Mac Life INVESTIGATES
The battle between the world’s largest music services has escalated. We take a look at what’s happening CHARLOTTE HENRY
Spotify and Apple Music are the two largest music streaming services in the world, attracting millions of listeners each day. For years, their parent companies have been locked in PR, political and legal battles.
Essentially, Spotify thinks the iPhone–maker treats it unfairly and favors its own product. Apple says that Spotify has to play by the standard App Store rules. This includes paying Apple a 30% cut for payments made via the App Store and accepting that it has banned other forms of transactions.
Spotify is classed as a reader app by Apple. This means that it is allowed to provide a link within the app that takes users to a website from where they can manage their account. But products like Spotify cannot show that it offers cheaper pricing via its website in the app. Indeed, to avoid the so– called “Apple tax”, Spotify does not give users the option to upgrade their plan within its app at all. You can see the price of its Premium plans, but cannot buy it on your iPhone. Instead, there is simply a message that says “You can’t upgrade to Premium in the app. We know, it’s not ideal.”
VERDICT AND APPEAL
The battle between the two companies started in 2019, when Spotify filed an antitrust complaint to the EU about Apple, prompting a formal investigation. Apple hit back, releasing a statement tackling the various allegations, including the idea that it was blocking access to Spotify updates and products. The company said at that point it had “approved and distributed nearly 200 app updates on Spotify’s behalf, resulting in over 300 million downloaded copies of the Spotify app. The only time we have requested adjustments is when Spotify has tried to sidestep the same rules that every other app follows.”
There are more changes coming to the EU as Apple responds to the demands of the Digital Markets Act. Things have, though, escalated in recent weeks. On March 1st 2024, Spotify signed a letter saying that it and other tech companies “are very concerned that Apple’s proposed scheme for compliance with the Digital Markets Act (DMA), as communicated on 25 January 2024, will not meet the law’s requirements therefore inhibiting our ability to deliver the benefits of the DMA to consumers as soon as possible.”
Just three days later, the EU hit Apple with a €1.8 billion ($1.9 billion) fine. Announcing the punishment as a result of the aforementioned investigation, EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager said: “For a decade, Apple has restricted music streaming app developers from informing their consumers about cheaper options available outside of the app. Apple
