The EU’s Digital Markets Act has turned out to be a nightmare for Apple. You may have followed the back and forth of deciding how third-party app stores will work, but there’s more to it than that. For example, Apple should display a browser selection screen, similar to what Microsoft had to do with Windows ten years ago. And it doesn’t end there either.
John Gruber from Daring fireball notable comments by Margrethe Vestager, who leads the EC initiative “Europe Fit for the Digital Age”. They suggest that Apple needs to allow not only the choice of which apps to install and use – but also which apps to uninstall.
Vestager singled out the Photos app in particular, but there are few such apps that are currently deeply integrated into iOS. Too deep, maybe. Photos is a gallery app, of course, but it also works as a file picker when you try to share a photo or video.
Photos application
As you may know, iOS allows you to share your entire gallery or just individual photos and videos with the app (this includes both files stored locally and those transferred to iCloud). Taking that out of iOS and allowing third-party apps to replace the functionality could be quite the challenge.
On the other hand, DMA requires Apple to provide full access to iOS APIs and features—everything, including mobile payments, installing apps, and (obviously) everything Photos has access to.
This is almost the same situation that Microsoft found itself in in the early 2000s. Internet Explorer was a key component of Windows, so users could not uninstall it. The Department of Justice agreed and filed a lawsuit against the company. Microsoft agreed and made Windows more open to third-party software. Browser selection screens came later (and were pushed by the EU).
Here’s what Vestager said:
The third relates to the DMA’s aim to open up closed ecosystems to enable competition at all levels. According to article 6 paragraph 3 of the DMA, gatekeepers have an obligation to enable easy uninstallation of applications and easy change of default settings. They must also display a selection screen. Apple’s compliance model does not appear to meet the objectives of this commitment. In particular, we are concerned that the current design of the web browser selection screen deprives end users of the ability to make a fully informed decision. Example: They don’t improve user engagement with all available options. Apple also failed to disable the installation of several apps (one of which would be Photos) and prevents end users from changing their default status (for example Cloud), as required by the DMA.
With the current version of iOS, you cannot uninstall the following apps: App Store, Camera, Messages, Phone, Photos, Safari, Settings. Apple is already opening things up to third-party app stores and is set to adopt RCS later this year, plus it will enable third-party web browsers. Still, that doesn’t mean these apps will easily be completely decoupled from iOS (for example, other browsers might need to take over WebView’s duties).
Source | Over it