I rarely used WhatsApp before moving from the United States to the United Kingdom a couple of years ago, opting for the built-in messaging app on my iPhone or fellow Meta-owned platform Messenger. No one I knew in the US used it, and, in fact, I had to get friends and family members to download it when I moved so we could communicate without being charged — you're welcome, Mark Zuckerberg. Well, that seems to be changing, with the head of Meta announcing WhatsApp has reached 100 million monthly active users across the United States — with about 10 million in Texas alone. WhatsApp has more than two billion users worldwide.
Meta enlisted former Modern Family cast members for an ad in June that highlighted frustrations when some people have an iPhone, and others have an Android. Now, a very targeted PR stunt accompanies the 100 million user milestone, with Meta installing a 200-foot bubble between the Apple and Samsung stores in The Americana Mall in Los Angeles. Zuckerberg previously took aim at Apple, allegedly once stating, "We need to inflict pain" on Apple and claiming that his company's products were superior.
In my experience, it's true that WhatsApp creates a more streamlined experience between different phone models, with easier reactions and formatting and no worries about being charged when traveling internationally. Meta claims that a WhatsApp-commissioned survey found one in four Americans don't communicate with a close friend or family member as regularly due to incompatible devices. We can take a survey undertaken by a for-profit company that demonstrates why said company is good with a grain of salt. However, as a daily WhatsApp user, I am excited about the idea of more Americans using it.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/whatsapp-hits-100-million-monthly-active-us-users-185541159.html?src=rss
There are some limitations for now. Availability will vary by region and Maps is only available in English on the web at the outset. As things stand, you can access Apple Maps from Safari and Chrome on Mac and iPad. Windows PC users can access the service via Chrome and Edge. Apple says it will expand the web experience to other languages, devices and browsers over time, but for now at least, iPhone users will need to keep using the Maps app.
The web version of Apple Maps includes directions; guides; opening hours, reviews and other helpful information for businesses; and actions such as ordering food. Apple will add other features, including Look Around (i.e. the company's version of street View), in the coming months.
After many years of restricting Maps to an app, Apple might be trying to take on Google at its own game. Google Maps has, for instance, long allowed developers to embed a section of a map on websites. Apple says devs will be able to link to its maps on the web to offer their users driving directions, information about places and more.
Expanding beyond the app is a smart idea and it could help Apple Maps reach more eyeballs. The company also started offering a web version of Apple Music several years ago.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apple-maps-is-now-available-on-the-web-in-beta-193648138.html?src=rss
Cash App Pay has integrated with Google Play to give consumers another option when buying stuff online. This will be especially useful for Android users, as Google Play is baked right into the OS. Cash App says this partnership will give “next gen consumers more choice” and the company specifically called out the gaming space.
Cash App users will be able to pull money from a pre-existing balance or via a linked debit card to pay for stuff on Google Play. Cash App currently has four million monthly active users and the company claims to have added one million new users each quarter for the last year. That’s a lot of new people flowing into Google’s ecosystem.
To use Cash App on an Android device, just select the payment method when checking out on Google Play. Obviously, new users should download the app and make an account before all of that.
The Cash App integration, however, extends beyond Europe and Google already allows PayPal as an option in most countries. Also, Android developers who distribute apps on the Google Play store Google’s parent company Alphabet is considered a gatekeeper under the DMA and one of the mandates of the legislation is that these organizations must allow for alternative payment methods.
The Cash App integration, however, extends beyond Europe and Google already allowed PayPal as an option in most countries. Also, Android developers who distribute apps on the Google Play store can already use an array of third-party payment systems in Europe, to comply with the DMA.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/cash-app-pay-integrates-with-google-play-to-offer-next-gen-consumers-more-choice-172310452.html?src=rss
iOS 18 has landed in public beta and Apple is offering up more control, yet again, of the layout of your iPhone. However, Apple Intelligence, the most exciting upgrade, is conspicuously (but unsurprisingly) absent.
The update also improves several native apps, such as Photos, Messages (RCS! Gasp!) and Notes, although Apple Intelligence will add even more features and tricks. While we all wait for the ability to generate our own emojis, there is still plenty to explore. It’s just a little drier than what Apple teased at WWDC.
