course companies are allowed to set, define and control their own products! They are allowed to have or exclude products from their platform and set conditions for developers who want access to their platform. As others have already noted, this kind of tight control already exists on a host of platforms such as the Xbox or PS3. You can argue that tight control is usually bad for business but it's not per se illegal.
Some people seem to be arguing that: 1) the relevant market is the market for mobile apps; and 2) Apple's App Store is so dominant in the mobile apps market that it raises antitrust concerns. This is far better and more reasonable argument. But you have to believe that the mobile apps market is in fact the correct relevant market over which Apple's control should be tested, as opposed to the relevant market being the market for smartphones where Apple is far less dominant. And even if you persuade someone that the mobile apps market is the appropriate relevant market, you then have to convince that Apple's App Store wields Windows-like monopoly dominance over the ENTIRE mobile apps market.
I think both cases are very hard to make, especially the latter. Apple's competitors in the mobile apps space, namely Google and its Android platform, are constantly reminding people of the breadth of the Android apps store, the rate at which apps are growing which is currently outpacing Apple's, and the explosive growth of the entire platform. You can't have it both ways. You can't argue, on the one hand, that you are a serious, legitimate and viable competitive alternative to Apple in the mobile apps space and then turn around and whisper into the government's ear that Apple has monopoly control over the entire market such that we can't compete effectively without regulatory intervention.
Pick one or the other but not both. I can't see how this inquiry, if it turns out to be real, would lead to any formal action against Apple.
And to be quite pointed about it: the market in question is the apps developed for the iPhone,
Likely that is too narrow.
But even if you consider it to be the market, then Apple has a 100% monopoly over it, and they use that monopoly to erect barriers to entry in other folk's markets.
But likely that is too narrow a market.
Quote:
Originally Posted by masternav
which is a mobile device, smartphone subcategory. The apps developed for the iPhone are not portable to other platforms as there is no other platform in the mobile device, smartphone subcategory that runs iPhone apps ( said market would have to be one that either allowed a higher level API translation layer to re-address iPhoneOS API calls to the suitable platform API calls in question, or ran a virtually identical version of the mach-kernel based iPhone OS ).
That's one way to conceptualize things. I would be surprised if the antitrust analysis looked anything like what you propose, however.
Quote:
Originally Posted by masternav
Apple owns 100% of the App Store application space. In which case yes they are a monopoly in that space. But as I have stated quite clearly previously, they do not have to actively support developer work for other platforms - that is clearly an anti-competitive market stance to take and does not reflect how a competitive marketplace operates.
I dunno. It seems like you are saying that Apple is using its monopoly power in a manner intended to reduce competition in the larger market. Generally, that's not OK.
But again, I think that the App Store is too small a market.
Wow four pages! All this talk and argument. All over a really poorly written piece in a second rate paper with exactly NO named sources. My take is it's completely made up. Sad part is so many will believe Apple guilty until proven innocent. Since none of this is true they will say Apple paid off the gov.
Comments
http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2010/05/...who-would-win/
U.S. vs. Apple: Who would win?
Posted by Philip Elmer-DeWitt
May 3, 2010 2:10 PM
Shades of the United States vs. Microsoft, an antitrust case that the government lost.
[text not included]
It didn't work 12 year ago, and it's hard to see how it's going to work today.[/I]
While your conclusion may turn out to meet the case, I am not sure that the DeWitt presentation of US vs Microsoft is truly accurate, although it is a matter of perspective. To my knowledge. the then President Bush was quite pro-business. This is not surprising because the bulk of political contributions come from companies. Microsoft lobby money is not an exemption.
The Justice Department did not pursue the case further, i.e., elevate the case to the US Supreme Court, as befits such landmark cases.
We have this idealism sometimes that the Judiciary system is impartial but the reality is that the judges are human -- they are as much subjective or biased, except they try to justify their decisions with what they believe the law actually meant.
Based on market share though, unlike the case of Microsoft at the time, except perhaps in the iPod market, Apple has a significant presence in mobile computing, but nowhere near a monopoly.
