Apple will cut App Store fees in half for small-business developers of iPhone applications. But while the change sounds dramatic, it will actually lead to a relatively tiny reduction in Apple’s revenue, according to a market-research firm.
Apple on Wednesday confirmed plans to cut App Store fees to just 15% for many of its developers.
The lower rate, which comes into effect in January as part of the new App Store Small Business Program, applies to those who earn less than $1 million a year in app revenue and in-app purchases.
Apple’s two theft claims against Epic Games were on Tuesday dismissed by a federal judge in California.
Epic filed the counterclaims filed in September, just weeks after the game-maker sued Apple for alleged anti-competitive actions. Cupertino removed Fortnite, the hugely popular battle royale game, from the App Store after Epic gave players on iOS devices the ability to purchase in-game currency outside of Apple’s ecosystem.
Like most tech giants, Apple and Google have a strange “coopetition” relationship, whereby they simultaneously compete and work together.
The latest example? Google, the company that spawned the rival Android mobile operating system, was the top developer in Apple’s iOS App Store last month.
What do you do when you pick up some food in the store, and want to quickly check how good or bad it is for you? You glance at the nutrition label, of course.
Throughout the last century, mandated labels on food forced manufacturers to reveal more and more information about the contents of their products — and their effects on people who consume them. Now Apple is bringing that same level of insight to apps in the App Store.
It’s about time!
As apps become ever more central to our lives — with increasing access to our most sensitive personal data — transparency about exactly how developers use that information is becoming more necessary than ever.
In its latest 10-K annual report, detailing its 2020 financial reports, Apple warns investors that if it’s made to reduce the commission it charges in the App Store, this could have a “materially adverse” affect on Apple’s bottom line.
Apple includes the clause, which seemingly hasn’t been in previous 10-K reports, at a time when Apple’s commission is being challenged. A number of developers and politicians have suggested that Apple’s control of the App Store in unfair, and that it charges too much.
The app economy has done well during the coronavirus pandemic but some categories have done better than others. According to a new report by app analytics platform Sensor Tower, one category of app that has done exceptionally well are home improvement apps.
In the United States, first-time installs of the top home improvement apps doubled year-over-year between the months of March and September. Monthly active users also grew by 35% during that time.
If you live in Brazil, India, Indonesia, Russia, or South Africa, expect App Store prices to most likely increase over the coming days.
This will affect the price of apps and in-app purchases, and possibly other services like Apple Music — although auto-reneweable subscriptions won’t be affected.
The Coalition for App Fairness, a group of developers targeting what they claim is Apple’s unfair control of the App Store, has more than doubled in size since its formation last month.
According to a new report, the original group of 13 companies — which included the likes of Epic Games and Spotify — has now increased to 40, with another 400 requests to join.
Apple must avoid following a path blazed by Google. Years ago, the search giant touted its “don’t be evil” policy. But somewhere along the line, Google lost track of that — and ended up getting sued Tuesday by the Justice Department.
Apple, which faces similar scrutiny by a variety of governmental bodies, has a chance now to drop some of its questionable policies. If it doesn’t, Cupertino could end up facing its own lawsuit(s).
The encouraging news is, Apple is mostly a good company, so a few tweaks now could easily head off much larger adjustments down the line. Court-ordered changes — like a forced sale of the App Store — could prove painful.
Here’s why Apple needs its own “don’t be evil” policy, along with some concrete steps Cupertino can take to prove that it’s actually a force for good in the world.
Ex-App Store review boss Phil Shoemaker told the congressional antitrust subcommittee that Apple creates “arbitrary” rules which it uses as a “weapon” against competitors. One such example is allowing Apple Arcade, while blocking Xbox Game Pass.
Shoemaker’s testimony appears in the antitrust subcommittee’s 449-page report published this week.
The House Judiciary antitrust subcommittee revealed its recommendations for dealing with Big Tech Monday in a 449-page report, following 16 months of investigation.
While the report has recommendations for Amazon, Facebook and Google parent company Alphabet, it also focuses on Apple — and what needs to change to make Cupertino antitrust-compliant.
