As a user, for now I am glad this is only in the EU. I am not looking forward to how this will degrade the user experience in favor of "choice" for User, when in reality its choice for the developers and Users have to follow.
I have yet to see a convincing argument that this was really necessary from a User prospective. The only argument I will buy is the limitations in what could be on the store like Adult apps, emulation, and similar. Which is valid, but not something requiring a separate store.
The day that an app requires me to install a separate App Store to use is the day my smartphone becomes less useful and I stop using that particular app. Being on the App Store has benefits to me as a User, particularly when it comes to privacy and billing. Do we really need to bring up just how much companies like Facebook pushed back on the app tracking bulletin and the scary popups many apps put up to try to convince you to allow them to track you?
Or the dark patterns that many companies continue to engage in regarding billing? Right now we are dealing with Cable companies complaining about yearly notices of renewal and being able to easily cancel, and you are going to try to tell me that companies won't find a way to abuse this?
Literally today I was trying to cancel a task management app that I mistakenly signed up on the web instead of through the app, and I have to email them to do so. But they are more than happy to let me increase the cost of my subscription with a single click.
So no this is not about choice for Users as this continues to be framed as, my choice was to go with an iOS Device in the first place for this walled garden. In the coming years the choice will be more and more made for me by developers. There is basically zero chance that Facebook, maybe Amazon, and companies big enough to try it won't jump at this chance when they have a big enough name to be able to leave the App Store and other developers can just piggy back on that.
Do you consider your PC "less useful" because there isn't a single app store for all your software, a single browser engine, a 30% surcharge for all your spending etc.?
My PC is a single purpose device, and that is for gaming. Which considering I use Steam for many of my games (not all) that 30% commission is already there.
The reality is many people use their PC's far differently than they use their phones. When my PC was my primary computing device many of the things I use and pay for on my phone either simply didn't exist, or I would never dream to pay for them.
Also you are missing the point, my phone becomes less useful because I flat out refuse to hand over access to my phone to a company which wishes to abuse that privilege of an alternative store. If they were going to act the way I want them to act, they would have no reason to use an alternative store.
The reality is most users don't have a PC, period. Even laptops are increasingly dinosaur-like, except for work-provided ones. It seems many home users are more than happy with some combination of phones, tablets, smart TVs, and consoles.
If I wasn't a gamer I wouldn't have a PC. I mean technically I would still have a Mac but much of what I use on my Mac is through the Mac App Store.
The vast majority of my general computing happens on my phone or tablet. My PC and Mac while technically general computing devices, are not in practice anymore and I would wager that is true for most people.
Not counting my Work computer for obvious reasons.
No, which in reality emphasizes the point I am trying to make. As a gamer I basically have zero choice but to install Steam, Epic Game Store, EA Store, or any other stupid launcher that a publisher decides to force on me when there is a perfectly fine game store built into Windows and Mac.
The "perfectly fine game store built into Mac" wouldn't even accept many of the games currently available on Steam. Anything with the "Adult Only" rating would just be outright rejected.
Obviously you also wouldn't be able to install the games you bought on there on any device that didn't have an Apple logo. Sharing the same game library between Windows, macOS and Linux? Nope, buy them again.
You might also have to kiss goodbye to cloud saves. The macOS App Store version of Resident Evil 4 doesn't support cloud saves between macOS and iOS devices whereas the Steam version has cloud saves.
And this is the state of Apple's game store when they are facing competition.
I am listing off those stores because I am making a point that as a gamer, I do not have a choice in using certain stores and launchers if I want to play the games I want to play.
That is the exact situation I want to avoid on my phone.
What is so hard about that to understand. This is removing a choice from a user.
You have a choice. Don't use the other store. If there was only one AppStore for games on PC you'd have no choice. That's the point. If it was only Steam, and Steam said they won't allow any games that depict war, what choice would you have?
But that's the magic of having multiple App Stores, they have to compete. They can't be the world police of software.
What's so hard to understand that having a choice means you can choose to do something, or not.
If you want to use your phone with only Apple's Appstore, continue to do so, if an app you really want is not on the app store, then DONT BUY IT, except now, someone besides you has the CHOICE to download it.
You are advocating for an indirect choice, I have no benefit to installing Epic Game store, rockstar, or any other launcher. None, it just isn't there.
