UDock for apple instal1/15/2024 In particular, Epic repeatedly pointed to an initiative called “Project Hug” where the company paid major game developers like Activision and Nintendo millions of dollars in incentives to keep their wares in the Play store and persuade them not to create their own rival stores. Google’s dealings with app developers played a prominent role during the trial. Key differences: Google’s Play store v Apple’s App Store “It proves that Google’s app store practices are illegal and they abuse their monopoly to extract exorbitant fees, stifle competition and reduce innovation.” Apple did not respond to a request for comment. “Today’s verdict is a win for all developers and consumers around the world,” reads a company blog post that followed the ruling. ![]() Google intends to appeal the ruling.Įpic, meanwhile, wasted no time taking its victory lap. Wilson White, Google’s vice-president of government affairs & public policy, said the trial “made clear that we compete fiercely with Apple and its App Store as well as app stores on Android devices”. “So if you choose to do business with lots of different phone manufacturers, as Google does, then it could be that, even if you are in a sense more open, your dealings are more subject to antitrust laws.” “Antitrust laws are often about unfair business dealing and contracts,” Bergmayer said. In the Apple case, it’s simply that Apple only has one App Store and won’t allow any others Katherine Van Dyck John Bergmayer, the legal director of the non-profit consumer interest group Public Knowledge, said that an entirely sealed-off ecosystem means Apple really has no “duty to deal” with others. From damning internal documents to missing and deleted evidence, the company seemed to take every chance it could to present itself as the very archetype of a powerful monopolist sneakily trying to muddy the truth, experts said. Google was also repeatedly caught misbehaving. Crucially, they said, a jury rather than a judge decided the Google case, meaning the gaming company’s underdog narrative likely held more sway. Differing trial circumstances also likely steered Epic v Google in a different direction than Apple’s trial. Apple’s more closed-off app ecosystem actually made it less susceptible to antitrust enforcement, they argued. So why did a jury find that Google held a monopoly but Apple didn’t?Īntitrust attorneys and other legal experts pointed to several key differences in the two trials. When it comes to exclusivity, Apple has become synonymous with “walled garden” in the public imagination. Google has taken great pains to appear more open than Apple, licensing the Android operating system to third parties like Samsung and allowing users to install apps via other methods than the Play store. Both companies briefly banned Fortnite from their app stores in response. Epic had tried to implement a payment system within Fortnite in 2020 that would have bypassed Google and Apple. ![]() Both cases highlighted app developers’ longstanding resentment of Google and Apple’s in-app purchasing fees, which can top out at 30%. The gaming company alleged the iPhone maker also operated an illegal monopoly via the App Store a judge ruled against Epic in September 2021. The verdict surprised many observers because Epic had lost a very similar battle with Apple two years ago.
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