SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
XDA Developers reports Google and Apple will be investigated by Netherlands authorities for their app store practices. From the XDA Developers article:
It is no secret that Google and Apple have monopolies on their respective platform's application marketplaces. Apple owns iOS' App Store and Google owns Android's Play Store. There are almost no other alternatives for third-party and indie developers to distribute their applications, which are sometimes their only source of income. That gives Apple and Google an edge to treat developers however they see fit, which may not be always for the best. The newest official report claims that The Netherlands Authority for Consumer and Markets (ACM) is going to investigate both of these marketplaces.
The important point to note is the investigation is not arguing it is wrong for Google or Apple to distribute their own apps on these market places but if they are manipulating the market place in a manner that gives them an unfair advantage against third party developers releasing similar apps on the same marketplace. As a reminder, both market places require a fee to join as a developer, a one time $25USD payment to Google and a yearly $99USD payment to Apple. Additionally, both stores then charge a 30% transaction fee on every purchase. This fee is assessed for both paid apps as well as in-app purchases. On top of that, Apple prevents apps in the App Store from linking to any websites where a transaction (one-time or subscription) could be processed outside of the app store. There are also rumors of Apple removing apps prior to or conjunction with a release of an Apple app that provides a similar function. Developers also note that Apple applications have access to the personal assistant API, allowing Siri to respond intelligently to owners requests with Apple apps. However, third party apps do not have access to the Siri API, they can't provide similar function with their apps, e.g. Siri can use iTunes to recognize a song or shop for music, while Spotify cannot because there is no API for Siri to pass information to their app.
The question is, with their ownership of the marketplace and platform, are they playing fairly with third party application developers releasing similar applications or are they using their dominance to purposefully disadvantage third party developers?
Fight between Apple and Spotify over 'fair play' on the App Store
ACM (Authority for Consumers & Markets) launches investigation into App Store abuse
(Score: 3, Insightful) by darkfeline on Saturday April 13 2019, @09:35PM (3 children)
The problem with this argument is that there are third party app stores for Android. You have to click Yes on a prompt once to whitelist it to install apps but otherwise it works transparently like the Play Store. For example there is F-Droid which offers FOSS apps and QooApp which offers games. You can also install individually packaged apps ("sideloading"?), you just have to confirm every time, no doubt in an attempt to minimize average users installing blatant malware.
I'm not familiar with the Garden of Apple, I have heard that they do in fact ban any kind of third party marketplace, which does at least bring up the risk of abusive practices.
The ACM needs to do their research.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 14 2019, @05:59AM
F-Droid now comes installed on some devices. Thanks, Samsung.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 14 2019, @01:18PM
Don't you think that "research" will be part of this investigation?
(Score: 2) by DeVilla on Wednesday April 17 2019, @03:04AM
I was coming to post something similar. The problem I've sen with android though is that you either set it to "Secure" (only apps from the play store) or "Insecure" (anyone can install anything from anywhere). They need a way to say "Trust this app to behave as an app store" so I can say trust F-Droid and 3 apps I personally side loaded, but not to allow anything else load code.
Right now, to enable F-Droid on my wife & son's phone I'm pretty sure I had to allow any store to install.
But if they fix this, I think Google would be ok. But then again one the biggest problems with android has always been that permissions were never granular enough to be useful. (Allow total access to the camera, external light and all your photos or nothing)