You can access the iOS preview by enrolling on Apple’s website, which will nudge the beta to your iPhone’s Software Update section. As always, remember to back up your iPhone first and ensure it’s compatible. (iOS 18 works on 2018’s iPhone XS and XR and newer phones.)
iOS 18 means even more customization
Beyond app folders and widgets, iOS 18 adds further functional and aesthetic customization. Alongside a new Dark look, you can tint all of them in a color of your choosing. Unlike previous dark modes on iOS, this time it also ‘dims’ individual app icons to keep it consistent with the darker theme. You can also have iOS choose the color for you, basing its recommendation on your iPhone’s wallpaper. If that sounds familiar, it’s because it is very similar to Material You, which Google introduced to Android in 2021.
You can also increase the size of the app icons ever so slightly, without reducing the number you can pack into a single pane. Doing so does strip away the text labels, so you better be sure you know, without words, which app icon is which. And, in a thrilling move for tens of pedants everywhere, you can move your icons outside a left-aligned, top-to-bottom snap grid. Do you want the Safari icon floating in the bottom right corner, all alone? You can do that now.
iOS 18 also brings two new ways to secure your apps. You can assign an app as locked or hidden. Locking an app will require FaceID access, useful perhaps for Photos or a plethora of other apps if you often share your phone with children. Doing sp will also mean information from there won’t appear or bubble around other parts of iOS, like searches and notifications. You can also choose to hide the app, which nudges it into a dedicated folder, locked away behind FaceID.
Apple has also refreshed its control panel and dropdown menu for settings. Similar to when iOS introduced widgets a few years ago, there is now a dedicated control gallery to add smart home shortcuts, launch timers and more.
This had the potential to clutter up the control panel, but Apple has divided this into four different tabs. While you can tap on the little icons to the side to leap to a specific section, you can also access all of them in a single continuous scroll. Your most used features can live at the top, and other sections pull together your smart home controls, entertainment playback and connectivity. Have you lost your hotspot shortcut? It’s here. All the controls are also resizeable to prioritize the most crucial ones.
Finally, you can now customize the iOS lock screen controls, too. If you never use the flashlight, you can swap it out for something more practical, like a timer, or even act as a shortcut to Shazam in a pinch.
Photo by Mat Smith/Engadget
Messages
RCS (Rich Communication Services) has landed on the iPhone, or at least on those running iOS 18. It pulls together advanced text features, like support for richer images, larger file attachments, voice notes, group chat, read receipts and more. But you got all those through iMessage on iOS, making RCS sound a little uneventful.
However, if your friends are divided across Android and iOS, you can start using Messages like other third-party messaging apps. Does it have all the features of WhatsApp? No. Does it do everything you can in iMessage? No.
But it will help. For example, with RCS, you can send messages over Wi-Fi without a phone signal. I’ve had issues before when running late for appointments, trapped on the metro with no signal, unable to text to let the other person know. RCS means those messages will send if you latch on to a passing Wi-Fi network.
There are more advances beyond RCS. You can also schedule text messages, like you might already do on work chat apps and email. If you’re into Apple’s recently introduced message tapbacks (emoji reactions), you can now do so with any emoji, including your own Live Stickers based on your photos and images. For even more expression, iOS 18 also adds italics, bold, underline and strikethrough formatting, and a family of cute word animations that feel like WordArt come to life. It’s silly, it’s frothy, it’s pointless. I love it.
Photos
Photo by Mat Smith/Engadget
Apple has hidden away some major changes to how it structures its photos app, reflecting the fact that many of us have had iPhones (and photo libraries) for over a decade and a half. And we’re not going to look at all of those pictures. We’re likely not even going to look at most of them. In iOS 18, Apple has ditched the tabs for “Library,” “For You,” “Albums” and “Search.” Instead of your latest photos, screenshots and videos taking up the majority of the screen, you’ll see some space carved out for your latest content, curated albums, memories and more.
It’s a divisive approach, but I think your reaction will depend on how you interact with your photos. I know where my favorite photos are or how to find them, but other people in my life are often pleasantly surprised when services and devices can auto-curate an album of photos from a day out or a vacation. This redesign seems aimed at them.
And what about Apple Intelligence? Eventually, it will add some additional tricks, like Cleanup, which can help erase any unwanted objects in your photos. It’s a feature that Pixel (and Galaxy) phone users have enjoyed for a while, and still, we await the arrival of Apple Intelligence to be able to test this. For more on what’s coming to your gallery in iOS 18, check out my colleague Cherlynn’s detailed article on what Apple’s done to the Photos app.
