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Apple just kicked Fortnite off the App Store

(www.theverge.com)
1704 points ardit33 | 3 comments | 13 Aug 20 19:03 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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andreasley ◴[13 Aug 20 20:37 UTC] No.24148645[source]▶
Epic Games has filed a lawsuit [1] and published a Fortnite-themed parody of Apple's "1984" [2] to get some publicity for it.

[1] https://cdn2.unrealengine.com/apple-complaint-734589783.pdf

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euiSHuaw6Q4

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ulfw ◴[14 Aug 20 03:23 UTC] No.24152926[source]▶
A PR stunt from Epic and everyone's falling for it.
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0xy ◴[14 Aug 20 03:37 UTC] No.24153018[source]▶
A PR stunt that consumers and small businesses could benefit from. 30% decimates indie studios and makes some apps fiscally nonviable.
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tommymachine ◴[14 Aug 20 03:42 UTC] No.24153051[source]▶
You’re kidding right? You think this is going to make a difference in the cut?

The word you’re looking for by the way is “financially”. Fiscally is to do with taxes.

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surround ◴[14 Aug 20 03:52 UTC] No.24153117[source]▶
> You think this is going to make a difference in the cut?

I’m confused. Is that not the purpose of the lawsuit?

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1. tommymachine ◴[14 Aug 20 04:07 UTC] No.24153235[source]▶
It seems likely the purpose was to cause more people to think about the game Fortnite by virtue of the publicity from this.

It seem like something their lawyers pitched to them as “hey if it works, great, you save millions a year on the App Store percentage, and if it doesn’t, hey, at least you’ll get a whole lot of publicity, which should drive your sales up enough to more than compensate for the losses of being off the stores for a bit.”

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2. jjeaff ◴[14 Aug 20 06:20 UTC] No.24154359[source]▶
Seems like a very expensive stunt if they don't get concessions from apple. That app is literally making millions a week on iOS alone.
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3. tommymachine ◴[14 Aug 20 07:38 UTC] No.24154975[source]▶
Ah it makes sense now.

Epic is the maker of unreal engine, which collects a 5% royalty on licensee game sales over $1M.

So they would stand to profit somewhat more than just from lower fees on Fortnite.