Judge delivers split decision on Epic vs Apple - more positive than negative for Epic

[Bombastinator]

17 minutes ago, mr moose said:

 

A monopoly exists everywhere, sure, but it becomes anti trust when that monopoly is used in a way that disadvantages another business or effects the ability for others to participate in trade.  That is the definition.  Yes LTT has a monopoly over he ltt forums, but that monopoly does not effect anyone else's ability to create a forum or for people to move between forums or even use multiple forums. 

 

This is the crux of the issue here,  apple can control another persons business,  as the judge has decreed, by apple banning UE on ios they have the ability to do irreparable damage to countless businesses.  That can only happen in a situation of antitrust which is a result of using a monopoly.

 

The problem many people have understanding this is they can't get their heads around the concept of a monopoly. Having a monopoly in and of itself is not illegal, using that monopoly to further your own business by controlling other business is antitrust.  Like what apple are doing here, they are using their monopoly of the app store to control other business (threatening to ban UE).

 

 

 

It’s a preliminary injunction not a ruling or a decree. There was no decree. The trial hasn’t even started yet.  All this says is the court finds the apple ban of fortnight so unlikely to be a problem that she didn’t even make an injunction until the trial takes place. It wasn’t quite throwing the epic complaint about fortnight out of court. The unreal engine thing has not yet been decided though, so an injunction is put  on that one.  This may hurt Apple more than epic because epic can still sell fortnight, but people may not buy Apple phones because fortnight will still play on android but not on iOS.  I don’t think it will be that huge a problem honestly because fortnight has been trending down lately.  Fortnight is considered a bit old fashioned. 

 

theres just nothing to make a claim about monopoly or anti trust here at all because nothing has happened as far as the lawsuit goes.  Epic could STILL lose the ability to update the unreal engine on iOS and Apple could STILL lose the ability to stop epic from coring out the game store from the inside by setting up their own inside it. It’s just an injunction hearing to prepare for a court case.  Not a court case.

[Kisai]

7 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

It’s a preliminary injunction not a ruling or a decree. There was no decree. The trial hasn’t even started yet.  All this says is the court finds the apple ban of fortnight so unlikely to be a problem that she didn’t even make an injunction until the trial takes place. It wasn’t quite throwing the epic complaint about fortnight out of court. The unreal engine thing has not yet been decided though, so an injunction is put  on that one.  This may hurt Apple more than epic because epic can still sell fortnight, but people may not buy Apple phones because fortnight will still play on android but not on iOS.  I don’t think it will be that huge a problem honestly because fortnight has been trending down lately.  Fortnight is considered a bit old fashioned. 

 

theres just nothing to make a claim about monopoly or anti trust here at all because nothing has happened as far as the lawsuit goes.  Epic could STILL lose the ability to update the unreal engine on iOS and Apple could STILL lose the ability to stop epic from coring out the game store from the inside by setting up their own inside it. It’s just an injunction hearing to prepare for a court case.  Not a court case.

This is all speculation at this point.

 

At best, Status Quo, Epic is forced to remove their payment option and never have it return without permission or change in terms of service to bring Fortnite back.

At worst. Fortnite stays off the Apple products. This probably is not going to kill it. However keep in mind that Fortnite is also a form of "social" playground for children/young-adults, so that might influence purchasing options, but not enough for Apple to change their mind. Fornite is already in decline.

 

https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=today 5-y&geo=US&q=fortnite

 

Notice that slight uptick when the pandemic began.

 

https://www.businessofapps.com/data/fortnite-statistics/

 

If 78% of Fortnite players are on console, then really, why isn't the antagonistic attitude aimed at the console hardware's stores.

 

[mr moose]

19 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

It’s a preliminary injunction not a ruling or a decree. There was no decree. The trial hasn’t even started yet.  All this says is the court finds the apple ban of fortnight so unlikely to be a problem that she didn’t even make an injunction until the trial takes place. It wasn’t quite throwing the epic complaint about fortnight out of court. The unreal engine thing has not yet been decided though, so an injunction is put  on that one.  This may hurt Apple more than epic because epic can still sell fortnight, but people may not buy Apple phones because fortnight will still play on android but not on iOS.