Despite far fewer installs than the Google Play app store, Apple’s iOS App Store raked in $19 billion to Google’s $10.3 billion in the third quarter of 2020, according to a new report by Sensor Tower.
Overall spending grew 32 percent in the quarter across both platforms. Meanwhile, overall installs increased 23.3 percent to a total of 36.5 billion. These record-breaking numbers likely had a lot to do with the coronavirus pandemic, which shut down large parts of the economy, but caused a spike in interest for developers while people were stuck home.
Apple’s default apps could potentially be banned from coming preinstalled on new iPhone and iPads in Europe, according to draft European Union legislation.
The so-called Digital Services Act is intended to level the playing field for smaller companies wanting to compete with “gatekeeper platforms” (aka tech giants). The EU currently has two investigations into the App Store and one into Apple Pay.
Apple has reportedly removed a pair of RSS reader apps, Reeder and Fiery Feeds, from the App Store in China due to their ability to allow users to access information the country would rather they not see.
It’s not clear exactly what prompted this particular banning, but China has been cracking down on RSS feeds since 2007. That year, it initiated a blanket ban on all web-based RSS feed aggregators. In 2017, Apple removed RSS reader app Inoreader from the App Store in China.
In other words, this may be less a case of “What did Reeder and Fiery Feeds do wrong?” than “how did they manage to survive as long as they did?”
Apple is giving businesses which host paid events online via the App Store reprieve on having to pay Apple a 30 percent cut.
Apple reversed the policy late last week, although it will reportedly only do so for three months as businesses reel to try and come up with new ways to make money during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Spotify, Match, and Fortnite developer Epic Games have joined a nonprofit that advocates for regulatory and legal action against Apple for what they claim is it unfair control of the App Store.
Their main objection is the way that Apple charges up to 30 percent for in-app payments. Apple lays out a detailed set of rules which apps must follow in order to be allowed in the App Store.
It still blows my mind that Doom and Doom II, games I remember being awestruck at the existence of on a home computer, can now fit onto a device the size of a deck of playing cards.
Now, thanks to an update by developer Bethesda, the iOS ports of these two classic titles are now better than ever. Here’s what they’ve added to this duo of gaming classics.
Apple laid out new rules for streaming games services hoping to be listed the App Store. But it’s not clear if the changes will result in Microsoft, Google Facebook and others actually introducing iPhone and iPad versions of their services, which are already available for other platforms.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg thinks Apple’s control of the App Store should be scrutinized. In an interview for Axios on HBO, the Facebook overlord said that Apple has “unilateral control of what gets on phones, in terms of apps.”
Zuck went on to say that this power meant that there are questions that should be asked about whether this is “enabling as robust of a competitive dynamic.”
Despite the challenges it continues to face, TikTok was the most downloaded non-gaming app worldwide on iOS and Google Play in August, a new report by app analytics platform Sensor Tower claims.
In total, TikTok was downloaded upward of 63.3 million times during the month. That is a slight increase of 1.6% from the same month last year. Indonesia and Brazil were the most popular growing markets for the app during the month.
The Epic Games v. Apple fight got a bit uglier on Tuesday. For the first time, the iPhone-maker asked that Epic Games pay damages for breach of contract. The two companies are arguing over whether Apple has the right to 30% of in-app purchases in the wildly-successful game Fortnite.
It will soon be possible for developers to give out codes to customers that bring discounts on subscription fees for software or services in the Apple App Store. The goal is to help app creators “acquire, retain, and win back subscribers” with these one-time use codes that people can then easily redeem, according to Apple.
The App Store ecosystem created almost 300,000 new U.S. jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic, Apple said Tuesday. It now supports more than 2.1 million people across all 50 states.
Apple pointed out that apps have become even more critical to Americans’ everyday lives as they adapt to new ways of working, learning and connecting during the coronavirus outbreak.
If a law proposed on Tusday to the Russian State Duma gets enacted, then Apple would only be able to collect a 20% commission on software sold through the App Store. And it would force Apple to allow iPhone users to install apps from other software stores.