Comment by anonymous908213
17 hours ago
That judge's ruling was essentially overturned last month on appeal.
> Even though Apple was no longer prohibiting linked-out purchases, the district court held that this new approach effectively prohibited linked-out purchases, and it violated the spirit of the injunction. The district court then enjoined Apple from imposing any commission or fee on linked-out purchases. However, the Ninth Circuit panel found that the complete ban was overbroad and punitive. Apple should be permitted to charge a commission based on costs that are genuinely and reasonably necessary for its coordination of external links and linked-out purchases, but not more.
"Genuinely and reasonably necessary", not being defined, will naturally be taken by Apple's malicious compliance department to mean "26%", I'm sure, and we'll get to enjoy a continued round of show trials in court with no meaningful effect for years to come.
I wouldn't describe that as "overturned" but rather "clarified a detail or two". They still aren't allowed to set arbitrary fees but if they can show receipts then they can demand reimbursement.
The idea seems to be that the injunction shouldn't be able to force Apple to operate a given account at an overall loss. They can bill you for resources of theirs that you actually use.
However, given we've seen how flagrantly they violated the first injunction, it's easy to believe they will take the liberty to interpret this one as maliciously as possible as well. Sure, if the fees are too high they'll end up back in court to attempt to prove costs, and maybe something will happen years later after bouncing around in appeals and violating new injunctions, or maybe it won't.