 

theres just nothing to make a claim about monopoly or anti trust here at all because nothing has happened as far as the lawsuit goes.  Epic could STILL lose the ability to update the unreal engine on iOS and Apple could STILL lose the ability to stop epic from coring out the game store from the inside by setting up their own inside it. It’s just an injunction hearing to prepare for a court case.  Not a court case.

Just because the case hasn't finished doesn't mean what they are doing isn't anti trust.  A court case largely doesn't actually mean anything in determining fact (lest i point out the courts claiming glyphosate is cancerous against the weight of scientific evidence).

 

The judge did indeed decree that apple were not permitted to retaliate because in the judges option such retaliation would cause irreparable damage to developers. 

Quote

In sum, the Court finds that based upon the record before it, the Winter factors weigh against granting a temporary restraining order based on Epic Games’ requests as to Fortnite and other games and in favor of granting a temporary restraining order based as to the Unreal Engine and other effected developer tools.

Remember a decree is an official order under law,  upholding the restraining order against apple is a decree.

 

Again, I point out that it is impossible for a company to do irreparable damaging by simply dropping support for something unless they have significant market power to effect other business.  As they do in this case, as highlighted below in the quotes of interest.

 

It seems the court anticipates the experts will say exactly what I said earlier:

 

Quote

While the Court anticipates experts will opine that Apple’s 30 percent take is anti-competitive, the Court doubts that an expert would suggest a zero percent alternative.

 

the courts also went on to say:

 

Quote

The parties’ dispute is easily cabined on the antitrust allegations with respect to the App Store. It need not go farther. Apple has chosen to act severely, and by doing so, has impacted non-parties, and a third-party developer ecosystem. In this regard, the equities do weigh against Apple.

Also supporting my earlier statements that their actions do indeed support the claim of anti trust because they do harm to 3rd party developers.

 

from the horses mouth:

https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.364265/gov.uscourts.cand.364265.48.0.pdf

[Bombastinator]

10 minutes ago, mr moose said:

Just because the case hasn't finished doesn't mean what they are doing isn't anti trust.  A court case largely doesn't actually mean anything in determining fact (lest i point out the courts claiming glyphosate is cancerous against the weight of scientific evidence).

 

The judge did indeed decree that apple were not permitted to retaliate because in the judges option such retaliation would cause irreparable damage to developers. 

Remember a decree is an official order under law,  upholding the restraining order against apple is a decree.

 

Again, I point out that it is impossible for a company to do irreparable damaging by simply dropping support for something unless they have significant market power to effect other business.  As they do in this case, as highlighted below in the quotes of interest.

 

It seems the court anticipates the experts will say exactly what I said earlier:

 

 

the courts also went on to say:

 

Also supporting my earlier statements that their actions do indeed support the claim of anti trust because they do harm to 3rd party developers.

 

from the horses mouth:

https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.364265/gov.uscourts.cand.364265.48.0.pdf

Re: just because the case hasn’t finished... 

it hasn’t even started yet.  You were making a “because this then that” argument.  I’m saying “this hasn’t even happened yet.

 

re: defending the concept of the wording:

that’s not how you used it though.

 

re: the rest of it

merely a repetition of the original statement. To which my reply has already been made.  It’s not worth going to the trouble of repeating. 

 

[mr moose]

2 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

Re: just because the case hasn’t finished... 

it hasn’t even started yet.  You were making a “because this then that” argument.  I’m saying “this hasn’t even happened yet.

Yep, the judge acknowledged that if apple carried out their threat it would be anti trust.  That happened.

 

2 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

re: defending the concept of the wording:

that’s not how you used it though.

Not arguing the definition of a word people can look up,  If people don't understand what I meant then that is on them, not English.

2 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

re: the rest of it

merely a repetition of the original statement. To which my reply has already been made.  It’s not worth going to the trouble of repeating. 

