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Apple has watched the barrel of many antitrust investigations this year, after app developers like Spotify and Rakuten accused the company of unfairly favoring Apple’s own apps before theirs. But Apple is apparently working on a new feature that could fix at least one of the common issues, proactively suggesting third-party apps (apps that Apple born make) to iPhone and iPad users when setting up their devices for the first time. Will Apple offer Spotify alongside Apple Music? It could be on the table.
9to5Mac spotted the feature in the new beta of iOS 14.3, and it seems pretty clear from the accompanying text that the feature is designed to satisfy countries that have a poor view of Apple’s current position. “In accordance with regional legal requirements, continue to display applications available for download,” reads part of the code, suggesting that it will only be deployed in regions where Apple feels obligated to do so.
Assuming Apple actually makes this feature a reality in a future version of iOS, that may not be enough to satisfy some of the companies that have spoken out against Apple. On the one hand, the iPhone’s default set of apps is just one place they believe Apple is giving itself an edge. Apple has also been accused of prioritizing its own content in search – although Apple says this is not true – and in relation to the changes to Search, a one-time attempt to recommend a small handful of applications to users who stick to the onboarding process would not. have so much impact.
But Apple seems to be making more of such a change this year; in iOS 14, it finally lets you set your own browser and default email apps, although there were a few bugs there.
Apple is also waging a somewhat different antitrust battle with Epic Games Fortnite, and it has been criticized for its handling of the App Store for some time. Recently, Apple changed some of its App Store policies to allow some of the types of apps it had blocked or attempted to remove – when their blocking drew unwanted attention.
Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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