neoncat

lkrupp said:

Once again we are treated to an ‘unverifiable rumor” and we’re off to the races. Tech blogs are ablaze with hate, indignation, recrimination, factual errors, and misinformation. Another day in the la-la land of make-believe and the continuous mantra drum beat of the Evil Apple Empire.

The point is not to besmirch your favorite magical and amazing company whom you love with all your heart, it's to get people like you with hair triggers all upset and angry so you post your boilerplate old-man-yelling-at-clouds grievance, which generates "yeah, you said it!" mob mentality likes, thus generating numerous page views. 

If you don't like the rumors, keep your mouth shut. But you can't, and you won't. We all play our part in a vast game of data bought and sold, manipulated into offering commentary that is predictable and fallow: Go Apple! Boo Not-Apple! Good dog. 

StrangeDays said:

Which no one is going to do. Still, we’re presented with stories like this every week as if the masses give a crack about DIY enthusiasts repair hobbies.

Well, as long as it makes you angry that some of us like to take stuff apart, I suppose our work here is done.

mike1 said:

Can you imagine how bad it would get with third-party app stores and side loading?!

Gosh, it's all just so dangerous, maybe we shouldn't have app stores at all? 

I never knew there were so many people absolutely unable to cope with even the slightest amount of risk until Apple's App Store conceit drove them all out of their safe spaces. At this point, I don't even care about alternate app stores. I rarely buy apps anyway. But the schadenfreude (childish as it may be, I admit) is almost too much to resist. 

The global audiobooks market size was valued at USD 4,219.0 million in 2021 and is expected to expand at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 26.4% from 2022 to 2030.

There's nothing "holding back" the audiobook market, as these growth numbers far outstrip growth in traditional publishing and ebooks. I have nothing personally against Apple (or anyone) using AI-based narrators, but as is typical of Apple and its maudlin, truth-stretching, self-celebratory press release language, their motivations for pursuing AI-based readings is avoiding SAG-AFTRA union rates for narrators. It's expensive to commission a reading for a book where the author and/or publisher has chosen not to pursue an audiobook as a first-party effort, and Apple's share of the ebook and audiobook markets is miniscule and falling (I work in book publishing). It's a purely practical/financial move for them to sidestep the traditional process in order to offer a "competitive" catalog against much, much larger competitors (e.g. Audible).

rob53 said:

I've never had a problem with Apple's 30% fee. This is nothing when comparing it to a regular store's up-charge over what they pay for their "products." I keep seeing a note in the window of a health food store that give customers a 30% discount over list price when buying in bulk, in other words, their wholesale price. This wholesale price still gives the store owner enough money to operate their store sho I continue to wonder why these chintzy developers keep complaining about a standard fee. They simple want all the money for themselves. All they have to do is charge more for their software. 

Common in retail arrangements like you describe is the ability for the producer (the company that creates the product sold) to not only choose which retailers they want to feature their product, but to set minimum (and maximum) advertised markups. Apple does this quite deliberately, for example, setting different markups for different retailers (Amazon, for example). Apple also has an "authorized dealer" program where specific stores are granted direct access to products and marketing support. Other stores are not afforded such blessings, and are instead referred to as the "gray market," where warranty and other concerns are called into question.

You understand here how the power is ultimately in the hands of the producer. Now compare that to Apple's adversarial relationship with developers in the App Store. You don't have to agree with me whether or not that's a problem, nor am I trying to convince anyone here that's a problem, but when the snide Apple White Knights rush to defense of a two trillion one trillion dollar company and declare developers "chintzy" for not toeing the line, it's hard not to roll my eyes. There's nuance in every relationship. I don't disagree that Apple provides a valuable service to end users with how they've structured the App Store. I disagree that it's worth the cost and/or that developers receive value on their end as well. But again, we can agree to disagree. Just do so fairly and acknowledge your desire to represent your own selfish needs, the same way a developer wishes to do for themselves.