Apple can no longer force developers to use in-app purchasing, judge rules:
A U.S. judge on Friday issued a ruling in "Fortnite" creator Epic Games' antitrust lawsuit against Apple's App Store, striking down some of Apple's restrictions on how developers can collect payments in apps.
The ruling says that Apple cannot bar developers from providing buttons or links in their apps that direct customers to other ways to pay outside of Apple's own in-app purchase system, which charges developers commissions of up to 30 percent. The ruling also said that Apple cannot ban developers from communicating with customers via contact information that the developers obtained when customers signed up within the app.
The ruling comes after a three-week trial in May before Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. Apple shares moved down about 2.5 percent on news of the decision.
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Apple turns post-lawsuit tables on Epic, will block Fortnite on iOS:
Weeks after Epic's apparent "win" against Apple in the Epic Games v. Apple case, Apple issued a letter denying Epic's request to have its developer license agreement reinstated until all legal options are exhausted. This effectively bans Fortnite and any other software from the game maker from returning to Apple's App Store for years.
Epic was handed an initial victory when the US District Court for Northern California issued an injunction on September 10 ordering Apple to open up in-game payment options for all developers. At the time, the injunction was something of a moral victory for Epic—allowing the developer to keep its in-game payment systems in its free-to-play Fortnite intact while avoiding paying Apple a 30 percent fee that had previously covered all in-app transactions.
But now Epic has faced a significant reversal of fortune.
The better thing would be to ban all micro-transactions. Instead this is more like a couple thieves divvying up the loot from the candy they stole from children. Sure, they didn't "steal anything", but kids aren't allowed to play the slot machines in Casinos, either.
Previously:
Apple Can No Longer Force Developers to Use In-App Purchasing, Judge Rules
Valve Gets Dragged into Apple and Epic’s Legal Fight Over Fortnite
Judge Dismisses Apple’s “Theft” Claims in Epic Games Lawsuit
Microsoft Thumbs its Nose at Apple With New “App Fairness” Policy
Your iPhone Copy of Fortnite is About to Become Out of Date [Updated]
Judge Issues Restraining Order Protecting Unreal Engine Development on iOS
Microsoft Issues Statement in Support of Epic Games to Remain on Apple Ecosystem
Epic-Apple Feud Could Also Affect Third-Party Unreal Engine Games
Fortnite Maker Sues Apple after Removal of Game From App Store
'Apple Must be Stopped' and Google is 'Crazy' Says Tim Sweeney
Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney has decided to take shots at Apple and Google once again and has said that "Apple must be stopped." Sweeney said this in an app conference in South Korea. He's also said that Google was "crazy" about how they handled app purchases.
[...] According to a report from Bloomberg, Sweeney referenced this failure in remarks that he shared in a conference.
[...] "Apple locks a billion users into one store and payment processor," Sweeney said at the Global Conference for Mobile Application Ecosystem Fairness in South Korea, home to the world's first law requiring mobile platforms to give users a choice of payment handlers. "Now Apple complies with oppressive foreign laws, which surveil users and deprive them of political rights. But Apple is ignoring laws passed by Korea's democracy. Apple must be stopped."
[...] Google also earned a strong rebuke from Sweeney, who criticized its approach of charging fees on payments it doesn't process as "crazy." Praising Korea for leading the fight against anti-competitive practices with its recent legislation, the Epic Games founder said "I'm very proud to stand up against these monopolies with you. I'm proud to stand with you and say I'm a Korean."
Previously: Apple Can No Longer Force Developers to Use In-App Purchasing, Judge Rules
Apple Turns Post-Lawsuit Tables on Epic, Will Block Fortnite on iOS
Judge Denies Apple's Request to Delay App Store Changes in Epic Games Case
Epic CEO Tim Sweeney has long been an outspoken opponent of what he sees as Valve's unreasonable platform fees for listing games on Steam, which start at 30 percent of the total sale price. Now, though, new emails from before the launch of the competing Epic Games Store in 2018 show just how angry Sweeney was with the "assholes" at companies like Valve and Apple for squeezing "the little guy" with what he saw as inflated fees.
The emails, which came out this week as part of Wolfire's price-fixing case against Valve (as noticed by the GameDiscoverCo newsletter), confront Valve managers directly for platform fees Sweeney says are "no longer justifiable."
[...]
The first mostly unredacted email chain from the court documents, from August 2017, starts with Valve co-founder Gabe Newell asking Sweeney if there is "anything we [are] doing to annoy you?" That query was likely prompted by Sweeney's public tweets at the time questioning "why Steam is still taking 30% of gross [when] MasterCard and Visa charge 2-5% per transaction, and CDN bandwidth is around $0.002/GB." Later in the same thread, he laments that "the internet was supposed to obsolete the rent-seeking software distribution middlemen, but here's Facebook, Google, Apple, Valve, etc."
