epic vs apple Tim Cook testifies against epic games - epic v apple update

[RejZoR]

4 hours ago, Mark Kaine said:

Just because you own something doesnt mean what you're doing with it cant be illegal, which is somewhat the point of this lawsuit, and no, its not just Apple, its also Google, Microsoft, facebook, etc.

 

 The crux of this lawsuit specifically is indeed should Epic win it sets a precedence of "epic proportions"  which is why I think its not happening, even though Epic is in the right in principle here. 

 

I.e. no more "walled gardens"  I just dont see a judge pulling this off just like that lol…

 

This is why I never understand the exact argument. What has ANYONE contributed to entire development of iOS? Nothing. Apple made it by themselves from ground up. What have others done for whole App Store offering, support and functioning? Nothing. Saying Apple is entirely dependent on others is bullshit because there were so many attempts at app stores and yet so many ecosystems collapsed entirely because others weren't contributing to it. So, it's not entirely down to app developers contributing, it also seems to be on app store and ecosystem provider side (Apple) to provide great support.

 

So, why should Apple be obligated to offer ANYONE ability to tap into their ecosystem, into their hard work and effort through years to make it work? It just makes no sense.

[Biohazard777]

2 minutes ago, RejZoR said:

What has ANYONE contributed to entire development of iOS? Nothing. Apple made it by themselves from ground up.

Was going to to point out how ridiculous that claim is and why, but then I realized I would just be wasting my time. Ground up, hah.

[RejZoR]

1 minute ago, Biohazard777 said:

Was going to to point out how ridiculous that claim is and why, but then I realized I would just be wasting my time. Ground up, hah.

How is it ridiculous claim? How has Epic helped or contributed in creating entire iOS operating system and ecosystem surrounding it? Nothing. Why should they be entitled to ANYTHING? If they want to be on Apple's platform, they can either be on it through their app store or they are perfectly free not to be on it. No one forces them to be on it. Apple will survive just the same without them. And frankly Epic will survive without Apple just the same.

 

It's exactly the same situation Apple itself is in China. They could say screw you China, we're not gonna give you user data and run servers in China. But they decided despite all this trouble and requirements, it's worth it to stay in China. It's identical situation when you're entering Apple's App Store. You're free to say screw you Apple and not be present on it. But you're also free to stay and play by Apple's rules on their platform, just like Apple for example is free to stay in China and play by their rules.

 

But hey, if you're going to say "omg it's not like that" and at the same time "I can't be bothered to argument", then you're just full of s**t. Why did you even bother to say anything then?

[leadeater]

2 hours ago, Kisai said:

Steam already offered cross-platform MacOS and Linux support, and pretty much no uptake on that. 

That's a totally different situation. Few games are made for for Mac OS, games are made for Windows and Consoles right now. Microsoft is already supporting single purchase right now, it's a thing right now. The uptake is 100%. If you buy something on the Microsoft store and it has a PC and Console version then you own it for both platforms.

 

I don't know why you are bringing up Mac OS or Linux in response to a post about PC and consoles.

[Brooksie359]

10 hours ago, leadeater said:

Well, if that meant Steam came to Xbox and then Microsoft implemented ability to play all your purchased PC games on it then hell yes I'm all for this. It'll never happen but one can dream 

While I would like that I don't believe they should be legally obligated to add such features. The same for Apple in this case. Like I get that it would be nice to have certain features on the iPhone or on consoles but I don't personally believe there should be any reason for them to be forced to add these features. I don't think anti trust laws original intent was to go as far as dictating every platform every be open to third parties. The implications of this would be extremely crazy if applied more broadly. You could basically force any manufacturers of hardware that comes with software to be required to allow for third party programs to be able to be installed. No matter how I look at this it would make things so much more complicated and would inevitably cost companies alot of money that they quite frankly should have to spend. 

[Fasterthannothing]

Here is a brilliant idea have a developer mode 3rd party app installer toggle. I wait android already has this so why can't Apple?

