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Is the EU Good or Bad for Developers?
This discussion was created from comments split from: NanoStudio 2 - FREE for a short while.
Comments
EU is complete utter shit. This is how it ends when leftist nd socialists are at the charge. Fuck it.
That’s a discussion best reserved for the Other category.
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That's not discussion... that's just fact.
Anyway.. will observe the situation.. if more small devs will follow, i'm done with this platform for good. What EU touches with regulations, that just rots and dies slowly... Sorry but i feel HIGH level of frustration, it's just too much what EU broke in recent year or two ...
Feel free to split thread to Others, it's probably good idea.
Seriously 😂 is it only about the address and phone number? You can get an affordable Po box in most countries and a free sim card in Europe (Netzclub with 100mb free data every month). You people complaining about Europe yet you never lived in it. I love Europe and it's protective laws for customers and citizens in general.
Writing on the phone so have to keep it short:
1) it's not Europe, it's the EU. Important difference! Call me a nitpicker!
2) I am a EU citizen and have been for all my life, and lived and worked for several years in several different EU countries, so you could say I'm even an EXPERIENCED EU citizen 😄
3) the P.O. Box, of which I STILL haven't found a conclusive firsthand account that it would actually be deemed "sufficient" by the EU, would cost me 360 EUR a year in Ireland, which is the same order of magnitude as the total EU sales for my apps (Matt of NS2 is probably in the same boat)
4) in general, this particular regulation is completely moronic. Why would anyone need my physical address where I live to contact me in 2025? Why are businesses below 100 employees not simply completely exempt from this?
5) on a philosophical note, I tend to be the reverse of most people and actually trust private entities / businesses MORE than I trust governments (especially big ones). The explanation in a nutshell: private entities are closer to me. They are basically just "normal people" who try to get on with life and make a living. Meanwhile, governments already have TOTAL CONTROL OF AND ACCESS TO my life and "data", and can put me in a cage at any moment at gunpoint if I "misbehave". So why should I trust these more than private app developers? 🤔
That's it, sorry if a bit grumpy.
@SevenSystems
What bout keeping app for free for EU (in that case you doesn't need phone / address shit) and ask for donations on Patreon/Paypal ?? I believe people here will for sure throw few cents at you here and there (patreon is ideal in my opition), at least after every update ...
Or do one-time kickstarter campain and set your goal which would allow you to keep it in EU store for free for next year .. and then create new campain for another year - keep customers to decide.
Then you can show middle finder to not just to EU but also to Apple
I am absolutely with you in this... free fucking market and capitalism FTW !
Governments are ALWAYS mess... and especially in EU where most of major economies are ruled by damn leftists/socialits who are like plague .. Gov == maximum inefficiency, maximum wasting of resources, maximum centralization, maximum bureaucracy, minimum freedom, minimum competitiveness ..
I don’t see why it’s such a big issue, personally. In the UK, anyone with a business website is required by law to display their company address - whether it’s a sole trader, or big company. We all do it.
Seems a bit iffy to me, all this anonymity business.
But hey, if you want to kick loyal customers in the teeth now you’ve made yer cash, I guess that’s your prerogative 🤷
If you think that average developer of MUSIC apps can afford to pay full-time at least one person who will be availabe on phone and answrting 24/7 calls from customers from ENTIRE WORLD (multiple various languages) then you are completely delusional..
It is really COMPLETELY differenr situation than having busines withimg ONE country so you heve to answer just calls from that country, in most cases in MAJOR way smaller numver of customers than is music app released to global apps market.
It’s showstoper for small (one-man company) ios apps devs.
Voicemail directing queries to an online form or support email address, or better still an FAQ page for those people in Tasmania, who want to spend £50 on a phone call to the developer in Poland, asking why their £2.99 MIDI AU isn’t working in Logic?
Who said anything about UK online businesses only dealing with one country?
It’s exactly the same for any business trading globally.
But isn't apple requiring this address to only send you a verification letter? You can just rent Po box for one month
I agree not all laws are logical but the question is if EU regulators are only to blame or maybe also Apple for poor execution of these laws like with alternative app stores. They basically made it impossible for this idea to come to life and be beneficial for people using their products.
