Epic Games launches a campaign (and lawsuit) against Apple

Epic Games is launching an all-out campaign against Apple and its App Store rules.

Thursday morning, Epic Games introduced a new payment mechanism through a server-side update that allowed gamers to purchase Fortnite’s in-game currency directly, allowing the app to bypass Apple’s in-app purchase framework and the substantial cut that Apple takes. Apple quickly acted in banning the app from the App Store.

Apple soon released a statement:

Epic enabled a feature in its app which was not reviewed or approved by Apple, and they did so with the express intent of violating the App Store guidelines regarding in-app payments that apply to every developer who sells digital goods or services.

Apple boots Fortnite from the App Store after Epic adds direct payments

The ban was an action Epic Games was ready for.

The company soon shared that they were taking legal action against Apple, alleging that they were abusing their market position, saying in part that “Apple’s removal of Fortnite is yet another example of Apple flexing its enormous power in order to impose unreasonable restraints and unlawfully maintain its 100% monopoly over the iOS In-App Payment Processing Market.”

Minutes later, Epic Games broadcast a short video inside Fortnite Party Royale, presenting a spin on Apple’s iconic “1984” commercial. On-screen text declared, “Epic Games has defied the App Store Monopoly. In retaliation, Apple is blocking Fortnite from a billion devices. Join the fight to stop 2020 from becoming ‘1984’. #FreeFortnite”

Epic is now trolling Apple with a '1984' parody commercial. this is amazing pic.twitter.com/fnfPeCErOX

— Rod Breslau (@Slasher) August 13, 2020

Any legal action against Apple on monopolistic grounds is going to be an uphill battle given the narrow (relatively speaking) focus of the suit, especially given the fact that Apple CEO Tim Cook has already spoken to congressional anti-trust officials who didn’t seem to deliver any knockouts at the recent Zoom hearings. While the legal efforts might be a challenge, Epic Games wields major influence over the 350 million users of Fortnite, and gamers have proven particularly apt at launching campaigns against companies and coming out on top.

This saga comes just days after Apple attracted criticism for denying Microsoft xCloud, a cloud game-streaming application, from the App Store.

Apple goes to war with the gaming industry

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Apple boots Fortnite from the App Store after Epic adds direct payments

After its creator Epic Games implemented a workaround to duck Apple’s hefty developer fees, Fortnite has vanished from the App Store. The popular game’s disappearing act came the same day that Epic added a new direct payment option for in-game currency on mobile, offering an enticing 20% discount for players who pay the company for its virtual V-Bucks rather handing that money to intermediaries Apple or Google.

“Currently, when using Apple and Google payment options, Apple and Google collect a 30% fee, and the up to 20% price drop does not apply,” Epic wrote in a blog post introducing the new option. “If Apple or Google lower their fees on payments in the future, Epic will pass along the savings to you.”

Epic Direct Payments on iOS

In a statement to TechCrunch, Apple confirms that it removed Fortnite for taking the “unfortunate step” of violating App Store rules:

Epic enabled a feature in its app which was not reviewed or approved by Apple, and they did so with the express intent of violating the App Store guidelines regarding in-app payments that apply to every developer who sells digital goods or services.

Epic has had apps on the App Store for a decade, and have benefited from the App Store ecosystem – including [its] tools, testing, and distribution that Apple provides to all developers. Epic agreed to the App Store terms and guidelines freely and we’re glad they’ve built such a successful business on the App Store. The fact that their business interests now lead them to push for a special arrangement does not change the fact that these guidelines create a level playing field for all developers and make the store safe for all users. We will make every effort to work with Epic to resolve these violations so they can return Fortnite to the App Store.

Epic Games founder and CEO Tim Sweeney has attacked Apple repeatedly in recent tweets over the cut it takes on the App Store, calling its decisions deliberately anti-competitive and declaring that Apple has “outlawed the metaverse.” A spicy tweet on Fortnite’s Twitter account evoking authoritarianism and Apple’s own iconic 1984 commercial also suggests that Epic has no intention of backing down.

Fortnite Party Royale will premiere a new short: Nineteen Eighty-Fortnite. Join us at 4PM ET. pic.twitter.com/BWvndK3gDt

— Fortnite (@FortniteGame) August 13, 2020

Epic also apparently just filed a legal complaint against Apple in the U.S District Court for the Northern District of California arguing that Apple removing Fortnite is “yet another example of Apple flexing its enormous power in order to impose unreasonable restraints and unlawfully maintain its 100% monopoly over the iOS In-App Payment Processing Market.”

