Mike Peterson
If enacted into law as-is, a piece of antitrust legislation recently introduced by the U.S. House would make it illegal for Apple to offer first-party preinstalled apps like Pages, Music, and Maps on iPhone.
The U.S. House earlier in June introduced five sweeping antitrust bills aimed at curbing the market power of tech giants like Apple. According to U.S. House Judiciary antitrust subcommittee chairman Rep. David Cicilline, one of those bills would mean that Apple couldn't preinstall its own apps if those apps competed with rivals on the App Store.
"It would be equally easy to download the other five apps as the Apple one so they're not using their market dominance to favor their own products and services," Cicilline told reporters on Wednesday.
Instead of automatically preinstalling apps, Apple would need to offer its own apps alongside third-party options. That could mean seeing a prompt to install Zoom or Skype alongside FaceTime, or WhatsApp alongside iMessage.
The Ending Platform Monopolies Act was among the five antitrust bills introduced by lawmakers on June 11. It specifically makes it illegal for technology companies to operate a line of business that creates a conflict of interest.
Cicilline also claimed that the bill would affect Amazon, which operates a digital marketplace but also sells its own first-party branded products that compete with third-party offerings.
The U.S. House Judiciary Committee is slated to review and modify the five bills in late June.
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67 Comments
So if I build my own phone and my own os, and sell it as a single product, I would be barred from loading my own apps on it?
I’m about to call my state Congress Representative and let her know my opinion that she should reject the Bill.
How is this a thing!!!???
Will grocers be required to bid out their in-house bakery space or in-house pharmaceutical clones? Or can they still pre-load them?
There is such a disconnect here.
MS got into monopoly trouble not for merely including IE with Windows, but for using their dominance in the OS space to force desired behavior from partners -- specifically denying OEM computer makers needed Windows licenses unless they promised to stop including Netscape with their computers. That was the anti-competitive behavior. Apple has not done the equivalent of that.
This is wrong. First off I am an IOS user and I do not mind in today’s world getting apps from Apple, installed by Apple, for Apple product that I purchase. I like several things about that. Continued development of the product, no charge updates for the apps, as well as support for the product. For one instance I have tried Several calendar apps and I could purchase them as well as pay monthly, but I like the included apple app. Same with the notes app, however for a more featured note app, yes I have purchased several and use them for specific reasons. As for PDF’s, yes I have punched a an app and pay a yearly fee to use it over the included Apple app, because it contained features that Apple did not have. I think in the end the Apple included apps do not stifle 3rd party apps but in reality they spur additional apps, free and or otherwise with increased functionality over that which Apple offers.