jollins's comments

I’m pretty certain the price removal was due to App Store and Play store policy. If you list the price, users expect to be able to purchase in-app, which then means Audible forks over the 30% tariff the platforms take.

This writer is really entitled. It is a free tier for a service that costs money to host and maintain. Of course there are upgrade prompts.

I use Feedly (free) as a hosting service, and Reeder or one of the other many great RSS client apps as the frontend to it, so I don’t have to see the feedly interface.But the Feedly API I use constantly and it is extremely solid.

That’s part of the greatness of RSS services. If the service’s UI bothers you, you don’t have to use it.

They have. See their responses to the Senate anti-trust panel. Also in numerous interviews.

Is the Epic game store the only place to get software on Windows?

I realize this won’t change your simplistic “Europe good USA bad” worldview but relatively high CA taxes do support good social services and as a CA resident I have benefitted. There is a strong paid family leave program for new parents or those caring for ill family, for instance.

Why do you keep bringing up examples of other corporations acting like jerks to excuse Apple acting like a jerk?

A video game console isn't used for programming, video production, writing, homework, etc. You know what I mean. The fact that they are specially packaged PC parts is beside the point.

You keep bringing up video game distribution though, so let's roll with it. Pretend all of software was like video game distribution. How much worse would software be for users? Imagine FOSS on that.

The rules on the store in this area have changed interpretations without notice. It not being a new rule but becoming far more strict all of a sudden is a big part of the issue.

Also, going to the press works. DHH is taking one for the team by fighting this.

To clarify, Hey does provide only a login, and no outside linking (or reference to outside payment, as Apple requires). Apple is now requiring that in-app-purchases must exist for "consumer apps" that aren't "readers", based on a changed interpretation of existing rules. If the above sounds ambiguous to anyone reading this, that's the issue.

I see the game console argument come up a a lot and I really don’t think it sticks.

Game consoles are not general purpose computers and have a much more narrow intended purpose. Apple themselves argue that the iPad is just as capable (or more so) than your typical computer, which means that we expect it to be capable of computer-y things which are inherently flexible and versatile, not hamstrung by Apple’s rent-seeking behavior.

This also isn’t about 100% transparency of Apple’s costs — saying it is misdirects. We don’t know their costs (though it certainly is below 30% of all revenue passing through in-app-purchases), that isn’t the issue. Requiring 30% of others’ revenue and being forbidden to even mention alternatives is another matter.

The Facebook html5 example predates react-native and all the other under-the-hood features and apps powered-by-JS that people don’t notice now.

Facebook was pouring resources into their HTML5 mobile apps ten years ago. I’m not saying web apps on mobile feel native now by any means, but I don’t think that’s a good example of a big company trying and failing anymore.

As you said yourself though, this was 10 years ago.

This isn’t good advise. Angular 1.X is discontinued and uses confusing patterns not used in Angular 2 , React, Preact, Vue etc. specializing in it is a very bad career move.