That this news has not been reflected too much in the international media already tells us a bit about the path they have decided to follow in Cupertino in light of the European laws that will come into force next year. And the news itself is important, because it is about confirmation of a new alternative App Store for iOS.
We knew of Microsoft’s intentions to open its own store, but for the first time, some have already explicitly confirmed what will be an alternative to the App Store. Setapp, the application subscription service, has made clear your intentions.
That Setapp wants to be one more store makes perfect sense
We are well aware of the strategy that Setapp has followed up to now: offer unlimited access to a catalog of premium applications in exchange for a monthly fee that starts at $9.99 per month plus taxes. A kind of Apple Arcade of apps, all controlled under one user account. Spark, CleanMyMacX, Downie or Taskpaper are some of the applications that are part of this catalogue.
Now Setapp wants to be managed through its own app store, and it makes all the sense in the world. You pay the monthly fee and you go to download the applications through its own store, not through the App Store. In this way they achieve more independence in front of the official store of those from Cupertino.
This is news just because it’s interesting to see the flexibility these alternative app stores can take, but we still don’t see any signs of it in the iOS 17 documentation. And that makes me think that The launch of this type of store will be very discreet on the part of the system itself, and only in countries where it is mandatory to do so. Apple is not interested in making people aware of the new mechanism of independent stores.
The European law that forces iOS and iPadOS to open the borders of the App Store will enter into force on March 5, 2024. It will be then when we will see if from Setapp they take the final step of launching this store or at least provide more details on how they plan to compete against the App Store itself. It will be a new frontier for the iPhone, with which European users will have certain freedoms (and responsibilities) to be able to install all kinds of applications on our devices.
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