Don't waste the sour cherries
So It Turns Out, #16
So,
I took a bit of a break. Like many of you, the Zombie Apocalypse just wasn’t conducive to writing anything positive. But, hey, I got a lot of apartment cleaning done!
Here are some things I’ve been thinking about this week:
Don’t waste the sour cherries
As every honest American knows, sour cherries are better than sweet cherries.
I first fell in love with them in Istanbul, where sour cherry flavors are embedded in, well, almost everything. But finding them is extremely difficult in DC — they’re only fresh in season for a few weeks a year, and exact timing depends on which farmer’s market you go to (forget trying to find them in supermarkets). To successfully source them involves an esoteric system cultivating relationships with stone-fruit farmers, monitoring a particular Department of Commerce attorney’s twitter feed, and more than a little bit of luck.
So I tend to keep my sour cherries too long, since they’re a once-a-year pleasure. They last for a long time in the fridge, or brandied or bourboned. But I never have enough space in the fridge, and brandied preserves taste great but different than fresh sour cherries, so I end up freezing the spares. And therein lies the problem.
See — if you keep sour cherries in the freezer too long, they’ll freezer burn. But you always want to hold onto them longer, because they only come once a year. So once every couple of years, I end up regretfully throwing out cherries that I could have enjoyed, but instead held onto for another day.
So, eat the damn cherries. They’re delicious.
(And if you didn’t get any in time, may I recommend Luxardo’s product as a delicious backup)
Epic platform moderation challenges ahead
You may have missed it, but Epic Games recently sued Apple. (Note, therefore, that all statements of the parties should be treated as allegations, etc.) The lawsuit came after Epic suddenly turned on a feature in Fortnite, its most popular game on iOS and Android, allowing players to purchase in-game currency directly from Epic, without paying a 30% platform fee to Apple. Apple responded by telling Epic to turn off the feature, or not only their apps, but also their very popular game engine (Unreal) would be removed from the App Store (meaning that another developer who made an app using the Unreal Engine could lose access, as well). Epic sued, and, well, the Zoom hearing was interesting:
Ultimately, the judge handed down a split TRO — Apple can keep the games off the App Store, but can’t block their graphics engine from being used by another developer. The case continues, of course, but I want to convince you that this isn’t just about a contract dispute — it has real implications for security.
Now, let’s be clear, Epic isn’t going to be out of business tomorrow. Most of their game revenues happen on PC or console, anyways. For some sense of scale, at oral argument on the TRO, it was alleged that revenues to Epic are at least $350M in the past 2 years (though it’s unclear to me if that’s pre- or post- Apple’s 30%), and it’s generally assumed that Epic’s total revenues from Fortnite are in the billions. Also, Epic just raised a bunch of new capital at a valuation reportedly in the tens of billions, so I’m not worried about their solvency.
So why is this happening? A lot of ink has been spilled about what this means for antitrust law, and I’m not a lawyer, so let’s ignore that. But I don’t really think it’s about the fees. You’ll note that Epic didn’t pick a fight with Xbox or PlayStation, just Apple and Google, even though it’s generally assumed in the games industry that those platforms also charge a 30% cut. Rather, it’s about closed vs. open platforms, and their implications.
You see, Epic has a long-term vision to own the Metaverse, a shared set of experiences beyond just a game (previously). As a result, they want to have an experience that is more than just video games, but your movies, your social hangout, your concerts, your EVERYTHING.
And, well, Apple doesn’t get a 30% cut of premium video apps like Amazon Prime TV… so why should they get a 30% cut of the monetization from when you attend a movie event inside Fortnite (in which, for example, J.J. Abrams frantically attempts to paper over plot holes from Episode IX), Epic asks. Apple basically says: tough, we invented the platform, we get to decide what category you’re in.
But Epic’s ambition isn’t about getting a lower rate — it’s about breaking Apple’s ability to limit installations on iPhones to their App Store. Rather, Epic wants to install its own 3rd-party store on iPhones, just like it’s accessible on PCs. They point out, after all, that we don’t allow the device creator to have control over where you buy items from on any other device (again, except of course for the ones we do, like Playstation and Xbox, or printer cartridges, or anything else the EFF’s complaining about the DMCA’s negative influence on this year).
And I want to convince you that even if you believe this is good from competitiveness reasons (again, a question I take no position on, so I’m just stipulating it for argument), there are some real tough questions you need to navigate.
Apple rightly points out that their App Store does a pretty good job of gatekeeping at least the most scammy and abusive apps out of iPhones. There are real security concerns about what happens when you let anyone install arbitrary lumps of code from arbitrary websites. If you don’t think they matter, imagine all the adware and bloatware and spyware crap your least-technically-savvy relative gets tricked into installing on their desktop computer, and imagine instead it’s installed on a geolocated, always-on microphone they carry with them into the bathroom. And Apple controlling that store gives them the ability (which you should be both thankful for and terrified by) to block an app that they learn is dangerous.
So, imagine for argument’s sake that Epic launches their own game store, and that Apple is forced to allow it on iOS devices. There are three paths I see:
Epic adopts essentially the same or better security and anti-fraud review processes as Apple, we all breathe a sigh of relief. This is unlikely, as the whole point of the store is to get users to install code with commerce options that Apple doesn’t control! But maybe the store really basically does the same as Apple for every app except Epic’s, or something.
Epic adopts looser policies, and bad apps start sneaking through. Did I mention that the users of Epic’s store are the most likely to be Fortnite’s relatively young customers, who are unlikely to be very savvy about these things?
Epic adopts different policies. Maybe, for example, they adopt content moderation policies that American politicians decide are problematic because they align with a Possibly Rival Country’s policies instead. And then Apple will, with certain ironic hilarity, get pressured by Congresspeople about the fact that they’re allowing Epic’s scaaarry eeeeevil censorship store onto their devices.
Regardless of which path they take, I want you to understand this: Epic’s trying to become a platform. And platforms have to make moderation choices. Try to solve a problem with platform governance, and all that happens is now you have two problems. Maybe we should think about that question now, before we sleepwalk into this discussion.
(Disclosures: I used to work in the video game industry for Activision Blizzard. ATVI and Epic both have been invested in by at least one common investor, Tencent. I also have some friends who work at Epic. They’re good people.)
May this birb bless your timeline:
Mana mana:
Great advances in crab infrastructure:
Other news:
The NSO-WhatsApp lawsuit continues to have hilarious conflicts of interest
Innovation not dead, says inventor of new awesome Corpse Reviver #2 variant
Next time on Dave Kasten:
Is there an objective cosmic unemployment rate?
Disclosures:
Views are my own and do not represent those of current or former clients, employers, friends, or my cat.
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