Where as my direct choice is, I want to play this game. If I want to play a specific game, the choice of launcher is being made for me.
That is not competition.
I should not have to make that choice, and until this roles out I have not had to make this choice with my phone. I have been able to confidently install anything I want from a single source and it's great.
That choice will be removed from me, that DIRECT choice. Not indirect which is what the App Store change will be.
> That choice will be removed from me, that DIRECT choice. Not indirect which is what the App Store change will be.
That direct choice is an obvious illusion, though. Apps get depreciated, delisted, or plain removed by their developer all the time, your lack of control is corollary to that process. The incentive to leave the App Store has always existed, it's just viable now with alternative storefronts. As a user embedded in Apple's ecosystem, politely put, you're not owed any special treatment.
The experience may well degrade from here. I'd expect Apple to do the smart thing, and implement Android-style process isolation and additional security considerations.
>when there is a perfectly fine game store built into Windows
I am surprised to see this sentiment, given how much trouble I've had with the Windows store the few times I've been forced to use it. The way it puts files into locations I have limited rights to even while operating in admin mode... game files... made it a nightmare. Especially when it stopped working and the installer couldn't even identify those files as existing for the sake of removing them. It was to the point now I'd rather skip playing a new game than use Window's store if it was my only option, even if the game was offered for free.
There isn't user choice, only developer choice. For example, if I want to play Fortnite with my IRL friends I must download Epic Launcher. If I want to play WoW with my friends I must download BattleNet, if I want to play Counter Strike I must download Steam. I don't get much choice in what my already existing community of friends decides to play. This is likely to be mirrored in phone app stores. Need whatsapp/facebook/instagram on your phone? download the Meta Store! Don't like their T&C? Pound sand.
Don't like their T&C, don't use them. As simple as that. I do not like Trucaller's T&C, so I do not use it. If some day I don't like WhatsApp's T&C, I won't use it. My friends and family will be asked to contact me via Signal (as an example).
To your examples with games, there are lots of games that I do not install simply because I don't like those launchers. Whats wrong with that? It is _my choice_. I am not forced to use only Windows Store, for example.
The argument that "because third party app stores can be shitty, they shouldn't be possible" is strange.
Maybe "And" would have been better, but I assume you are not a gamer if you think that.
The reality is no, if I want to play Fortnite I have to install the Epic Game store. If I want to play GTA, even if I buy the game through steam I have to use the Rockstar Launcher.
There are multiple instances of this situation in gaming and it is the exact thing I don't want to happen here.
> but I assume you are not a gamer if you think that.
Why would you assume that? I play video games on my PC. I'm not forced to install any software. I can make informed decisions and understand the trade offs with what software I want to use.
Chosing to install Epic Launcher and playing Fortnite is you sending a signal into the market. Competition exists, users can express their opinion and act on it.
Then you are conceding that the choice is to ether install those stores or not play the game?
That is the exact point that I am trying to make in my post. That is not giving a user a choice that should matter to the User. That is removing the opportunity to me to play a game from where I want to play it.
The problem is, many people are just fine doing it because they want to play a large enough game. Which again is my point. In reality most users would likely download a Facebook apps store if it was required to use Facebook, same for Twitter, TikTok, and whatever other thing that people are addicted to on their phones.
That is my problem here and why comparing it to the situation with gaming is a good example. I should not loose the CHOICE to use an app from the App Store that I already use, because a developer is making their choice to push their own store.
That is the situation we are looking at here, that to use the apps I want to use I have to use those stores. Which is ridiculous, and it is naive to think it isn't going to happen when it is the state of gaming right now.
> That is the situation we are looking at here, that to use the apps I want to use I have to use those stores. Which is ridiculous, and it is naive to think it isn't going to happen when it is the state of gaming right now.
Consider the alternative where the only place to install apps (and hence games) is the Windows Store. Would that really be better? Windows Store's update process is lot worse than Steam (flaky download status, no way to make backups etc), and in many cases Steam has better integration with local payment processors.
Maybe I shouldn't have said that there was a perfectly fine store on Mac and Windows, that isn't really true. I mean they do their job but yeah.
