Internal Apple emails: Special deal with Netflix, sideloading originally considered

By: MRT Desk

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Internal Apple emails: Special deal with Netflix, sideloading originally considered

Apple always emphasizes treating all developers equally in the App Store – no matter how big or how small. In the course of the large-scale proceedings between Epic Games and the iPhone manufacturer, internal e-mails have now appeared again, suggesting a different approach. For example, the streaming giant Netflix is ​​said to have received special treatment from the app store team, reports the IT blog The Verge after reviewing the documents from the Epic vs Apple process.

It’s supposed to be early on “unique arrangement” between Apple and Netflix have given, through which the video service only had to pay 15 instead of the usual 30 percent commission on subscription fees. Reduced rates are now part of Apple’s official app store rules for video services. But the deal with Netflix is ​​significantly older. Apple is said to have tried the 15 percent rule for the service in 2018 extendwhich existed well before the so-called “Apple Video Partner Program”.

This in turn shows that Apple was ready at an early stage to conclude special agreements with major customers that were not available to small developers who continued to dutifully pay their 30 percent commission in the first year of subscription per user.

More from Mac & i

More from Mac & i

More from Mac & i

The internal Apple emails also show that the company has considered enabling so-called sideloading on the iPhone. This allows users not only to get apps from the App Store, but also to use the web and other ways to install programs on their iPhone. Apple officially prevents this – in contrast to Google for Android, for example. Most recently, Apple boss Tim Cook even had one Interview claims sideloading is a “back door”. This could be used by attackers to gain access to the system, as can be seen in ransomware attacks on PCs.

But as early as 2009 – a year after the App Store was launched – Apple is said to have considered whether to “ever allow developers to sell their apps themselves and bypass our store”. As early as May 2008, the then CEO Steve Jobs released a language regulation on how the iPhone should report when an app is installed via a different route than the App Store. Interestingly, Jobs preferred a prompt that did not indicate that the app did not come from the App Store.


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