 

If it's not worth repeating then don't even bother posting.   You'll note I have stopped responding to some of the posters in this thread,  the arguments have all been rebutted and debunked. I don't need to repeat myself with them.

[TheSage79]

26 minutes ago, mr moose said:

 

A monopoly exists everywhere, sure, but it becomes anti trust when that monopoly is used in a way that disadvantages another business or effects the ability for others to participate in trade.  That is the definition.  Yes LTT has a monopoly over he ltt forums, but that monopoly does not effect anyone else's ability to create a forum or for people to move between forums or even use multiple forums. 

 

This is the crux of the issue here,  apple can control another persons business,  as the judge has decreed, by apple banning UE on ios they have the ability to do irreparable damage to countless businesses.  That can only happen in a situation of antitrust which is a result of using a monopoly.

 

The problem many people have understanding this is they can't get their heads around the concept of a monopoly. Having a monopoly in and of itself is not illegal, using that monopoly to further your own business by controlling other business is antitrust.  Like what apple are doing here, they are using their monopoly of the app store to control other business (threatening to ban UE).

 

 

 

A couple of things...

 

1) The judge never decreed any such thing. You have a fundamental misunderstanding of what a TRO is if you think that. Judges simply don't make those kinds of decrees with a TRO. The judge is *only* maintaining a status quo that she knows is doable for both companies until she can sort things out - nothing more. She did not, and will not, make any qualitative decrees on the legal questions of the case, for a long time to come.

 

2) For Epic to prevail in its lawsuit, Epic would have to prove that the original contract, under normal conditions, is anti-trust. Epic can't just can't arbitrarily break its contract with Apple (like they did) and then complain that Apple practices anti-trust because Apple broke off its business relationship with them for being a bad actor. No anti-trust law gives Epic the right to break its contract. Epic is the legally the bad actor here (has the unclean hands as the lawyers would say) and therefore the UE problem is a problem entirely of Epic's own making. Epic is perfectly able to resolve any problems with UE development by simply getting back in compliance with the contract they originally agreed to - Apple even said so itself in its own filing. In fact, theoretically speaking, Epic's UE customers could sue Epic to get an injunction against Epic to force Epic to do just that. Remember, just as Apple has a monopoly over iOS, Epic has a Monopoly over the UE. Its not like there are a bunch of competing 3D engines out there for them to choose from. 

[mr moose]

1 minute ago, TheSage79 said:

A couple of things...

 

1) The judge never decreed any such thing. You have a fundamental misunderstanding of what a TRO is if you think that. Judges simply don't make those kinds of decrees with a TRO. The judge is *only* maintaining a status quo that she knows is doable for both companies until she can sort things out - nothing more. She did not, and will not, make any qualitative decrees on the legal questions of the case, for a long time to come.

 

2) For Epic to prevail in its lawsuit, Epic would have to prove that the original contract, under normal conditions, is anti-trust. Epic can't just can't arbitrarily break its contract with Apple (like they did) and then complain that Apple practices anti-trust because Apple broke off its business relationship with them for being a bad actor. No anti-trust law gives Epic the right to break its contract. Epic is the legally the bad actor here (has the unclean hands as the lawyers would say) and therefore the UE problem is a problem entirely of Epic's own making. Epic is perfectly able to resolve any problems with UE development by simply getting back in compliance with the contract they originally agreed to - Apple even said so itself in its own filing. In fact, theoretically speaking, Epic's UE customers could sue Epic to get an injunction against Epic to force Epic to do just that. Remember, just as Apple has a monopoly over iOS, Epic has a Monopoly over the UE. Its not like there are a bunch of competing 3D engines out there for them to choose from. 

 

I don't care if epic prevail or not, I don't even care if they are guilty or not. Absolutely none of my posts ever have said anything about epic being anything other than evil.  

 

I care that the app store is a monopoly that apple engages in antitrust with. 

