As we're seeing with more and more robust browser based applications (and other technologies), the legal discussions about this will lag behind the fast-moving marketplace.
In my opinion, it's absurd that Apple is considered to have a monopoly on a "market" that didn't exist before they created it (namely a market for iOS apps). As for whether third-party apps work or don't work cross platform, that's not true at all. Most of the applications people use are available across platforms. Netflix anyone? Hulu? Zoom? Zillow? Workday? Etc. etc.
If consumers want "cheaper" apps with lower commissions, Google is free to make that point in their marketing materials. This isn't like a monopoly in phone or power providers. A couple of decades ago I lived in a county that had one cable provider (thanks to the local government committing us to that). That's a monopoly, and that sucked. However, in short order companies found a way around that (satellite providers, for example). The same will happen here (and is happening here). Companies are very innovative in serving customers and customers are clever about finding the best deals. Courts and Congress will always be a step behind and irrelevant at best and counter productive at worst.
But you have to enjoy (not) the sight of politicians and government employees "protecting" consumers from the companies who created the things that those companies created.
crowley said: Ok? It's still not the same. Just because a past case was dismissed because of a lack of evidence doesn't mean a future one will be. It depends what evidence they present. I would think that would be obvious.
The case wasn't dismissed. Psystar lost their antitrust lawsuit and as a result set a legal precedent in the United States that an operating system like OS X wasn't unique enough versus other operating systems available to be considered an entire market by itself. Epic's only real attempt at claiming iOS is somehow unique versus Android is to say that it doesn't allow side loading. However, lack of side loading also applies to operating systems on consoles and Epic does significantly more business on consoles than on iOS or Android.
Nobody seems to understand what a monopoly is. Just because there are other phones doesn’t mean Apple isn’t engaging in a monopoly.
Wal-Mart has a monopoly on Wal-Mart. That doesn’t mean Coca Cola has the right to change their rules.
That’s not a monopoly.
A thing cannot monopolize itself. It must monopolize a market.
Apple has zero monopoly anywhere on any market.
Case closed.
There is a market for iOS apps, iOS apps are not exclusively owned or created by Apple and yet Apple runs the only store. Case reopened.
Apple does not control a majority of the mobile marketplace. so case closed. A monopoly has to have control a given market. Ford, HP, GM... like Apple controls the market for their given products but none are a monopoly.
The argument is that the market is not iOS devices, but iOS apps. And Apple very much do control that market.
Nonsense.. You can get Frappy Bird on iOS AND Google. Stop trying to skew reality to suit your narrative. There's a crapload more Google apps than there are iOS apps. As a developer myself, I totally get it. Apple is at the whim of USERS, not developers. The majority of iOS developers are quite happy with how the status quo is. It's only the whiny, entitled ones that feel the rules don't apply to them.
Nobody seems to understand what a monopoly is. Just because there are other phones doesn’t mean Apple isn’t engaging in a monopoly.
Wal-Mart has a monopoly on Wal-Mart. That doesn’t mean Coca Cola has the right to change their rules.
That’s not a monopoly.
A thing cannot monopolize itself. It must monopolize a market.
Apple has zero monopoly anywhere on any market.
Case closed.
There is a market for iOS apps, iOS apps are not exclusively owned or created by Apple and yet Apple runs the only store. Case reopened.
Apple does not control a majority of the mobile marketplace. so case closed. A monopoly has to have control a given market. Ford, HP, GM... like Apple controls the market for their given products but none are a monopoly.
The argument is that the market is not iOS devices, but iOS apps. And Apple very much do control that market.
Nonsense.. You can get Frappy Bird on iOS AND Google. Stop trying to skew reality to suit your narrative. There's a crapload more Google apps than there are iOS apps. As a developer myself, I totally get it. Apple is at the whim of USERS, not developers. The majority of iOS developers are quite happy with how the status quo is. It's only the whiny, entitled ones that feel the rules don't apply to them.
I cannot get "Frappy Bird" in a binary that works on my iPhone anywhere other than the iOS app store (and possibly Cydia, but that's not a reasonable alternative). I'm not trying to skew anything, that's an absolute objective fact.