CGC
Somewhat. He uses "monopoly" when presumably he means "market power," which are not identical concepts, and implies that it's all about market share, which it is not. The bottom line is, it would be extremely difficult to demonstrate that Apple has the power to harm competitors in any unfair way (other than, you know, competing with them). To make matters worse for Adobe (assuming they have filed a complaint), Apple and Adobe aren't really competitors. Apple is not obligated to be accommodating to Adobe's wishes and desires.
I agree. What I find strange about this, and it's something I've raised in the past, is that if this is the case:
To win a Sherman Antitrust case against Apple, the government would have to prove both that Apple's market share constitutes a monopoly ? itself not illegal ? and that it has abused that monopoly power in ways that damage its competition.
I don't understand why there is not a better definition of what a monopoly constitutes. Lets suppose Apple has 30% of the market for smartphones. To me, 30% doesn't sound anywhere near a monopoly, hence the second part of the above does not need to come into play at all.
Why don't they state what a monopoly is? I know that some of it comes down to how you define the market, but I would say you have a monopoly in the smartphone market if you have >75% of the market.
Question to developers....
How is development handled on the following?
- Xbox 360
- Sony PSP
- Sony Playstation
- Nintendo Wii
- Palm (back in the day)
etc etc...
Do Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo, etc, allow for games to be developed in/with tools other than those furnished to said developers? I'm just curious...
Up until I read this I was against Apple on this. I had never looked at it like this, every console requires DEV machines, software etc.... and it has been proven before, developing for the PS3 is completely different then the Xbox 360. Now migrating from the PC to Xbox 360 seems to be pretty easy but that is because Microsoft is both. If a Dev wants to develop for all platforms (like the console devs do) then they are going to have to do the work (like the console devs do). The only issue is that none of the consoles have an overwhelming market share over another. I wonder if this would be a different situation if the PS3 was 90% market and everyone else was pulling up 2nd? Apple owns the App market, a market everyone wants a piece of. If Apple makes it more and more difficult to port to another platform, I see dev's just giving up on anything other than Apple since they are the biggest game in town and providing the most revenue. The issue with that is the little guy suffers, especially the up and coming App store, Apple will make it not worth anyones time to develop for them and squash competition. With the consoles, everyone is pretty much equal so the devs want to spread the wealth across all platforms to saturate the market. Develop just for the Apple App store and you already saturate the market, killing anyone trying to penetrate into it. I see both sides of the coin but I think Apple is in a very unique situation with how much market it actually owns with the App store. Even if Apple opened up the app store to all devices, up and comers will still have a very difficult time penetrating the App market.
While your conclusion may turn out to meet the case, I am not sure that the DeWitt presentation of US vs Microsoft is truly accurate, although it is a matter of perspective. To my knowledge. the then President Bush (the firts) was quite pro-business. This is not surprising because the bulk of political contributions come from companies. Microsoft lobby money is not an exemption.
The Justice Department did not pursue the case further, i.e., elevate the case to the US Supreme Court, as befits such landmark cases.
We have this idealism sometimes that the Judiciary system is impartial but the reality is that the judges are human -- they are as much subjective or biased, except they try to justify their decisions with what they believe the law actually meant.
Based on market share though, unlike the case of Microsoft at the time, except perhaps in the iPod market, Apple has a significant presence in mobile computing, but nowhere near a monopoly.
CGC
Uh, no. The first complaint against Microsoft was filed in 1992 with the FTC. When the FTC deadlocked it was taken up by the Antitrust Division of the DoJ which pursued the case vigorously for many years, all the way to the Court of Appeals, where the government won on the Findings of Fact but the remedy (as proposed by Judge Jackson) was thrown out. By then it was 2000, George Bush (the younger) was in office and the government and Microsoft were entered into a Consent Decree process to hammer out a new remedy. The Bush administration snatched defeat out of the jaws of victory and settled for a far milder remedy than Judge Jackson's original plan.
I agree. What I find strange about this, and it's something I've raised in the past, is that if this is the case:
I don't understand why there is not a better definition of what a monopoly constitutes. Lets suppose Apple has 30% of the market for smartphones. To me, 30% doesn't sound anywhere near a monopoly, hence the second part of the above does not need to come into play at all.