More iOS 18 highlights
If you’re a daily Notes app user (yes, I’m guilty), there are some nice advances in iOS 18, too. You can now transcribe conversations and meetings directly into the app. At the time of my testing, you’ll have to ensure your iPhone is set to US English and US as a region for the transcription icon, shown in the image above, to appear.
We also get Math Notes, which can be accessed through the Notes app and from the calculator. Here, you can write out sums and calculations and your iPhone will solve them. It’ll even remember figures for future calculations. It feels niche, but there’s some definite utility here, perhaps if you’re looking to add up a vacation budget or DIY project.
Notes’ new collapsable subheadings proved more useful for me. I have several lengthy Note files, and now I can organize them better and not have to search for specific words to find what I need.
Apple brings a similar approach to its Reader on Safari, which can add a table of contents and even attempt to summarize an article before you even get your teeth into it. Meandering recipe intros: you may have been put on notice. But I say “may“ because as of this writing, I haven’t been able to test this on any sites I’ve visited.
There’s also a new Passwords app, which, in a lot of ways, is just an easier way to access your iCloud passwords instead of diving into your iPhone’s settings. The app divides your passwords into different categories like accounts, codes, Wi-Fi networks and Passkeys, and, wisely, will support the iCloud for Windows app and a Chrome extension. You can also share password collections with visitors, friends or family.
Apple continues to tentatively develop its smart home features within iOS 18, too. It’s adding express mode to automatically unlock connected doors as you approach — as long as you have your iPhone (or Apple Watch) on you. Meanwhile, Apple has created a guest access tab so you can grant access to parts of your smart home and even schedule the times a garage door, say, stays unlocked, perhaps for a package delivery.
Wrap-up
Photo by Mat Smith/Engadget
My early impressions of iOS 18 are more limited than I wanted them to be. Apple Intelligence and most of its exciting features teased at WWDC, are not part of this public beta. Without those, iOS 18 feels more like iOS 17.5. There are more features, but most of them are incremental.
RCS is finally here, adding more functionality to cross-OS text messaging (and possibly worrying the likes of WhatsApp) while elsewhere, Apple focuses on upgrading and enhancing its native apps. The company made some... interesting choices. In iOS 18, even Calculator is getting beefed up, with Math Notes, calculation history, and a new scientific calculator view.
The public beta is relatively stable, so it’s easy to recommend to those looking for early access to the latest iPhone features. However, without Apple Intelligence, drawing more meaningful conclusions on iOS 18 will have to wait.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ios-18-preview-waiting-on-apple-intelligence-for-the-true-upgrade-143059859.html?src=rss
Anthropic announced that its Claude chatbot is now available as an Android app. After introducing the platform’s free iOS app in May, Android owners can now also play with the company's AI on their mobile devices. The Android app is free and works with both the Pro and Team plans for paid users. Conversations with Claude can happen across hardware, with both of the mobile apps and the web version connected to each other.
This platform is one of several large-language model AI chatbots currently available to the public. OpenAI and its ChatGPT tool have attracted the lion's share of attention. ChatGPT is already available in both Android and iOS app form, and it underlies many features of the new Apple Intelligence. However, it's possible that Claude may have more powerful skills. According to Anthropic, the Claude 3 version of the platform performed better than both ChatGPT and Google's Gemini on some important benchmarks. The Claude 3 Opus version scored top marks in March and the Sonnet 3.5 version did the same in June. We always need to take that kind of comparison from one of the companies in question with many grains of salt. But even the leaps between the Sonnet and Opus over the course of a few months do appear to be impressive.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/anthropics-claude-chatbot-is-now-an-android-app-220046355.html?src=rss
Apple’s first 2024 public betas have arrived. You can now install early builds of iOS 18, iPadOS 18, watchOS 11 and macOS Sequoia to preview Apple’s software updates before their official arrival this fall. You just need to enroll your Apple ID (soon-to-be Apple Account) in the Apple Beta Software Program to join the pre-release fun.
Although it won’t be available in beta until the fall, Apple’s take on generative AI — Apple Intelligence (get it?) — is the common thread in this year’s updates. Intertwined in each platform’s 2024 software, Apple Intelligence is a blend of on-device and cloud processing, and it includes optional ChatGPT integration. It adds a new superpowered Siri, Safari highlights and summaries, writing tools and much more.
