30% is not Bullshit

Apple charges 30% for the payment system it provides so it’s not completely bullshit. For the 30% you give to Apple, you don’t need to setup any payment gateway to charge your customers, you don’t need to get their Credit Card information, Apple completes the transaction for you, for an app that’s hosted on their store.

In turn it holds a responsibility to its customers to keep that trust of secure data. Think of the App Store as a departmental store where you can sell your products. It does the transactions for you, so you don’t need any payment setup. In turn it hopes that you don’t setup your own competitive stores inside it. By that analogy, not allowing third party payment gateways for buying digital content seems to be fair.

The tax is legit. But Spotify’s problem is legit too. True, it’s wrong for them to say that the 30% tax is bullshit. But when your competition is Apple, it puts you in a tough situation where Apple, because it owns the store doesn’t need to pay the Apple Tax and hence can price their music for a lot less than what Spotify can give.

Another thing in defense of the App Store’s payment methods is that it’s the most convenient mode of payment, you just need to authenticate yourself with your finger and Believe it or not, ease of payments helps a lot in sales. Is the 30% still too much?

Another thing, Apple does banner promotions too. It’s essentially Apple saying, “Buy this, it’s pretty cool”, 30% not worth yet?