But I can't even stay within Steam only if I wanted too. Which is well established as the standard platform, but that hasn't stopped publishers from pushing their own. Including Epic for that matter thanks to how popular Fortnite is.
Sure ok Windows Store sucks but that is changing the conversation here, I fail to see what features a general App Store on my phone would add that would truly benefit to me as a user.
But again my point here is that the choice on gaming has been removed from me if I want to play a particular game. Just saying don't play it, is not a valid argument to me.
Steam has seemed perfectly fine with basically no real competition. For the most part the consensus seems to be that users only leave Steam when they have too not because they want too.
The iOS App Store is fine with no competition (for users).
How do users loose out from payment competition on iOS? I can't think of how I loose out on anything, in reality an app trying to convince me to use their payment option instead of iOS saves me money because I don't want to fall victim to dark practices when I want to cancel.
Sure developers get a 30% cut but that seems to be the norm in the industry, that is what Steam charges. Developers can't just not tell me a yearly subscription is about to charge, make me call to cancel, but as a USER that is a good thing.
If a developer tries to push me outside of the App Store to pay them, once again that is the Developer making the choice for me.
Why do we keep pretending PCs are comparable with phones? They compute, that's the end of their similarities. They have completely different use cases and are needed for different reasons. Things that are good on a PC might not be good on a phone.
For sure. I agree with their whole post. There isn't any advantage whatsoever as a user to have Steam, Microsoft App Store, Epic Store, etc. All those stores take their pound of flesh and it is up to me to manage them all. It sucks.
This attitude is completely baffling to me. I certainly understand if you don't want to use those other stores and loading options, but I feel like everyone has Stockholm Syndrome thinking it's a good thing that alternative ways to run software on a device you own should be forbidden by our tech overloads. On a site called Hacker News no less!
As a user of said stores, I understand the frustration : because of exclusivity deals, some games are available on shop x but not shop y, and you end up with a fragmented view of your games, different rules etc.
Now as you pointed out forbidding alternative ways is not necessarily the one true solution !
F-Droid gets this right out of the box. A one-stop-shop for Free, Open Source applications has annihilated my desire to purchase apps at all. I don't buy PDF readers or file browsers or launchers or basic system utilities any other user would expect for free. I install it, because I have that choice.
Without F-Droid or the ability to install Open Source software, I wouldn't use Android. It's that much of a game-changer, and I suspect Apple wants to avoid a similar disruption at all costs.
Wasn't the Epic Game store also found to be a privacy nightmare? I could be wrong but I felt like that was a major reason the Heroic Game Launcher got so much traction (which is fantastic btw)
> I am not looking forward to how this will degrade the user experience in favor of "choice" for User, when in reality its choice for the developers and Users have to follow.
That's an interesting point. I can see Apple figuring this out as well and choosing this model, precisely to annoy users and degrade the user experience. If users complain they can shrug and say "Well EU asked for it and we complied. Talk to your representatives, I guess..."
I've seen this strategy in politics, when a party goes through some effort to subtly sabotage initiatives and projects promoted by their opponents only to later say "look, how badly they failed".
The only entity you should be blaming is Apple themselves. They could have eased up their grip just a little bit to prevent this from happening, but instead they chose to be dragged kicking and screaming.
Yeah, agreed. I am especially upset at the custom browser rendering engines, as I really do like Safari and I'm not at all excited about my favorite apps stuffing a Chrome instance inside of them (electron for iOS now??)
I hope user choice is prioritized, and it seems like the way Apple has it set up, apps won't be able to get a significant following by distributing outside the App store.
1) As a "technical" user who started using Firefox when it was called Phoenix (then Firebird, then Firefox)—this is of zero value to me. Might be to (frankly, a very few) others, but I will see no personal benefit from this. I have zero need for more browser engines on my phone & tablet.
2) The main market effect is probably gonna be that Google is able to cross-promote and "whoopsie" bugs its way into having even more market share for its engine. Don't love that, but it won't personally harm me unless Safari market share gets low enough that dev shops drop from "test on Chrome and Safari" to "test on Chrome... and that's it".
3) Where this might really, really suck is if they have to permit non-browsers to bundle Web and/or JS engines. I very much do not want that and it's likely to make my experience noticeably worse, if that happens. Dunno if that's required by the changes, though.