In making the decision to add direct payments, a feature it calls “permanent,” Epic was well aware that removal from Apple’s marketplace was likely in the cards. By adding the new payment method anyway, the hit game maker is planting a flag in the recent roiling controversy over Apple’s App Store fees. What happens next in a showdown between Apple and such a prominent software maker is anyone’s guess, but we’ll be following this story as it develops.

Apple doubles down on its right to profit from other businesses

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Apple said to soon offer subscription bundles combining multiple of its services

Apple is reportedly getting ready to launch new bundles of its various subscription services, according to Bloomberg. The bundled services packages, said to be potentially called ‘Apple One,’ will include Apple services including Apple Music, Apple Arcade, Apple TV+, Apple News+ and iCloud in a number of different tiered offerings, all for one fee lower that would be lower than subscribing to each individually.

Bloomberg says that these could launch as early as October, which is when the new iPhone is said to be coming to market. Different package options will include one entry-level offering with Apple Music and Apple TV+, alongside an upgrade option that adds Apple Arcade, and other that also includes Apple News+. A higher-priced option will also bundle in extra iCloud storage, according to the report, though Bloomberg also claims that these arrangements and plans could still change prior to launch.

While the final pricing isn’t included in the report, it does say that the aim is to save subscribers between $2 and $5 per month depending on the tier, vs. the standard cost of subscribing to those services currently. All subscriptions would also work with Apple’s existing Family Sharing system, meaning up to six members of a single household can have access through Apple’s existing shared family digital goods infrastructure.

Apple is also said to be planning to continue its strategy of bundling free subscriptions to its services with new hardware purchases – a tactic it used last year with the introduction of Apple TV+, which it offered free for a year to customers who bought recently-released Apple hardware.

Service subscription bundling is move that a lot of Apple observers have been calling for basically ever since Apple started investing more seriously in its service options. The strategy makes a lot of sense, especially in terms of helping Apple boost adoption of its services which aren’t necessarily as popular as some of the others. It also provides a way for the company to begin to build out a more comprehensive and potentially stable recurring revenue business similar to something like Amazon Prime, which is a regular standout success story for Amazon in terms of its fiscal performance.

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Apple said to soon offer subscription bundles combining multiple of its services

Apple is reportedly getting ready to launch new bundles of its various subscription services, according to Bloomberg. The bundled services packages, said to be potentially called ‘Apple One,’ will include Apple services including Apple Music, Apple Arcade, Apple TV+, Apple News+ and iCloud in a number of different tiered offerings, all for one fee lower that would be lower than subscribing to each individually.

Bloomberg says that these could launch as early as October, which is when the new iPhone is said to be coming to market. Different package options will include one entry-level offering with Apple Music and Apple TV+, alongside an upgrade option that adds Apple Arcade, and other that also includes Apple News+. A higher-priced option will also bundle in extra iCloud storage, according to the report, though Bloomberg also claims that these arrangements and plans could still change prior to launch.

While the final pricing isn’t included in the report, it does say that the aim is to save subscribers between $2 and $5 per month depending on the tier, vs. the standard cost of subscribing to those services currently. All subscriptions would also work with Apple’s existing Family Sharing system, meaning up to six members of a single household can have access through Apple’s existing shared family digital goods infrastructure.

Apple is also said to be planning to continue its strategy of bundling free subscriptions to its services with new hardware purchases – a tactic it used last year with the introduction of Apple TV+, which it offered free for a year to customers who bought recently-released Apple hardware.

Service subscription bundling is move that a lot of Apple observers have been calling for basically ever since Apple started investing more seriously in its service options. The strategy makes a lot of sense, especially in terms of helping Apple boost adoption of its services which aren’t necessarily as popular as some of the others. It also provides a way for the company to begin to build out a more comprehensive and potentially stable recurring revenue business similar to something like Amazon Prime, which is a regular standout success story for Amazon in terms of its fiscal performance.

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Microsoft’s dual-screen Surface Duo arrives September 10 for $1,399

I can’t recall the last time people were this intrigued by a (non-Xbox) piece of Microsoft hardware. Announced a little under a year ago amid a deluge of new devices, the Surface Duo turned a lot of heads, leaving many wondering whether the product amounted to more than a concept device.

Today, however, the dual-screen mobile device takes an important step closer to reality, with a release date and price. As a matter of fact, the Duo actually goes up for pre-order starting today. It’s set to arrive in stores on September 10. As for how much it costs, well, that’s bound to be a sticking point for some.

Image Credits: Microsoft

In the grand scheme of things, $1,399 isn’t a crazy price to pay for a dual-screen, perhaps. Certainly it pales in comparison to, say, the first generation of foldable mobile devices. But it will probably be enough to deter those who were simply casually interested in the new form factor.

