cjlacz

mknelson said:

Mike Wuerthele said:

Right, which is what the story says. And, what the lead image in the story practically demonstrates.

The elevated heart rate on her Apple Watch is what clued the woman in to the heart attack, leading her to get medical attention.

Do you know if the watch put up a "hey, this seems like a problem" alert as we've seen in some other cases "heart rate warning", or if she just noticed the high heart rate on her own?

The article doesn’t say, but the watch certainly has a setting to do that. I imagine she probably got a high heart rating warning, I’m not sure if the watch counts it as a warning. It’s been a while since I had one from setting it abnormally low. Either way, Apple has been promoting always on health devices and this does show the value of that. 

Companies need to actively defend trademarks or the power of the trademark weakens. Let it slip even a little, and future cases get weaker. Unfortunately I think Apple’s hands are tied a bit in this case. They pretty much have to defend their trademark even when it’s a bit ridiculous. Common sense may suggest they are very different, but legally I don’t think it’s that simple. 

avon b7 said:

This move doesn't tackle the root issue that is being investigated on multiple fronts. That there is only one App Store on Apple devices. 

Apple can legitimately charge whatever it wants but that isn't, and has never been, the root issue.

I think Apple feels good news won't result from the different investigations and this reduction is a move to leave them in slightly better light when final rulings are delivered. 

To be honest, this is an appealing point of the Apple ecosystem. I don’t want to have to install multiple store apps. I don’t want to have to give my credit card to other app stores, some of probably questionable quality. I don’t want to have to figure out which App Store to to go to check for updates. I don’t want to have to search through multiple app stores (or worse each app individually) to figure out what subscriptions I have. The single store brings a lot of advantages that I don’t want to give up and probably more I’m forgetting to list. I think people get too concerned about only cost and don’t see the chaos multiple stores could bring. The idea that costs would go down I don’t think is a sure thing either. it just means money going into different pockets, not less money. Apple spend a lot of money developing the chips and other technology in the phones. They spend a ton of money on the compiler and developer tools. They spend money developing the APIs the developers use. They aren’t going to just open this to other stores completely bypassing Apple. if it’s mandated, the stores are going to have to pay Apple something. 

Pascalxx said:

This sounds like Epic has a separate developer account for their Unreal Engine team which is marketed under a separate entity and Apple has threated to close both accounts, despite only one violating the App Store rules. So maybe they have a case after all?

What I remember reading in the past is that the tax id (?) and emails on the accounts are identical. If your corporate identifiers are the same, then the accounts are under the same company. If SARL is really a different company not under epic shouldn't it have a different tax id? Personally, I think I agree with Apple pulling all the accounts with the same IDs. I'm not sure I'm against the judge ordering restoration of the SARL account, which is what it sounds like. It basically only means they get official access back to the dev tools and the normal App Store support tools I think. They'd probably get in trouble again if they tried to move Fortnite to the SARL account. 

canukstorm said:

agilealtitude said:

"Does the world's largest company really get to decide how millions of other businesses can interact with their own customers?“

Yes they can, because it is their ecosystem. Maybe you should have read their guidelines before developing the world’s umpteenth email app and submitting it to the App Store. 

You obviously didn't understand what the hell is  talking about.  Did you actually read the original post?  Here's the entire context surrounding that sentence;

"But personally, as the owner of a business, this isn’t just about money. Money grabs the headlines, but there’s a far more elemental story here. It's about the absence of choice, and how Apple forcibly inserts themselves between your company and your (the developer's) customer.

Does the world’s largest company really get to decide how millions of other businesses (ie: developers) can interact with their own (again, referring to developers')  customers? In fact, Apple’s policy distances you from your customer."

His implication is, is that with respect to the app or service, the consumer is the developer's customer not Apple's and that the developer has the right, without interference, to manage the relationship between the developer and user of the app or service.  And he has a good point.  And you can bet that the coming investigation or hearing will take this into account.  The major issue is not the 30% cut although no doubt that will play a part in it as well.  

He does have a point, but I'm not really sure it's to the benefit of the customer.  For an app like Hey.com that requires I subscribe to the service I *want* to be able to subscribe through my Apple account if I download app rather than be force to put my credit card number on their site and manage another subscription from yet another location. This is why Apple has the rule in place, but that option benefits the consumer. In some ways it benefits the developer too, but I won't try most applications that would require me to add billing details external to the app when it's basically paying for a feature or service of the app. For something like Hey, if I used it long time, I'd might change my payment method if I decide to make it my main email so that's it is independent of the App Store, but by god, I want the options to subscribe in the app to start with. 

I don't really agree with him either that the customer is the developer's customer. I use an iPhone because I like the management of the App Store. I enjoy the quality of the apps and the usability of the system. That includes managing payments through Apple. Buying an iPhone or iPad is an agreement between Apple and I that the store is managed well, and that it's designed to work well for me as a customer. So yes, Apple has a place putting themselves in the middle. 

I originally thought he might have a valid point when this all started, but the more he talks the worse is sounds. And after reading the App Store guidelines, I think Apple's argument is the right one. If they added support for imap and pop3, so it actually can work like an email client out of the box, then yes, the subscription could be handled outside of apple. But as an App that doesn't work until you buy a subscription to a service, there MUST be a way for the consumer to purchase it inside the app. This is different from he reader category of apps. You aren't buying content elsewhere, you are purchasing a service as a requirement to get a working app.