As for what you will see in the first public beta, iOS 18 gives you more control over your Home Screen. You can place apps and widgets on any open spot on your screen and even change app icon colors, personalizing your phone with a unified aesthetic. The Control Center also gets a redesign, with easier access to your most used toggles, including new customizations. In addition, Photos gets its biggest overhaul to date, and Messages includes new formatting and effects.
Much more than a port of the iOS version, the Calculator app includes a new Math Notes feature for the Apple Pencil (or keyboard) that can evaluate expressions, assign variables and plot graphs in real-time: Type an equals sign, and Math Notes solves the problem. In parallel, the Smart Script tool in the Notes app can smooth out your sloppy handwriting (while still looking like your penmanship) as you write, and you can turn recordings into searchable live audio transcriptions.
macOS Sequoia adds iPhone Mirroring, letting you view and control your phone’s screen from your Mac. A new Passwords app pulls your stored credentials out of iCloud Keychain and Safari’s settings and into a standalone app. (That S.O.S. call you hear is from 1Password’s developers.) Window Tiling lets you “magnetically” snap windows into various grid patterns, similar to Microsoft’s Snap tiling feature in Windows 11. Finally, new video call features let you replace your background with built-in images or personal photos.
Apple
watchOS 11 lets you pause your daily Activity Rings when you need a break (like when you’re sick, injured or have other disruptions) without losing your streaks. You can also change your goals based on the day of the week and customize which metric the Fitness app shows. A new Vitals app expands on sleep tracking to show you at a glance whether any of your overnight metrics deviate from your norm. And a training load tool gauges how your workout intensity may affect your body over time.
If you’ve never installed an Apple software update with the Apple account you use on your devices, head to the Apple Beta Software Program website to register it. Then, navigate to Settings > General > Software Update on your device, choose the Beta Updates menu, select the Public Beta option and install the update on the Software Update screen.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apples-ios-18-ipados-18-macos-sequoia-and-watchos-11-public-betas-are-ready-to-download-202921608.html?src=rss
The retro PC game emulator UTM SE is now available on the App Store for iPhone, iPad and Apple Vision Pro, marking the first time Apple has allowed a PC emulator for iOS onto its marketplace, per The Verge. UTM SE will let you run classic PC games, but you’ll first need to either download a pre-built virtual machine — several of which UTM offers for free on its website — or you can create your own from scratch.
We are happy to announce that UTM SE is available (for free) on iOS and visionOS App Store (and coming soon to AltStore PAL)!
Shoutouts to AltStore team for their help and to Apple for reconsidering their policy.https://t.co/HAV5JnT5GO
Apple previously rejected UTM SE, but the team behind the app shared on X that it was able to move forward with a “JIT-less build” thanks to the help of another developer, so it could comply with Apple’s restrictions. The developers also said UTM SE would soon hit the alternative app marketplace AltStore PAL as well, which would open it up to users in the EU. “Shoutouts to AltStore team for their help and to Apple for reconsidering their policy,” the UTM team posted.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/theres-finally-a-pc-emulator-on-the-app-store-175320490.html?src=rss
Already fascinated with y2k-era tech, some members of Gen Z have wondered what those early, simpler social networks were like. Now, they can get an idea thanks to a new app called noplace, which recreates some aspects of Myspace more than a decade after its fall from the most-visited site in the US.
The app officially launched earlier this month and briefly made the No. 1 spot in Apple’s App Store. Dreamed up by Gen Z founder Tiffany Zhong, noplace bills itself as both a throwback and an alternative to mainstream social media algorithms and the creator culture that comes with them. “I missed how social media used to be back in the day … where it was actually social, people would post random updates about their life,” Zhong tells Engadget. “You kind of had a sense of where people were in terms of time and space.”
Though Zhong says she never got to experience Myspace firsthand — she was in elementary school during its early 2000s peak — noplace manages to nail many of the platform’s signature elements. Each user starts with a short profile where they can add personal details like their relationship status and age, as well a free-form “about me” section. Users can also share their interests and detail what they’re currently watching, playing, reading and listening to. And, yes, they can embed song clips. There’s even a “top 10” for highlighting your best friends (unclear if Gen Z is aware of how much trauma that particular Myspace feature inflicted on my generation).