Why don't they state what a monopoly is? I know that some of it comes down to how you define the market, but I would say you have a monopoly in the smartphone market if you have >75% of the market.
This (the definition of a monopoly) can get complicated. In the 1960-1980s IBM had 97% market share of mainframe computers... it was found that they had attained this through fair and excellent marketing and support of superior products... They had done nothing illegal.
At the other end, a merger between Von's and Shopping Bag (small supermarket chains) was disallowed... Even though the merger would only give them 7% of the market, it was found that it tended towards a monopoly.
After years of litigation, IBM signed a consent decree for a case claiming illegal tie-in of IBM accounting Machines requiring IBM punched cards. IBM had argued that they could only warrantee their machines if they used only IBM authorized supplies. This has a ring of familiarity
I've over-simplified the above... but the anti-trust, restraint of trade laws are open to wide interpretation.
...maybe they could get creative and bring the case against Apple in LA criminal court-- with Judge Lee (from the OJ trial). Of course, his honor would use a promenently-displayed, thinly-disguised iPad... ...and the attorney for the defense would win the day with the assertion: "if it doesn't fit [Cocoa Touch], you must acquit!"
.
Question to developers....
How is development handled on the following?
- Xbox 360
- Sony PSP
- Sony Playstation
- Nintendo Wii
- Palm (back in the day)
etc etc...
Do Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo, etc, allow for games to be developed in/with tools other than those furnished to said developers? I'm just curious...
Each platform has a specific set of developer kit setups.
SONY PS3
http://www.tmstation.scei.co.jp/ps3/info_e.html
PS2 and PSP [http://www.tmstation.scei.co.jp/]
Microsoft:
http://creators.xna.com/en-US/downloads
Developing for Windows Phone:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/ff...8VS.92%29.aspx
System Setup is quite revealing:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/libr...=VS.92%29.aspx
Where is the outrage?
Nintendo:
http://www.nintendo.com/consumer/sys...en_la/EULA.jsp
They control every aspect of their Dev platform.
Control access here: http://www.warioworld.com/
This (the definition of a monopoly) can get complicated. In the 1960-1980s IBM had 97% market share of mainframe computers... it was found that they had attained this through fair and excellent marketing and support of superior products... They had done nothing illegal.
At the other end, a merger between Von's and Shopping Bag (small supermarket chains) was disallowed... Even though the merger would only give them 7% of the market, it was found that it tended towards a monopoly.
After years of litigation, IBM signed a consent decree for a case claiming illegal tie-in of IBM accounting Machines requiring IBM punched cards.
I've over-simplified the above... but the anti-trust, restraint of trade laws are open to wide interpretation.
...maybe they could get creative and bring the case against Apple in LA criminal court-- with Judge Lee (from the OJ trial). Of course, his honor would use a promenently-displayed, thinly-disguised iPad... ...and the attorney for the defense would win the day with the assertion: "if it doesn't fit [Cocoa Touch], you must acquit!"
.
I personally feel the only solution here is to get Steve Jobs up in front of Judge Judy!
I don't understand why there is not a better definition of what a monopoly constitutes. Lets suppose Apple has 30% of the market for smartphones. To me, 30% doesn't sound anywhere near a monopoly, hence the second part of the above does not need to come into play at all.
Why don't they state what a monopoly is? I know that some of it comes down to how you define the market, but I would say you have a monopoly in the smartphone market if you have >75% of the market.
The word monopoly isn't much used in actual antitrust law because its definition is not really applicable. By the dictionary definition, actual monopolies rarely occur. A company has to have the demonstrated ability to harm competition and it has to be demonstrated that they have actually used that ability to harm competition. The point is, there's no arbitrary threshold or market share test applied.
Why don't they state what a monopoly is? I know that some of it comes down to how you define the market, but I would say you have a monopoly in the smartphone market if you have >75% of the market.
This about the App store not smart phones. If we took out all the comments referencing smartphones and monopolies, this thread would be one page.
