In that case, let's have that conversation as a society and as a government. "Are companies listed in Table 1 and 2 in collusion as defined by current law?".
In most of the Apple 30% conversations, the conversations seem to be about an instance (Apple) instead of an object (Digital Store Tax, Collusion etc). Lets set the frame and be clear about the conversation we want to have regardless of the business we talk. We can use Apple, Microsoft et al as examples to make the point. We shouldn't replace them with the overarching discussion.
i personally think anti-trust/anti-monopoly regulations should be tightened by an order of magnitude or so. any market that exhibits such extended, obviously inflated profit margins needs to be sliced up more finely. any market participant with more than ~10% market share should be scrutinized closely. piercing the corporate veil should be the norm with any anticompetitive infraction (as well as embezzlement, insider trading, and other such executive crimes).
in short, make markets fair (not just 'free').
and in turn, that should allocate capital more efficiently throughout the economy, rather than letting it accumulate inefficiently in fewer and fewer hands.
I'm all for it. What's your concrete proposal to change in the current law for digital store distribution "tax"?
They somehow think that this brand of 'freedom' without regulation will not decent into rule of the strongest and basically tyrany, just like it has every time in history.
They have not heard about standard oil market manipulation, railway monopolies, the Phoebus Cartel and others
They do not understand that regulation is what stands in the way of other people taking your freedoms.
for instance, make platforms like apple allow other app stores equal footing on their platform. then they would have to compete on price and features to get the best apps to be on their app store rather than resting on their laurels of being the only viable option. apple already has lots of advantages, so they don't need monopoly power on top of that to be able to compete effectively.
Also this would mean that you are killing off a feature to the end user (me in this case) where I actually like the walled garden as I don’t need to check and verify apps I download.
I understand where you are coming from but if I bought an iOS device (for my parents) I want them to not have a way to install other apps. For me that’s a feature. I don’t want there to be a way to enable anything that allows them to side load or use a different store. This is me as a consumer.
As a developer I see it like this: my (potential) customers decided to use Apple for a reason. I have to respect their decision. If that means I make 30% less than I can try and convince them to use Android and side load but I should respect their choice. Would I like the 30% off for myself - sure.
I think a big part of the discussion misses the reason ppl have chosen iOS and the arguments come from only one side.
If we can get to a position that makes sure that you keep you current state (gatekeeper + trust in iOS App Store + can’t get scammed with malware apps) but allows the option to distribute outside of that would be ideal but I’m too stupid to think of it :D
I just don’t want to kill off a feature I paid a huge amount of money (iOS devices for every close family member) to have and I feel that should be respected. :)
So in fact you’re be losing the walled experience
Honestly I think if maybe allow sideloading is an a setting available only for the iCloud family organiser to enable that mitigate most of my use cases.