Epic Games, Spotify, Others Form Coalition For App Fairness Against Apple App Store Policies

Named as the Coalition for App Fairness, several companies including Epic Games, Spotify, Tile, and others have formed a coalition. Many of the member companies are already individually battling against Apple’s App Store policies.

The coalition’s website mentions it as an independent nonprofit organization. It says that “Every day, Apple taxes consumers & crushes innovation.” This in itself is a clear indicator of the group’s main aim.

Some of the major members of the coalition are Basecamp, Blix, Blockchain, Deezer, Epic Games, EPC, Spotify, and Tile.

In its manifesto, the Coalition for App Fairness highlights several issues pertaining to the Apple App Store. These issues include Apple’s control over the operating system, “carefully curated anti-competitive policies,” and the app tax.

The app tax has been one of the major issues over which many other companies have been fighting with Apple. The Cupertino giant charges an app tax, which, the coalition says, leads to Apple users missing out on occasional deals from the app makers. For example, a Fortnite membership costs $7.99 on the Fortnite website and $9.99 on the App Store.

In their ‘Vision for the Future’ document, the Coalition for App Fairness has issued ten principles to introduce a fair App Store. The group is also aiming at developers to join in a bid to gather support for its objectives.

No New Allegations

Participants of the Coalition for App Fairness are majorly the companies that are already fighting with Apple over one issue or the other. However, the common ground here is that all the issues of the members are related to the Apple App Store. The Apple-Fortnite issue has already been in the news for a while.

Apple’s row with Telegram was also highlighted when the latter filed an antitrust motion against the former. There are also allegations from Basecamp that Apple refused to accept their app updates unless they use the App Store for subscription purchases. The Coalition for App Fairness basically allows all these affected companies to pool resources and gather developers to put up a united front.

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Epic Games, Spotify, Others Form Coalition For App Fairness Against Apple App Store Policies
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