[mr moose]

One thing people probably need to come to terms with is that you don't have to take sides in this.  You can hate both players and hope for a different outcome.  From the very beginning I have not said anything about wanting Epic to prevail, I do not like epic as a game dev and I don't particularly care for their business practices.  As far as I am concerned if you play with fire one day you will get burnt.  But that doesn't make apple innocent on all accounts and that doesn't change the fact they also need to be burnt.  

 

What's best for consumers and tech development is that everyone has a fair playing field.  Once you imbalance the playing field and have different fields where only some people can play, then you don't get competition and then you get shit products with higher prices. 

 

 

[TheSage79]

2 minutes ago, mr moose said:

 

I don't care if epic prevail or not, I don't even care if they are guilty or not. Absolutely none of my posts ever have said anything about epic being anything other than evil.  

 

I care that the app store is a monopoly that apple engages in antitrust with. 

 

Again, the idea that Apple's app store is a harmful monopoly would be a brand new interpretation of the law. Just like Best Buy has complete control over everything in its own stores, Apple has the same right to control everything in it's own store. If the courts find Apple is in violation of anti-trust because of its control over its own app store, then that precedent would equally apply to Best Buy and it's control over it's own stores. Heck, a quick google search shows that Best Buy even has similar Market Share in the US (45.6% vs iOS's 54%) to Apple thus can be said to have a similar (but slightly less given the 10% difference) anti-competitive influence to Apple yet no one is suing Best Buy. This is why Epic has an uphill legal battle. 

 

As a side not, if you really stop to think about it, if Epic were to actually win on all of its legal arguments,(a *big* if) that would end, by precedent, all walled-garden eco-systems in the US because they would become unworkable. Such a result would actually remove the walled-garden option from consumers giving consumers one less choice. That doesn't seem like a win for consumers to me. A lot of Apple users use Apple precisely because it's a walled-garden they can trust. 

[divito]

12 minutes ago, mr moose said:

 

I don't care if epic prevail or not, I don't even care if they are guilty or not. Absolutely none of my posts ever have said anything about epic being anything other than evil.  

 

I care that the app store is a monopoly that apple engages in antitrust with. 

Does this mean you also think all closed systems are monopolies? So car infotainment systems, and television operating systems?

If a consumer buys into a certain TV ecosystem, and their smart TV doesn't have certain app offerings, they're committing antitrust by not allowing other app developers onto their platform, because they can "control another persons business?"

TVs in the past have also had features and app support only to remove it after time. Whether that was based on contractual time period or other factors, that's also antitrust to you?

[mr moose]

12 minutes ago, TheSage79 said:

 

Again, the idea that Apple's app store is a harmful monopoly would be a brand new interpretation of the law.

No it's not.  Read the excerpt I linked earlier.

Quote

Just like Best Buy has complete control over everything in its own stores, Apple has the same right to control everything in it's own store.

Not just like it at all, best buy customers can go to walmart or some other store, iphone users can't.  They are not the same at all.

 

 

Quote

If the courts find Apple is in violation of anti-trust because of its control over its own app store, then that precedent would equally apply to Best Buy and it's control over it's own stores. Heck, a quick google search shows that Best Buy even has similar Market Share in the US (45.6% vs iOS's 54%) to Apple thus can be said to have a similar (but slightly less given the 10% difference) anti-competitive influence to Apple yet no one is suing Best Buy. This is why Epic has an uphill legal battle. 

If apple are found guilty of anti trust, nothing else will change,  best buy won't change. The law does not dictate a monopoly is illegal,  the law says using your monopoly to harm other trade is illegal.  That is why the law is called anti trust and the condition it rests upon is a monopoly.  They are two very different things, but for whatever reason people in this thread can't grasp the idea that a monopoly by itself means NOTHING.  What matters us what the company does with it.

 

Quote

As a side not, if you really stop to think about it, if Epic were to actually win on all of its legal arguments,(a *big* if) that would end, by precedent, all walled-garden eco-systems in the US because they would become unworkable. Such a result would actually remove the walled-garden option from consumers giving consumers one less choice. That doesn't seem like a win for consumers to me. A lot of Apple users use Apple precisely because it's a walled-garden they can trust. 

