Apple sued by French media over App Store power Apple faces fresh claims its App Store rules violate antitrust laws and stifle competition, now in a lawsuit filed on Monday, led by three French media conglomerates. Societe du Figaro, L'Équipe, and Le Geste publish news, cover sports, and produce other types of digital content across multiple platforms, including mobile apps …
There are a number of things I don't get in this action.
1) Why the hell is it a bunch of newspapers that are suing Apple about this ? How exactly are they impacted by the Apple Store's requirements ? If I'm not mistaken, in France (and pretty much everywhere else in civilized countries), in order to sue, you need to be wronged, or you need to prove that you represent wronged people. I fail to see how those newsies are wronged, and they are certainly not representing French iOS developers.
2) How can you possibly sue in your country for rules that are not followed in another ? I wait with baited breath to see how a judge is going to consider him/herself competent to judge that.
3) Why isn't it the French Chamber of Commerce, or some other governmental institution, that is handling this ? It's August, so they're all on vacation ?
This whole thing is a mess. An April Fool's prank that is 4 months late. Or, a marketing gimmick.
I expect the courts to throw it out summarily.
The answer to 1) is easy, newspapers and media content creators sell subscriptions to their users through the app store, and Apple will gladly collect 30% of that (just as Google does on its own app store)
The second point though is really astonishing, I thing is unheard of. That one country's law should be applied worldwide is a usual bet, an the US as a habit of trying it, but asking that another country's law should be applied in your own is just weird!
The French government, starting at its head, is a fully owned subsidiary of the GAFAM & associates, as the Uber story explained a few weeks ago.
So don't expect them to go to the rescue of any European company against their masters (unless perhaps banks start complaining - but you'll note that Apple doesn't get yet 30% of any wire transfer that you initiate or receive through your banking app on an iPhone).
Those "category stores" never happened for brick and mortar software either, other than games.
I wonder if they will sue Google next, because Android doesn't have the app stores targeted at categories they think should exist, and navigating the Play Store, as well as the alternate Android app stores, isn't any easier than Apple's App Store? If they will sue a company under another country's laws (trying to get a French judge to rule whether a US company violates US law, no less) surely they would be fine with suing Google for the failure of the alternate app store model to work the way they want it to! If they think it is hard for potential buyers to find their app on one app store, just wait until they have to search a bunch of app stores to find it...
The real source of butthurt seems to that they can't add something to the App Store and suddenly get a bunch of sales just because they worked hard on it. They see it as a crime that developers "must consider whether to spend the effort, time, and energy that is required to design and program an app or related product". Welcome to capitalism, if you decide create a new product there are no guarantees that effort will be rewarded!
They already have a perfect testbed for their brave new world where iPhones are unshackled and alternate app stores exist, with Android. If things are so bad on the iPhone side, surely the lawsuit is replete with examples of how great things are for them on Android, right? If not, why do they expect a different outcome on iPhone if their lawsuit succeeds?
If you want to sell a physical newspaper, then you need to pay the printers to make it, the distributors to get it to a region, and the individual shops who stock it. I’m pretty sure that adds up to more than 30% of the cover price…
It is why magazines want subscribers because posting it directly to people gives them more money.
I think the big chains even charge you depending on where the on the shelf you go I.e. pay more be on the front row.
Still suing someone in one country under the rules in a 3rd country seems really odd, and can these huge publishers not afford $99 a year…
@Giles C "If you want to sell a physical newspaper, then you need to pay the printers to make it, the distributors to get it to a region, and the individual shops who stock it. I’m pretty sure that adds up to more than 30% of the cover price…"
I sure it is way more than the 30% of the cover price and you might have a point if the digital price was the same. But it is not, digital newspapers are much cheaper, your apples to oranges comparison is irrelevant,
The UK paper I have a yearly online subscription for is almost 10% of the cost of buying the physical version daily for a year. A saving of almost 90% for a version that has much more content and can go back to content from previous editions.
L’un des principes essentiels du droit international privé conduit à retenir qu’un juge français peut être amené à appliquer une loi étrangère, dans la mesure où cette loi est désignée par la règle de conflit de lois compétente. Il est alors nécessaire que la teneur de cette loi soit établie. Il s’agit là de la question dite de la preuve de la loi étrangère devant le juge selon l’expression traditionnellement utilisée en ce domaine, même s’il serait préférable de parler de la question de la connaissance de la loi étrangère par le juge français.
https://www.dalloz-actualite.fr/flash/application-d-une-loi-etrangere-et-office-du-juge
Summary: a French judge can apply a foreign law.
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