[Helpful Tech Witch]

17 minutes ago, SlidewaysZ said:

Here is a brilliant idea have a developer mode 3rd party app installer toggle. I wait android already has this so why can't Apple?

Apple does. Kinda

With a app like Cydia impactor, you can sideload. Just you need to pay 100$, and know your Apple ID info) to apple for a dev license to keep sideloaded apps for over one day.

[Brooksie359]

1 hour ago, SlidewaysZ said:

Here is a brilliant idea have a developer mode 3rd party app installer toggle. I wait android already has this so why can't Apple?

The better question is why should they have to? I get that it would be nice but just because something can be done doesn't mean they should be forced to do it. Like I get that people want certain features in an os but it really shouldn't be up to them what it is allowed in the os. If they don't like it then use a different os and get and android phone. Why should others dictate how someone else's os functions when they aren't the ones who are making it. 

[Kisai]

4 hours ago, gabrielcarvfer said:

I don't know if it is a cultural thing, but I'm starting to think it is.

How can you purchase and own something, but at the same time defend the seller/manufacturer from preventing you/other customers from doing whatever you want with your product?

 

Because it's not about "I own it, I want to do whatever I want with it", it's about devaluing the product. Products that are extremely hackable, tend to become worthless the quickest. Cars, Desktop computers, many appliances and IOT devices. Every time you see something exploited, with very few exceptions (the WRT54G and nVidia shield being an exception) usually results in people not buying the product for what it's marketed as. The WRT54G opened the door to Linux-based consumer routers being viable, because Linksys quite frankly did an oopsie, and then subsequent models were split between good Linux models and bad models based on something else entirely. The nvidia shield is basically worthless to everyone who owns it unless they are into piracy, of which it's was the best device to do it with.

 

You can't be a legitimate company and market your product as "we made it hackable on purpose so you can play pirated stuff", that always backfires, and every time I see an x86 or ARM "game console" all I ever see are pirated games being played on them. 

 

Quote

Printers breaking due to "unauthorized" toner/ink is the same stuff: it is plainly absurd and abusive. The printer manufacturer can't guarantee the 3rd-party ink will work, that it won't clog/lump, that the clog won't end up breaking it, but it shouldn't be allowed to just refuse to work. At least printers are usually sold at loss or low margins to justify that, differently from Apple/John Deere/Tesla/etc stuff.

That's a consumable though. It's like asking your Tesla to only be charged at the Superchargers, despite living 800 miles from one. You can't sell a product intended for mass consumption and then not make it possible to use the product.

 

Case in point, the Kurig's and the SodaStream devices use exactly the same razor blade model. There is exactly one store that sells Sodastream devices here, and one reason why I never considered buying one is because London Drugs doesn't stock the cylinders, and up till recently, canadian tire and best buy didn't either. They were all selling the machines though. So you know what people did? They bought adapters for regular CO2 tanks (which aren't food grade.) Keurig's are hacked in a similar way, 

 

People will find ways to hack things, but they're almost always about avoiding paying money. With app stores it's about avoiding paying for the software, or in EGS's case, avoiding paying fees to Apple.  It's not about freedom to use your device, because if Apple allowed all side-loading, then people would stop buying software. Period. That is how it is on Android.

 

https://www.businessofapps.com/data/app-revenues/

 

Quote

• Games accounted for 71 percent of total app revenue in 2020. iOS generated $47.6 billion revenue in 2020, while Google Play made $31.9 billion
• Outside of games, iOS was responsible for 76 percent of the $32.1 billion revenue created in 2020. Google Play generated $6.7 billion non-gaming revenue in 2020, to iOS’ $24.7 billion

The take away here, is that either people are unwilling to buy things on Android, or they are more willing to Trust Apple to not do evil things to them if they buy on iOS.

