A lot of percentage are thrown around in your reply, but all of these are relative to a specific market you define. Wether it’s the relevant market definition is up for grabs.
You should have a look at the Apple vs Epic fillings, where Epic came with a pretty different perspective on which definition should be taken into account. They of course lost as the US judge sided with Apple’s definition (while Korea came with a different verdict…), but that’s at least an indication of how important that definition is. “30% of device share” or “80% of in-app purchases” are completely different perspectives.
> if a potential customer doesn’t like how Apple operates, they are free to buy something else
Customers are mostly irrelevant. To get back to your Microsoft example, no developper was stopped from developping for linux, nor were customers stopped from buying barebone machines, or Apple, or beOS, or mainframes. The issue was Microsoft making backroom deals with the vendors to make Windows alternatives pricier and non competitive. This makes it worst for customers as a result, but that’s the result, not the core issue (I’m referring here to the EU rulings). Definition of a anti-trust issue should be about how a player distorts the market by pressuring other business, not wether the customer has theoretical choices or not.
You should have a look at the Apple vs Epic fillings, where Epic came with a pretty different perspective on which definition should be taken into account. They of course lost as the US judge sided with Apple’s definition (while Korea came with a different verdict…), but that’s at least an indication of how important that definition is. “30% of device share” or “80% of in-app purchases” are completely different perspectives.
> if a potential customer doesn’t like how Apple operates, they are free to buy something else
Customers are mostly irrelevant. To get back to your Microsoft example, no developper was stopped from developping for linux, nor were customers stopped from buying barebone machines, or Apple, or beOS, or mainframes. The issue was Microsoft making backroom deals with the vendors to make Windows alternatives pricier and non competitive. This makes it worst for customers as a result, but that’s the result, not the core issue (I’m referring here to the EU rulings). Definition of a anti-trust issue should be about how a player distorts the market by pressuring other business, not wether the customer has theoretical choices or not.
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