Apple just kicked Fortnite off the App Store

> This is just three big corporations fighting over their respective slices of the pie

Yes, this is how capitalism works. The companies can be started by virtuous, far-sighted dreamers, like Steve Wozniak, Larry Page and John Lennon, but then they get infused by money from venture capitalists and investors who just want ROI.

Once they hire more than 5000 people, the edges of the company are not controlled by dreamers - worker bees are employed to make money by leveraging whatever is there to be leveraged. And so the mission drifts.

Or else, the company fails or disappears, which is what happened to John Lennon's company, Apple Music.

We need to rethink capitalism, so companies can grow to medium size, and stay there, providing good things to their customers in a virtuous, mutually beneficial way.

Steve Jobs was at the heart of Apple as a distribution monopoly.

This is big corporations fighting over their respective slices of the pie, and this is beneficial to consumers. That is how capitalism works. Some (somewhat small to some) amount will go directly to consumers (vbucks discounts), some (most likely most) will go toward creating a better product (hiring more developers, artists, designers etc.) and a bit might go to each of those developers, artists, and designers (and/or improve their working conditions, hopefully reducing the number worked to their limits like eg. the Rockstar employees who created Red Dead Redemption 2, and other game devs who sleep at work). Unfortunately some will be wasted on lawyers, etc., but IMO that’s not much worse than it staying in the hoard of the world’s most valuable company, and worth the benefits to everyone else.

I'm not sure what you mean to emphasise with your italics, boogies.

The article is about Fortnite being excluded from Apple's monopoly distribution platform. That platform enriches Apple at the expense of consumers and software developers.

Are you saying it's a good thing that Apple can exclude Fortnite for trying to get around the Apple tax?

No, the opposite. I’m saying that Epic is demanding an exception for selfish reasons, but Apple waiving their fees will benefit consumers.

Thanks for clarifying, boogies.

I agree. Apple should not charge 30% for this type of transaction, which is just the resupply of virtual currency.

Apple should have a lower tier fee for this type of ongoing service transaction, which is clearly different to a sale in which a new customer is converted.

If Apple had a service tier with a fee of say 5% for virtual currency they’d still be compensated for providing the platform, but not excessively. Consumers and software vendors would benefit commensurately.

This two tiered model is just what happens in traditional pre-digital capitalism. Furniture stores charge 30-50% markup to cover the overheads of showroom rent and sales staff. Financial services companies like forex and credit cards charge 3-18% because they have different overheads and provide different value-add compared to retail sellers.

Was ever Steve Jobs a virtuous dreamer? He was a good designer and visionary but virtuous does not come to mind when I think about him.

Then start with the Playstation, Nintendo, Xbox and Steam stores. They take 30% off the top as well. Epic's store is only doing 12% for now as they try to catch up to the bus they missed.

Wanna get a DLC? They all take a percentage. Also regardless of the money you spend on making your game. They all have to review it and only if they approve will it get published. Going to selling some XBox physical disc? You pay your percentage on what you print not what sells. Also you need to use a trusted disc manufacturer, they pay a percentage to XBox also, note this is all the same for Sony and Nintendo.

You raise an interesting point, ekanjo. What does "virtuous" mean? I think I know what you mean, and I would agree with you if it means something like giving benefits to others ahead of self-enrichment. Wozniak is probably recognised by most people as the virtuous one of the duo, wouldn't you think?

Jobs was the superior business person. At least, it turned out that way after he returned to Apple, rescued it from Scully, and spent decades turning it into a behemoth that changed the world.

Woz might have given the computers away just for the joy of it, but where would that have left us?

Tens of thousands of developers owe their livelyhood to Jobs' vision. They get to make apps and everything else, all because Steve created platforms and ecosystems that would sustain an entire industry.

Still, that doesn't excuse greed. Jobs is gone now, so he can't evolve the app store into what it should be becoming, which is a more mature version of the quality platform he created.

It wouldn't take much to fix this current hoo ha. Apple could just introduce a lower fee tier for trivial sales such as the re-supply of virtual currency in games. If they took 10% instead of 30%, the problem would be over, the platform would continue, the community would still have opportunity, consumers could play their games and buy their apps, and life would go on. Does that sound virtuous to you, eklanjo?

> Tens of thousands of developers owe their livelyhood to Jobs' vision. They get to make apps and everything else, all because Steve created platforms and ecosystems that would sustain an entire industry.

That's typically a broken window fallacy. You can't take this a proof of anything because you do not know what the world would have looked like if Apple did not exist - such developers could have gone and made other things on other platforms as well. A great artist will be able to produce great work even if they have to use spaghetti instead of paint. Tools are just tools.

> That's typically a broken window fallacy. You can't take this a proof of anything because you do not know what the world would have looked like if Apple did not exist...

I see.

Your original comment to me was about Steve Jobs, and what to make of his intentions and his legacy. Would you care to share your thoughts about Steve Jobs?

> Would you care to share your thoughts about Steve Jobs?

I recognize the fact that he was probably a good leader when it came to driving Apple focus to make quality hardware and solid software integration (the original iPhone was a big step in making portable devices actually usable by everyone).

However, I was reflecting that the word 'virtuous' was a poor fit for a person like Steve Jobs. You can typically think of someone virtuous as having high moral standards and principles.

Jobs was constantly driving his company to make ridiculous false claims (saying that Apple was the first company to invent X or Y) which is deceitful.

Apple's business practices consist in making walled gardens everywhere (which is kind of anti-competitive and entice users to be locked down in the ecosystem) instead of developing standards that can be used and shared by everyone, and this is also something that Jobs spearheaded from the get go (right since the beginning of Apple).

Of course, everyone has different standards, but being a good citizen is about taking and giving back. I can't remember Jobs ever giving anything back to the tech scene.