Still, i think cutting 25% of your sales because you don't like EU is maybe not in your best interest and wouldn't impact the laws in any way
And right-wing rule is somehow better?
if you ask about my political orientation then i'm minarchist, libertarian (not same as liberal !!) ... in nutshell it's about maximum of personal freedom, very minimal state, free market - that's values important for me..
i don't play game left / right too much, but yeah, in general right is always more close to my world view cause leftists and socialists are all about strong state, everything over-regulated, often strong police state, strong law on everything even on how i should wipe my ass
But again - when i talk about left/right, i do not mean far left or far right - both those extremes are basically same shit.
Historically - i like old USA from times of Ronald Reagan .. that was golden era.
Me and my family have strong personal negative experience with socialism, so i really hate going in that direction (which is happening in current European Union
)
You know that not all regulations are bad, right? Some are actually there to protect you from people who really don’t have your best interests at heart.
Western Europe is more like a police state than right-wing governments?
Free market capitalism exists exactly nowhere. [not that it would be a good thing if it did exist]. Truly free market economies don’t exist — at least among countries with sizable populations.
The real question for me isn't the EU rule. It is why it applies to the developer, rather than Apple. As a customer, when I buy something from the appstore, I do it in contract and under terms and conditions supplied by Apple. They then pay a developer in a contract they have with them. The developer is effectively a supplier to Apple. In my opinion it is Apple's contact details that should be provided. When I buy something I get an invoice from Apple, not from the developer.
Good point.
Somewhere in between is probably best.
That’s what supposedly have had, for decades, neo-liberal, neo-conservative governments, wolves and foxes.
The EU and the member countries seem hardly to qualify as far-left entities. Whatever the bureaucratic flaws, they seem hardly a reflection of where the EU falls on the left/right spectrum.
Sorry for the delay, had to do a family visit to Germany and caught the sniffles!
Yeah I've thought about this whole "donation" / Kickstarter model in various ways, it would have a few advantages. It might not even count as a business then, and thus avoid a lot of bureaucratic red tape as you mentioned. I'm still looking into it, particularly considering a Kickstarter to open-source the entire Xequence web-based DAW (i.e., basically NanoStudio 2 in the browser, without AU) 😊 It's all there, but I can't give it away for free. CONSCIENCE! 🥴 (and finances. Which are part of conscience. Somehow.)
😄 I see I struck a nerve with you there! Yeah, it depends on the government, there's nuances... but the EU seems to be particularly "adept" at various kinds of weirdness.
Regarding capitalism vs socialism -- I do support SOME degree of "socialism" in that society should care for the weak / ill and not let them starve if they can't care for themselves. But maybe that's not even socialism, but just common sense / "being human".
Sorry for the delay, had a family trip and caught the sniffles!
I'm not even SURE what this is required for, it's all very murky. And at the current levels of income my apps generate, I am really careful about any additional spending to keep them alive. And Po boxes can only be rented for one year minimum here in Ireland, unfortunately!
Yes, I think it's obvious that Apple is also somehow "pissed" by these regulations and partially passes on the "blame" to the developers, who then have no clue what's going on and what really is legally required (i.e. the aforementioned murkyness!). But on the other hand, Apple also does developers a HUGE service by streamlining all the (ridiculously complicated!) international tax / bookkeeping requirements by "bundling" all your international app sales together and doing all the per-country legal/tax shenanigans (mostly), for a very small fee (15% for small developers). That is insane value, and without Apple it would be impossible for indie devs to exist.
It might not be. But I'm 45 so nothing is in my best interest anymore anyway 😂
Finally, someone says it straight up. I get sh*t every time I mention this when someone calls out the "Apple tax" like it's some crazy extortion scheme. I get when they don't understand the hidden costs and hassle the App Store saves a small business. I've been there. The challenges of complying with international and tax law, plus the other services the App Store provides are huge. The businesses I worked for would gladly have paid an agent 15% of sales to take all that off their hands. I don't say that as an Apple fanboy (I'm not), but as someone directly involved in international business overhead.
However, someone else made a good point. This registration thing is something Apple should be handling. They're the seller in all other respects. You're just a supplier. They should be the registered address.
