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Comment by khriss

2 days ago

No? Apple charges a fee on every app sale. Where do you think the app makers pay that walled garden tax?

Never spent money on an app on my phone.

  • You still suffer, because developers who don't want to pay the Apple tax on their apps simply avoid the App Store. You have no access to many good apps at all. Including FLOSS.

    • How many users actually care about those? Convincing customers to fork over money for an app at ALL is like pulling teeth.

      The only things I’d really miss on a phone ecosystem is like, game emulation and some more esoteric network data/file management functions. These are things that are almost inherently outside the range of interests for the vast majority of people and the main reason they’re restricted is because they’re so piracy adjacent that it’s basically impossible to extricate them from association with a whole bunch of technically illegal use cases.

      Little wonder then, that both the App Store proprietor AND App Store vendors would have an interest in locking those out to maintain the health of that platform as a viable place to run a business through.

    • I don’t care about apps at all, I avoid them wherever possible. Web stuff is good enough for most things.

      That being said I won’t purchase an apple device again if this one croaks

      1 reply →

Buying apps is hardly "all activity on a phone". It's completely inconsequential to my spend since summer of 2008, when I began using Apple products. Maybe a couple hundred dollars in total app store purchases? It would make no sense for me to base a decision about devices I use day and night over that small amount of money (30% of a couple hundred dollars).

  • > It would make no sense for me to base a decision about devices I use day and night over that small amount of money (30% of a couple hundred dollars).

    Fair enough. It might not be consequential for you, the fact remains Apple took 30% of every dollar you spent on the app store. This, after you paid a premium for Apple hardware. I'm happy the walled garden with a toll is worth it for you. All I'm saying is, others might not agree with that if they knew. Just look at the push back again tariffs as an example.