The Epic & Apple Case Closes, Decision Yet To Be Set

Well, it was fun while it lasted wasn’t it? I mean, we had that one bit where Apple’s marketing director Trystan Kosmynka said when asked what an app is, “If you think of a game or app, games are incredibly dynamic. Games have a beginning and end, there’s challenges in place. I look at the experiences that are in Roblox similar to the experiences in Minecraft.” This was after Epic’s lawyers said that Roblox was a game with a number of games within it. Which one is right? Epic, of course, they are the ones who actually know what a game is, but according to Apple games only have a beginning and an end.

So that’s Grand Theft Auto V out the mix of being a game, Tetris is no longer a game. The Sims is just Desperate Housewives with extra fiddly bits, Fallout 4 is suddenly a soap dispenser, and everything else is suddenly a vibrating MP3 player. I mean, there are tri-dimensional chess moves that are less complex than that last Minecraft part. Not only this, but we’ve seen how much the free games cost Epic for their games store, along with the emails we were privy to now that everyone’s laundry was being aired. Then there was the icing on the cake, as after Tim Sweeney said “the fight isn’t over Epic wanting a special deal, it’s about the basic freedoms of all consumers and developers.” Only to say when asked if he’d have taken a special deal, “Yes, I would have.“

This mess I would like to call some kind of cluster of procreation is now over, or at least the first little bit is. According to GamesIndustry.biz, both Epic and Apple have made their closing statement in the antitrust lawsuit that was created thanks to corporate cat-fighting and dumb propaganda. The whole fight started with Epic kicking things off by subverting Apple’s storefront, to create a narrative about store fees and fighting a trillion-dollar company. They even “made” (wink wink) that parody of Apple’s 1984 ad, which itself was a parody. Nonetheless, it happened.

After weeks of this nonsense Epic’s lawyers from Cravath, Swaine & Moore made their closing remarks. They made their argument, stating “Epic acknowledges that this is an important case, […] and that a remedy […] of this sort that Epic has requested would be important and significant,” said Gary Bornstein. He went on to say “But that is because the issue affects such a large number of consumers, such a large number of developers, and has persisted for such a long period of time.” He then closed by adding that, to not bow down to what Epic demands would be too grave of consequence to ignore.

On the other side, Apple’s lawyers from Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher wanted to highlight the unforeseen outcomes of what Epic is proposing. “Epic is talking out of both sides of its mouth on this [case], when the impact, the results and the way this will play out, the impracticalities are plain and are simple,” said Richard Doren. “The only thing Epic is willing for Apple to do to any app that are not submitted to the App Store is to do some sort – they don’t describe what – of malware review.” Trying to spotlight the security risks, he added “that does nothing for the social engineering issues, and that is the iceberg under the water, not the tip of it, which in Apple’s case, because its excellence, is malware.”

Bornstein got to make final remarks following this, to which he was rather childish, stating, “Ultimately, what I continue to hear as a theme from Apple is ‘We’re doing a really good job, your honor. Please let us continue to do a really good job‘.” adding that this isn’t how defense works in antitrust law. When pressed to clarify the statement the childish quoting went on. “You have them pretending to be a benevolent overlord and saying ‘We don’t think anybody should compete, we’re trying to do a good job‘,” said Bornstein. He then closed his argument, stating, “But the point is you have to compare, you have to decide whether what they’re doing is what it would be in the face of competition.”

When all was said and done, Judge Yvonne Gonzales Rogers thanked both sides, noting her toughness was just a tool to get to the bottom of each case. She added that we might not see the final decisions by the middle of summer, August 13th being noted for it being the anniversary of Epic’s narrative beginning (I hear Apple enjoy those) with the Fortnite update. “I’m not promising to have this by August 13th, but I want to get to this while the memory of the testimonies [and] the arguments are fresh,” said Rogers. “But we do have thousands and thousands of cases to review. We have 4,500 pages of testimony, so there’s quite a bit of work still to do.” When her decision is made, which “will take a while,” it will be delivered in writing.

Of course, don’t expect this to end any time soon. As Judge Rogers said when both parties asked for a bench trial, “I know that I’m just a stepping stone for all of you. Whoever loses is going to take it up and say everything I did was wrong — that’s what litigators do.” She added that which side is defined as the loser in round 1 will take this to the court of appeals, look to get it overturned, and from there I don’t know how it all works out. We’ve all seen a few too many episodes of Law & Order and the such, so by the time you get to appeals TV shows are bringing down the credits and the actors are having a smoke.

Though, of course, we’re also getting the EU and Australian reboots of this trial, yet to be dated at the time of writing. Then you have to remember there is also the recasting of the whole thing, where Apple “dies” in car crash but reappears in the Queen Vic with new hair and a top that two big Os on it, recast as Google. Did that soap opera joke go too far? Maybe. Nonetheless, Google will also be taken to court at a date yet to be set again, in the UK and Australia too. Look, court cases are dry, let me have a bit of fun at the end of this; we could all use a laugh.