If Ias an iPhone user were to buy Frappy Bird from the Google Play Store then I have to spend an additional couple hundred dollars for hardware to run it, which is arguably not a reasonable price of substitution for an app.
Getting a bit tired of repeating myself by the way, can anyone else who wants to reply try and make the effort to understand what I'm saying at least. Fine if you disagree with it, but most of the responses are missing the point entirely.
Nobody seems to understand what a monopoly is. Just because there are other phones doesn’t mean Apple isn’t engaging in a monopoly.
Wal-Mart has a monopoly on Wal-Mart. That doesn’t mean Coca Cola has the right to change their rules.
That’s not a monopoly.
A thing cannot monopolize itself. It must monopolize a market.
Apple has zero monopoly anywhere on any market.
Case closed.
There is a market for iOS apps, iOS apps are not exclusively owned or created by Apple and yet Apple runs the only store. Case reopened.
Spot on.
There's a market for smartphone apps => Android and iOS apps. Apple created the store, development and distribution infrastructure for iOS apps. Developers are free to develop apps for iOS, Android. Case closed.
Can we quit with this pithy "case closed" nonsense please, clearly it's not as clear cut as you guys are making out else we wouldn't be having the conversation.
My contention is that for the purpose of competition law, which is what matters here, smartphones are substitutable, and constitute a market. However, apps that run on smartphones, because they are bound to a platform, might be considered as their own markets, as while an iPhone owning consumer can substitute one iOS (e.g.) Notes app for another on iOS, they cannot substitute an Android Notes app because Android apps do not run on Android, and the vast majority of consumers will own only one of an iOS or Android device. The fact that you'd need to change your device means that you could say that these are differently dependent markets, that developers often operate across.
By the same standing do consumers care about the app as much as the data and the function? If my notes are synced to a cloud/email service and move machine to machine with an app that is included on both platforms am I locked in.
Lots of apps are free with offline subscriptions to a syncing account.
Nobody seems to understand what a monopoly is. Just because there are other phones doesn’t mean Apple isn’t engaging in a monopoly.
Wal-Mart has a monopoly on Wal-Mart. That doesn’t mean Coca Cola has the right to change their rules.
That’s not a monopoly.
A thing cannot monopolize itself. It must monopolize a market.
Apple has zero monopoly anywhere on any market.
Case closed.
There is a market for iOS apps, iOS apps are not exclusively owned or created by Apple and yet Apple runs the only store. Case reopened.
Spot on.
There's a market for smartphone apps => Android and iOS apps. Apple created the store, development and distribution infrastructure for iOS apps. Developers are free to develop apps for iOS, Android. Case closed.
Can we quit with this pithy "case closed" nonsense please, clearly it's not as clear cut as you guys are making out else we wouldn't be having the conversation.
My contention is that for the purpose of competition law, which is what matters here, smartphones are substitutable, and constitute a market. However, apps that run on smartphones, because they are bound to a platform, might be considered as their own markets, as while an iPhone owning consumer can substitute one iOS (e.g.) Notes app for another on iOS, they cannot substitute an Android Notes app because Android apps do not run on Android, and the vast majority of consumers will own only one of an iOS or Android device. The fact that you'd need to change your device means that you could say that these are differently dependent markets, that developers often operate across.
By the same standing do consumers care about the app as much as the data and the function? If my notes are synced to a cloud/email service and move machine to machine with an app that is included on both platforms am I locked in.
Lots of apps are free with offline subscriptions to a syncing account.
That's a decent point, but I think free apps sort of sit apart from the entire fray. Free app makers get a very good deal out of the app stores and probably wouldn't benefit from competition between app stores, though it wouldn't hurt them much either unless the app stores started charging for hosting, or by download. As it stands, they're halfway to being webapps anyway, so I don't think they really count for much in the debate.
And I think paid apps could legitimately be aggrieved that part of the 30% cut is taking from their revenue is subsidising the store presence of other apps' busines models (whether it be advertising, or web subscriptions). It's in Apple's interest and the free app makers interest, but it's being supported by everyone else.
The argument is that the market is not iOS devices, but iOS apps. And Apple very much do control that market.
