Apple should start charging companies like Netflix, that charge customers but give nothing back to Apple, for making their services available through the AppStore.
They do "give back" to Apple since they offer a service that Apple users want. How is it so different from Apple hosting other "free apps" that users find valuable, stuff like Dropbox or Adobe Reader or Lastpass, that help keep Apple users happy in the ecosystem?
Pretty sure you wouldn't want Netflix mobile as an Android exclusive. it wouldn't reflect well on the platform would it?
Remember when Apple stopped installing YouTube as a default app? How long did that last before Google put an app in the App Store?If Apple started charging Netflix, how long do you think it would be before Google did too. Apple needs some form of income to ensure the App Store remains viable.
The $B's they make from it now won't be enough to remain viable?
Apple should start charging companies like Netflix, that charge customers but give nothing back to Apple, for making their services available through the AppStore.
They do "give back" to Apple since they offer a service that Apple users want. How is it so different from Apple hosting other "free apps" that users find valuable, stuff like Dropbox or Adobe Reader or Lastpass, that help keep Apple users happy in the ecosystem?
Pretty sure you wouldn't want Netflix mobile as an Android exclusive. it wouldn't reflect well on the platform would it?
Remember when Apple stopped installing YouTube as a default app? How long did that last before Google put an app in the App Store?If Apple started charging Netflix, how long do you think it would be before Google did too. Apple needs some form of income to ensure the App Store remains viable.
The $B's they make from it now won't be enough to remain viable?
Not if everyone followed Netflix’s example. Netflix wants to make money from iOS. It should give Apple some recompense for this.
Apple should start charging companies like Netflix, that charge customers but give nothing back to Apple, for making their services available through the AppStore.
That’s crazy. Apple is a HARDWARE company. Services and the App Store are gravy, neither of which exist if people aren’t buying the hardware. Companies like Netflix are giving Apple customers services to enjoy. No services and those customers buy someone else’s hardware. I’d get rid of AppleTV without a second thought if Netflix wasn’t available.
The primary concern for Netflix is constant subscriber growth, so I'm not sure what the point of this really is. Seems like an odd move. It's hard to see how eliminating Apple's cut is really that beneficial to them in the larger scheme of things.
> Other critics have suggested that it's unfair for Apple to claim revenue from content it doesn't produce or host.
This line goes a long way to describe how two faced some of these execs can be. It's "unfair" for Apple to claim revenue, but they can't see that there is real costs in:
Hosting their app and providing editorial to keep a compelling store to drive awareness/traffic to their app
Keeping backups of their app, along with maintaining the servers and server security
Increasing server farms to allow their app to be distributed to larger audiences, and working with the various governments worldwide to provide this, including in regions where their competitors are banned.
Building and running green energy facilities to run said server farms
Make store cards and deals with retailers world wide to minimise friction into the store and provide a bricks-and-mortar presence.
The continual development of APIs to provide new features for the developers to monetise into their apps. (Plus other features such as allowing Siri to search their content for easier purchasing/use.)
Continually enhancing and reacting to threats upon iOS/macOS security so these apps won't inadvertently divulge customer data or put their users at risk.
Yet all of that is included after paying a measly developer subscription cost - which is significantly less than any other kind of professional grade software subscription. Maybe we should go back to renting movies at Blockbuster or buying software on floppy discs in boxes?
This is someday going to come back and bite Apple - because it will be seen as an Unfair Business Practise.
Apple claims services revenues are growing rapidly, but this is clearly not healthy. This is the sort of thing that a court or the Justice Department can take cognizance of, and hit them with a really big fine. Maybe even force a split of the company, so that Apple Services becomes a separate and standalone company.
This policy might still be justifiable if Apple isn’t in the streaming business - but now, it’s an extremely uncompetitive practise.
Apple deserves to be split up, so that there is fairness all around.
Google, FB, etc make money off violating customer privacy, and we think of that as bad.
Apple engages in unfair business practices, but it’s ok?
How different is this from Microsoft making IE the default browser on Windows? MS at least didn’t charge Netscape anything. And still got canned for it.
Apple is attracting too much bad karma and some day this will all come back to bite Apple. Waiting for that moment.
Apple will crib if Qualcomm wants 4% royalties that are tied to the cost of the phone - and not to the much lower cost of the chipset.
But Apple wants a 15% cut of ONGOING subscription costs of NetFlix, even though the only service provided by Apple is hosting the app and delivering it. Which is a one time service. That too, with a policy that prevents customers from downloading from elsewhere.
