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Apple Technology

Elon Musk Says Apple's App Store Fee is Equivalent To '30% Tax On Internet' 211

Elon Musk likened Apple and its App Store to the equivalent of a "30% tax on the Internet" and said the fee is "10 times higher than it should be," in a series of tweets responding to a Slashdot tweet about the European Union's latest antitrust complaint against the tech giant .
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Elon Musk Says Apple's App Store Fee is Equivalent To '30% Tax On Internet'

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  • by presidenteloco ( 659168 ) on Tuesday May 03, 2022 @04:22PM (#62500398)
    to use Internet on shiny Apple pocket device.
    You have other choices.
    • Technically, I'd bet that the overwhelming majority of apps exist today because of iOS demand.

      When you want to argue about choice, speak to the developer of your apps. You might find they carry around a shiny Apple pocket device by force.

      • Technically, I'd bet that the overwhelming majority of apps exist today because of iOS demand.

        That is prolly because Safari sucks.
        Most apps are just glorified version of the company website.

        • Almost all apps exist today to create revenue streams by selling you as the actual product. Doesn't matter what flavor of tracking turd you carry around in your pocket, that fact exists across the app universe.

          And damn near everyone has an HTTP(S) alternative. That excuse died when the internet turned 20 years old.

          (Everyone under 25) "Browser? The fuck is a browser?"

        • Glorified?

          When you discover that an app is a great way to track you better than using your web cookies you might realize that an app is worse.

      • So what? That is their choice. Those developers could be carrying non-Apple devices. What exactly does the Apple device do for them that a Google or Samsung device will not?

        If your answer is that their customers choose to use Apple devices, well, then pass the cost to the customer - it is the customer's choice to use Apple. There are always costs of providing service for a brand and that cost should be included in the price of the product. If you want to service any Tesla, you have to pay Elon's company t
      • You might find they carry around a shiny Apple pocket device by force.
        By the force of whom or what?

    • I like using an iPhone, but Iâ(TM)ve never had a need to buy any apps or use costly Apple cloud services. I keep a rooted android in my pocket too.
    • I hae an iPhone. Once I purchased it I have not given any additional money to Apple, not even a single penny, and I have not purchased any apps for which Apple will take a cut.

  • by luminate ( 318382 ) on Tuesday May 03, 2022 @04:28PM (#62500422)
    Hmm. It's kind of cool that Musk keeps responding to Slashdot tweets. I wonder if he's a Slashdotter. If so, hi Elon!
  • All the digital platforms, be it Google's Android play store, Apple's mac/ios app store, Microsoft's Windows and Xbox store, Sony's Playstation store, etc, should be forced to switch from a store to an open mall model, with the platform provider hosting it own stores upon the mall in competition with anyone else being able to set up a store on the same platform.

    With the exception of the platform providers own store and own apps, platform providers do do not get revenue direct from app creators/software vend

  • We were all here sitting on our hands wondering until the great thinker of our age to explain it to us 15-years after it happened.
  • by Petersko ( 564140 ) on Tuesday May 03, 2022 @05:00PM (#62500564)

    So, given that Apple does in fact have really large profit margins in general, I'm inclined to agree that 30% is probably high. but 10x? That seems a little silly.

    What is provided for that 30% isn't insubstantial. The argument, I suppose, is whether Apple should have the margins they have, not whether they are commensurate with the benefits derived by the seller.

    To accommodate a 90% reduction in revenue, what would need to be given up for the App Store to remain reasonably profitable? I mean in real terms.

    • So, given that Apple does in fact have really large profit margins in general

      Why focus on that? Why does the existence of high profit margins for a company require them to make a loss-leader? How does Apple's profit margin affect the 30% cut of Google, Gog, Microsoft, or Steam? How does Epic Game's lower cut causing them to actually lose money on the store weigh in on your point?

