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Apple. Developers. And crypto. A lot has been said lately mostly to criticize Apple app store rules and fees. And although the situation is far from perfect I feel the critics are just one sided and miss a bigger picture.
Here are my (balanced)thoughts on the topic
Here are my (balanced)thoughts on the topic
The app store has been around for over 10 years. If you have been there long enough you know that the ecosystem is vastly increased and rules substantially changed. For eg at first only listed cryptos were allowed and no one knew is new tokens would be approved. Not any more
It surely would be better if Apple has no rules and would allow anything in the App Store right ? Well, no. The virtue of a curated store is to add a layer of protection for customers that developers alone Would not or could not. Including from themselves (bugs and so on)
The App Store is exposed to 1 billion people who are clueless about crypto and its complexity and risks. Apple as private company is also liable of what it allows in its store. It is legitimate for them to want to protect users.
In that sense they do not allow apps to become their own App Store of apps in particular not listed in the App Store. This is why dapp browsers are not allowed. Those who are is simple oversight which will end up being corrected.
Steve Jobs said it once. The App Store is just a bunch of people making decisions. Sometimes they make bad decisions and course correct. This goes both ways: approval ending up in rejections and rejections resolved in approval.
But certain rules do not change. And even the recent turn in direction regarding streaming apps for games shows that Apple is ready to change but always care about curation.
On dapps not being able to charges w/ crypto. Apple has a rule that digital items can’t be charged by something else than in app purchase. While I find it very restrictive I understand the logic. If consumers started to make purchases and complained to Apple what would they do ?
Apple does not reject dapps. They clearly allow them when natively integrated and disclosed and not making people buy digital items via crypto. We know it first hand because this is how we deal with it @ZenGo and others too
You can also include a wallet connect and let users connect to whatever dapp including mobile to mobile. But not in the native app. If Apple was clamping down on crypto apps they would restrict both native integration and wallet connect. They don’t.
Finally and against what @brian_armstrong is saying Apple has nothing against earning crypto. They don’t block airdrops. They don’t block referral programs like ours paid in crypto (including coinbase own).
What Apple is clamping against is offer walls of disguised and undisclosed ads presented as educational videos. This is considered deceptive and on the edge of illegal. Coinbase should be clearer and honest about this.
Sure Defi is a cool lab but given how scammy and hacky it is can’t blame Apple for wanting to control more and not less. Imagine what would app reviews and consumers would look like in front of a pull rug. Imagine crypto twitter * 100000
On the 30% store fee. Crypto should not complain about this given the enormous margins and money the industry makes I do understand the difficulties for low margins businesses (commerce. Media ) and for those Apple should work toward a tier 2 fee model.
The one thing I would however gladly welcome is apple finally allowing to charge at some point stable coins for certain vetted and approved services. It would not hit their bottom line and unlock crypto payments. One step at a time.
Is Apple perfect ? No. Is this system stuck? No. If you are a developer you know you can talk to them. The right way. Many channels exist including the new appeal process. In my experience they are way more open to dialog than google for example.
A propos Google. Things don’t look much better there. Recent history show how aggressive they are against developers (epic ) infringing rules. Tens of thousands of apps removed testify to that.
But developers hit Apple first because this is where most money is made. We all know it. It is however ironic that the biggest voices against Apple are walled gardens with historical toxic developer or artist policies (Spotify. Facebook. ...).
Crypto and the App Store could be much better but for that we need more developers working together and speaking with Apple. Not against them. And certainly not in public channels alone.
At ZenGo we had our fair share of rejections. But always were able to resolve them swiftly. Knowing the rules matter. Crypto doesn’t like rules. But this is how it is.
Steve Jobs said it. You can use the browser. It is unrestricted. No one will reject you there. But users have voted. They want native apps. Play by the rules.
Should Apple allow an unrestricted mode to allow everything like on the Mac ? Maybe it will happen. They recently allowed default browser to be changed. Maybe a first step. But that will come with a price. No more guarantees from Apple.
Fin
Ps. The one area where I feel Apple is unfair and hard is how crypto apps are never promoted by Apple in editorial. Not once. Sure. They have to protect consumers. But apps approved have passed a filter. Why not enjoy what other 2 million apps have already. Why discriminate