[Fasterthannothing]

All Apple needs to do is give people a choice. Otherwise their at best a helicopter parent for paying customers and at worst a bully who tells you when and how you can use your devices. I don't understand why any person apposes giving people a choice of how to use their phone. If their value falls because they gave people a choice then that sounds like a dictatorship style of ruling and their was no real value in the first place. As to who is going to win the case my bet is in Epic because they have done enough damage to get Tim cook himself to have to defend Apple and even got them to throw their Mac's precious security under the bus so to speak.

[Kisai]

8 hours ago, gabrielcarvfer said:

My point is not playing pirated stuff and I'm totally against that (except when the content is region locked).

 

Fingerprint game assets and block the app from running. DMCA exists for that reason.

That doesn't work either. Once you release something, the horses have bolted and it's pointless to lock the door after-the-fact. The DMCA abuse you see right now is the assumption that people aren't paying for the things they use, which is really an ass-backwards way of dealing with copyright infringement. 

 

Price discrimination, where prices are offered at higher or lower prices in different parts of the world is part of the problem. If you can't offer the same product for the same price everywhere in the world, then you are asking too much for the product in the first place. Strange how this works for hardware, but not software isn't it? US prices tend to be cheaper than they are in China and India.

 

We have to stop applying the logistics of hardware to software. Software can be infinitely copied for 0$. There is no logistical cost to digital distribution. So a reasonable person would go "Oh, well if it costs the company nothing to make a copy of it, then why am I paying for it?" And that's the impetus pirates operate on. You don't see hardware piracy, just counterfeits, and the counterfeits cost money to produce and can damage everything you use it with, so you may as well not risk buying the crappy counterfeit. Pirated software though? Malware, Randomware, viruses, etc are endemic to to the piracy scene, but only "Software" has the potential to wreck your computer or device. Pirated photos, comics, music, movies, anime, etc zero risk to the downloader. That's why the RIAA/MPAA type of copyright lobbyists keep wanting to treat fair use of a copyrighted material as equal to having never paid for the content in the first place. The assumption is that nobody has the right to use anything without going through them.

 

We should be treating copyright infringement as what it is, the copyright holder either

a) Not aware that there is a market for their content in a certain language/device

b) Not able to license (see video games and comics that are movie tie ins) it for distribution

 

Of which piracy is going to be the only solution for either of those until the copyright holder makes smarter choices. There's no point treating those pirates like they are operating a billion dollar counterfeiting operation, when the consumers are people who have no legitimate way to buy the product in the first place. 

 

However there is also a huge section of the English market who refuse to pay for anything, and they are the ones who want side-loading because then they never have to buy anything while still having the benefit of the high quality hardware.

 

Again, it's pretty clear that the end-game here is EGS not wanting to pay Apple. Epic can claim they are acting in the consumer's best interests, but THEIR OWN STORE doesn't even discount games that are available on elsewhere. The publishers want 79.99 per game, and that's what they get listed at, no matter what store it's on.

 

 

[hollyh88]

On 5/23/2021 at 8:11 AM, Arika S said:

Do you think Apple in incompetent with their own OS and ThEiR bUsInEsS that they wouldn't be able to put additional safe guards in place along side allowing third party app stores?

aye but it doesnt matter what they can do. They can probably make one of the safest secured systems out there. oh wait.. they already did. And now people want to endanger that safety just because they want to download some shady apps?

you as a consumer do have a choice. there are many phones out there that you can buy. not just from apple and not just from samsung. if you as a consumer don't want a phone that is locked down so heavily with security than you just get another brand. Its literally that easy. 

i for that reason own a samsung phone. But many like apple because it's so secure. 

so yes it is already up to the user. Get a different phone with less protections in place. your argument makes no sense. 
Just like epics arguments make no sense. crying about how apple is anti consumer. and a monopoly. on their own damm platform. yet epic is literally doing the same things. buying every game company. locking them behind their stores. forcing exclusivity. Or how they shadely try to do things behind apples back that started this whole mess. 
 

