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Comment by Evan__ | Hacker News Reader

You’re “not forced to use them” in exactly the same way you’re not forced to use Apple.

There's a fairly big difference between a duopoly, which, for the record, major government services rely on (if you want the COVID tracking app its either iOS or Android, if you want an app that your senator will use, you probably have to make it for iOS, etc.), and services that you can actually wholesale replace in your product like a payment processor. Not to mention certain school courses that are taught with iOS, etc. Apple has worked very hard to position themselves as one of the only players in the space, and they've succeeded! There is certainly an argument that the duopoly situation is fine, but it is in absolutely no way the "exact same" as with Apple and the AppStore.

Consoles are also effectively a duopoly, and yet Microsoft has argued that they should be allowed to keep third-party app stores off the Xbox while also signing on to the lawsuit to try and force Apple to open up their own.

I feel like you stopped reading my comment as soon as you hit the word "duopoly". Look at the specific reasons I gave why phone AppStores are different: they are increasingly necessary for everyday life. COVID-tracking, political interaction, school courses, paying for parking, etc. etc. The day XBox becomes one of the few ways to do these things, and not primarily a means to play video games, then it would be appropriate for the calculus to change there too. You can bring up Keurig coffee cups too, but the implications just aren't the same.

at the end of the day there is always an alternative to ios though: the other OS that controls 87% of the market.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/272307/market-share-fore...

ios isn't a monopoly, there is always the other option. The option that has six times the marketshare.

again, this is literally about shutting down any possibility of a company ever offering a "walled garden" model. It's not that apple is dominant in the market - they're not. You have many many alternatives to using their devices, they're about an eighth of the market. But even that eighth cannot be allowed to exist, that business model has to be shut down permanently.

That will be a crucial point of the ruling to come yes, as the full version is "You're not forced to use them to sell on the market", and it depends on what you define as "the market".

If you consider selling apps to ios devices to be its own market, then yes you are forced to use Apple. If you don't consider that to be its own market but only a part of the actual "phones and tablets apps" market then no you are not forced to use Apple.

I believe because of the size of their userbase that apps for ios devices are a market on their own, therefore "you are forced to use Apple" applies. Here the EU seems to agree.

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