II understand the point you are trying to make but think this is also the wrong reading. The market definition as we see with initial government inquiries and that is consistent with other antitrust actions is the mobile app market. The mobile app market was worth $170bn in 2019. I haven't seen the 2020 numbers yet. Of that $170bn 99% was owned by 2 vendors - Apple and Google. This is a textbook duopoly. Of the $170bn worldwide, Apple had 2/3 of the market. This is enough marketshare to qualify as having monopoly power. Considering we know Apple has a much higher percentage of handset volume in the US chances are (I can't say for sure as I haven't seen a breakdown) their overall percentage of the mobile app market is higher in the US than the 2/3 they own worldwide. Apple has zero chance of winning an argument that they don't have monopoly market share in order to avoid governmental antitrust action.
The argument is that the market is not iOS devices, but iOS apps. And Apple very much do control that market.
II understand the point you are trying to make but think this is also the wrong reading. The market definition as we see with initial government inquiries and that is consistent with other antitrust actions is the mobile app market. The mobile app market was worth $170bn in 2019. I haven't seen the 2020 numbers yet. Of that $170bn 99% was owned by 2 vendors - Apple and Google. This is a textbook duopoly. Of the $170bn worldwide, Apple had 2/3 of the market. This is enough marketshare to qualify as having monopoly power. Considering we know Apple has a much higher percentage of handset volume in the US chances are (I can't say for sure as I haven't seen a breakdown) their overall percentage of the mobile app market is higher in the US than the 2/3 they own worldwide. Apple has zero chance of winning an argument that they don't have monopoly market share in order to avoid governmental antitrust action.
Good point well made. In which case my distinction wouldn't even matter that much, though I still think it may be relevant.
The argument is that the market is not iOS devices, but iOS apps. And Apple very much do control that market.
II understand the point you are trying to make but think this is also the wrong reading. The market definition as we see with initial government inquiries and that is consistent with other antitrust actions is the mobile app market. The mobile app market was worth $170bn in 2019. I haven't seen the 2020 numbers yet. Of that $170bn 99% was owned by 2 vendors - Apple and Google. This is a textbook duopoly. Of the $170bn worldwide, Apple had 2/3 of the market. This is enough marketshare to qualify as having monopoly power. Considering we know Apple has a much higher percentage of handset volume in the US chances are (I can't say for sure as I haven't seen a breakdown) their overall percentage of the mobile app market is higher in the US than the 2/3 they own worldwide. Apple has zero chance of winning an argument that they don't have monopoly market share in order to avoid governmental antitrust action.
The root problem isn't so much the 'monopoly' per se but abuse of a dominant position and anti competitive practices.
As an aside, did Apple and Google really have 99% of the 2019 market? How much did China generate?
The developer is irrelevant, the consumer is all that matters, and from the consumers perspective an iOS app and an Android app are not substitutable because iOS app binaries do not run on Android and Android app binaries do not run on iOS. That is a significant argument for iOS apps representing a market and Android apps representing a different market.
Unfortunately not. If that was the case then Apple would also have a monopoly on macOS as they are not compatible with Windows. The market for desktop apps isn't split into macOS and Windows it is a PC applications market. As a consumer your choice of PC (Mac or Windows compatible) limits your choice of available applications.
Ultimately, it is the developers that are able to provide options for cross platform compatibility and there are many examples where this is and isn't the case in the PC app market as well as the mobile app market. Consumer hostility is driven by whether developers are motivated to release their product on a platform - the store is an irrelevance.
As a small developer myself I release on macOS and iOS only, so you could say I am consumer hostile to those on Android and Windows. The reason I don't release on Android is that its just not worth the hassle for me to support so many iterations and for Windows its simply laziness on my part. When I do finally release on Windows my plan is to provide cross platform support (macOS and Windows) but I could easily choose to go down the route of charging separately. Again, that is my choice as a developer, not something forced on me by Apple.
