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Comment by starfallg | Hacker News Reader

>It’s a retail cut they’re used to from other platforms like Sony PlayStation, or Ticketmaster for concert tickets.

The counterpoint being that Ticketmaster doesn't take a 30% cut on consession sales at the event AFAIK.

That's the real issue - these stores are distributing some apps for free and some for pay. Hence free apps can sidestep paying the Google/Apple cut and then offer in-app payments directly. But that's entirely due to their business model of allowing free apps and taking a cut on paid apps.

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Ticketmaster's parent company is Live Nation which owns some concert venues and also manages concert tours. In both those capacities they do sometimes collect a percentage of concessions sold.

But that's only if they own/operate the venue. And there is commercial separation between the ticketing service and venue.

So it's like you use Google Firebase as the backend for your app and they take a cut under that agreement, as opposed to the Play Store agreement.

Ticketmaster often negotiates exclusivity rights to venues. Meaning you can’t use a different ticket selling service for that venue.

There was an attempt to argue they were a monopoly that should be regulated due to the % of the ticket they retained (Pearl Jam spearheaded this in the 90s). It didn’t work.

Also I see nothing wrong as a business model with the Firebase analogy. If you could convince customers to go for it, then why not? Will the business model police arrest you?

What I don’t get about these arguments is that they’re trying to get the government to punish a couple of companies that built a very successful business model purely because others want some of that dough. This isn’t about monopoly by any historical definition, it’s about sour grapes.

> Ticketmaster doesn't take a 30% cut on consession sales at the event

Ticketmaster doesn't provide as complex of a service as Apple does with the App Store.

To whom? Users want their non-malicious apps / non-fake tickets. Sellers want to sell their apps / tickets.

The service doesn't seem that complex. Executing the service well may very well be complex, but the service itself isn't.

If the App Store is more complex than Ticketmaster is by Apple's own doing. Certainly nothing that justifies taking 30% of all transactions that go near it.

Who gets to say it’s unjustified? As the judge said, there is zero evidence it is unjust.

Not sure what you mean, because Google/Apple also take a cut on in app payments.

That's the crux of the matter in the Epic suit, and my point being that Ticketmaster doesn't take a 30% cut in food and drink sales at the venue.

There is no law preventing them from trying!

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