Per the parent comment, the terms they would have to add to be competitive in this scenario would be "Developers can blatantly and horrendously mine all sensitive data from users." which, while they would be appreciated by many businesses that want to provide apps to iOS users, may not be as desirable to the users themselves.
Essentially, what I believe that parent comment is calling out is that Apple is currently (voluntarily) acting as a user advocate by discouraging exploitative behavior, and enforcing that position using their monopsony.
When the monopsony breaks down, Apple will lose the power to enforce this rule, and exploitative practices will become the new norm. Of course, this does take a somewhat paternalistic view of users, in that it assumes that people will continue to use TikTok, Instagram, and so on despite their privacy being grossly violated. I think that this assumption does have a strong precedence, however.
And not just privacy but also shady practices around canceling and managing subscriptions and others.
There is a very good reason I bought my parents iOS devices and the app store is the biggest one.
Even as a technical person myself this is a big selling point for me to have an iPhone.
Does it give a lot of control to apple and have they blocked some apps I wish they could allow, Yes!
But I will take that over a future (that I really don't see being an "IF" since we know developers like Facebook will jump at the chance to be shady, and they could just make it easier for others to follow) where the choice is made for me by an app not being available on the store.
I'll respond to both of your comments here, since I think you're largely coming around to the same point.
> the terms they would have to add to be competitive in this scenario would be "Developers can blatantly and horrendously mine all sensitive data from users."
If they can do this as-is on iOS, that's the OS manufacturer's failure, not the failure of the store. Apple controls the runtime, they control what data gets exposed. Same as it ever was.
> Apple is currently (voluntarily) acting as a user advocate by discouraging exploitative behavior
I'm going to proceed on good faith and say I agree. Their idea of "exploitative behavior" is an obvious double-standard, but they don't make zero effort to protect their runtime. For the sake of argumentation, I'll assume they're entirely benevolent (even if I believe they aren't).
> Apple will lose the power to enforce this rule, and exploitative practices will become the new norm.
No they won't. They control the sandbox, there is no reason to assume "this rule" goes away. They just have to enforce it on an OS level instead of with arbitrary App Store signing. Their current method is arguably the worse/less secure option anyways.
> it assumes that people will continue to use TikTok, Instagram, and so on despite their privacy being grossly violated.
They already do. Apple can protect them against certain fine-grained fingerprinting from the runtime (and should), but they haven't removed any of those apps from their store. They all violate their acceptable terms for data processing, but they do it server-side where Apple can prove nothing. Apple's personal enforcement crusade failed since they cannot compel any company to truly act in good faith. It's living proof that the government should be handling this, not a private company. If Apple would lobby for privacy bills stifling Meta/TikTok, their privacy dollars would go much further than signing certs for known malicious apps.
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> And not just privacy but also shady practices around canceling and managing subscriptions and others.
Sure, all those are great features. They also require Apple to charge an asinine per-transaction fee to sustain, but I'm sure the user experience is excellent. Without the ability to impose an unfair monopoly, I'm not sure if they'll be able to offer these going forward.
> Even as a technical person myself this is a big selling point for me to have an iPhone.
I'd hate to hear what you go through when you gotta cancel the morning edition of The Times.
> But I will take that over a future where the choice is made for me by an app not being available on the store.
You don't get to choose. If the market settles on an illegal or unproductive status quo, it will be disrupted or regulated back into functionality. It doesn't matter if you're a user or a shareholder, bad behavior gets patched-up through the democratic process. Apple is standing in the way of fixing things, and instead of cooperating they're being bent into compliance by the EU and States.
> that I really don't see being an "IF" since we know developers like Facebook will jump at the chance to be shady
FWIW, it's not like Apple doesn't also have a litany of shady moments. They're cardholding PRISM members who have no problem operating in China even if it means compromising iCloud. They want to upload unique identifiers for your Photo Gallery so they can pinkie-promise that they won't use it for anything bad, complimenting their OCSP telemetry.
Facebook is no saint, but nobody is forcing you to use their app. Your "fear" is that other people might still find Facebook's terms agreeable after leaving the App Store, which is neither "your" business nor that different from the status quo. The only thing that changes is Apple isn't negotiating the business side of things anymore... and why should they? Their only concern should be keeping the runtime secure and improving their platform.
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In conclusion, myself (and a number of regulators) feel like Apple has asserted unfair control over app distribution. No foul, they still have a chance to fix things - the iOS platform can still remain secure while offering users options. The very plain reason Apple resists this is because the status quo is profitable - the App Store makes ~$80bn annually on a good year, so they'll defend it's monopoly to the death. Apple shouldn't say what the user does on a phone they own though. You should have the option to default to Apple's opinion, but purchasing any product does not make you beholden to the manufacturer's will. Apple has seemingly forgotten this: the government will kick them out of bed if it finds that they've been fucking the economy on the side this whole time.
Let's stop pretending that not being allowed to engage in "mining sensitive data" is the only reason a company has to not want to be on the app store.
- Discrimination against entire fields of endeavor like emulators and streaming clients
- 30% tax
- Victorian era morality clause that has forced applications to make UX degrading changes for NSFW content
- Anti-competitive behavior for anything that competes with Apple's own offerings, including e-books (audible), music (bandcamp), web browsers (Firefox/Chrome), and probably more I'm not thinking about right now.
- No GPL on the app store
If this were just about "Facebook is mad because they can't data mine and stay on the app store" there would be a much stronger case, but in the world we live in, Apple has abused their so-called "user advocate" position to advance their own interests at the expense of their competitors, and users, in many other ways. They did not have to do this.
If you want to be upset at someone, be upset at Apple for inviting the typically heavy and imprecise hammer of the state when they could have just stayed in their lane and not behaved like greedy controlling puppet masters.
Essentially, what I believe that parent comment is calling out is that Apple is currently (voluntarily) acting as a user advocate by discouraging exploitative behavior, and enforcing that position using their monopsony.
When the monopsony breaks down, Apple will lose the power to enforce this rule, and exploitative practices will become the new norm. Of course, this does take a somewhat paternalistic view of users, in that it assumes that people will continue to use TikTok, Instagram, and so on despite their privacy being grossly violated. I think that this assumption does have a strong precedence, however.