Rayz2016

gatorguy said:

I don't think any rules were bent. There was no rule against what they were doing to begin with AFAICT.

Actually there was a rule against it: the minimum length of a subscription was 7 days. The problem is that the Apple curators were inconsistent when applying the rule. The developer said that he's been through the review before and he's never had a problem with the one day purchase.

But it is a great example of Apple's new developer dispute mechanism, recognizing now that they were mistaken, and that's the big takeaway. A year ago the only way to get Apple to change its mind or recognize an error in its app review process was much more time-consuming and might see the app removed from the store until Apple got around to listening to the developer's side of things.

Yes, I think what we're seeing here is Apple now being a lot firmer in how they apply the rules. Now they're fighting to keep the App Store under their control, they need to show that the rules are being applied consistently and fairly to all developers, when in the past they clearly have not.

Predictions for the future based on absolutely nothing.
========================================

Apple will continue to push Battle Royale as the original that runs everywhere.

Epic will continue to sulk.

Apple will lose zero sales (no one buys an iPhone for one single game)

Epic will lose the 70% it could have earned, but it won't amount to very much (no one buys an iPhone to play Fortnite)

In six months time, Epic will sue Apple for poaching people working on the Unreal Engine. It will then launch a campaign game featuring nerds running around a landscape, murdering each other while trying to avoid being eaten by massive zombie Apple logos. Fornite (Basement Dwellers Edition) is a huge success

Apple sues for illegal use of their logo.

Epic loses the poaching suit.

Apple loses the logo suit.

WWDC 2022, Apple gives developers the first look at the at its Arcade Engine. It's a full development kit that looks a lot like the Unreal Engine with VR support.

Epic sues Apple over the Arcade Engine.

In a rare moment of brilliance, Apple's legal team reminds the judge that you cannot copyright an idea:

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/pubg-sues-fortnite-copyright-infringement

The judge tells Apple not to law-splain stuff, and throws out the case.

Apple misses the Christmas deadline to get the Arcade Engine out to users. Half a dozen eagerly awaited games miss the holiday season.

Apple gets the engine out for February.

An unknown blogger shows screenshots of something called the Arcade Portal, he claims its an app that runs on Windows and Android that allows users to stream games from Apple Arcade.

The internet loses its collective shit. 

Apple's legal department is expanded to the size of a small country in preparation for the six thousand lawsuits launched in a single day.

Epic releases the FortnitePhone, and buys a tract of land for use as future landfill.

SpamSandwich said:

Hey, more competition? Bring it on.

I think ‘competition’ might be overstating things a little. 

Amazon assures potential buyers that Halo is designed with multiple layers of privacy and security are built into the service to keep data safe. Health data is encrypted, and customers are able to delete data at any point. Body scan images are automatically deleted from the cloud after they are analyzed, and voice clips are analyzed locally on a user's phone. 

maestro64 said:

Why are they not suing the mining companies and the government of the Congo, or why not sue the UN or WHO who claims to have responsibility over what countries do in the world market. Is they because China is the user of most all the mineral coming out of the Congo and China does not care.

Because they'll make a bigger stink by suing organisations people have actually heard of. The companies involved don't own the mines, don't mine the mines, don't make the batteries.

They just bought the batteries, so it's a bit like me being sued for wearing trainers made by child labourers. 

The problem is that government will do nothing to protect its own citizens so this is why they're going after the names. 

dantheman827 said:

I love the iPhone hardware, but I want to install software of my choosing on the hardware I've purchased.

The iPhone, iPad (Pro), and Apple TV all have amazing hardware but they lock us in the prison that is the App Store requiring a jail break to freely install anything desired.

My hope is that they do one of the following:

• Open up their iOS/tvOS for hardware owners to install their own choice of applications which would be limited to the confines of their security sandbox
• Offer the option to unlock the bootloader so that it would be possible to install your own choice of operating system.
  

These devices aren't cheap, yet Apple plays gatekeeper to all the software and anything they don't agree with gets rejected.

Security wouldn't need to be weakened either since even with existing methods like code signing or enterprise certificates, apps are still sandboxed and subject to the same restrictions as those from the App Store.

They wouldn't even have to make it easy, for all I care they could pop up a message on install saying WARNING: This software has not been verified by Apple, it may be able to steal all your data, proceed with extreme caution for all I care as long as the option was provided.

I do not think this would be the end of the App Store since even on Android Epic had tried direct distribution for Fortnite and didn't like the outcome, so they decided to release it on the Google Play store.

If Epic of all developers couldn't make it outside of the Play Store, what makes you think other developers would? Apps like Netflix already get along just fine by not offering IAP for their subscriptions and just function as a "reader" app.

Well, as long as you’re happy that your phone is no longer an iPhone.