The board could argue that it's damaging to the company's brand and long term bottom dollar to charge such usurious fees and fire the CEO for taking such a harsh stance with app developers.
This nonsense has been parroted so often by now there should be a name for it.
And I'll be happy to prove you wrong: there are many things that Apple could do but hasn't done yet that would make them money and yet nobody is suing them for that. For instance they could make the cut 35% or 50% and if they don't then shareholders would sue. But they won't.
I’m not sure we’re actually disagreeing. Boards are expected to maximize long-term shareholder value, not mechanically maximize short-term revenue at every opportunity. Sometimes that means pushing harder on extraction; other times it means holding back because of regulatory risk, developer backlash, or brand damage.
The claim isn’t that Apple must raise fees to 35% or be sued—clearly that’s not how fiduciary duty works. The claim is that, over time, dominant platforms tend to increase extraction once they’ve locked in users and developers. That pattern has been observed repeatedly, and it’s what people are pointing to when they talk about “enshittification.” Individual fee levels can vary, but the long-term direction for monopoly or duopoly platforms is fairly consistent.
The board could argue that it's damaging to the company's brand and long term bottom dollar to charge such usurious fees and fire the CEO for taking such a harsh stance with app developers.
They could do a lot of things.
This. The board and the shareholders are the ones with the real power.
This nonsense has been parroted so often by now there should be a name for it.
And I'll be happy to prove you wrong: there are many things that Apple could do but hasn't done yet that would make them money and yet nobody is suing them for that. For instance they could make the cut 35% or 50% and if they don't then shareholders would sue. But they won't.
I’m not sure we’re actually disagreeing. Boards are expected to maximize long-term shareholder value, not mechanically maximize short-term revenue at every opportunity. Sometimes that means pushing harder on extraction; other times it means holding back because of regulatory risk, developer backlash, or brand damage.
The claim isn’t that Apple must raise fees to 35% or be sued—clearly that’s not how fiduciary duty works. The claim is that, over time, dominant platforms tend to increase extraction once they’ve locked in users and developers. That pattern has been observed repeatedly, and it’s what people are pointing to when they talk about “enshittification.” Individual fee levels can vary, but the long-term direction for monopoly or duopoly platforms is fairly consistent.
No, the claim is that if a CEO would make the decision not to pursue a particular revenue stream that the company would be sued. This is bullshit.
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