Google will appeal the decision: https://www.theverge.com/2023/12/11/23996902/google-will-appeal-the-epic-v-google-verdict
Look, I despise Google as much as anyone these days, and I’m glad they’re taking a beating this time around, but at the same time, it’s also kind of bullshit. And it’s not even because you can sideload apps, or have alternate appstores on Android, but because we have yet to see the same standards being applied to Apple.
I don’t understand, this is bullshit because Apple won their case? Do you mean the Apple case was bullshit?
Right. Apple is even more restricted but somehow won their case. Makes it all seem like bullshit.
The judge in their case decided that the relevant market was mobile gaming, not app stores or in-app payment processing, and since technically Apple didn’t have a monopoly there, the whole monopoly claim by Epic was deemed invalid by that judge. Courts can be stupidly black & white sometimes but that’s how it is and a whole case can be tossed out based on a technicality. Google v Epic however was a jury trial and Epic obviously took lessons from their loss against Apple.
Google is a monopoly. Apple in many ways, is also a monopoly. They are lamenting that the latter was not acknowledged.
Definitely a case of “good, now go do apple again”. The mobile marketplaces being locked down and tied to services is bullcrap. If I want a run of the mill open source android OS and to be able to use Gmail (or drive, or some other Google product ) I should not have to allow Google full access to the knowledge of every app I run and the screen time and my location information… Etc, etc.
But I do think the apple win on a technicality will be revisited at some point.
And to be clear, I freaking do not like Epic. But this fight they’re on the side I agree with. Open up the mobile platforms.
Google is a monopoly.
Web search, sure. Online video, sure. Mobile operating systems in the US specifically? Uhh, no.
On Android you can install unapproved apps and even entire app stores. The barrier to having people install your app is a couple of taps (approximately as difficult as it’d be on Windows when you’ve got to approve UAC a time or two).
So, it is kind of ridiculous in comparison that they lost but Apple with an entire walled of ecosystem that you can’t bypass without finding a zero day exploit won their case.
With that said, I know a lot of people who only buy Apple BECAUSE of that walled off ecosystem and conversely I know people that primarily buy Android for their relatively open system, so I’m in the minority where I think neither Google nor Apple should have to change in this particular regard. Both companies suck, but charging the same price they always have for their app store isn’t the issue I’d fight them over.
The barrier to having people install your app is a couple of taps
Not entirely true. Google has a history of making it as difficult as possible for other app stores to run without outright locking them out as possible.
Not disagreeing, but sidelosding is obvious for people like us who have tinkered with smartphones, especially back when most devices used to be ‘open’ and tons of 3rd party roms were around. It’s obvious for us who know about adb commands and developer settings. It’s not so obvious when you’re a new customer who got their 1st galaxy phone - you’d have no idea there’s something else other than Google play for apps.
Why are you mad about this?
Google absolutely does.
Name me 4+ more Android app stores you can use?
Not that I am defending Google but there are plenty
Amazon App Store
Galaxy (Samsung) App Store
F-droid
Mi GetApps
SlideME
The only thing we’ve learned today is that Apple’s lawyers are far better than Google’s…
Yeah… How the fuck is Google action here “monopolistic” and Apple literally refusing to let anyone in at all somehow isn’t? What a joke.
Because iOS is Apple’s OS on Apple’s hardware. The court ruled they could do what they want. Android is not Google’s OS, even if it’s mostly theirs, and they certainly have no control over the hardware apart from Pixels.
Competition is possible on Android in a way it isn’t on iOS. Google was being anti-competitive in a space where others can compete, Apple was just being a bully in their own backyard.
That’s a really bad way to look at it if that’s really what it boils down to.
It’s so frustrating seeing this question constantly in all these threads when this has been explained.
iOS is locked down. It is not an open, competitive market. That in itself is not against the law, and it won’t be considered an anti-trust issue until the market share grows.
Android is not locked down, which means it’s a competitive marketplace.
Google was not doing the same thing as Apple. Google was using shady deals to make Android less competitive. iOS was never competitive to begin with.
Apple got off on a technicality, basically.
What Apple does is shitty and deserves regulating, but apparently we have a ways to go before we reach the EU’s level of understanding on this.
It’s so frustrating seeing this question constantly in all these threads when this has been explained.
I’ve read your comment as well as a bunch of articles and I still don’t understand it. From the article: “[Epic] wants the court to tell Google that every app developer has total freedom to introduce its own app stores and its own billing systems on Android”. My Samsung phones comes with two completely different app stores out of the box, the Google Play one and the Samsung Galaxy one. The latter offers the Epic Games Store. I really cannot wrap my head around why in this specific case Google is being anti competitive.
To get access to the Play Store, OEMs have to bundle a bunch of additional apps and services. That I get for being anti competitive but that’s not what Epic’s case was about. They didn’t sue about their web search being disadvantaged by the Google Search bar mandate. They didn’t sue because they made a web browser nobody is using because of the Chrome mandate. They sued and apparently argued successfully that they cannot get their store onto Android phones and yet, as stated, my phone already comes with two app stores and EGS is listed in the second one.
Also the Browser extension store?
Wouldn’t they just argue you can use developer mode to install the extension? Or is that not available on mobile?
I think a lot of people here are missing the point that in a court legal != pro-consumer. The US has monopoly laws that Apple (annoyingly) follows but Google does not.
Apple follows the monopoly laws but Google doesn’t? Which one allows you to install alternative app stores again?
Because Apple does not break monopoly law. Which isn’t about installing app stores, would be weird if that’s in the law anyways given the age.
Apple sells a device they make, with firmware they create. That firmware allows plugins from a catalogue they curate because it’s all their ecosystem, top to bottom.
Google otoh creates an OS. More like MS or Canonical or so.
It’s a clever-evil (clevil?) gambit, right? Become the largest corporation on the planet, but somehow skirt being a monopoly technically. If Apple’s iPhone hardware team colludes with Apple’s App Store team, it’s just collaboration. If they did so with a third party, it’d be collusion.
Meanwhile:
- Third party Bluetooth hardware (like smartwatches) has to use an inferior API than Apple’s private one for their Bluetooth accessories
- Third party browsers have to use Apple’s rendering engine in degraded performance to Safari and can’t use their own
- Third party apps are forced to follow Apple’s power policy (ex: background apps can’t run over 10 minutes) while Apple’s apps can do what they want.
- Apple can circumvent third party VPNs to always allow their traffic to 17.0.0.0, so there is basically no way to block an Apple device from talking to Apple HQ except for taking it offline.
On Android you can take an OEM device and change most aspects of it to suit your needs. On iOS, nope. Sad thing is though, Google seems to be slowly closed-sourcing Android to be like a broken version of Apple.
In the end, we all lose.
The laws need updating, also the people in governance need updating so they can comprehend these things.
Edit: Formatting
Apple makes its own app store for its own OS to be used on its own devices. It doesn’t make anyone else bundle its services on third party devices.
It is more that iOS isn’t the market leader. If iOS had Android’s marketshare, Apple would have lost its case.
