Lots of "free" apps are trial period followed by automatic subscription renewal unless canceled. That's not a scam, it's failure on the part of the customer to actually read the terms of what they're downloading. Personally, I find the subscription cost of a lot of main-line software apps (Adobe, Micro$oft, etc.) to be exorbitant and they all auto-renew unless canceled, but they're not scams either.

The lesson here is to pay attention to your finances and update your payment information promptly when it changes. Why in the world would vendors continue to provide access or service more than 2 weeks after your payment failed and you made no attempt to update it?

I'm sure if your automatic payment fails to Epic, they'll disable your access as well.

Another story about the continuing saga of a digital pyramid scheme.

Actually, Epic dragged Steam into the fray. Apple is retaliating, using Steam. Steam should direct it's angst toward Epic.

" ... after not having released a new beta since the 25th of September!"

Today is Sept 15.

After watching the "gig economy" for a few years I've come to the conclusion that it is just a pretty name slapped on traditional business models so they can pretend they're something new and inventive, under-pay employees, offer no benefits, scrape all the profits to the investors, and walk away when someone notices that they're a traditional business using semantics to try to avoid labor laws and legal responsibilities.

Yea that works fine until the competition is gone and you find yourself paying twice the original price with no where else to turn to save money.

It's funny when people confuse "the manufacturer makes the device difficult to repair" with "the manufacturer make the device as compact and sturdy as possible." There's always the hint that a manufacturer goes out of their way to make devices difficult to repair.

There is no change to paradigm; fees charged by tech companies is a fair, objective comparison. Any other basis of comparison would be subjective. And if a company wanted to make a computer that ran only proprietary software there's no law against that; the market sorts that out. As for “The OS is licensed and not sold therefore I don’t actually own anything I buy,” actually you own the device, even if it's little more than a paperweight without functioning software. And there's no law in the world that says someone who makes a device has to make it so it will run all software a user might want to use. The fact that an iPhone or a Pixel won't run a particular app doesn't equate to monopolistic practice; it's simply a limitation of the device.

Apple's 30% fee on app developers is consistent with fees charged by other tech companies. Control of what's allowed (and not allowed) in a store is part of the store owner's right and responsibility. Delays to app updates due to app review processes are routine in the industry because reviews take time and developers don't always adequately address the store policies. An app store where developers could do as they please would be vastly more hostile to user privacy. Every store (digital or brick n mortar) gets full visibility of which products users are purchased as part of running a store.

The administration hasn't prepared for much of anything that wasn't already prepared for by previous administrations, and has even degraded some preparedness (i.e. the pandemic preparedness). When everything bad that happens is a hoax, no preparations are made for anything.

Yes but they don't demand that Ford fix their GM-ified vehicle, or vice versa.

It's just another attempt to replace the "cord" I cut years ago with a bundle of channels, the majority of which I wouldn't subscribe to and don't want to fund with my money, so other people can watch them. F.A.I.L.

Like every president, including Trump, he would have policies and send legislation to the hill. Which the hill would promptly ignore. Doesn't really matter who is in the White House, their priorities and policies do not translate into legislation without 51 votes in the Senate. There aren't 51 votes in the Senate for much of anything.