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In the ongoing dispute over the financial framework in the App Store, Apple is accommodating the providers of apps for the second time within a week. The company has reached an agreement with the Japan Fair Trade Commission (JFTC), which has examined Apple's app store practices for five years: In the future, providers such as Netflix, Amazon and Spotify, as well as media publishers and e-book providers, will be able to use their respective stores Apps direct potential customers to their own website via a link. For example, they could create a paid account for the respective service outside of Apple's App Store.
For users, this could lead to cheaper subscriptions if they accept the somewhat more cumbersome way to take out.
Because if the deal is done via a website, Apple does not share in revenue from in-app purchases - on which the company has earned well for many years.
It's Apple's second small concession to regulators and app developers in a week.
Last Friday, in a comparison, the group gave smaller developers the opportunity to send app users targeted information about subscriptions outside the app store.
However, this must not be done within the app itself, but must run outside the app - for example by email.
Apple demands a commission between 15 and 30 percent from app providers. So far, the company has tried to prevent the developers from directing their users to external payment alternatives. The agreement with the JFTC now affects the "reader apps" - and not only globally in Japan. “Reader apps” are applications with which previously purchased content or subscriptions for digital magazines, newspapers, books, audio, music and video content can be consumed.
The compromise with the JFTC does not specifically refer to game apps and will therefore not end the legal dispute with the "Fortnite" developer Epic. Epic boss Tim Sweeney wrote on Twitter that Apple should open its iPhone operating system iOS in terms of hardware, stores, payment methods and services and enable competition. "Instead, they literally recalculate divide-and-conquer every day, hoping to get away with most of their practices." A judgment in the process is expected in a few days or weeks.
Apple emphasizes that the App Store is a lucrative platform for app developers and at the same time protects users from attempted fraud.
The lucrative business model could not only be broken up by the Epic process, in which the game developer ultimately wants app providers to be able to operate their own app stores on the iPhone bypassing Apple.
The EU Commission also accuses Apple of unfair competition in the business with music streaming apps such as Spotify and aims in the planned digital services law to pave the way for alternative app stores on the iPhone.
pbe / dpa