I think you're right that this is Apple shoving this down to developers to get them angered at the EU regulators. Petty corporate temper tantrum.
Maybe the EU regulations (which I'm sure encompass at least 5000 pages of unreadable, artificially "inflated" legal gibberish only consumable by LAWYERS) explicitly do not permit this, as the EU wants to FULLY EXPOSE the EVIL SELLER's FULL IDENTITY. You know. To protect privacy 😂
I wish that were the case! But any tariffs or digital taxes aimed at Apple just get passed straight to developers. In one country, we only make 18 cents on the dollar. (They're taking 82%!)
On average, Apple takes about 25% from each of our payouts. But, before they lowered it to "15%" from "30%", they took an average of 40%. ¯_(ツ)_/¯ I guess that counts as foreign taxes?
And then, of course, we still have to pay U.S. taxes.
Thinking out loud, I wonder if Canadian App Developers will make 25% less once the Trump tariffs kick in? Apple will have to pay the tariffs, and simply make the developers pay it instead of the customers (like they do in other countries?)
EDIT:
Asked ChatGPT
"Yes, that’s exactly how Apple tends to operate—any extra costs, whether from foreign taxes, regulations, or tariffs, get passed down to developers rather than absorbed by Apple. If the proposed Trump tariffs on China or other countries include digital goods or services that impact Apple’s business, they could find a way to shift the burden onto app developers instead of increasing App Store prices for consumers."
Thanks for that excellent additional information @AnalogMatthew !
But I think what we're getting at is 15% commission for legal and tax compliance administrative overhead, plus the rest of the infrastructure, etc, that you would have to spend time on, and probably hire professional help with to transact internationally is a bargain.
Apple isn't "taking" the additional tariff and tax costs from you. The countries that impose them are. They're just passing those through (without you having to understand and manage it yourself, file and pay in each jurisdiction, prove that you did so if audited, pay fines if you screw up, etc, etc, etc).
I don't see why governments causing additional costs on you should be seen as a reflection on Apple. You have control over pricing in every region. If you're not charging more in the regions that cost you more to do business, that's your choice.
Or, am I missing something?
Oh, I agree with you, Wim! And yes, that’s technically true. I used to think Apple was doing us a favor, too.
But in practice, at least here in the US, the folks I know who sell VSTs, sample libraries, and sound packs outside the App Store on their own websites aren’t dealing with these regulations, tariffs, or legal overhead at all. Apple, being a bigger and more visible target, gets hit with those costs, then passes them down to us as a "convenience."
Which is totally fair. The thing is, it’s a convenience none of us at this level actually NEED. It’s like buying a 3 ton pickup truck just to drive to the grocery store. To me, it just feels like yet another case of billionaires acting like they’re doing us a favor while really just protecting their own bottom line by keeping us in their App Store. It almost feels like they are scaring developers into not selling things on our own.
I violently agree on every point. 😎
I never truly figured small indie developers doing international business from their own storefronts ever bothered with international tax compliance, and almost as much that anyone generally experiences fallout from not doing so. My background is from larger companies that had higher visibility. Maintaining compliance was a huge pain.
It's very clear that Apple's hissy fits are designed to try to redirect outrage to the rank and file. Like how whenever the my US state is faced with a budget showdown, they cut off funding for things like the State Parks that actually generate revenue in some cases, to drive the point home to voters, while leaving wasteful hidden spending all over the place alone.
No, I'm not defending Apple. I still maintain that the 15% is a good value for what it provides for many people. I'd pay it it in a heartbeat. But if it's so freaking awesome then it shouldn't need to be the only option allowed.
(yes, yes, yes, I get all the security concerns. Those are real too. But we're all adults that have been able to make our own decisions about risks in almost everything else. We don't need Mama Apple to protect us.)
Couldn't resist! (as this thread originally vibed around the DSA and its fallout)
https://x.com/SevenSystemsLtd/status/1891995374975349061
nvm about apps. Now THIS is something to be concerned about. Very concerned! 😂
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2025/02/21/coffee-is-dangerous-for-you-warns-eu/
OK, now that is some next level government meddling. 😂