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Apple just kicked Fortnite off the App Store

(www.theverge.com)
1704 points ardit33 | 1 comments | 13 Aug 20 19:03 UTC | HN request time: 0.239s | source
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throwaway140820 ◴[14 Aug 20 04:16 UTC] No.24153297[source]▶
Apologies for the extreme swearing that ensues.

Wow, I would have hoped for better support from the HN community. Instead there are apologists after apologists. So what if Epic is big. Really, seriously shouldn't we have had alternative app stores available form the official ones. Why is this even a point of debate? All the time we hear stories of people one of our own getting fucked by these app stores and their lordship and now that we have an opportunity to make some noise, this is the response? Fuck that. Maybe we deserve these lords.

Fuck your security and fuck your walled gardens. Fucking no alternative browser allowed. Fuck that, fuck you apple and fuck you google. Fuck your monopoly and chokehold on the devs.

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msh ◴[14 Aug 20 04:28 UTC] No.24153395[source]▶
Why does epic single out two platforms and not also sue Microsoft (Xbox), Sony and Nintendo. Seems like double standards to me.
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1. garmaine ◴[14 Aug 20 04:55 UTC] No.24153685[source]▶
Because Epic has so much sway in the video game console arena that the console makers (except perhaps Nintendo which relies more on 1st party content) would never dare take anticompetitive action against Epic, or at least do while granting Epic-specific concessions which make it hard for them to have standing for a anti-monopoly lawsuit.

Epic wants an antitrust decision from the courts and/or regulators, and that requires them to get a clear, unequivocal rejection from the platform owner to have unchallengeable standing. A game console maker would have met Epic halfway, but Google and Apple did not.

The timing is probably also critical: Google and Apple just testified to Congress that they're not engaging in monopolist behavior because they treat every applicant equally. To back down from that right now would mean they perjured themselves before Congress. That's something no one in their right mind would want to do.