Apple’s DMA Plans

John Gruber provides an outstanding anlaysis of Apple’s proposal here.

I say proposal. As Gruber writes:

I’ve emphasized throughout this piece the word proposals. That’s key, because no one, including Apple, knows whether the European Commission is going to find any or all of them compliant with the DMA. Apple has met with EC representatives dozens of times across several years regarding the DMA, but the way the EC works is that (1) they pass laws; (2) companies do all the work to attempt compliance with those laws; and only then (3) does the EC decide whether they comply. Companies like Apple don’t get to run ideas past the EC and get a thumbs-up or thumbs-down. They have to build them, then find out.

Which brings me back to my lede, and Sebastiaan de With’s quip that he couldn’t tell if a gripe about “overly powerful, rent-seeking gatekeepers” was about Apple, or about the EU.

The delicious irony in Apple’s not knowing if these massive, complicated proposals will be deemed DMA-compliant is that their dealings with the European Commission sound exactly like App Store developers’ dealings with Apple. Do all the work to build it first, and only then find out if it passes muster with largely inscrutable rules interpreted by faceless bureaucrats.

Irony indeed.