Apple Isn’t Ready to Release Its Grip on the App Store
“Especially for the big app developers with loads of downloads, who are the ones that really Apple make all their money from, that will rack up to a very high cost very quickly,” says Max von Thun, Europe director at Open Markets, a bunch devoted to campaigning towards monopolies. “This new cost structure, including the core tech fee, will disincentivize lots of developers from moving to the new system.” Less than 1 % of builders would qualify for this charge, Apple mentioned in its announcement. Government businesses or nonprofits are exempt.
The caveats sparked outrage from builders that had been hoping to learn from DMA-inspired adjustments. “Allowing alternative payments and marketplaces seems positive on the surface, but the strings attached to Apple’s new policies mean that in practice it will be impossible for developers to benefit from them,” Proton’s Yen mentioned in a press release. “Apple will continue stifling competition and innovation, and taking a cut even when developers opt out of its walled garden.”
Tim Sweeney, founder and CEO of Epic Games, went additional, accusing Apple on X of “twisting this process to undermine competition and continue imposing Apple taxes on transactions they’re not involved in.”
Sweeney has been battling Apple over its App Store guidelines within the courts and on social media guidelines for years. “Truly, Apple has no right to take any percent of any company’s revenue just because they made the phone people use to access the stuff,” he mentioned again in 2020. But Epic suffered a setback in that combat earlier in January, when the US Supreme Court declined to listen to Epic’s attraction in its authorized dispute with Apple—primarily permitting Apple to place in place a system within the US that lets apps hyperlink out to buy pages however nonetheless fees a 27 % fee for funds made when customers get there.
There’s uncertainty about whether or not Apple’s concessions rely as complying with the DMA. “The App Store is very, very lucrative for them,” says von Thun, who believes there are query marks over whether or not these adjustments go far sufficient. “I would say this is basically their attempt to do as little as possible while, potentially, being compliant with the law.” A spokesperson for the European Commission, which enforces the brand new guidelines, mentioned it didn’t touch upon such bulletins, including the deadline for compliance was March 7.
“These changes comply with the DMA, and in the weeks and months ahead, we’ll continue to engage with the European Commission, the developer community, and our EU users about their impacts,” mentioned Apple spokesperson Fred Sainz in a press release, including the adjustments the DMA launched within the EU resulted in a much less safe system.
“We’re limiting these changes to the European Union because we’re concerned about their impacts on the privacy and security of our users’ experience—which remains our North Star.”
With only a matter of weeks till the EU’s March deadline, Apple and builders alike will quickly discover out whether or not the EU thinks these adjustments have gone far sufficient.