One day whatever Apple wins from Qualcomm will be lost multiple times over because of this policy.
Apple’s policies were OK and acceptable when it was a small struggling company - not when it is the largest company in the planet. Maybe the DoJ or someone else should step in, and make it a smaller company once again.
> Other critics have suggested that it's unfair for Apple to claim revenue from content it doesn't produce or host.
This line goes a long way to describe how two faced some of these execs can be. It's "unfair" for Apple to claim revenue, but they can't see that there is real costs in:
Hosting their app and providing editorial to keep a compelling store to drive awareness/traffic to their app
Keeping backups of their app, along with maintaining the servers and server security
Increasing server farms to allow their app to be distributed to larger audiences, and working with the various governments worldwide to provide this, including in regions where their competitors are banned.
Building and running green energy facilities to run said server farms
Make store cards and deals with retailers world wide to minimise friction into the store and provide a bricks-and-mortar presence.
The continual development of APIs to provide new features for the developers to monetise into their apps. (Plus other features such as allowing Siri to search their content for easier purchasing/use.)
Continually enhancing and reacting to threats upon iOS/macOS security so these apps won't inadvertently divulge customer data or put their users at risk.
Yet all of that is included after paying a measly developer subscription cost - which is significantly less than any other kind of professional grade software subscription. Maybe we should go back to renting movies at Blockbuster or buying software on floppy discs in boxes?
None of that is included in the price of hardware? Also using this logic there should be no free apps in the AppStore. Yet the majority of apps on my phone are free (or free with ads) and the most popular/downloaded apps are free.
Goodbye Netflix. Never subscribing back to you. iOS’s system used to allow me to see the subscriptions I was going to renew. If you are not on this list ,wont be paying you.
The primary concern for Netflix is constant subscriber growth, so I'm not sure what the point of this really is. Seems like an odd move. It's hard to see how eliminating Apple's cut is really that beneficial to them in the larger scheme of things.
While my first impulse is to agree with you, it comes down to numbers. Maybe most Netflix subscribers already use Netflix.com for payments? It’s pretty easy math if you have all of the information - which none of us do.
I’m sure Netflix ran the numbers and decided that the money it was paying Apple was better spent elsewhere, like advertising and growing its subscriber base in new markets. Netflix is a global player. While Apple might be a mobile behemoth in wealthier western nations, that can’t be said for the rest of the world. Netflix probably sees huge opportunity in those markets and virtually none of those potential subscribers are Apple customers.
This is someday going to come back and bite Apple - because it will be seen as an Unfair Business Practise.
Apple claims services revenues are growing rapidly, but this is clearly not healthy. This is the sort of thing that a court or the Justice Department can take cognizance of, and hit them with a really big fine. Maybe even force a split of the company, so that Apple Services becomes a separate and standalone company.
This policy might still be justifiable if Apple isn’t in the streaming business - but now, it’s an extremely uncompetitive practise.
Apple deserves to be split up, so that there is fairness all around.
What exactly is unfair?
I don’t think you understand how the laws concerning monopolies work, in the US anyway. Apple is free to compete in services. There’s no anti-competitive behavior happening. Apple isn’t excluding any competing services from its platforms.
The stupid thing I wish they’d remove — on Apple TV, forcing me to select which user profile to use...SINCE THERE IS ONLY ONE CHOICE! (me). This makes zero sense. If there’s only one profile on an account, then there is no reason to prompt the user to pick one. Logic mandates this.
Mentioned it on their twitter help but may have to file it again on their support site.
And for multiple profiles, at least that makes some sense on a family device, but even on personal devices you have to still select your profile. Hulu gets this right.
But how does it make sense for Apple to allow any app on it’s store for free?
There are hard costs associated with running their servers. I must be missing something...
Change your perspective. The App Store makes iPhones more attractive. It’s a feature. The fact that any iPhone user can find tons of free apps makes the platform more appealing. Apple would be justified, in my mind, if it charged companies like Netflix, who offer a free app and charge for a service outside the app, a fee to cover hosting and bandwidth costs. But wouldn’t that be petty? I mean, if Apple is that desperate for revenue, they have big problems.
I wish they'd also kill that video preview and that annoying, recently-added startup sound - or at least give users an option to disable them.
What's next - commercials for other same-service content at the beginning of each video like Amazon Prime Video added a while back?