Myspace, of course, was at its height years before smartphone apps with a unified “design language” became the dominant medium for browsing social media. But the highly customizable noplace profiles still manage to capture the vibe of the bespoke HTML and clashing color schemes that distinguished so many Myspace pages and websites on the early 2000s internet.
noplace
There are other familiar features. All new users are automatically friends with Zhong, which she confirms is a nod to Tom Anderson, otherwise known as “Myspace Tom.” And the app encourages users to add their interests, called “stars,” and search for like-minded friends.
Despite the many similarities — the app was originally named “nospace” — Zhong says noplace is about more than just recreating the look and feel of Myspace. The app has a complicated gamification scheme, where users are rewarded with in-app badges for reaching different “levels” as they use the app more. This system isn’t really explained in the app — Zhong says it’s intentionally “vague” — but levels loosely correspond to different actions like writing on friends’ walls and interacting with other users’ posts. There’s also a massive Twitter-like central feed where users can blast out quick updates to everyone else on the app.
It can feel a bit chaotic, but early adopters are already using it in some unexpected ways, according to Zhong. “Around 20% in the past week of posts have been questions,” she says, comparing it to the trend of Gen Z using TikTok and YouTube as a search engine. “The vision for what we're building is actually becoming a social search engine. Everyone thinks it's like a social network, but because people are asking questions already … we're building features where you can ask questions and you can get crowdsourced responses.”
That may sound ambitious for a (so far) briefly-viral social app, but noplace has its share of influential backers. Reddit founder Alexis Ohanian is among the company’s investors. And Zhong herself once made headlines in her prior role as a teenage analyst at a prominent VC firm.
For now, though, noplace feels more to me like a Myspace-inspired novelty, though I’m admittedly not the target demographic. But, as someone who was a teenager on actual Myspace, I often think that I’m grateful my teen years came long before Instagram or TikTok. Not because Myspace was simpler than today’s social media, but because logging off was so much easier.
Zhong sees the distinction a little differently, not as a matter of dial-up connections enforcing a separation between on and offline, but a matter of prioritizing self expression cover clout. “You're just chasing follower count versus being your true self,” Zhong says. “It makes sense how social networks have evolved that way, but it's media platforms. It's not a social network anymore.”
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/how-false-nostalgia-inspired-noplace-a-myspace-like-app-for-gen-z-163813099.html?src=rss
On Tuesday, the FTC unanimously banned the social messaging app NGL from hosting minors as part of a $5 million settlement. The first-of-its-kind ban comes after revelations that the company actively marketed the app to children with bait-and-switch tactics, false claims about AI moderation and the targeting of “popular” kids (like cheerleaders) to try to lure others onto the predatory hellscape.
“NGL marketed its app to kids and teens despite knowing that it was exposing them to cyberbullying and harassment,” FTC Chair Lina Khan wrote in an agency press release. “In light of NGL’s reckless disregard for kids’ safety, the FTC’s order would ban NGL from marketing or offering its app to those under 18. We will keep cracking down on businesses that unlawfully exploit kids for profit.”
The FTC and the Los Angeles DA’s office worked together on the complaint, which paints a picture of an exploitative business that prioritized building its social graph above honoring even the most fundamental of ethics. (Sound familiar?) Although NGL is still a relatively niche app with nowhere near the popularity of Instagram, TikTok and other first-tier platforms, it has “exploded” in popularity, according toThe Washington Post. In 2022, it briefly became the most downloaded app on the iOS App Store.
The company markets the app as a place to message anonymously with unknown friends and contacts from other social channels. That alone sounds like a recipe for disaster. But the FTC says the company made it much worse with false claims of using “world class AI content moderation” with “deep learning and pattern matching algorithms” to prevent cyberbullying and other concerning behavior. It also sent fake, computer-generated messages — which users believed were from their real friends — with provocative prompts like “Are you straight?” and “I know what you did.”
In addition, the company’s predatory business practices also allegedly included bait-and-switch upsell tactics, which promised to reveal the identity of anonymous “friends” (which may have been fake) if they paid up to $10 weekly for a premium subscription. After paying, the service would only supply useless “hints” like the message’s timestamp, the sender’s general location and whether they used an iPhone or Android phone. It would also turn on recurring, hard-to-cancel charges that users didn’t expect.