This about the App store not smart phones.
It is? How do we know what this about, really?
This about the App store not smart phones.
Sure, I said smartphone as an example, but I meant whatever market is applicable, smartphone, app store, condoms, whatever, I would have thought it possible to put a number on when you would be coming into the focus of the anti-trust laws, though understand from Dr. Millmoss' posts that the language is not actually about monopolies.
"It will focus on whether the policy, which took effect last month, kills competition by forcing programmers to choose between developing apps that can run only on Apple gizmos or come up with apps that are platform neutral, and can be used on a variety of operating systems, such as those from rivals Google, Microsoft and Research In Motion."
I'd like to see how you can easily write code that runs on both Android, Microsoft (C# + Silverlight on WinMo7) and RIM (whatever they use, C/C++ ??) once only.
This is just utter BS.
Seeing as none of those three platforms have any real common (or even similar) language, form-factor, runtime environment you'd have to more than likely write the core code in C or a "C-like" language to port it and then write the custom UI code separately for each platform (as is the case with MonoTouch). More than likely the common language for the backend would be C/C++ as it would be the most portable. And that is fully supported by the iPhone SDK.
The fact that developers can choose between developing apps that can run only on Apple gizmos or come up with apps that are platform neutral implies that this doesn't warrant anti-trust investigations as there is significant (more than 60% of the smartphone market) alternatives for developers to code for. None of which could be written for using a single codebase.
This would be rather irrelevant if it ever amounted to anything, and it would surely also preclude any company from vertical integration in the future once they get past a certain size.
Pure BS!
And to all people saying this is about the App Store. I don't see how, nothing has changed about the App Store. And besides, there aren't many Flash games on the store currently. There are plenty of other places to peddle there Flash crapware, more places than the iPhone/App Store reaches even.
Each platform has a specific set of developer kit setups.
SONY PS3
http://www.tmstation.scei.co.jp/ps3/info_e.html
PS2 and PSP [http://www.tmstation.scei.co.jp/]
Microsoft:
http://creators.xna.com/en-US/downloads
Developing for Windows Phone:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/ff...8VS.92%29.aspx
System Setup is quite revealing:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/libr...=VS.92%29.aspx
Where is the outrage?
Nintendo:
http://www.nintendo.com/consumer/sys...en_la/EULA.jsp
They control every aspect of their Dev platform.
Control access here: http://www.warioworld.com/
Yeah, but this is about the iPhone/Apple and Steve Jobs, so facts don't count.
Freedom is just a perception that people have to make them feel happy. There hasn't been any freedom for hundreds/thousands of years. As people we like to fool ourselves into thinking we have more freedom than we do.
The freedom here, is to take your flash app and either rewrite it, or bugger off and develop for another platform(s) which do actually have greater market share than just the iPhone.
Yeah, but this is about the iPhone/Apple and Steve Jobs, so facts don't count.
Freedom is just a perception that people have to make them feel happy. There hasn't been any freedom for hundreds/thousands of years. As people we like to fool ourselves into thinking we have more freedom than we do.
The freedom here, is to take your flash app and either rewrite it, or bugger off and develop for another platform(s) which do actually have greater market share than just the iPhone.
Doesn't it seem odd that this outrage wreaks of disinformation on the political landscape?
They seem to be attempted surgical strikes hoping facts don't arrive to stamp down the rhetoric.
The Macrumors site is rife with people who don't know LLVM, don't get your assertions or my own that cite facts over rhetoric.
These pockets that come in just rambling with no facts hopefully are paid shills to do so, or these people truly have no lives.
You can? I gather that Adobe hasn't been able to get Flash working on any cell phone platform tells me not.
The Flash plugin working on any mobile platform is irrelevant. There is an important distinction between Apple not allowing the Flash plugin in the iPhone web browser and Apple blocking 3rd party development tools, naming one is grounds for an antitrust inquiry and the other isn't.
Interesting. I just got a car that is completely metric. Now I can't use all the tools I have on it. Maybe there should be an inquiry on the car manufacturers as well.
You miss the point.