I don't know.. what if every app suddenly becomes 200MB bigger and devs throw Chrome instances in just about everything? They could bring electron to iOS and make an app that's not even native. Not to mention it would be objectively worse from a tracking/privacy point of view. Chrome has never been on the side of user privacy and I'm scared that continues with its introduction to iOS.
I think providing more choice will help Apple stay competitive though. If that happens, then users will find Apple's native browser/apps to be faster. A win for customers overall and insurance for Apple to not drop the ball!
As far as tracking/privacy, I suspect Apple's next move would be to provide greater restriction of your device information and browsing information secure (another win for customers that isn't really granularly provided today).
That one on paper I don't mind, I mean I don't particularly enjoy the idea of Google being able to have even more of a stranglehold on the Browser market by them pushing Chrome heavily on iOS.
But yes, that is a good change that should have happened a long time ago. Same with the game streaming one.
> I don't particularly enjoy the idea of Google being able to have even more of a stranglehold on the Browser market by them pushing Chrome heavily on iOS.
Aren't you just describing... competition?
If Apple's browser product is superior, users will use it. If those users want a feature Chrome has, Apple can either implement the feature or ignore it. That's no different than things are today, if you wanted to avoid a Chrome hegemony then we should have invested in a better cross-platform delivery mechanism than Electron. We didn't get one.
Apple's support to WebKit and Safari is entirely compulsory. I agree that it's a positive impact on the web as a Firefox user, but I'd also argue Apple's ends did not justify their means. The development of Safari is very distinctly neglected to increase demand for native (read: taxable) APIs.
My problem here is Google, we can't deny they have used their position in Search, Gmail, Maps and others to push users towards Chrome with constant reminders to use their tools. I mean if I sign into Google on my iPhone I basically instantly get an email about setting up my iPhone with google or something, which is ridiculous.
Competition in this space is great but Google has far too much control of the browser market for my comfort and we are seeing the harm of that with third party cookies, tracking, AMP, and other things.
And again I welcome this particular change, I am just worried about what it will mean as Google pushes harder.
You're not wrong, but unfortunately I'm hard pressed to treat Apple any differently now. Apple also uses their position on the web, desktop and mobile to set unfathomably destructive standards for modern computing. AdSense and the App Store are two sides of the same con; circular marketplaces where the players scramble and the house always wins. They both feed back into terrible UX decisions and encourage the darkest, most manipulative side of either company.
It'll be different regulation that comes for Google, but you can take solemn certainty in knowing they're up next. My biggest concern is that Microsoft won't receive enough scrutiny, but on the other hand I can barely trust them not to capsize Windows over the next decade.
Regardless, 10 years from now I hope we'll have a more competitive and vibrant future for local compute and the web. It's a shame (but not unexpected) that regulation has to draw the line.
Apple is just as guilty of this. They regularly push users into Apple Maps for any address or location bit, can't even change the default app to which it would open. In fact, if I highlight and copy the address and then go into Google Maps, I get asked to grant permission to copy and paste every time...
I have yet to see a convincing argument that this was really necessary from a User prospective. The only argument I will buy is the limitations in what could be on the store like Adult apps, emulation, and similar. Which is valid, but not something requiring a separate store.
The day that an app requires me to install a separate App Store to use is the day my smartphone becomes less useful and I stop using that particular app. Being on the App Store has benefits to me as a User, particularly when it comes to privacy and billing. Do we really need to bring up just how much companies like Facebook pushed back on the app tracking bulletin and the scary popups many apps put up to try to convince you to allow them to track you?
Or the dark patterns that many companies continue to engage in regarding billing? Right now we are dealing with Cable companies complaining about yearly notices of renewal and being able to easily cancel, and you are going to try to tell me that companies won't find a way to abuse this?
Literally today I was trying to cancel a task management app that I mistakenly signed up on the web instead of through the app, and I have to email them to do so. But they are more than happy to let me increase the cost of my subscription with a single click.
So no this is not about choice for Users as this continues to be framed as, my choice was to go with an iOS Device in the first place for this walled garden. In the coming years the choice will be more and more made for me by developers. There is basically zero chance that Facebook, maybe Amazon, and companies big enough to try it won't jump at this chance when they have a big enough name to be able to leave the App Store and other developers can just piggy back on that.