AppleZulu said:

Waiting for the reality-defying explanation from @9secondkox2 about how this is “all part of the plan.”

Even if Apple thought they could move iPhone manufacturing to the US, it would take years. A 25% tariff now isn’t going to help with that. 

Watch instead for some bluster followed by a reversal. Watch for Trump and his inner circle to buy Apple stock this afternoon and sell after the reversal. 

"Here’s the options as I understand them:

1. Unjust Enrichment.
This kicks in when a company profits unfairly at someone else’s expense, especially where no legitimate contractual justification exists (DON”T Scream. I am NOT saying there is or there isn’t, but the case is at the top, so it passed the initial tests of reasonableness to proceed).

While it’s typically a civil remedy (not a regulatory tool — let’s not get into regulators, but look what they did to the telecoms industry and rightly so, in the last century, to break up Ma Bell’s monopoly), it’s often part of a broader case that looks at whether a company has gained financially through market distortion, manipulation or bad faith. Given the length of this case and others, that seems a given, to be underway — no?

2. Antitrust and Monopolistic Practices
Judges can and regularly do rule against companies for anti-competitive behaviour that harms consumer welfare. Epic have painted a picture of how Apple harm consumers by painting a picture of how Apple’s “price gouging” is forcing them to charge more to consumers than they want to. Not for us to question, but for the law to decide: Are consumers’ interests being threatened, and effectively being double-charged, by Apple, and by Epic raising its prices by being forced to cover the “Apple Tax.” In the eyes of the law this is a legitimate question and is not the easy pushover everyone seems to think it is just because it’s “Apple’s store.”

Let me just say Rosa Parks at this point, and sit with that for a second.

One more minute. Did that sink in?:

It’s not just about whether Apple’s 30% cut is high; it’s about whether Apple’s total control of the iOS platform illegally restricts competition and access. If developers have no way to reach iPhone users without accepting Apple’s terms, that could appear as  monopolistic coercion.

Rosa Parks. Again, sit with that for a second.

Before running to Apple’s defence, remember this is a matter of law  NOT a matter about who is an ass, or whether the law is an ass or if the judge is behaving like one or if Apple gaslighted the law.

It’s a matter of the law, and jurisdiction. The Court seems to have it, irrespective or whether the proposed remedy was over-reach.

Practices like “tying” (forcing use of one product or service to access another) and closing off competitive market access fall squarely under this.

3. “Reasonableness” in Commercial Contracts
Even in a free market, courts can step in if pricing schemes violate principles of good faith, fair dealing, or broader public policy.

If a contract or business practice is found to be so one-sided that it effectively removes the counter party’s ability to negotiate or traps them in a take-it-or-leave-it scenario that’s where courts get involved. Like it or not, it would seem they have a right to seek jurisdiction here, however “unfair” you might feel this is on Apple.

Gregg: Important Distinction — your analogy to a bricks and mortar store earlier.
Brick-and-mortar stores aren’t under the same scrutiny because customers can literally walk down the street and choose a competitor. But with Apple, developers can’t do that. If you want to sell to iPhone users, you’re stuck with the App Store. That’s a closed market, and it’s that lack of real alternatives that brings in antitrust scrutiny.

So this isn’t about judges setting prices but it’s about them weighing up whether a company is eliminating natural competitive forces that would normally keep prices in check.

If Apple’s behavior is found to block competition and manipulate market conditions, the courts absolutely have the power to force change under antitrust law. Not because 30% is “too high,” or too low but because no functioning market exists to challenge it.

And people are being denied their right to a fair and competitive system, under the law, to ensure prices are not “too high or too low” but fairly set by market forces. Hence all the antitrust and monopoly laws.

This seems to be the point where everyone falls down and starts wailing about poor Apple and their right to set prices in their own store. They do, but only if there is fair access to it, not just because “it’s fair and Apple is the company wot built it so theyz can do anything OK?”

Does the bus company have the right to tell black people where they can sit and give white people a pass to sit at the front? No. But it took someone to challenge that to get rid of the status quo.

Rosa Parks.

Yes, yes hyperbole.. but sometimes it seems like the only way of getting through.

No don’t suddenly go “what if but well I THINK APPLE SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO DO anything it wants it its store.” Because it can’t. It’s not OK, under the law, whether it’s 5% or 30%, if there’s no natural force in play acting as a balance to, if you like use competition to enable price and discovery and legitimacy.

The above areas of law become directly relevant to Apple and its practices and the judge probably does have jurisdiction to throw the book at Apple if some company complains about access and fairness and unjust enrichment at the expense of consumers.

Which is exactly what Tripp Mickle says has occurred.