Ok, write it for iPhone and then bitch to Adobe, because they don't have a cross-platform tool to port iPhone apps to other platforms.
I lol'd
Antitrust law kicks in when a company has monopoly control over the RELEVANT MARKET, not just the company's own product. Microsoft wasn't determined to be a monopolist because it had 100% control over Windows; it was a monopolist because courts determined Windows so dominated the market for ALL operating systems that control over Windows was de facto monopoly over the entire OS market.
People who say Apple's complete control over its own app store is by itself illegal simply don't know antitrust law. Of course companies are allowed to set, define and control their own products! They are allowed to have or exclude products from their platform and set conditions for developers who want access to their platform. As others have already noted, this kind of tight control already exists on a host of platforms such as the Xbox or PS3. You can argue that tight control is usually bad for business but it's not per se illegal.
Some people seem to be arguing that: 1) the relevant market is the market for mobile apps; and 2) Apple's App Store is so dominant in the mobile apps market that it raises antitrust concerns. This is far better and more reasonable argument. But you have to believe that the mobile apps market is in fact the correct relevant market over which Apple's control should be tested, as opposed to the relevant market being the market for smartphones where Apple is far less dominant. And even if you persuade someone that the mobile apps market is the appropriate relevant market, you then have to convince that Apple's App Store wields Windows-like monopoly dominance over the ENTIRE mobile apps market.
I think both cases are very hard to make, especially the latter. Apple's competitors in the mobile apps space, namely Google and its Android platform, are constantly reminding people of the breadth of the Android apps store, the rate at which apps are growing which is currently outpacing Apple's, and the explosive growth of the entire platform. You can't have it both ways. You can't argue, on the one hand, that you are a serious, legitimate and viable competitive alternative to Apple in the mobile apps space and then turn around and whisper into the government's ear that Apple has monopoly control over the entire market such that we can't compete effectively without regulatory intervention.
Pick one or the other but not both. I can't see how this inquiry, if it turns out to be real, would lead to any formal action against Apple.
Each platform has a specific set of developer kit setups.
SONY PS3
http://www.tmstation.scei.co.jp/ps3/info_e.html
PS2 and PSP [http://www.tmstation.scei.co.jp/]
Microsoft:
http://creators.xna.com/en-US/downloads
Developing for Windows Phone:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/ff...8VS.92%29.aspx
System Setup is quite revealing:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/libr...=VS.92%29.aspx
Where is the outrage?
Nintendo:
http://www.nintendo.com/consumer/sys...en_la/EULA.jsp
They control every aspect of their Dev platform.
Control access here: http://www.warioworld.com/
That is, so, totally, like, revealing.... I am a 70-year-old Valley Duda! *
En Español-- Hay dudes, y hay dudas!
.
That is, so, totally, like, revealing.... I am a 70-year-old Valley Duda! *
En Español-- Hay dudes, y hay dudas!
.
They're all closed source environments that have strict toolkits you have to adhere to for several reasons.
And to be quite pointed about it: the market in question is the apps developed for the iPhone,
Likely that is too narrow.
But even if you consider it to be the market, then Apple has a 100% monopoly over it, and they use that monopoly to erect barriers to entry in other folk's markets.
But likely that is too narrow a market.
which is a mobile device, smartphone subcategory. The apps developed for the iPhone are not portable to other platforms as there is no other platform in the mobile device, smartphone subcategory that runs iPhone apps ( said market would have to be one that either allowed a higher level API translation layer to re-address iPhoneOS API calls to the suitable platform API calls in question, or ran a virtually identical version of the mach-kernel based iPhone OS ).
That's one way to conceptualize things. I would be surprised if the antitrust analysis looked anything like what you propose, however.
Apple owns 100% of the App Store application space. In which case yes they are a monopoly in that space. But as I have stated quite clearly previously, they do not have to actively support developer work for other platforms - that is clearly an anti-competitive market stance to take and does not reflect how a competitive marketplace operates.
I dunno. It seems like you are saying that Apple is using its monopoly power in a manner intended to reduce competition in the larger market. Generally, that's not OK.
But again, I think that the App Store is too small a market.