What a time I picked to fall behind on my writing. It’s hard to believe this was only 10 days ago.
I dont need to summarize what’s going on here, this is the biggest bout of tech drama in many years. To add icing on the cake Fortnite is literally the only video game our 10 year old son will play which means I’ve come to know the game, and how Epic operates, much better than I ever wanted to.
I’m trying to keep my mind to just the information we’re knew at the time so I wont go in to Apple’s offer to put the app back if they just remove the direct payment option. But like Ben even know its hard to see a way where this ends without both companies getting a lot of blood on their hands.
It’s easy to see Epic as the hero and Apple as the villain here but Epic is really just looking out for Epic. They talk about wanting to expand options for users but really what they are looking for is more money for themselves. For years theres have been stories about Epic stealing IP, particularly dance moves, from folks without so much as credit it let alone any revenue sharing.
And assuming this case does go to court its hard to see how they make the case that they deserve this kind of freedom on the iPhone without also requiring game platforms like xBox to allow this kind of thing. Epic is explicit about this, they have said that they want to see an epic game store on gaming console too but they also smartly identified Apple as the most vulnerable place to start.
I can remember seeing a post about the 20% discount on v-bucks and groaning about having to argue with our son about how this didnt make v-bucks “such a great deal” since you’re still just paying money for digital clothing and theres no reason to believe that epic wont just raise the prices of things (in v-bucks)
But then I noticed the part of the story where they talked about direct payment options. Thats curious I thought. I wonder how they got away with that, that doesnt seem like something you are allowed to do. I remember getting hopeful, maybe this means apple is opening up a bit about this and later in the day I’ll ready about some kind of partnership between Apple and Epic.
But boy I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Apple pulled the App shortly after the stories broke and within minutes Epic released their 1984 inspired #freefortnite video to the world, along side a lawsuit against Apple. I loved John’s comment that it was like in a game of chess when you make a move and you opponent immediately responds that means they knew you were going to do that and they are at least 2 moves a head of you.
Notes on the episode
- Epic had the lawsuit ready to go.
- It’s crazy that this was only a week ago
Was this code part of the downloaded update or somehow remotely controlled or timebombed.
Losing money on Nintendo since they have the discounted rates there and they are paying 30% to those platforms. They don’t seem to be bothered by it.
Hard to see a way out of this.
Clearly a stunt in a way that Hey wasn’t. Video and lawsuits were ready to go.