It shouldn’t be US vs EU, but unfortunately it is. As a european: it’s not any kind of conspiracy theory. Specially in tech, the EU has become ultra-protectionist, trying to clearly favour european companies due to the failure of most of them. Of course, in other fields (like food), it happens the other way around. Anyhow, it’s always sad.
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EU Fines Apple $2 Billion for Anti-Competitive Behavior Toward Spotify
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LOL, you have no idea about the EU do you? The EU has not protected it's own for generations which is why many companies and business in the EU have complained to the EU for decades about it's position on 'open markets'. Supermarkets persistently buy a lot of their fruit, veg, milk and meat from outside the EU because it is cheaper than buying it from their own farmers. Car dealers buy a lot of their vehicles from outside the EU because it is cheaper than getting them from car manufacturers within the EU. Steel imports from China has been a bone of contention for years because EU manufacturers are buying the cheaper steel from China rather than buying it from the EU's own steel producers and the EU allows all of that to happen because of it's stance on 'open market'.
What justifies prohibiting Spotify from advertising through exactly the one outlet that their customers are already frequenting and signed in on?
That’s preposterous.
Where is the harm to consumers?
Please, Spotify is available on Linux, Windows, Mac OS, iOS, Android, Chrome OS, ....
And iOS isn't even the biggest platform.
Meanwhile, Spotify is by far the biggest music streaming service in the world and are much more close to being a "monopolist" than iOS is.
This and many people defending Apple here and elsewhere with the CTF miss the point.
Apple doesn't actually care about collecting the money and has never cared about fair compensation.
If they cared about the money and supposedly being fairly compensated they would never have allowed Apps to offer subscriptions without an in-app-purchase in the first place.
There are hundreds of big name apps (Adobe, Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Spotify) that earn billions but pay no money to Apple (at least no App Store commission). Apple doesn't have a problem with this.
The no linking restriction is an arbitrary and pointless anti-steering mechanism that doesn't actually seem to influence big developers and thus is just an anti-consumer practice...
I will start taking arguments that Apple deserves compensation seriously if Apple starts trying to collect from these companies with a consistent policy applied worldwide.
Looks like they are going to take Apple with them before that happens
Heh, I just renewed too. Thanks for the reminder.
“Music artists can clearly choose which platform they want to be on, can’t they?!”
If you don’t want your music streamed on Spotify, just sign with any other service.
Deezer, Qoobuz, YouTube music, Tidal, Bandcamp, Sound loud, Amazon Music…
That you can't figure that out on your own is part of why these conversations are always silly here on "ihateapple.com"
Spotify can too. And Spotify don't even need the App Store, because Spotify can be accessed in the Safari browser in iOS.
I can well figure it out: Apple degrades or imposes a tax (at Spotify’s choice) their competitor’s product and access to consumers, thereby preferencing their own competing service.
Exactly the anticompetitive behaviour that they’ve been fined for.
lol, at this point, Apple should have a good case for its shareholders for leaving EU
They will be. This is just the beginning. Repeat offenders will be fined up to 20% of their global revenue and if they still do not change their behavior, they may be broken up.
Can't have it both ways. This is an All or nothing argument.
When Spotify allows me to purchase via the app, then maybe this argument holds up. But, I can't. Since they don't allow it. Even at a higher price.
$99 barely pays for a few app reviews.
Spotify submitted nearly 1 new update per week. now estimate how much Apple spends on servers to serve Spotify binaries to the order of billions of downloads per year.
$99 is essentially free.
That you think Apple operates by using "taxes" again, shows me that EU supporters here have no understanding of the difference between business and government.
Apple already gets no money from Spotify. Apple's help is mostly just building the APIs, and they don't provide this help altruistically, they do it because having a robust app ecosystem helps sell iPhones.
If, as you posit, Apple is entitled to a share of all money flowing through iOS then Uber would have to pay Apple a percentage (They don't currently) as would Amazon for physical goods sold to you, as would Microsoft for office 365 subscriptions, etc...
Doing so would invariably lead to many developers switching to web apps and probably massively damage the native app ecosystem.
I don't have a concrete answer on how the store should work to pay for itself but I expect something like hosting fees would be a feasible solution (with maybe companies with revenue under $1 million are free to host).
Just to be clear, this is simply the EU viewing Apple as a target for easy money. "Anticompetitive behavior" is just the new term for vague laws that can be easily defined based on the profits of the target company.
The EU made a law requiring side loading: Apple complied.
The EU made a law requiring USB-C: Apple complied.
If the EU wants to ban certain activities, do so! Instead, they just keep fining for behavior that has no law. There is a term for this: Judicial Activism and it is always unethical.
The EU made a law requiring side loading: Apple complied.
The EU made a law requiring USB-C: Apple complied.
If the EU wants to ban certain activities, do so! Instead, they just keep fining for behavior that has no law. There is a term for this: Judicial Activism and it is always unethical.
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You’re wrong. The fine absolutely pales in comparison to their European revenue and earnings.
Actually, as you have pointed out before, rights holders are the one who decide where music is streamed.
Not always the same as the artist... not often at all.
Preventing Spotify from adding a button in their app that just says "subscribe here" that opens a web view would not harm Apple. Preventing it is just spiteful anti-consumer behaviour.