Not sure how many people subscribe to anything on Lemmy, but let’s give it a try
30%. That’s robbery, it should be illegal.
It would be fine IF iOS allowed other app stores to compete with their own. This is why it’s fine when steam does it, because the game developers can always go to GOG or Epic or itch if they want
Steam has the biggest reach and has a Most Favored Nation policy. If you offer your product cheaper anywhere else, you’ll be exiled from Steam.
It’s required. And they’ll charge whatever the fuck they want and you’ll pay it. Otherwise, you’re never selling your game outside of your family.
This is completely incorrect.
The rule is that
You cannot generate Steam codes and sell them on alternative storefronts for less than you would sell them for on Steam for a similar length of time.
There is absolutely no rule saying that you cannot sell your game on alternative store fronts for less. There isn’t even a rule saying that you can’t sell Steam keys on alternative store fronts for less than you are currently selling them of Steam. Just not always selling Steam keys on alternative store fronts without at least sometimes selling them for that price on Steam.
I don’t think that’s a fair categorisations. I believe that is only for selling steam keys elsewhere.
Steam allows publishers to generate steam keys for their games at no cost. The publisher can then sell those keys elsewhere. The only requirement is the keys not be sold for less than the price charged on steam. ie if the publisher can sell the key on any other platform and valve gets $0.
Expecting valve to distribute your game and provide access to their steam works features for free while allowing a publisher to undercut them would be insanity.
https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/features/keys
Steam Keys are single-use, unique, alphanumeric codes that customers can activate on Steam to add a product license to their account. Steam Keys are a free service we provide to developers as a convenient tool to help you sell your game on other stores and at retail, or provide for free for beta testers or press/influencers. Steam keys are a free service, so we ask you to use good judgment and follow basic guidelines and rules around requesting and selling them.
But 30% is standard.
It has always been highway robbery. Yes, even Steam. Look at how desperate Microsoft was to copy it on their platform that was successful because it’s more open (than Apple).
Class action lawsuit against Steam’s 30%.
https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.wawd.298754/gov.uscourts.wawd.298754.1.0_1.pdf
Wrong, Apple does not provide any additional features besides taking a cut. Sure, maybe they provide the payment process, but that’s it. The moment you subscribe, you might as well forget Apple exists.
Steam, on the other hand, allows: cloud saves, family sharing, media library, big picture, controller support, Linux support, achievements, community, friends, groups, store with tag search, advanced review features, inventory, couch coop over internet, and fuckton of stuff.
I’d say 30% is pretty generous, given Steam’s reach. Also you are not forced to use Steam, you can you GOG, Epic (eww), Ubisoft, EA, Amazon, etc., while with Apple you can’t.
The moment you subscribe, you might as well forget Apple exists.
Slight disagree on this point. Having subscriptions tracked in one place and easily cancelled with a single tap does offer simplicity and some peace of mind. Unfortunately companies sometimes do unexpected things with subscriptions.
For example, say you turn off auto-renew during a promotional period. Often companies will take you through a please-don’t-cancel workflow where you have to find the hidden confirmation button. Worse IMO is when they end the promotional period immediately if you don’t keep auto-renew enabled. Protection from stuff like that must have some value.
Wrong, Apple does not provide any additional features besides taking a cut.
I do think 30% is a lot, but this is absolutely wrong.
Steam, on the other hand, allows: cloud saves, family sharing, media library, big picture, controller support, Linux support, achievements, community, friends, groups, store with tag search, advanced review features, inventory, couch coop over internet, and fuckton of stuff.
Compare this to the APIs and features Apple provides such as iCloud storage, family sharing, media library (both photos/videos and music, separate APIs), AirPlay, controller support, Game Center achievements and leaderboards, integration with iMessage, two whole game engines to build off of, AR API that’s used even by cross platform AR apps like Pokemon Go, a ton of UI/UX tools, and tons of other stuff you need to make an app.
The EU introduce the Digital Markets Act that is supposed to force Malus and Gogle to open up their ecosystem. Gogle is fairly open but for some reason another app store hasn’t made it big. Malus is just locked down as hell but now has AltStore in the EU.
Malus does however not abide completely by the DMA. Someone mentioned “notarisation” to me recently: they still have to approve apps on alternative stores, which the EU isn’t happy about. No one knows how long it’ll take for the EU to force Malus to play by the rules and get rid of notarisation though. Maybe with how the US is acting, it could speed that up, but my bet is on 2026.
Gogle is fairly open but for some reason another app store hasn’t made it big
Samsung has their own app store which I presume does reasonably well in their ecosystem, and Amazon maintains their own app store for Kindle. F-Droid is also reasonably popular with the open source and privacy focused crowd.
Samsung has their own ecosystem and their appstore is installed by default (power of defaults). Amazon is actually shutting down their appstore, so much for popularity.
Do you know any other app store that normal people actually install on their phone to get paid apps?
It pays for the development of system apis, update infrastructure, software deployment infrastructure, software development sdks and toolkits, among a bunch of other very expensive to maintain infrastructure. There’s the argument to be made to force them to allow competition, but I don’t think you can call it robbery from an informed 10000 foot view because everything they provide is extremely expensive and extensively technical to host/construct on your own.
Which doesn’t justify a cut of a 30%. I’m not saying they shouldn’t charge anything, but this is at usurious levels.
I don’t believe you can say that without adequately providing evidence and financial breakdowns. Not saying you’re wrong, but given that developers even in the EU where alternative app markets are allowed still publish to the apple app store, I think that it’s likely more fair than you realize. The cost to do all of what they provide for a $100/yr dev license + 30% pro-bono is immense. Even the least used applications with the smallest budgets receive state of the art infrastructure, toolkits, and security review as well as a bevy of other apple provided resources. It’s the same for other marketplaces as well. Steam for example provides marketing, development guidance, server hosting, and a wide variety of other non-trivial non-free to provide services for their share of the cut.
So does Google?
Deny the parasite profit
No, I just can’t do this one, I used to do that but Apple is great at giving my money back, there was a mental health app located in Europe that stole not 200$ but 400$ from me during a period I could not afford it.
They made two mistakes after I had already deleted the app and unsubscribes from the trial.
Apple is great at giving me my money back and I trust them , it takes 15 minutes most of the time.
Get a Fairphone. Buy European.
Fairphone 5 on Fairphone OS looking for alternative OSes. Do you guys use NFC payments, and apps with play protect, do they work well?
Should be illegal.
