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Comment by titoCA321 | Hacker News Reader

Well Document Foundation is "free" to host their own payment services and download servers deal with customers and MasterCard and Visa and American Express to avoid paying the 30%. But they did not, so they must figure that they can't beat the 30% once all the costs add up.

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Are they? In the mac store? Because the comparison with payment on their own website is kinda irrelevant.

If you sell through the Apple App Store, Apple charges 30%. This is the industry standard when you sell through storefronts PlayStation, Steam, Xbox, etc. If they sell through their website then Apple doesn't charge any fees.

They knew well ahead that Apple would take a 30% cut so I don't understand why some commenters are saying about why this is a "problem."

Because they would make the same comment on the playstation, steam, xbox etc. store? I am not sure what you think the "problem" is supposed to be instead or why it needs quotation marks.

> I don't understand why some commenters are saying about why this is a "problem."

I'd prefer the money goes to the Document Foundation, who already need to pay to use the app store. It's not a major issue, but it's a downside to the decision in my eyes.

They already offer download servers for free, and I doubt a credit card fee comes close to 30%. I'm not positive what their reasons for choosing to charge on the app store are, but "they couldn't self host it for cheaper" isn't it.

You're right we don't really know the real reasons why Document Foundation charged the price they did, after all they could also put the app on the Apple Store without charging as well, and some developers do put apps on the Apple Store without any costs to the end-user.

There's a bunch of other related costs associated with commerce on apps. This is why some developers don't "charge" for apps or don't setup their own storefronts. Take credit card charge-backs or fraud disputes. By going through the Apple Storefront, Document Foundation is outsourcing that headache to Apple.

>Take credit card charge-backs or fraud disputes. By going through the Apple Storefront, Document Foundation is outsourcing that headache to Apple.

You know what also solves that headache? Offering a cost free download of your software. Like LibreOffice already does for MacOS, which they say is the recommended source for all users.

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