Even worse, Joao Figueiredo, one of the company’s co-founders, allegedly directed employees to look on “high school cheer [Instagram] pages” to find “kids who are popular to post and get their friends to post.” One user allegedly reported that their friend attempted suicide because of their experience on NGL.
When consumers complained, NGL executives allegedly laughed them off as “suckers.”
The FTC and Los Angeles DA added that NGL violated the COPPA Rule. It requires companies with apps “that are directed to or knowingly being used by children under 13 to inform their parents about the personal information they collect.” Other accusations include a violation of the Restore Online Shoppers’ Confidence Act.
In addition, the dumpster fire known as NGL allegedly made no attempt to verify users’ ages, failed to obtain parental consent to collect and use data from preteen children and failed to honor parents’ requests to delete children’s data. Finally, the company supposedly “retained children’s data longer than reasonably necessary to fulfill the purpose for which the data was collected.”
Under the settlement terms, NGL and its cofounders have agreed to pay $4.5 million to “provide redress to consumers” and a $500,000 civil penalty to the LA DA’s office. From now on, the company will have to require an age gate that prevents new and current users under 18 from using the app, deleting all info associated with those under 13, agreeing not to misrepresent the origins of messages, make false claims about AI tech and received consent from consumers before billing them for subscriptions (while making canceling recurring charges simple).
It remains to be seen whether the FTC can use the unanimous, bipartisan ruling against NGL as a precedent to go after bigger fish in the social sphere using egregiously unethical marketing tactics of their own.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ngl-becomes-the-first-app-banned-from-hosting-minors-by-the-ftc-171524202.html?src=rss
Update, July 5, 5:25PM ET: The same day it posting a tweet thread about Apple's app submission processes, Epic now says its game store has been accepted by Apple. The company offered no further commentary beyond a single tweet noting that “Apple has informed us that our previously rejected Epic Games Store notarization submission has now been accepted.”
Thirty minutes later, Epic CEO Tim Sweeney said "Apple is now telling reporters that this approval is temporary and are demanding we change the buttons in the next version - which would make our store less standard and harder to use. We'll fight this."
Guess this saga's got more legs to run.
The original story chronicling Epic's moody tweets follows unedited.
Epic says that Apple has once again rejected its submission for a third-party app store, according to a series of posts on X. The company says that Apple rejected the latest submission over the design and position of the “install” button on the app store, claiming that it too closely resembles Apple's own “get” button. Apple also allegedly said that Epic’s “in-app purchases” label is too similar to its own label, used for the same reason.
The maker of Fortnite suggests that this is just another salvo in the long-running dispute between the two companies. Epic says that it’s using the same “install” and “in-app purchases” naming conventions found “across popular app stores on multiple platforms.” As for the design language, the company states that it's “following standard conventions for buttons in iOS apps” and that they’re “just trying to build a store that mobile users can easily understand.”
1/3 Apple has rejected our Epic Games Store notarization submission twice now, claiming the design and position of Epic’s “Install” button is too similar to Apple's "Get" button and that our "In-app purchases" label is too similar to the App Store's "In-App Purchases" label.
— Epic Games Newsroom (@EpicNewsroom) July 5, 2024
Epic has called the rejection “arbitrary, obstructive and in violation of the DMA.” To that end, it has shared concerns with the European Commission in charge of tracking potential Digital Markets Act (DMA) violations. The company still says it's ready to launch both the Epic Games Store and Fortnite on iOS in the EU in “the next couple of months” so long as Apple doesn’t put up “further roadblocks.”
This is just the latest news from a rivalry that goes back years. The two companies have been sparring ever since Epic started using its own in-app payment option in the iOS version of Fortnite, keeping Apple away from its 30 percent cut.
This led to a lengthy legal battle in the US about Apple’s walled-garden approach to its app store. Epic sued Apple and Apple banned Epic. A judge issued a permanent injunction as a way to allow developers to avoid Apple’s 30 percent cut of sales. This didn’t satisfy anyone. Apple wasn’t happy, for obvious reasons, and Epic contested the language of the injunction, which didn’t call out Apple for having a monopoly. Both companies appealed, eventually making its way to the Supreme Court. The court decided not to hear the case. The justices must have had other things to do.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/epic-says-that-apple-rejected-its-third-party-app-store-for-the-second-time-183914413.html?src=rss