Microsoft just announced a dual-screen Surface phone

The price tag seems to largely be a product of the Duo very much being a first-generation product for Microsoft. To hear the company, they built the system from the ground up, including the 360-degree hinge and a cabling system that allows for a pair of batteries, each hidden behind one of the screens.

I’ll preface this by saying I have not seen the Duo in person: COVID-19 has really put a damper on my ability to travel to events. That said, the hardware looks slick, and Microsoft has done a good job here building on top of the Android foundation to ensure there’s a dynamic two-screen experience. Again, the important caveat here being that some of those foldable devices also looked slick in the initial videos/demos, so I’m holding off on making any sort of sweeping judgments until I can get my hands on a unit.

Image Credits: Microsoft

Most additions to Android are focused on things like multi-tasking. The most obvious example of this is probably the App Groups, which lets users essentially pair two apps into a single icon on the desktop top. Tapping it will open them both at the same time, so you can, say, have a book open on one display and a note-taking app on the other. Or, perhaps, two social media apps, if you want to punish yourself.

Android is, perhaps, not the most obvious choice for Microsoft, which has devoted so much time to sticking Windows 10 on as many form factors as humanly possible. But it does, perhaps, represent some growth for a company committed to choosing the best software for this specific hardware, a decision that largely came down to the lack of mobile apps on Windows. The Duo is likely to start life as a niche device, but limiting the number of potential apps will only dampen its appeal.

In addition to its own first-party productivity apps, the company has already worked with a number of developers, including Amazon on a Kindle app — that certainly makes perfect sense for the dual-screen form factor, finally realizing some degree of the long-ago abandoned promise of the Courier device. Microsoft says apps will work across the dual-screens regardless, but an API will help developers further customize them for the unique form factor.

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As for why the company went dual-screen instead of foldable, that appears to mostly come down to materials. A foldable display would have made it much more difficult to cover the product with a sufficiently strong glass covering, which, in turn, would have made a pen input a bit of a non starter. And Microsoft’s Surface Pen is going to be a big part of the puzzle here (even if it’s not actually included in the $1,399 price tag).

There are, of course, trade-offs. Because there are always trade-offs. That’s just how this world works, friend. Here the biggest one seems to be the gap between screens. Sure, the two displays add up to a sizable 8.1 inches, but the gap plus the bezels could be a real pain when it comes to things like watching video on the thing.

Ultimately, I suspect the Duo will very much be a learning experience for Microsoft and the industry at large, but at the very least, it’s going to be one of the more interesting ones we’ve seen from a major vendor in recent years.

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Google’s Lookout app for vision-impaired now scans food labels and long documents

Google has updated its Lookout app, an AI toolkit for people with impaired vision, with two helpful new capabilities: scanning long documents and reading out food labels. Paper forms and similarly shaped products at the store present a challenge for blind folks and this ought to make things easier.

Food labels, if you think about it, are actually a pretty difficult problem for a computer vision system to solve. They’re designed to be attention-grabbing and distinctive, but not necessarily highly readable or informative. If a sighted person can accidentally buy the wrong kind of peanut butter, what chance does someone who can’t read the label themselves have?

Image Credits: Google

The new food label mode, then, is less about reading text and more about recognizing exactly what product it’s looking at. If the user needs to turn the can or bottle to give the camera a good look, the app will tell them so. It compares what it sees to a database of product images, and when it gets a match it reads off the relevant information: brand, product, flavor, other relevant information. If there’s a problem, the app can always scan the barcode as well.

Document scanning isn’t exactly exciting, but it’s good to have the option built in a straightforward way into a general-purpose artificial vision app. It works as you’d expect: Point your phone at the document (the app will help you get the whole thing in view) and it scans it for your screen reader to read out.

The “quick read” mode that the app debuted with last year, which watches for text in the camera view and reads it out loud, has gotten some speed improvements.

The update brings a few other conveniences to the app, which should run on any Android phone with 2 gigs of RAM and running version 6.0 or higher. It’s also now available in Spanish, German, French and Italian.

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Samsung Galaxy Watch 3 review

Samsung makes good smartwatches. The fact tends to get lost in discussions about a category that’s traditionally been so dominated by a single player. Things have shifted a bit of late, globally. Apple’s market share has slipped somewhat and Huawei and Samsung have been there to pick up some of the pieces.

Here in the States, Huawei is less of a player for reasons that should be painfully obvious. Google’s Wear OS is — for now at least — a non-starter. Acquisition target Fitbit has made a dent with its solid smartwatches, though it’s not quite a juggernaut. Same goes for Garmin, which does well, but commands a relatively small niche. For those looking for Android compatibility — or just an Apple alternative, generally — Samsung continues to be your best shot.