[...]
The second email chain revealed in the lawsuit started in November 2018, with Sweeney offering Valve a heads-up on the impending launch of the Epic Games Store that would come just weeks later. While that move was focused on PC and Mac games, Sweeney quickly pivots to a discussion of Apple's total control over iOS, the subject at the time of a lawsuit whose technicalities were being considered by the Supreme Court.
[...]
In a follow-up email on December 3, just days before the Epic Games Store launch, Sweeney took Valve to task more directly for its policy of offering lower platform fees for the largest developers on Steam.
[...]
After being forwarded the message by Valve's Erik Johnson, Valve COO Scott Lynch simply offered up a sardonic "You mad bro?"
(Score: 4, Insightful) by darkfeline on Tuesday September 14 2021, @08:12AM (10 children)
This means that Apple cannot charge commissions any more period. It will take a while for the libraries/stackoverflow answers to roll out to all the developers, but why let Apple take a cut when you can list an app for free and immediately ask for the real app price when the app is first started, via an external payment processor.
Good news for users, at least for the short term. Apple is going to recoup its lost revenue one way or another, and it's not like those in the walled garden have any alternative.
This recalls the Vizcaino v. Microsoft Corp case, where contractors sued Microsoft for being treated worse than full time employees, and as a result contractors are now treated even worse than before. Beware the unintended consequence.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 3, Informative) by c0lo on Tuesday September 14 2021, @08:19AM (6 children)
Oh, they can. At the application purchase. The judge said nothing about the monopoly of distributing the app (obtaining and installing the application for the customer) and/or the updates for it. Perhaps the "adv revenue" as well, we haven't heard anything in this regards too.
It's only the in-app purchases and extra content that the judge banned.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Opportunist on Tuesday September 14 2021, @09:42AM (5 children)
OK, then the app is free to download from the Apple store, and if you want to use this or that gimmick to work, here's an external purchasing option that will mail an unlock code to you.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by looorg on Tuesday September 14 2021, @09:57AM (3 children)
Couldn't Apple just institute some kind of listing fee for having the app in the store? None of that dodgy free to download stuff in their walled garden.
(Score: 5, Touché) by Opportunist on Tuesday September 14 2021, @10:35AM (2 children)
Only if they allow sideloading, or else the next antitrust suit is coming.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by canopic jug on Tuesday September 14 2021, @12:33PM (1 child)
"Sideloading" used to be called "installation" of software. By getting people to call the old activity by a new name, they can shift the public's attitudes and diminish their expectations. Installing software is normal. Apple wants the public to think that it is dodgy or illegal. It's part of their front in the ongoing war against general purpose computing.
Money is not free speech. Elections should not be auctions.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday September 14 2021, @04:45PM
Is that like when you call a new OSHA workplace safety policy that doesn't even require a vaccine a "vaccine mandate" to make it sound scary?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by c0lo on Tuesday September 14 2021, @09:58AM
OK, then your development account yearly subscription will carry a price. Plans per size of download, plans per number of downloads.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 4, Insightful) by helel on Tuesday September 14 2021, @01:47PM (1 child)
I think that for allot of smaller developers the trust and convenience for the customer of just paying through the apple store will still be worth the price. If you use the apple store in-app purchase all the customer needs to do is click it, click confirm, and bam, you have their money. If you use an outside service now they're sent over to a website or your application is asking for credit card info directly making the transaction harder and making many customers wary.
(Score: 2) by choose another one on Tuesday September 14 2021, @03:25PM
And on top of that you now have to setup, maintain and pay for a web presence (which has to be up and available when customer wants to pay), and also contract with a payment service provider (or maybe more than one to cover all parts of the world and all customers). Costs of all that are probably only worth it if your in app purchase volumes are significant.
(Score: 3, Informative) by EvilSS on Tuesday September 14 2021, @10:03PM
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday September 14 2021, @03:35PM (2 children)
Whew! Google is safe from this. Not a single mention of Android in this.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 4, Informative) by maxwell demon on Tuesday September 14 2021, @06:45PM
Sure, since Google doesn't disallow installation of apps through other means than their app store, they can impose restrictions on the apps in their app store without triggering antitrust. You can just choose to sell through another app store instead, or even put up your own.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by EvilSS on Tuesday September 14 2021, @09:50PM
(Score: 2) by LabRat on Tuesday September 14 2021, @08:02PM
1) Epic has appealed Friday’s ruling in the Epic v. Apple case [theverge.com] (contains embedded PDF appeal text)
2) Apple hasn’t decided whether to appeal the Epic v. Apple ruling [theverge.com]
Both parties are unhappy, but Apple isn't unhappy enough to snap appeal like Epic.