And if it's upheld, then he’s won, and Apple will have been a complete ass for losing its grip over its walled garden by kicking so many asses for so many years and making Apple Legal a “profit centre” as disclosed a few years ago in another case, that through sheer hubris and refusal to at least be seen to be fair will have kicked itself in the ass so hard things will never be the same again, and the next domino to fall will be another of it’s services, when challenged on whatever spurious grounds someone comes up with.

I am basing much of this on my knowledge of UK law in these areas but the UK and US have very similar legal systems and structures, so with what I know about US law, what I’ve written I don’t think, is over-reach. However, US courts are much more reactionary and prone to kick ass than UK courts out of personal spite or opinion, so with that thrown in the mix you have the perfect storm.

Which is why I always say, don’t end up a target of regulators and the judiciary by visibly treating them like asses, because chances are they will be determined to take you out, over time, and like a Terminator, will just never give up until they’ve taken a chunk out of your ass for daring to mock them in public or worse still, be shown to have done so in private memos or emails during disclosures.

So  the very fact this case reached the courts and has churned around in it for so long (and in other cases too, giving form to many similar claims out of the box) means a credible claim of market distortion already passed initial tests.

And this one went all the way to the top, where the judge decided Apple had made an ass of her and the law, and threw the gavel at Apple."

davidw said:

The solution for Apple seem quite simple. If a developer want to have an app in the Apple App Store where there are advertising and links in the app that allows for any IAP payments outside of Apple iTunes, then Apple will charge those developers $1 per app downloaded per month, with a deal for $10 per  app per year.  (or something to that nature). It will be up to the developers if they want to charge their customers for downloading the app. So a developer can weigh in on whether to have a free app where Apple will get a commission or paid for each downloaded app and hope the users makes enough IAP to bring the cost of having such an app, below what they would had paid in commission.

This way the developers that are happy with the arrangement of having a free app and paying Apple a commission to handle IAP payments (along with refunds and updates) can still do so. And those that don't want to pay Apple a commission on IAP can do so by paying Apple upfront for having an app in the Apple App store from which they are profiting from using Apple IP.

Isn't Apple already doing something like this in the EU, with downloads from third party app stores?

Apple’s response to the Injunction strains credulity. After two sets of evidentiary hearings, the truth emerged. Apple, despite knowing its obligations thereunder, thwarted the Injunction’s goals, and continued its anticompetitive conduct solely to maintain its revenue stream.

Remarkably, Apple believed that this Court would not see through its obvious cover-up (the 2024 evidentiary hearing). To unveil Apple’s actual decision-making process, not the one tailor-made for litigation, the Court ordered production of real-time documents and ultimately held a second set of hearings in 2025.

To summarize: One, after trial, the Court found that Apple’s 30 percent commission “allowed it to reap supracompetitive operating margins” and was not tied to the value of its intellectual property, and thus, was anticompetitive. Apple’s response: charge a 27 percent commission (again tied to nothing) on off-app purchases, where it had previously charged nothing, and extend the commission for a period of seven days after the consumer linked-out of the app.

Apple’s goal: maintain its anticompetitive revenue stream.

Two, the Court had prohibited Apple from denying developers the ability to communicate with, and direct consumers to, other purchasing mechanisms. Apple’s response: impose new barriers and new requirements to increase friction and increase breakage rates with full page “scare” screens, static URLs, and generic statements.

Apple’s goal: to dissuade customer usage of alternative purchase opportunities and maintain its anticompetitive revenue stream.

In the end, Apple sought to maintain a revenue stream worth billions in direct defiance of this Court’s Injunction.

In stark contrast to Apple’s initial in-court testimony, contemporaneous business documents reveal that Apple knew exactly what it was doing and at every turn chose the most anticompetitive option. To hide the truth, Vice-President of Finance, Alex Roman, outright lied under oath. Internally, Phillip Schiller had advocated that Apple comply with the Injunction, but Tim Cook ignored Schiller and instead allowed Chief Financial Officer Luca Maestri and his finance team to convince him otherwise. Cook chose poorly.

The real evidence, detailed herein, more than meets the clear and convincing standard to find a violation. The Court refers the matter to the United States Attorney for the Northern District of California to investigate whether criminal contempt proceedings are appropriate.

This is an injunction, not a negotiation. There are no do-overs once a party willfully disregards a court order. Time is of the essence. The Court will not tolerate further delays. As previously ordered, Apple will not impede competition. The Court enjoins Apple from implementing its new anticompetitive acts to avoid compliance with the Injunction. Effective immediately Apple will no longer impede developers’ ability to communicate with users nor will they levy or impose a new commission on off-app purchases.

The TLDR version? 

"This is an injunction, not a negotiation. There are no do-overs once a party willfully disregards a court order."