Apple’s App Store faces the prospect of additional class-action-style damages claims in the European Union after the bloc’s highest court ruled that users of its Dutch App Store may collectively sue in the Netherlands, irrespective of their location.
Judges at the EU Court of Justice held that an Amsterdam court has jurisdiction to hear the original claims brought by the foundations Stichting Right to Consumer Justice and Stichting App Stores, which allege that Apple’s App Store commissions — reaching up to 30% per transaction — are anticompetitive.
Samuel Stolton for Bloomberg News:
“The Netherlands courts have jurisdiction to hear a representative action concerning the alleged anticompetitive conduct of Apple in relation to its App Store aimed at the Netherlands market,” the EU court said in a statement on the preliminary ruling in Luxembourg on Tuesday.
Cupertino, California-based Apple argued against the jurisdiction of the Dutch court to hear this case, as the alleged harmful conduct had not occurred in the Netherlands and in particular in Amsterdam.
MacDailyNews Take: Again:
The vast majority of developers who pay Apple an App Store commission, pay 15%. That amounts to 12 cents of “inflated prices” for non-free apps on average. So, if you bought 50 apps for your iPhone, it would cost you, on the average, a total of $40. Halving Apple’s commission would reduce that price to $37. Removing Apple’s commission entirely would reduce that price to $34.
Here you see the absolute horror of “inflated prices” caused by Apple trying to cover costs to run their App Stores for 2.35 billion users (and counting). A total of $3-$6 per every 50 apps, on average. How can any app consumer survive such abject gouging?!
How much did it cost developers to have their apps burned onto CDs, boxed, shipped, displayed on store shelves prior to Apple remaking the world for the better for umpteenth time? Does Apple not have costs to store, review, organize, surface, and distribute apps to 1+ billion users? – MacDailyNews, July 30, 2021
Either Apple continues to take App Store commissions to pay for their infrastructure costs or they increase hardware and/or subscription prices to pay for government interference.
As usual, Big Government is a meddling middleman just attempting to move costs around in order to appeal to their base: “We fought the big, bad corporation meanies and saved you oh-so-much money on your apps (a whole 12 cents per). (We won’t talk about your other costs – hardware, subscription rates, etc. – that were increased in order to compensate for our meddling). We think you’re stupid. Vote for us.”
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