Apple Loses EU Fight Over App Store Gatekeeper Label (macrumors.com) 55
Europe's General Court dismissed Apple's challenge to the EU's designation of its App Stores and iOS as "gatekeepers" under the Digital Markets Act. The ruling means Apple remains subject to DMA obligations requiring it to allow alternative app stores, support interoperability with rival services, and avoid favoring its own services over competitors. MacRumors reports: Apple took its case to Luxembourg's General Court in 2024 after the European Commission designated its five App Stores -- on the iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple TV, and Apple Watch -- as a single core platform service under the Digital Markets Act (DMA), a label that brings with it a set of strict obligations. Designated "gatekeepers" are prohibited from favoring their own services over those of rivals, and are prevented from combining personal data across different services. They also have to give users the option to use alternative app stores.
Apple also challenged the EU's designation of iOS as a gateway platform, a status that requires the operating system allows rival services to interoperate with it. The company also disputed the classification of iMessage as a number-independent interpersonal communications service, or NIICS, which would subject the app to EU telecoms rules. But the General Court said Apple's actions regarding the iMessage service are inadmissible.
Apple also challenged the EU's designation of iOS as a gateway platform, a status that requires the operating system allows rival services to interoperate with it. The company also disputed the classification of iMessage as a number-independent interpersonal communications service, or NIICS, which would subject the app to EU telecoms rules. But the General Court said Apple's actions regarding the iMessage service are inadmissible.
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The point is, a gatekeeper has to follow certain regulations to avoid anti-competitive behavior. For apple this mostly means they can't force app developers to only offer apple pay but must allow custom payment. Alternative appstores are also covered by DMA.
Re:Imagine... (Score:5, Insightful)
You're so brainwashed you think a monopoly is a great thing, and no one should be allowed to compete with it.
Go move to Russia.
Fuck you forever and ever.
Cancerous growth is not sustainable (Score:2)
You seem to be arguing with a cloud of no ones about nothing substantive, though you do raise the freedom issue in the mist.
However I see most problems in terms of time these years. The humans making the decisions are mostly motivated by short term considerations. They are trying to claim as much money as possible before they die. Freedom and innovation are mostly irrelevant to their business decisions. In particular, the current winners see freedom and innovations as threats. They don't want customers who
Re: Cancerous growth is not sustainable (Score:2)
What is or isn't a monopoly is literally irrelevant here, that is not at issue. They don't have to be a monopoly to be a gatekeeper. They only need control over an influential platform.
Re: Imagine... (Score:2)
Imagine a company selling devices to billions of people and then using local laws to stop them from using those devices how they want.
Apple is a scummy company with no regard for capitalist rules of competition. They are just butthurt their homegrown strategies of buying politicians isn't working overseas.
Correct analogy (Score:5, Insightful)
Imagine:
You own a shop which is the ONLY place where people can buy parts for their car. When a competitor wants to sell parts as well, they need to go through YOUR shop. Because it's your shop, you ask companies who want to offer products via your shop to pay 30% of their revenue to you. They are also required to use all your other services. When you notice someone has a good product, you start offering the EXACT same thing, but cheaper.
In what universe is this called fair? It's a good thing the EU actually does something about such behavior.
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Yes, and that "something" is levying a fine, one carefully designed to be as high as possible, but not high enough that Apple will actually change their behaviour
The fines have demonstrably caused Apple to change their behaviour based on multiple EU regulations. That includes even hardware like how you charge your device. You may not notice if you don't live in the EU but here's some examples for ignorant dolts like you:
* Apple has changed the fee structure for digital revenue.
* Apple has allowed 3rd party payment processing for iOS apps
* Apple now allows web downloads from within apps.
* Apple now allows payment redirects from within apps.
Trump isn't tariffing you enough.
Nothing says stupid like th
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Except that if you don't like this model you are free to buy an Android car instead of an Apple car.
Not really a monopoly if you ask me.
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Imagine:ford saying all parking, tolls, gas, etc. Must be paid under ford pay that changes an 15-30% service fee.
Re: Imagine... (Score:3)
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Can I buy my BMW seat heat from another party?
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You can replace your entire BMW seat if you like with seats from another vendor. Put in a racing seat, or even install a seat you designed yourself.
This probably was not the brilliant analogy you thought it was going to be. :p
Re:Imagine... (Score:4)
...you create supermarket from never having been in the supermarket business.
Sure.
It becomes successful, without leeching off your competitors.
It becomes successful, and you sell your house brands at a price lower than your competitors can sell their brands, because you don't have to pay yourself the retail markup. Okay, supermarket analogy still applies so far, except that your customers also live in a town (operating system) that has only your supermarket, and you use technological means to prevent those customers from going to another supermarket unless they buy a new house (phone).
All of a sudden they start whining, and The Man decides you should not only allow them to sell inside your store, you are supposed to do it for free, even use your resources to help them sell, and not devote 100% of your time to your own business.
False. None of the competitors are demanding that. They are demanding that either A. you level the playing field so that you don't have an unfair competitive advantage from being the only supermarket or B. you stop using technological and legal means to prevent other supermarkets from existing.
That's what the EU is doing here.
Not remotely.
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It's more like you have a successful supermarket and it expands until you own the full mall. Then you start to dictate prices because people have a too long way to alternative malls so you basically have a monopoly in that area. The EU law now tells you need to allow other companies to rent a shop in the mall and offer their items at their own prices without you dictating them how to run their business.
Yeah, the monopolist needs to rent out space in their mall and tell them how to run (a part of) their busi
Not really surprising (Score:2)
Apple had to try to avoid the designation (the restrictions and requirements were not to Apple's liking (and profit margins)). And the attempt was also almost certainly doomed to fail.
