I led the build of an SVOD service at a large media company that was also mentioned in this article. Negotiating with Apple at the time to get our service approved, and then negotiating with them further on integration with the TV app, it was clear their ambition was be a media company by the concessions they wanted. This was years ago, mind you.
Which leads me to the other part of Apple's brand: they will make your life hell if you play in a space they deem important to their survival. Any developer on the app store knows this.
We're entering a world where it will be very, very difficult to survive as a third party in an ecosystem, and the argument will be "our brand." For any success you have, 30% of your gross revenue is going to help finance a potential future competitor. We have to double down on mobile web in the next decade if we want any semblance of competition in media.
This is a very one sided story. We have an existence proof of there being literally dozens of video on demand apps on iOS and tvOS - many of which don’t allow people to subscribe within the app.
There are also a half dozen streaming music services.
This is why we have antitrust law. Google has been fined for pushing their own services on Android, because they have multiple times the market share of Apple. I'm sure if Apple went far enough they would get dealt with too.
If Netflix doesn't like being dependent on Apple, they should have built the rails. They chose not to, and that's probably the correct move, but I don't see why they'd complain about the 30%. They could have not spun-out Roku and not have to pay for distribution to anyone! They obviously knew that being everywhere would maximize profits in the long run. But it goes hand-in-hand that now they've eliminated the capital expenses of developing a platform, they'd be paying others for distribution.
I mean that's what net neutrality was always about really, not being responsible for the rails but also regulating them to maximize the advantage to themselves (a standard commoditize your complements play). They dropped their net neutrality advocacy after they got big enough and wanted to partner with cable companies and wireless carriers for distribution, which they gladly pay for.
Which leads me to the other part of Apple's brand: they will make your life hell if you play in a space they deem important to their survival. Any developer on the app store knows this.
We're entering a world where it will be very, very difficult to survive as a third party in an ecosystem, and the argument will be "our brand." For any success you have, 30% of your gross revenue is going to help finance a potential future competitor. We have to double down on mobile web in the next decade if we want any semblance of competition in media.