commit 84561c2342ca09319647b726f6c7b732182c7197
parent 18c7dd0a3a48fb0f5ecb9b1c769465af67f8783f
Author: Christian Grothoff <christian@grothoff.org>
Date: Fri, 4 Jul 2025 12:49:15 +0200
add text from marc
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diff --git a/static/images/applecheckout.png b/static/images/applecheckout.png
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diff --git a/template/news/2025-05.html.j2 b/template/news/2025-05.html.j2
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+{% extends "common/news.j2" %}
+{% block body_content %}
+
+<h1>2025-07: "ApplePay vs. Alternative Payment Services"</h1>
+<p>
+<small>by Marc Stibane</small>
+</p>
+<h2>Thought experiment</h2>
+<p>
+Imagine an airport which issues a frequent traveller card which millions of
+passengers have signed up for. This Airport demands from the shops in the
+airport mall to either only offer their traveller card for payments, or any
+other payment method, but not both. So if merchants offer alternative payment
+methods to customers, they may not offer the airport traveller card.
+</p>
+<p>
+This would be ridiculous, right? We expect that every merchant can offer their
+customers all payment methods they want - some merchants only accept cash,
+some accept debit but not credit cards, some accept all cards you can think
+of. An Airport should never demand that shops in their mall wanting to offer
+the traveller card are not allowed to offer other payment methods. Would the
+EU allow Visa or Mastercard to impose such exclusion rules on merchants who
+want to accept their credit cards? Definitely not.
+</p>
+
+<h2>AppStore Rules</h2>
+<p>
+But that's exactly what Apple demands from app manufacturers in their mall:
+Manufacturers must decide whether their apps either offer ApplePay only (in
+which case millions of users can pay easily with just two clicks) or whether
+they use an alternative payment service. App manufacturers are <b>not</b>
+allowed to offer their users to choose from both ApplePay and alternative
+payment services.
+</p>
+<p>
+This means merchants have no real freedom of choice. Since millions of
+customers already have signed up for ApplePay, merchants in the Apple AppStore
+cannot really afford to exclude them as potential customers. Merchants should
+be able to freely choose one or multiple payment service providers (ApplePay
+and/or 3rd-Party) to offer their customers. Users would then have the choice
+for each payment, which of the offered payment methods they want to use now.
+And of course, zero fees should go to Apple if the choice is not ApplePay.
+</p>
+
+<h2>Apple itself does not eat their own dogfood</h2>
+<p>
+The Apple Store, where Apple sells its own hardware, offers multiple payment
+methods. Customers in the Apple Store can pay not only with ApplePay, but
+also with debit or credit cards, bank transfers, or PayPal. Apple knows it
+would loose sales if it offered only one payment method.
+</p>
+<div align=center>
+<img src="{{ url_static('images/applecheckout.png') }}" alt="Screenshot of Apple Store checkout">
+</div>
+<p>
+Here, the gate keeper Apple offers ApplePay and other payment methods
+simultaneously, and lets customers choose how they want to pay for each order.
+App manufacturers in the AppStore may only offer either-or, but not both. In
+this situation, alternative payment providers have zero chance to be chosen
+instead of ApplePay, since few App manufacturers would risk to loose their
+ApplePay customers.
+</p>
+
+<h2>Fair competition!</h2>
+<p>
+Countries should require Apple to let App manufacturers offer all payment methods
+they want (incl. ApplePay) simultaneously, so the end customer can decide
+which payment method to choose for each individual payment. We hope EU's
+Digital Market Act will allow the commission to establish such a rule in Europe.
+</p>
+
+{% endblock body_content %}
