Judge to Epic: So if google extended the same deal to you would you be down?
Epic: No, it’s anticompetitive
Judge: But if you’re getting the same deal deal as spotify it’s fair…
Epic: No, it’s anticompetitive
If indie devs, for example, aren't getting the same deal, it sounds anticompetitive to me.
(I'm no Epic fan, just a random thought)
Indie devs do already get a bit of a break by only paying 15%.
Judge: But if you’re getting the same deal deal as spotify it’s fair…
The judge sounds like an idiot. Just because someone agreed to a deal doesn't mean it's a fair deal. Millions of developers have agreed to Google's terms... and millions more have not agreed to them (I'm a developer, none of my apps are on the Play store for example, in part because I don't like the terms).
I agree it’s a bizarre take—they’re a judge, not a settlement lawyer! You’d think a judge’s training would be to consider the general implications of the problem being brought to them given that that’s kinda their job.
The judge sounds like he no longer wants to sit on the case and is trying to end it, asap, any way he can.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
“Disclosure of the Spotify deal would be very, very detrimental for the negotiation we’d be having with those other parties,” Pomerantz told Judge James Donato, who is overseeing the Epic v. Google antitrust case.
Reading between the lines, it sounds like Spotify is getting some sort of special treatment and that other app developers would want the same if they learned the terms of the deal.
Epic filed its suit long before Google announced User Choice Billing, and it’s made clear already that it doesn’t see the option as a solution.
CEO Tim Sweeney has called the program a “sham” that still sees “Google taking 26 percent of the revenue in exchange for doing exactly nothing.” It echoed this position in court.
Its multibillion-dollar agreements to be the default search engine on phones and browsers, for instance, are at the heart of an ongoing antitrust trial brought by the Department of Justice.
Donato has said he doesn’t want any redacted documents filed in his courtroom, but he’s allowing Epic and Google to enter only specific portions of them.
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