Thursday, July 23, 2020

Apple-commissioned study defends App Store commission rates | Music Ally

Apple is facing antitrust scrutiny over the way it runs its App Store, including the 30% cut of in-app purchases (which drops to 15% for subscriptions after a year of someone paying) that it takes. But look! Here’s a study that has found “Apple’s App Store commission rate is similar in magnitude to the commission rates charged by many other app stores and digital content marketplaces”, and also that “developers earn a substantially higher share of total sales made through digital marketplaces, including the Apple App Store, than through many brick-and-mortar channels.”.

Admittedly, Apple did commission the report from research firm Analysis Group – the disclosure is at least prominent: “Support for this study was provided by Apple. The conclusions and opinions expressed are exclusively those of the authors.”

Read the report with that in mind, then, but the study still has value as a summary of how Apple will be defending the App Store model that has come under attack from Spotify and other critics. Its publication comes ahead of CEO Tim Cook testifying in a US antitrust hearing next Monday (27 July) alongside the leaders of Amazon, Facebook and Google.

Stuart Dredge


[from https://ift.tt/2vCxqPg]

No comments: