The European Commission will launch a probe into whether Apple is unfairly using the App Store to disadvantage competitors, reports the Financial Times.
据《金融时报》报道,欧盟委员会要开始调查苹果公司是否在不正当利用苹果商店来打压对手。

The antitrust investigation comes after Spotify filed a formal complaint with the European Commission in which it said that Apple’s App Store rules “purposely limit choice and stifle innovation at the expense of the user experience.”
此次反垄断调查是因为Spotify(全球最大的正版流媒体音乐服务平台)正式向欧盟委员会提起了诉讼,诉讼中该公司称苹果公司苹果商店的规定“蓄意限制用户的选择,以牺牲用户体验为代价扼杀创新。”

图片来源:视觉中国

Specifically, Spotify’s complaint focuses on Apple’s 30% cut of App Store sales, including subscriptions that Spotify users sign up to via the Spotify iOS app. As Spotify argued in a blog post back in March:
确切地说,Spotify公司的控诉主要是关于苹果公司在苹果商店销售额中30%的分成,包括Spotify用户通过Spotify苹果应用程序注册订阅的费用。Spotify在刚刚过去的三月份在一篇博客文章中提到:

To illustrate what I mean, let me share a few examples. Apple requires that Spotify and other digital services pay a 30% tax on purchases made through Apple’s payment system, including upgrading from our Free to our Premium service. If we pay this tax, it would force us to artificially inflate the price of our Premium membership well above the price of Apple Music. And to keep our price competitive for our customers, that isn’t something we can do.
我要举几个例子来阐明我的想法。苹果要从Spotify和其他数字服务公司通过苹果支付系统所获得的收入中提取30%的分成,包括免费服务和高级服务的升级操作。如果我们付了这30%,那就不得不提高高级会员的费用,这就远高于苹果音乐的会员费了,那对用户来说,我们就失去了价格的竞争优势。

Apple then hit back at Spotify saying the company “seeks to keep all the benefits of the App Store ecosystem–including the substantial revenue that they draw from the App Store’s customers–without making any contributions to that marketplace.” Apple also alleged that Spotify was being misleading in its complaint, saying:
之后苹果回击Spotify称该公司“想要继续利用苹果商店这一平台的所有优势,包括从苹果商店用户那里获得的可观收益,又不想为这一市场做任何贡献。”苹果也声称Spotify在控诉中传递了误导性信息:

The only contribution that Apple requires is for digital goods and services that are purchased inside the app using our secure in-app purchase system. As Spotify points out, that revenue share is 30 percent for the first year of an annual subscription–but they left out that it drops to 15 percent in the years after.
苹果公司只从通过应用程序内部的安全支付系统购买的应用程序内部的数字商品和服务中提取分成,Spotify只说第一年的分成是会员年费的30%,却不提之后分成会降到15%。

 

翻译:菲菲