Apple has won an appeals court ruling upholding its App Store’s policies in an antitrust challenge brought by Fortnite-maker Epic Games.
Monday’s ruling by the US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a lower-court judge’s 2021 decision largely rejecting claims by Epic, the maker of Fortnite, that Apple’s online marketplace policies violated federal law because they ban third-party app marketplaces on its operating system. The appeals panel upheld the judge’s ruling in Epic’s favor on California state law claims.
The ruling comes as Apple has been making changes to the way the App Store operates to address developer concerns since Epic sued the company in 2020. The dispute began after Apple expelled the Fortnite game from the App Store because Epic created a workaround to paying a 30% fee on customers’ in-app purchases.
“There is a lively and important debate about the role played in our economy and democracy by online transaction platforms with market power,” the three-judge panel said. “Our job as a federal court of appeals, however, is not to resolve that debate — nor could we even attempt to do so. Instead, in this decision, we faithfully applied existing precedent to the facts.”
MacDailyNews Take: The big loser here, as has always been the case, is Epic Games.
It’s Apple’s App Store. Of course they have a right to charge commissions.
Apple’s App Store isn’t a charity and it’s not free to operate. – MacDailyNews, November 14, 2022
How much did it cost developers to have their apps burned onto CDs, boxed, shipped, displayed on store shelves prior to Apple remaking the world for the better for umpteenth time? Apple incurs costs to store, review, organize, surface, and distribute apps to over one billion users. — MacDailyNews, June 10, 2022
The bottom line is clear: Epic Games wants to enjoy all of the benefits of Apple’s App Store, including access to well over one billion of the world’s most affluent users for free. That is illogical, unfair, and, basically, theft. – MacDailyNews, May 4, 2021
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MDN’s take is perfect — concise; cogent; and correct. The 3 Cs.
There is no free lunch for Epic!
The three c’s for Apull scenic apply – clueless curt countryman
Bart with an F!
Sucked in, scenic