Not really,  so long as their is an alternative to the walled garden that consumers can opt into or out of without having to spend money, then apple can keep their walled garden, it's just ios users will have the choice to use it or not.

 

10 minutes ago, divito said:

Does this mean you also think all closed systems are monopolies? So car infotainment systems, and television operating systems?

Technically they are monopolies, but as I pointed out above, a monopoly by itself is not a problem nor illegal.  In fact I have already linked several articles that highlight that from the perspective of the law itself and precedent in past cases.

 

Quote

If a consumer buys into a certain TV ecosystem, and their smart TV doesn't have certain app offerings, they're committing antitrust by not allowing other app developers onto their platform, because they can "control another persons business?"
 

If by doing so it adversely effects the ability of another company to compete fairly then yes, that is anti trust.  Please note that there is a difference in consumers choosing a product that is better which creates a monopoly, and the company doing something that prevents another company from reaching customers.

 

Quote

TVs in the past have also had features and app support only to remove it after time. Whether that was based on contractual time period or other factors, that's also antitrust to you?

Depends on the systems and what they did.  I can't give an opinion on a product I don't know anything about.

 

 

[Helpful Tech Witch]

18 minutes ago, divito said:

If a consumer buys into a certain TV ecosystem, and their smart TV doesn't have certain app offerings, they're committing antitrust by not allowing other app developers onto their platform, because they can "control another persons business?"

Ok. This happened with Roku and HBO, when HBO max was released. HBO and Roku couldn’t come to a agreement, and HBO max isn’t on Roku.

If, HBO decides to not make the deal with Roku, Roku doesn’t violate anti trust, as that was HBOs choice. If Roku said no, and then HBO was harmed as a business, then HBO would have a argument that Roku violated anti trust.

[TheSage79]

2 minutes ago, mr moose said:

No it's not.  Read the excerpt I linked earlier.

Not just like at all, best buy customers can go to walmart or some other store, iphone users can't.  They are not the same at all.

 

 

If apple are found guilty of anti trust, nothing else will change,  best buy won't change. The law does not dictate a monopoly is illegal,  the law says using your monopoly to harm other trade is illegal.  That is why the law is called anti trust and the condition it rests upon is a monopoly.  They are two very different things, but for whatever reason people in this thread can't grasp the idea that a monopoly by itself means NOTHING.  What matters us what the company does with it.

 

Not really,  so long as their is an alternative to the walled garden that consumers can opt into or out of without having to spend money, then apple can keep their walled garden, it's just ios users will have the choice to use it or not.

 

Technically they are monopolists, but as I pointed out above, a monopoly by itself is not a problem nor illegal.  In fact I have already linked several articles that highlight that from the perspective of the law itself and precedent in past cases.

 

If by doing so it adversely effects the ability of another company to compete fairly then yes, that is anti trust.  Please note that there is a difference in consumers choosing a product that is better which creates a monopoly, and the company doing something that prevents another company from reaching customers.

 

Depends on the systems and what they did.  I can't give an opinion on a product I don't know anything about.

 

 

If you want to arbitrarily redefine the iPhone/iOS market to be somehow separate from the smartphone market, then that argument would hold weight, but the courts would have to rule that the iPhone/iOS market is a separate and distinct market from the smart phone market - which is very unlikely. Just like Best Buy customers can leave Best Buy and go buy something at Walmart, nothing is stopping Apple Customers from going to a Samsung store and buying a Galaxy (millions of people have done so). Yes, you can only get iOS apps through the App store but you can only get Best Buy merchandise through Best Buy (You can't buy Best Buy merchandise from Walmart). Sure, you can get the same items sold at Best Buy from Walmart (assuming the company also sells through Walmart), but you can also get the same Apps on Android (again, assuming the company makes an Android version). There is simply no difference here. 

[Kisai]

42 minutes ago, divito said:

Does this mean you also think all closed systems are monopolies? So car infotainment systems, and television operating systems?