Oh, it will inevitably be worse. Unskippable mid-stream commercials will be in play sooner or later. There is virtually no visual or communications medium that won’t be filled with ads, solicitation, or spam. Sooner or later. 99.9% of my paper mail, by weight at least, are ads, offers, spam, etc. It so bad now, that it is easy to throw away my bills with them, because it is lost in the tonnage or they look too much like the spam mail. Just the thought of all the fuel burnt to transport them fills me with rage.
Heck, the sheer amount of intellectual power used to design filters in email, and smart agents for phone calls in the future, so that we won’t be inundated with spam email and spam calls should fill everyone with rage. If it wasn’t for concession sales at movie theaters, there would be commercials for movies, mid-viewing, as well as the 20 minutes in front.
Makes sense. Especially now that Apple will become a competitior. And anyone who says Apple deserves a cut of Netflix subscriptions then must also believe Apple deserves a cut of every Uber and Lyft ride.
Audio and Video services are not the same as Taxi services. Should Apple create, maintain and support iTunes and just allow third party music services to just come for the ride? Will Netflix allow pornographic video vendors to offer their videos on their Netflix platform? Netflix does not create it or host it either.
Nokia failed because the French military refused to let them use GPS in their phones, and their cost to repay their spectrum purchase loans made their business model untenable.
Comments
This line goes a long way to describe how two faced some of these execs can be. It's "unfair" for Apple to claim revenue, but they can't see that there is real costs in:
- Keeping backups of their app, along with maintaining the servers and server security
- Increasing server farms to allow their app to be distributed to larger audiences, and working with the various governments worldwide to provide this, including in regions where their competitors are banned.
- Building and running green energy facilities to run said server farms
- Make store cards and deals with retailers world wide to minimise friction into the store and provide a bricks-and-mortar presence.
- The continual development of APIs to provide new features for the developers to monetise into their apps. (Plus other features such as allowing Siri to search their content for easier purchasing/use.)
- Continually enhancing and reacting to threats upon iOS/macOS security so these apps won't inadvertently divulge customer data or put their users at risk.
Yet all of that is included after paying a measly developer subscription cost - which is significantly less than any other kind of professional grade software subscription. Maybe we should go back to renting movies at Blockbuster or buying software on floppy discs in boxes?Apple claims services revenues are growing rapidly, but this is clearly not healthy. This is the sort of thing that a court or the Justice Department can take cognizance of, and hit them with a really big fine. Maybe even force a split of the company, so that Apple Services becomes a separate and standalone company.
This policy might still be justifiable if Apple isn’t in the streaming business - but now, it’s an extremely uncompetitive practise.
Apple deserves to be split up, so that there is fairness all around.
Apple engages in unfair business practices, but it’s ok?
How different is this from Microsoft making IE the default browser on Windows? MS at least didn’t charge Netscape anything. And still got canned for it.
Apple is attracting too much bad karma and some day this will all come back to bite Apple. Waiting for that moment.
But Apple wants a 15% cut of ONGOING subscription costs of NetFlix, even though the only service provided by Apple is hosting the app and delivering it. Which is a one time service. That too, with a policy that prevents customers from downloading from elsewhere.
One day whatever Apple wins from Qualcomm will be lost multiple times over because of this policy.
Apple’s policies were OK and acceptable when it was a small struggling company - not when it is the largest company in the planet. Maybe the DoJ or someone else should step in, and make it a smaller company once again.
But how does it make sense for Apple to allow any app on it’s store for free?
There are hard costs associated with running their servers. I must be missing something...
I’m sure Netflix ran the numbers and decided that the money it was paying Apple was better spent elsewhere, like advertising and growing its subscriber base in new markets. Netflix is a global player. While Apple might be a mobile behemoth in wealthier western nations, that can’t be said for the rest of the world. Netflix probably sees huge opportunity in those markets and virtually none of those potential subscribers are Apple customers.
I don’t think you understand how the laws concerning monopolies work, in the US anyway. Apple is free to compete in services. There’s no anti-competitive behavior happening. Apple isn’t excluding any competing services from its platforms.
Heck, the sheer amount of intellectual power used to design filters in email, and smart agents for phone calls in the future, so that we won’t be inundated with spam email and spam calls should fill everyone with rage. If it wasn’t for concession sales at movie theaters, there would be commercials for movies, mid-viewing, as well as the 20 minutes in front.
Should Apple create, maintain and support iTunes and just allow third party music services to just come for the ride?
Will Netflix allow pornographic video vendors to offer their videos on their Netflix platform? Netflix does not create it or host it either.