I'm not a fan of what Apple is doing, and am happy to see it be tested in court.
But, I'm not a fan of another multi-million dollar company making such a blatant appeal to emotion, as if Fortnite needs to be "freed", to the common person who has no concept of how nuanced the legalities of this entire thing are.
I'll be happy when the theatrics are over with, and we can simply view the outcome of the legal precedent that is about to be set. This is a battle for the courts, not Twitter.
If they did so without overtly manipulating people via appeal to emotion and over-simplification, and not attempting to simultaneously run a PR campaign designed to whip people into a social media frenzy, I would not have the dirty taste in my mouth.
It’s the same bs that tv networks pull on subscribers when they have disagreements with cable providers over the rates they get paid. They air commercials saying “Verizon is trying to keep you from seeing your favorite shows!!” when they are the ones demanding increases from Verizon et al. Newsflash: neither of the parties are the good guys. It’s all manipulative and a pathetic attempt at portraying themselves as the victim. Meanwhile consumers, the real victims, are constantly getting random price increases forced upon them with no option to go elsewhere. It’s transparent and it’s moronic, and I wish it were different.
personally, i feel very different when the dispute is "they're charging us too much" versus "they are not paying us enough", though i guess the underlying cause is the same - companies trying to profit out of the fact that they have access to consumers.
Yes it's another Billion dollar company going against Apple, but then, who else can actually go against them and not financially ruin themselves? Smaller Indie studios definitely can't
I get their desire to have the fight be a fair one instead of Epic rallying its positively massive fanbase to suddenly start viewing Apple as the bad guy... but I also don't think it'll be that relevant to the court case. Both companies have the best lawyers money can buy, I'm sure they'll be able to throw out any "but think of the fans, look how mad they are" accusations.
I don't think the court case is the only thing that matters. iPhone sales might see a noticeable drop if Fortnite fans pull off. That would make a lot of sense, if Epic would not try to combat Google at the same time.
I think the larger move here is to start a fight, which other devs join soon after, so that eventually with critical mass, they can bully Apple into bending the knee.
The legal channel isn't the only one though. Sure it would be amazing if the court would do something, but let bet honest here, like you said, it's just a billion dollar company versus another one, except a shit ton of cash, nothing will come out of it.
People need to understands the power Apple has (and Google, and so many others, too by the way). When the theatrics are over, is when people will stop caring... there's nothing good about that. People needs to be aware that companies abuse their monopoly and they need to be aware that when they choose a platform that decide to abuse their monopoly, that they help that kind of abuse.
But, I'm not a fan of another multi-million dollar company making such a blatant appeal to emotion, as if Fortnite needs to be "freed", to the common person who has no concept of how nuanced the legalities of this entire thing are.
I'll be happy when the theatrics are over with, and we can simply view the outcome of the legal precedent that is about to be set. This is a battle for the courts, not Twitter.