[hollyh88]

14 hours ago, SlidewaysZ said:

All Apple needs to do is give people a choice. Otherwise their at best a helicopter parent for paying customers and at worst a bully who tells you when and how you can use your devices. I don't understand why any person apposes giving people a choice of how to use their phone. If their value falls because they gave people a choice then that sounds like a dictatorship style of ruling and their was no real value in the first place. As to who is going to win the case my bet is in Epic because they have done enough damage to get Tim cook himself to have to defend Apple and even got them to throw their Mac's precious security under the bus so to speak.

because thats what people get wrong. 

you dont make your choice when you already own a phone.

you make this choice when you want to buy a phone. 

thats what people seem to get wrong here. you as a consumer have the choice to buy whatever phone you want. but you also as a consumer then decide if you want a heavily secured locked down phone or not. if yes you buy apple if not you buy any of the other phones out there. The choice you make is before you have a product. not after. you take the consequences of your purchase when you purchase it. not after. you buy a phone with the features you want and like. But dont complain afterwards if those features dont suite what you like. 

[Bratstech]

Jesus this post blew TF up

[wanderingfool2]

On 5/23/2021 at 12:07 AM, RejZoR said:

This is why I never understand the argument of people that Apple is obligated to do anything. It's literally THEIR everything from ground up. They designed devices, the app store, the whole ecosystem. It wasn't a collective of 150 phone makers around an OS someone else made (Google's Android) and they all eat from the same bowl. It's just Apple, on their own. If they decide to have total control over stuff they made in its entirety, then that's entirely their own choice.

Under that definition though Microsoft did nothing wrong with IE, Google using their search engine to push their products first, or the whole concept of right to repair is useless (since it's the companies and their ecosystem).  It's a sliding scale really, with no black and white borders; and in my opinion Apple has crossed it.

 

Let me propose the question like this.  Should Microsoft be allowed to force an update on all users that limit them purchasing the Apps from only the MS store?  Under your definition they should be able to.

 

On 5/23/2021 at 12:07 AM, RejZoR said:

If you don't like iOS then you go with Android where you have all the freedom you want

You are mixing consumer choice with developer choice.  Where there is major apps, it's expected by consumers that the App is on both devices.  Your China example just goes to prove a point as well. Just because it currently exists like that doesn't make it right.

 

On 5/23/2021 at 12:07 AM, RejZoR said:

Your example with consoles is very similar and very much valid. Imagine Microsoft gets forced to allow 3rd party stores on their Xbox console. You know, the console they designed, with ecosystem and services on it they designed, usually with huge loses because consoles have historically gave back profit through sales of games, not hardware itself. Imagine you spend billions designing console, OS for it and then all the big revenue goes to Epic because they forced in their game store on Xbox. Yeah, Apple's hardware is more like consoles in a lot of aspects

The iPhone is sold for profit, which is a huge distinction.  While it's less likely to happen now, EA once reverse engineered the Sega system and were threatening to license it to other people (in effect making a separate App store).  It didn't happen because Sega came to an arrangement with EA, but yea, EA almost undercut Sega.

 

While I don't deny there are similarities between XBox and Apple, there are enough differences (I also suspect that major titles actually don't get charged nearly as much...and in some case Microsoft pays the developer to make the game essentially for timed exclusives).

 

With all that said as well, if a developer did do what Epic did then I wouldn't be completely opposed to it.

 

[RejZoR]

I never had ANY issue with Internet Explorer. So it comes with Windows. You kinda expect OS to be fully featured and that includes browser. I was always free to use anything else and I have. I've used Opera back when it was still ad supported and later Firefox. Never had a single issue with that. The whole raging over IE was just stupid.

[StDragon]

12 minutes ago, RejZoR said:

I never had ANY issue with Internet Explorer. ....... The whole raging over IE was just stupid.

IE, or Edge? Because IE is a  pile of . It's a giant security exploit that's welcoming the malware party to root the OS into oblivion!

[Guest willies leg]

It's weird, there are laws. Seems lot of that goes out the window in media spectacles like this. Instead it's how to stretch and "interpret" them.