      Mall owner charges rent for shops wanting to setup in mall, boo fucking hoo. No one is forcing a developer / company to make an iOS app and charge for it.

    • by _xeno_ ( 155264 )

      What is provided for that 30% isn't insubstantial.

      What the fuck is provided for 30% though? Content hosting for the binary download I guess?

      The thing you have to remember is that Apple throws a ton of hoops in the way of you releasing something on their App Store. Until you've been through the process (and technically I haven't, I've just been involved in a project that tried and failed to get something fucking tested which involves going through a partial App Store process), you don't realize how much bullshit there is to dealing with Apple and the App St

      • And yet how many apps are on the App Store? Seems like if you tried and failed, the hundreds of thousands of successes might imply the problem is you? Apple makes nothing if your app is not published. It's in their best interests for it to be available. They don't put up barriers to their own revenues.

        Content hosting, payment management, the perception that your app has been "vetted" and curated, a sales provider that's generally trusted and whom the send users don't question, availability to a potential cl

        • Apple makes nothing if your app is not published. It's in their best interests for it to be available.

          Sure, but equally, they don't care if your app is published. As long as they have apps in every category, and people are paying, the system is working.

          Content hosting, payment management, the perception that your app has been "vetted" and curated, a sales provider that's generally trusted and whom the send users don't question, availability to a potential client bases of many, many millions of folks who statistically pay for apps more consistently than any other platform...
          These things aren't valueless.

          Clearly not, because people are still choosing to make apps for iOS. The real question though is whether Apple's policies actually benefit users, or harm them. Since there's no need to prevent sideloading to do all the things they normally do in the name of security (with the understanding that sideloaded apps may compromise the system) it's clearly for Apple

    • Re: (Score:2, Offtopic)

      by geekmux ( 1040042 )

      So, given that Apple does in fact have really large profit margins in general, I'm inclined to agree that 30% is probably high. but 10x? That seems a little silly.

      So does that obscene pile of cash they're sitting on. You can at least try and pretend you're not talking about one of the world's wealthiest companies. Like Big Oil, they didn't get that way by sipping on Capitalism.

      And the concept of reasonably profitable is able to be grasped at Apple about as well as giving and sharing on Wall Street.

  • No it's not (Score:4, Insightful)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Tuesday May 03, 2022 @05:20PM (#62500634)
    It's a tax on anyone who wants easy access to highly profitable consumers. If you just want to put together a website you don't have to give a penny the Apple.

    Apple computer and the iPhone one with Google and Android are still vast improvements over the state of cell phones and cell phone development before Apple jumped in with the iPhone and Google followed. I remember looking into a dev kit to make little mobile apps and finding I would have to pay one of the major carriers 10 or 15,000 dollars. And I would have to do that for each carrier. I can go out tomorrow and spend around 12 to $1,500 on Apple hardware or about half that on PC hardware and get started on mobile development.

    And if musk doesn't like it maybe he should have saved some of that $44 billion he just blew on Twitter and spent it making his own cell phone OS.
  • If we actually required the American mega-corporations to pay taxes, and enforced the tax laws, then it would be a moot point. People could pay a lot for services, but the corporations would pay us back.

    • ...People could pay a lot for services, but the corporations would pay us back.

      It's practically cute you assume the end result of this, would actually be a gift of lower taxes that would make it all the way down, into the wallets of The People.

      Capitalism much?

  • It's a free market. He's free to take his billions and spin a cell phone company and app store out of thin air. Seems to have worked well with the car company.

  • Are ya tired of reading about him yet?
  • Really, why make every Tweet to be a story or post. Who cares what this doofus thinks. He clearly just says random shit most of the time without thinking.

    Also, Apple/Google/Valve/etc. do a lot for their cut. Credit Card fees, charge-backs, hosting, very limited QA, offset the cost for the free stuff, etc. While yeah 30% will be too much, but I'm sure 3% they would lose money, or have to drastically cut back services/features.

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