Comment by sneak
9 months ago
I agree with this, but then look at Uber: Without the cooperation and approval of Apple and Google via their respective developer programs and app stores, they wouldn't exist because you couldn't do notifications or location in webapps at the time.
There are myriad examples like this of downright giant startups that would not exist if they refused to proceed just because Apple can veto them. Instagram is probably the largest example. Look what happened to Tumblr.
Depends on the size of the business. Apple/Google can screw over small businesses all day long, but once they start getting bigger there is some assumed risk on A/G's part in future anti trust lawsuits if they screw over companies with enough wealth to hurt them in court.
These are inspite of.
The moving fear is being vetoed only works for well funded startups. A small independent startup would have to consider this before betting the farm on a product that might get smashed by the feeling of the day Google and Apple app moderators have.
But should those app stores even be the sole judge of whether or not those apps can exist?
Uber could sell their own devices to users and drivers. The app is _that_ useful for millions (billions?) of people, that people would buy it. People used to buy separate GPS devices, so it's not something out of the ordinary.
Spotify tried this, did not go well for them. Amazon and Meta learned the same many years ago
Maybe Spotify didn't put enough effort into it? And besides, listening to music was nothing special, people had portable music players for decades before Spotify. Uber opened up a completely different way of transport. I don't doubt that they would have success with their own device.
Amazon have been extremely successful with their dedicated book reading device, the Kindle. So thank you for that example. That really shows that Uber could have had success with their own device, better than I can argue for it.
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