If a consumer buys into a certain TV ecosystem, and their smart TV doesn't have certain app offerings, they're committing antitrust by not allowing other app developers onto their platform, because they can "control another persons business?"

TVs in the past have also had features and app support only to remove it after time. Whether that was based on contractual time period or other factors, that's also antitrust to you?

Remember the PS3? Remember the OtherOS feature? Ultimately PS3 owners were entitled to $10 for the loss of the feature.

[TheSage79]

10 minutes ago, Kisai said:

Remember the PS3? Remember the OtherOS feature? Ultimately PS3 owners were entitled to $10 for the loss of the feature.

If I recall, that wasn't an Anti-trust issue, it was a removed feature issue. AKA, part of the price people paid to Sony for the PS3 was for the ability to run OtherOS, so when Sony removed that ability, they arbitrarily devalued the PS3 by removing a feature people, in theory, paid for. A feature the courts determined was worth $10.  

[Kisai]

1 minute ago, TheSage79 said:

If I recall, that wasn't an Anti-trust issue, it was a removed feature issue. AKA, part of the price people paid to Sony for the PS3 was for the ability to run OtherOS, so when Sony removed that ability, they arbitrarily devalued the PS3 by removing a feature people, in theory, paid for. A feature the courts determined was worth $10.  

So my point with mentioning that, is since Fortnite is free, what value has been lost for the consumer by removing it? $0. IAP were always optional s/.

 

[TheSage79]

Ahhh, I see now. My bad. 

[TheSage79]

1 minute ago, Kisai said:

So my point with mentioning that, is since Fortnite is free, what value has been lost for the consumer by removing it? $0. IAP were always optional s/.

 

Ahh, I see now. My bad. 

[mr moose]

11 minutes ago, TheSage79 said:

If you want to arbitrarily redefine the iPhone/iOS market to be somehow separate from the smartphone market,

It's not arbitrary, they are divorced form the rest of the market, you can't by iphone software from anywhere else, ergo its been isolated from the rest of the market.  I'm not arguing google is much better, in fact I am arguing they have a monopoly of sorts too, buy at least you can buy and use software straight from the developer with android without having to pay anything extra or get a new device.

 

11 minutes ago, TheSage79 said:

then that argument would hold weight, but the courts would have to rule that the iPhone/iOS market is a separate and distinct market from the smart phone market - which is very unlikely. Just like Best Buy customers can leave Best Buy and go buy something at Walmart, nothing is stopping Apple Customers from going to a Samsung store and buying a Galaxy (millions of people have done so). Yes, you can only get iOS apps through the App store but you can only get Best Buy merchandise through Best Buy (You can't buy Best Buy merchandise from Walmart). Sure, you can get the same items sold at Best Buy from Walmart (assuming the company also sells through Walmart), but you can also get the same Apps on Android (again, assuming the company makes an Android version). There is simply no difference here. 

The judge has already said he fully expects the experts to argue the app store is in violation of antitrust (primarily the 30% being anti competitive).  So it's not just my opinion, it is the expected opinion of the courts too.  Not too mention the other cases and preliminary findings of those as well.  There is a actually quite a lot of people claiming what I am saying.

 

 

 

[mr moose]

17 minutes ago, TheSage79 said:

If I recall, that wasn't an Anti-trust issue, it was a removed feature issue. AKA, part of the price people paid to Sony for the PS3 was for the ability to run OtherOS, so when Sony removed that ability, they arbitrarily devalued the PS3 by removing a feature people, in theory, paid for. A feature the courts determined was worth $10.  

And where that relates to fortnight is that people have bought in app stuff for fortnight which they may no longer be able to use or advance with.  For the consumer the product changed.

 

The courts have addressed that though, This is why the courts barred apple form banning UE in ios, to calculate the financial damage would e almost impossible with the sheer number of developers and games that have current iap and the number that are in current development.  So we can't just say, well that game was free therefore it has no value, it contained lots of value in iap and the UE contained almost undefinable value in games currently in development.