II understand the point you are trying to make but think this is also the wrong reading. The market definition as we see with initial government inquiries and that is consistent with other antitrust actions is the mobile app market. The mobile app market was worth $170bn in 2019. I haven't seen the 2020 numbers yet. Of that $170bn 99% was owned by 2 vendors - Apple and Google. This is a textbook duopoly. Of the $170bn worldwide, Apple had 2/3 of the market. This is enough marketshare to qualify as having monopoly power. Considering we know Apple has a much higher percentage of handset volume in the US chances are (I can't say for sure as I haven't seen a breakdown) their overall percentage of the mobile app market is higher in the US than the 2/3 they own worldwide. Apple has zero chance of winning an argument that they don't have monopoly market share in order to avoid governmental antitrust action.
I'm not sure anyone is arguing that Apple doesn't have a monopoly in the mobile app market. But even so, does that make the monopoly illegal? As has been established in the US many times previously simply having a monopoly is not illegal. Abusing your monopoly position is.
Given Apple effectively created the mobile app market in the first place, owning virtually 100% of it at the beginning (with the 30% cut in place) one can clearly see that they have continued to lose market share since then. They haven't really changed their 30% cut rule so arguing that they are abusing their monopoly position will be challenging from a fee structure perspective, especially as any fee change has resulted in a reduction. Further, given the current climate, the curation of the store is unlikely to find many complaints at the centre of government as it is allied to many of their ideologies for censorship of certain "unpalatable" content.
Yes Apple retains significant market share in the US right now, but this has reduced over the last decade significantly and the trend may actually continue to be downwards. But again, having this share alone is not enough for antitrust action because as we know, having a monopoly is not actually illegal.
Outside the US the position is even less clear as Apple doesn't have a majority share of in many of the markets and this is where the EU will likely run into trouble.
Comments
In my opinion, it's absurd that Apple is considered to have a monopoly on a "market" that didn't exist before they created it (namely a market for iOS apps). As for whether third-party apps work or don't work cross platform, that's not true at all. Most of the applications people use are available across platforms. Netflix anyone? Hulu? Zoom? Zillow? Workday? Etc. etc.
If consumers want "cheaper" apps with lower commissions, Google is free to make that point in their marketing materials. This isn't like a monopoly in phone or power providers. A couple of decades ago I lived in a county that had one cable provider (thanks to the local government committing us to that). That's a monopoly, and that sucked. However, in short order companies found a way around that (satellite providers, for example). The same will happen here (and is happening here). Companies are very innovative in serving customers and customers are clever about finding the best deals. Courts and Congress will always be a step behind and irrelevant at best and counter productive at worst.
But you have to enjoy (not) the sight of politicians and government employees "protecting" consumers from the companies who created the things that those companies created.
If my notes are synced to a cloud/email service and move machine to machine with an app that is included on both platforms am I locked in.
Lots of apps are free with offline subscriptions to a syncing account.
As an aside, did Apple and Google really have 99% of the 2019 market? How much did China generate?
Ultimately, it is the developers that are able to provide options for cross platform compatibility and there are many examples where this is and isn't the case in the PC app market as well as the mobile app market. Consumer hostility is driven by whether developers are motivated to release their product on a platform - the store is an irrelevance.
As a small developer myself I release on macOS and iOS only, so you could say I am consumer hostile to those on Android and Windows. The reason I don't release on Android is that its just not worth the hassle for me to support so many iterations and for Windows its simply laziness on my part. When I do finally release on Windows my plan is to provide cross platform support (macOS and Windows) but I could easily choose to go down the route of charging separately. Again, that is my choice as a developer, not something forced on me by Apple.
Given Apple effectively created the mobile app market in the first place, owning virtually 100% of it at the beginning (with the 30% cut in place) one can clearly see that they have continued to lose market share since then. They haven't really changed their 30% cut rule so arguing that they are abusing their monopoly position will be challenging from a fee structure perspective, especially as any fee change has resulted in a reduction. Further, given the current climate, the curation of the store is unlikely to find many complaints at the centre of government as it is allied to many of their ideologies for censorship of certain "unpalatable" content.
Yes Apple retains significant market share in the US right now, but this has reduced over the last decade significantly and the trend may actually continue to be downwards. But again, having this share alone is not enough for antitrust action because as we know, having a monopoly is not actually illegal.
Outside the US the position is even less clear as Apple doesn't have a majority share of in many of the markets and this is where the EU will likely run into trouble.