Latest news with #TimSweeny
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Australian court finds Apple, Google abused app store market power
Epic Games has just secured a win in its crusade against Apple and Google's app store policies: The Federal Court of Australia on Tuesday ruled that Apple and Google's engaged in anti-competitive conduct when it came to their respective app stores, ABC News reported. While Judge Jonathan Beach found that the two tech giants had abused their dominant position in the market for app distribution to limit competition, he rejected Epic's claims that the companies had engaged in 'unconscionable conduct.' Epic Games has been fighting Apple and Google's fee structure for in-app purchases in various jurisdictions around the planet. The company scored a major win against Apple this year in the U.S, and as a result, Fortnite returned to Apple's U.S. App Store after five years. Tuesday's ruling could yield a similar result for Epic in Australia: the company's CEO Tim Sweeny said that the Epic Games Store and Fortnite would return to the Apple App Store in the country soon. 'We welcome the court's rejection of Epic's demands that we distribute app stores from within the Google Play store, and Epic's attacks on other critical security protections that users rely on. However, we disagree with the court's characterisation of our billing policies and practices, as well as its findings regarding some of our historical partnerships,' a Google spokesperson said in an emailed statement. Meanwhile, Apple told ABC News that its app store is the safest way for users to get apps, and that it disagreed with the court's ruling on some of Epic's claims. Connectez-vous pour accéder à votre portefeuille
Metro
21-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Metro
Fortnite mobile still not available in UK despite return to US App Store
The long road towards getting Fortnite back onto the UK iOS and Android app stores continues, even though it's back in the US. It's taken five years, a costly legal battle, and several court orders, but Fortnite is finally available again in the US App Store, meaning that American fans can now play it on iPhone and iPad. According to publisher Epic Games it should turn up on the Epic Games Store and AltStore in the EU today as well, but unfortunately none of that seems to be helping its availability in the UK. Epic hasn't been specific about anywhere else, but as of right now the mobile version of the game isn't available in the iOS App Store or Android's Google Play in the UK. And it's not clear when that's going to change. The game's absence began in 2020, when Epic purposefully broke Apple's rules about fees for in-app purchases, knowing that it would get them thrown off the store. This led to a five year legal battle which seemed to end in a stalemate, but which this year saw a US judge instruct Apple to stop trying to take a cut of payments. This immediately led to Epic announcing that Fortnite would be making a return, but its initial attempts to do so were blocked by Apple. Apple was told to stop doing this, by a US judge, and so on Tuesday the game finally returned to US App Stores, complete with the ability to buy cosmetics and other in-app purchases directly from Epic. That means more money for Epic, as they won't now be giving 27% of every payment to Apple, but it makes little difference to players, other than there are some good deals at the moment to incentivise them into using the Epic store. As you might gather from all this, Fortnite mobile is not actually a very large proportion of the overall audience, or otherwise Epic Games wouldn't have allowed it to sit the last five years out. Instead, they embarked on a bizarre marketing campaign, using Orwellian imagery and trying to paint Apple as a restrictive tyrant. Really, the only problem was that Epic didn't like having to give Apple money, in what is a fairly standard licensing arrangement similar to how Steam and video game consoles work. But then Epic boss Tim Sweeny doesn't like those either. Since Epic hasn't been specific about any region other than the US and Europe it's unclear exactly what's going on in the rest of the world but as of right now Fortnite is not available on iOS or Android. So, sadly, the answer to the above question is just to… wait. More Trending Last year, Epic Games stated that they hoped to get Fortnite back in the UK in the second half of 2025. That was before the recent court judgements in the US, but it's unclear if that's going to speed things up or not. Thanks to Brexit, the UK is no longer in the EU, so any changes to the situation there have no relevance here. However, the UK does have legislation very similar to the EU's DMA (Digital Markets Competition and Consumers Act) so in theory there shouldn't be a problem. Epic boss Tim Sweeney told The Guardian last year that, 'Unless Apple and Google manage to lobby the UK government that they should be able to continue blocking competition, we should be able to move on that by the end of next year.' There's no sign that Apple and Google are trying to lobby anyone at the moment, so that hopefully clears the road for a UK annoucement soon. Email gamecentral@ leave a comment below, follow us on Twitter, and sign-up to our newsletter. To submit Inbox letters and Reader's Features more easily, without the need to send an email, just use our Submit Stuff page here. For more stories like this, check our Gaming page. MORE: Next gen Xbox could remove backwards compatibility and add PS5 games says report MORE: If Borderlands 4 costs £80 Gearbox's boss thinks you should pay it MORE: Baldur's Gate 3 may have the worst video game merchandise ever made