[Helpful Tech Witch]

16 minutes ago, Kisai said:

So my point with mentioning that, is since Fortnite is free, what value has been lost for the consumer by removing it? $0. IAP were always optional s/.

 

I mean, now, I beieve that skins and other items bought on mobile can only be used on mobile, and vice versa

[TheSage79]

1 minute ago, mr moose said:

It's not arbitrary, they are divorced form the rest of the market, you can't by iphone software from anywhere else, ergo its been isolated from the rest of the market.  I'm not arguing google is much better, in fact I am arguing they have a monopoly of sorts too, buy at least you can buy and use software straight from the developer with android without having to pay anything extra or get a new device.

 

The judge has already said he fully expects the experts to argue the app store is in violation of antitrust (primarily the 30% being anti competitive).  So it's not just my opinion, it is the expected opinion of the courts too.  Not too mention the other cases and preliminary findings of those as well.  There is a actually quite a lot of people claiming what I am saying.

 

 

 

Of course the judge says she fully expects the experts to argue the merits of the 30% cut. There would be no point to the lawsuit if Epic and Apple didn't bring in their respective experts to argue the issues of the case. I expect several years of argument between the experts, lawyers, and everything in-between, before this case is done. That doesn't mean the case has already been decided though. Every lawyer I have seen discussing this case had said the same thing - Epic is trying a novel, or new, approach to try and change existing precedent currently in the law. Some have even mentioned that congress is holding anti-trust hearings concerning the tech industry is precisely because they see existing law as inadequate. A few of the lawyers even think Epic has no real plans to win this case, but rather, wants to use the case as a way to bring more publicity to the issue and prove the need for new regulations. 

[Helpful Tech Witch]

18 minutes ago, Kisai said:

So my point with mentioning that, is since Fortnite is free, what value has been lost for the consumer by removing it? $0. IAP were always optional s/.

 

Acaually, technically the value of iPhones has gone down now.

[mr moose]

3 minutes ago, TheSage79 said:

Of course the judge says she fully expects the experts to argue the merits of the 30% cut. There would be no point to the lawsuit if Epic and Apple didn't bring in their respective experts to argue the issues of the case. I expect several years of argument between the experts, lawyers, and everything in-between, before this case is done. That doesn't mean the case has already been decided though. Every lawyer I have seen discussing this case had said the same thing - Epic is trying a novel, or new, approach to try and change existing precedent currently in the law. Some have even mentioned that congress is holding anti-trust hearings concerning the tech industry is precisely because they see existing law as inadequate. A few of the lawyers even think Epic has no real plans to win this case, but rather, wants to use the case as a way to bring more publicity to the issue and prove the need for new regulations. 

All of those things are true, or at least highly likely.   But my point is not to argue the outcome is set, but that the concept of the app store being a monopoly is not arbitrary nor an ideal.  It has legitimate grounds in law to be considered anti trust.  

[TheSage79]

23 minutes ago, mr moose said:

And where that relates to fortnight is that people have bought in app stuff for fortnight which they may no longer be able to use or advance with.  For the consumer the product changed.

 

The courts have addressed that though, This is why the courts barred apple form banning UE in ios, to calculate the financial damage would e almost impossible with the sheer number of developers and games that have current iap and the number that are in current development.  So we can't just say, well that game was free therefore it has no value, it contained lots of value in iap and the UE contained almost undefinable value in games currently in development.

It was Epic who changed Fortnite and broke their contract with Apple, any damages to any customers because of that is entirely on Epic. There is no anti-trust law that allows epic to break a contract. 

 

And once again, thats just not how TRO's work. The T means temporary (30 days in this case IIRC) and the matter will be re-addressed at a later date. There has been no final decision one way or the other if the developer account can be banned or not. All that has happened is the judge put everything on hold.

 

As a side note, Apple never said they were banning UE based games from the App store. They just said they were going to ban Epic from the developer program. Existing UE games would be unaffected.