The company has long approached its wearables with a similar philosophy to the one that governs its smartwatches: lots of options, plenty of features and a big, flashy footprint. For my money, however, the top-line feature on the Galaxy Watch 3 is the return of the rotating bezel. The company recently abandoned it for its Active line, attempting to convince us that a haptic approximation was just as good. It wasn’t.

The bezel is back for Samsung’s Galaxy Watch 3

The ability to toggle between screens by spinning the border of the display has long been the Gear line’s most distinguishing characteristic — and the best smartwatch input by far. The Apple Watch crown isn’t even close. It was an odd choice for Samsung to drop it, even for a splinter line of watches. It’s back, thankfully, made from the same stainless steel casing as the rest of the watch body and sporting a perforated ridge for a better grip. There’s something satisfying in the ability to smoothly spin between screens.

The bezel is a bit thinner this time out, matching an overall reduction in case size. All told, the 3 is 14% thinner, 8% smaller and 15% lighter than the original Galaxy Watch. The 45mm model is still large, compared to other smartwatches, but this goes a ways toward addressing what’s long been one of my chief complaints with the line. Ditto for the availability of a 41mm version. Past Galaxy Watches have felt needlessly bulky — an issue with a device intended to wear on one’s person all day and night.

Image Credits: Brian Heater

The watch is still a bit big for my personal tastes, but outside of the Active line, this is definitely the most comfortable Samsung watch in some time. The metallic casing also has a fairly timeless design, as far as smartwatches go, maintaining a sporty look that’s been a standard of the line for a few generations now. I tend to prefer something a bit more minimalistic. For me, the S2 was and continues to be the pinnacle of design language for the line, but I recognize that plenty of people prefer something a bit more…complex.

The screen measures 1.4 inches on the 45mm and 1.2 inches on the 41mm — a touch smaller than the 1.65/1.5 inches found on the Apple Watch. Though, obviously the round design also offers up a different form factor. The screen is nice and clear and reads pretty well in daylight, thanks in part to the ambient light sensor. The model ships with a nice leather band, and thanks to its standardized fit, can be swapped out with an essentially infinite list of different third-party bands.

Apple Watch Series 5 review

Tizen has always seemed like an odd choice, but Samsung’s very much made the operating system its own here, as Google has struggled for wider adoption with its own wearable OS. The watch’s app selection continues to lag Apple, including some bigger-name developers. There are some important partners here — most notably Spotify. With Apple making major plays on both the watch and streaming front, the partnership makes a lot of sense for both parties. Among other key features is the ability to download playlists directly to the device, so you can leave the phone at home for a workout, if you’re so inclined.

And what the Galaxy Store lacks in apps, it more than makes up for in watch faces, with more than 80,000 currently available. There are also some 40 different modular complications. You can also create custom faces by taking an image of real world patterns.

Battery life is decent, as long as you turn off the always-on display. By doing so, I was able to get a couple of hours short of two full days of life. That’s not exceptional, but it should help you take advantage of the sleep tracking a few days a week, assuming you’re comfortable falling asleep with a sizable watch on your wrist. That admittedly takes some getting used to. With always-on enabled, you can expect to get about half that total.

Image Credits: Brian Heater

The watch does a good job autodetecting select workouts. Running analysis goes a bit deeper, adding to a feature introduced with the Active 2. After a run is complete, it breaks down the specifics of your run mechanics (as best it can as a wrist-worn monitor) in an attempt to help reduce running-related injury. As a current former runner, I can attest to the fact that poor form is a really good way to injure yourself.

As Apple is finally getting serious about sleep tracking on its watch, Samsung is smoothing out its own experience. The watch breaks down light, deep and REM sleep, offering up a score for the night. I found myself getting scores in the 40s — not great, given that people in my age range apparently score around a 70. Samsung also offers up features like mindfulness and stress management to get that under control. Personally, I think getting better sleep on my end is going to take a “not constantly thinking about COVID” feature.

Image Credits: Brian Heater

Two key health additions aren’t ready out of the box here in the States: both the EKG reader and blood pressure detector will have to wait for all of the standard regulatory approval, so I’ll hold off judgment accordingly.

Samsung’s certainly not attempting to price competitively here. At $400 and $430 for the 41mm and 45mm versions, respectively, it’s a premium price tag. It’s clear that the company doesn’t see companies like Huawei or even Fitbit as its primary competitors. As with its flagship smartphones, Samsung’s got Apple firmly in its sights, and it’s priced to match. Apple is far and away still the best option for iOS users, but when it comes to Android, not many can compete with Samsung’s premium offering.

 

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