Digital Markets Act (Score:2)
I agree that this sector needs to be regulated in order for there to be a fair playing field for all participants. But let's not forget that DMA was written with Apple and Google in mind, it is not much surprise that their cases are going to be lost in the EU.
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it was written specifically to punish Apple and Google for doing things that were not, and still are not, illegal. the EU is dead set on breaking up technology to the detriment of the users.
users want interoperability, users want info shared across services, etc we see it every day. and if you work support, doubly so.
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I'm not going to carry water for trillion dollar corporations that rake in record profits every year through subtle and not-so-subtle anti-competitive practices.
The users currently get a walled garden system. With Apple locking other markets out almost entirely. And Google playing whack-o-mole with user-installed open source markets and subtle limitations for OEMs that want to maintain capability with Play store but also run their own store and own search partner.
The current market is not consumer friendly.
Re: Digital Markets Act (Score:2)
Users want interoperability and apple is against it
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it was written specifically to punish... for doing things that were not, and still are not, illegal.
You seem to have been dropped on your head once too many times as a child.
The whole point of a new law is that it changes what is legal. So if something was legal and a new law changes that, that's intentional. It's the purpose of legislation and rulemaking. To change the rules.
Also, if it was still not illegal, then wouldn't be any complaint from the perp about getting busted...
And you actually know the intent was to change the rules, because you start off with a claim that the change was intended to cha
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Monopolies have always been illegal and should be appropriately dealt with.
A lot of the monopolies in tech benefit the USA a lot, but basically suck the rest of the world dry. Go to a given website: it's AWS; search for anything: one way or the other, it's Google (Alphabet); The dominant desktop OS in the world: Windows (Microsoft). All of this has lead to significant harm to the competition, no matter where they come from. Worse, they invade adjacent markets and suck the life out of those. So, yes, monopol
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it was written specifically to punish Apple and Google for doing things that were not, and still are not, illegal.
So to be clear, a law was written to cover an action, and the result is you think that action is not illegal? I mean leaving aside the specifics, do you actually understand what a law or regulation is?
Land of the free (Score:3)
Re: Land of the free (Score:2)
Re: Land of the free (Score:2)
It was only the land of the free before white people showed up, but it's been good propaganda.
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It's because the US is big on negative freedom, which is freedom from interference, but seems to dislike positive freedom, which is the opportunity to prosper.
In Europe there is a lot of positive freedom. The right to an education, limits on what you can contractually sign away, rules that address the power imbalance between large corporations and individuals.
Consoles? (Score:3)
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It would be a good thing yes.
But it's still different. Historically, you could always buy a game from brick and mortar store not owned by Nintendo or Sony. That was never possible with the iPhone.
Not sure how it is with digital stores now, but I wouldn't be surprised if they followed Apple's "lead" in that vendor lock-in department as well.
Still, console makers would argue that they sell consoles at loss and they make profit with the games. Apple makes a huge profit on phones. It appears the EU DMA applies
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In principle yes, but the Commission works market by market. They'll eventually reach "gaming" in their TODO list in some years. The gatekeeper definition requires 50 million monthly users in the EU. PlayStation Network reports 125 million monthly users in the world, it will needs careful assessment for the EU.
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No they don't. They work by law. The DMA has thresholds for when a platform is considered a gatekeeper and neither Nintendo Online nor the PSN meet that threshold.
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Nintendo's online store is not a designated gatekeeper under the DMA so not covered under the law. The portable gaming market is too small to have a formal impact on the larger society (The DMA only targets major platforms that impact a really wide market), and you can use a Switch without using the store (they have physical cartridges). Same for Sony.
But they are getting close. Nintendo is only $1bn away from meeting the EU revenue size requirements which is one of the criteria for being designated a gatek
Denies water is wet (Score:2)
The company also disputed the classification of Water being wet. Later the company disputed the claim of what goes up, must come down. Tomorrow they are expected to file a brief claiming the classification of having trillions upon trillions of dollars, operating the #1 closed source product, and having captive lock in capability is just a way to "provide jobs".
Re: Denies water is wet (Score:2)
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Is this a setup for a your mom joke?
Prove that it can't be used for nefarious purposes (Score:1)
All you need to do is prove that an "alternative" app store can't be used to distribute malware or worse, some EU commie spyware.
Re:Prove that it can't be used for nefarious purpo (Score:4, Insightful)
The Apple ios app stores have been used to distribute malware and will be continued to be used for such.
They must either stop accepting third party apps in their app store (which will mean that they don't have a product anymore), or accept the fact that people are going to figure out ways to get malware in.
In the EU the government is actually doing it's job by trying to make things difficult for monopolies - and they should; any government should. Wherever the monopoly comes from, it's life should be made really hard to allow the market to flourish. Monopolies suck the life out of the industry they occupy. The fact the USA has a disproportionate amount of monopolies, shows that corruption has reached baffling proportions over there.
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No, if that's your concern then it is up to you, as the consumer, to verify that before you choose to use their store.
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I fully anticipate Apple to just completely pull out of that market entirely. You do not tell me what I will sell in my own store.
Every jurisdiction of consequence regulates stores.
Apple has a lot more influence than a mere "store".
Your substitute for an argument is disingenuous.
Re:Jed, Move Away From There (Score:4, Informative)
In what universe?
The EU is a bigger market than the USA, you know.
The danger of monopolies (Score:2)
It may seem like a good thing that apple has this single app store for all of its devices, but the reality is that it is a monopoly. Monopolies tend to be a really bad thing for markets. If allowed to continue, monopolies tend to harm competition badly. Thing is, that they've got a solid revenue stream and nobody else even has a hope of getting a fair shot at obtaining a big enough chunk of the market to make them matter. The monopoly could also dictate unreasonable terms to people wanting to make use of th