The value app stores create isn't primarily economic: it's ensuring user trust by protecting the privacy of user data, the security of their devices, and even users' physical safety against those who might stalk them
App stores are especially important for families, protecting kids against a variety of threats, and empowering parents to decide what apps & media are appropriate for their kids
Parents simply did not have such powerful control before app stores launched in 2008
Some complain about commissions (15-30%) on leading app stores
But it wasn't so long ago that most software was distributed in physical media, and middlemen took 50-70%
App stores made distribution vastly more efficient, radically boosting developers' net revenues
Apple & Google's app stores are integral parts of their operating systems. Since launching in 2008, they've created an entirely new market for downloadable apps
The market for downloadable *desktop* software in 2008 was tiny. Even on the leading proto-app store, only one app had more than a million downloads web.archive.org/web/2008071117…
App stores addressed consumers' need for trust and convenience in multiple dimensions, vetting regular updates to apps and pushing them out to users' phones for automatic installation, and offering a unified, trusted payment system and mechanism for resolving disputes/refunds
While Apple and Google charged a higher commission (30%) than Download .com did (8-12%), they *created* an infinitely larger market, provided development tools, and easy ways to reach consumers
Some claim that Apple, Google, Microsoft and Amazon abuse "gatekeeper" power over their app stores
But the commissions they charge have only fallen: both Apple and Google recently cut their commission in half, to 15%, for the first million in revenue
Meanwhile, Aptoide, a leading competing app store, charges 25% across the board
And in China, where the Play store is not available, alternative app stores can charge commissions as high as 50% inc42.com/features/the-m…
In short, there's no reason to think that app stores are earning monopoly rents in how they split revenue with developers
Innovation is steadily eroding the importance of getting app into app stores
Progressive Web Applications PWAs now offer much of the functionality of apps, and are actually much cheaper to develop
They run in the browser (even iOS), so don't require approval or commissions
Various pending state bills would force OS makers to allow "sideloading": installation of unverified apps from the Internet
Sideloading creates serious privacy and security risks
Android, Windows and MacOS already allows this today while iOS does not. That's the market at work.
Requiring the installation of third-party app stores creates the same risks as sideloading--unless those stores screen apps just as carefully. Amazon tries to do that but other alternative app stores just can't. It's a hugely costly and complex undertaking.
Finally, some have proposed to require app stores to allow developers to use alternative payment systems. This would have the same effect as price caps: allowing developers to free-ride off the app store and OS that is supported by revenues from the app store
Congress (and states) shouldn't rush into legislating around app stores. The market is thriving, and there's too much at stake for consumers to risk getting this wrong
At a minimum, let the #antitrust suits over market power in app stores play out in court before legislating
Justice Thomas jumped into the #Section230 debate to embrace GOP arguments for narrowing protections for content moderation. He might think differently in a case where the issues he raised were actually briefed by both sides—unlike this very narrow case
Thomas often issues such statements when SCOTUS decides not to take a case—to vent his frustrations about the state of the law
But this is the first time SCOTUS has ever considered taking a case involving #Section230. The briefs here did not even address the issues Thomas raises
Justice Thomas is free to call for fuller briefing on Section 230’s meaning in, as he says, “an appropriate case,” but this is not that case. Justice Thomas had no need to express his own views, in extensive dicta, without the benefit of the briefing he acknowledges is needed.
#Section230 protects “tech platforms” just as it protects National Review’s site, or a user’s (ahem, Trump's) retweet of someone else’s defamatory statements
230 DOES Internet media differently from other print & broadcasting, because they ARE different
Traditional publishers review content pre-publication but Internet media just can’t b/c:
—SCALE: billions of pieces of content created daily
—SPEED: much content is real-time
WEBSITES AREN’T PUBLIC FORA: Supreme Court jurisprudence and case law DOES NOT support the EO’s claims that they are. The EO cites two cases that don’t apply to social media platforms:
1) Pruneyard (1980) was limited to shopping malls (very different from websites) and definitely wouldn’t be upheld by the Court today anyway, as made clear in Johnson v Twitter (2018) 2) Packingham (2017) is about restrictions on Internet imposed by STATE LAW, not private actors
1/6 @LindseyGrahamSC's #EARNIT Act would give AG Barr a blank check—via #Section230—to crack down on Internet services, effectively ban secure #encryption & impose other de facto mandates that could never get through Congress as legislation
2/6 AG Barr could use Graham’s bill to force Apple to give law enforcement a backdoor on iMessage, iCloud or even iPhones—effectively banning end-to-end encryption
3/6 #Section230 has never shielded child porn (CSAM) traffickers from federal prosecution, but Graham's bill would create vast new legal liability for websites—then use that liability to force them to do whatever the AG commands
Trump’s order would transform the FCC & FTC from consumer protection agencies into regulators of online speech
Rs complain about ‘censorship’ by private companies. But this order would mean REAL censorship, empowering regulators to decide what kinds of speech are allowed online
That the GOP, after decades of fighting government meddling in broadcasting, now wants its own Fairness Doctrine for the Internet is staggeringly hypocritical
We value the balance between freely exchanging ideas, fostering innovation, & limiting harmful speech. Because this is an exceptionally delicate balance, #Section230 reform poses a substantial risk of failing to address policymakers’ concerns and harming the Internet overall.
Principle #1: Content creators bear primary responsibility for their speech and actions.