
Dustee Jenkins Chief Public Affairs Officer, Spotify
Five years ago, I sat in a conference room with key members of our legal team, several antitrust experts and Spotify founder & CEO, Daniel Ek. The topic at hand: Apple denied Spotify's app update and sent a new set of restrictions that would once again further limit our ability to conduct business in its app store. After careful consideration and lots of hand wringing, we decided we'd had enough. So weeks later, we took a step that seemed almost impossible but totally necessary: fight back against one of the biggest, most powerful (and beloved) companies in the world to protect the future of the internet economy.
Of course, we did this because Apple's practices were harming Spotify, but we also did it because we believe companies should be able to compete to the very best of their ability for the hearts and minds of consumers. And we also believe consumers should have access to all the information they need to make better, more affordable choices for them and their families. Sounds pretty reasonable to me. But sadly, these beliefs are in direct conflict with how companies, like Apple, have built their businesses to benefit their bottom lines.
This isn't some empty warning-the world is moving faster than ever. Every day that passes without regulatory intervention, consumers continue paying too much, many developers' dreams die on the vine under a 30% tax they can't afford and Apple's monopolistic roots take an even stronger hold.
Five years later, while we are finally seeing some momentum in Europe, there has not been enough progress worldwide. Apple has continued to enjoy-and profit from-the status quo while everything else in the world has seemingly advanced forward. In the absence of meaningful government action, Apple gets a free pass to do whatever it pleases and consumers are paying the price.
This is incredibly frustrating-especially when I think about how many consumers around the world are being impacted. Apple denies consumers' ability to choose for themselves, forcing them to pay more for apps, limiting their user experience and preventing them from hearing about cheaper options.
It's even more frustrating when you realize the actual reason Apple is doing this: to protect their own bottom line. As their product sales continue to slow, their services business becomes even more critical to their financial performance. So to defend their multi-trillion dollar monopoly, they are pouring even more resources into maintaining their stranglehold over the App Store.
We feel this acutely at Spotify. As a company that always focuses on building a simple, intuitive and seamless experience for users, Apple's artificial constraints are stifling and we know our users deserve better.
Recently, we launched audiobooks on Spotify and we were beyond thrilled to connect authors with millions of fans. But Apple stood in the way and our engineers were forced to create a complicated, multi-step process for audiobooks that users don't want or deserve. It was a subpar experience, that honestly, we were embarrassed to deliver but felt bullied into. (If you want to see what we wanted to deliver vs. what we had to, check it out here.)
But that's not all. Outside of the audiobooks issue, we can't do the following things on Apple:
Tell customers what our prices are to upgrade Premium membership options;
Let our customers request an email or other communication telling them about the ways they can save money;
Provide our customers with different payment options beyond what Apple mandates (e.g. a credit card or PayPal, etc.); or
Deliver new product enhancements or introduce new features to our customers without Apple's explicit approval.
In many cases to get these approvals, we first have to share our proprietary strategies with Apple-our competition-and there are no restrictions on what Apple can do with that information. I don't know about you, but I'd prefer not to be forced to share sensitive business plans with our biggest competitor, giving them insights from which they can copy, learn and gain an unfair advantage. But that's our reality as well as many other developers who also compete with Apple.
Apple also picks and chooses which app developers in the App Store have to pay them a 30% tax. Often, customers end up paying this extra cost. In contrast, Apple's own apps don't have to pay this tax (like Apple Music), and they come pre-installed on the iPhone so consumers see and pay for Apple's apps first.
I am proud that Spotify has helped to give a voice to a growing coalition of app developers big and small who are impacted by this behavior. But when does the talking stop and action finally start?
Knowing that Apple is not just going to change on their own volition, regulators in Europe have taken up the mantle to intervene in Apple's app store dominance. With the passing of the Digital Markets Act (DMA), Europeans may start to feel relief soon, assuming Europe delivers effective enforcement.
In the UK, Parliament is working on the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers bill (DMCC), which will similarly target dominant companies like Apple and ideally force them to compete more fairly. I am hopeful that it will have the impact consumers need and deserve.
And in the US, we also see light on the horizon with Congress poised to reintroduce the Open App Markets Act - a bill that would require Apple to stop its practices that prohibit other companies from providing options for consumers to pay in a variety of ways and letting companies like Spotify talk to customers directly. The fire has also been lit in countries like Japan, South Korea, and Brazil, which are realizing that Apple has been dictating the rules for far too long.
Someone re
Most recent headlines
06/10/2025
France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...
04/09/2025
Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE), in collaboration with Dalet, has been a...
07/08/2025
July 8 2025, 22:30 (PDT) Tata Motors & Dolby Bring Dolby Atmos to Harrier.ev, R...
18/07/2025
Blanche Barton, Peter Gilmore, Scott Cummings, Sundance Institute Director of Programming Kim Yutani, and Peggy Nadramia throwing horns. (Stephen Lovekin/Shutte...
18/07/2025
By Jessica Herndon
One of the most exciting things about the Sundance Film Fest...
18/07/2025
BOSTON Sports network NESN today relaunched the NESN 360 app with a redesigned user experience and upgrades....
18/07/2025
Berklee Singers Wow the Competition on Netflixs Building the Band Netflixs new music competition show features two Berklee artists looking to make their pop b...
18/07/2025
As the House of Representatives voted early Friday morning to eliminate federal funding for public broadcasting, advocates warned that the elimination of $1 bil...
18/07/2025
DENVER Imagine Communications has announced that it is deepening its commitment to the North American sports and live events market with investments in its prod...
18/07/2025
LOS GATOS, Calif. Netflix once again reported strong financial growth, with revenue increasing 16% year-over-year to $11.079 billion in Q2 2025 as net income s...
18/07/2025
Live from the 153rd Open Championship: SMT Enhances Video Board Experience; Enab...
18/07/2025
ShotTracker's Davyeon Ross on Revolutionizing Basketball On the Court and ...
18/07/2025
Home Pitch: How the Danish League Brought Its Live Match Production In-House Matchday Production produced 800+ matches across Denmark in its first year By Geor...
18/07/2025
Live From the 153rd Open Championship: EMG Debuts Spidercam for Golf, Expands Su...
18/07/2025
Usyk vs Dubois II: Bringing the fight to life with state of the art cameras and ...
18/07/2025
Usyk vs Dubois II: DAZN's head of boxing Chris Glanville talks helicopters, ...
18/07/2025
Live From the 153rd Open Championship: NBC Expands Unilateral Effort; Shared Stu...
18/07/2025
Warner Bros. Discovery's Anne Graham on Training New Professionals to Ensure...
18/07/2025
Live From the 153rd Open Championship: How R&A Spidercam Became a Reality for Go...
18/07/2025
ESPN Bulks Up Onsite Studios, Cameras, Player Mics for WNBA All-Star Weekend Besides the game, four studio shows will be produced onsite By Jason Dachman, Edit...
18/07/2025
Friday 18 July 2025
Credit: Marc Sethi
The Sky Arts Awards will return on 16 September, once again taking place at the iconic Roundhouse in London. Produced b...
18/07/2025
This month, players can dive into special crossover events featuring SpongeBob SquarePants in Snake.io+ and Crossy Road Castle, available exclusively on Apple A...
18/07/2025
Up for the Match brings the fun, the passion-and a bit of Riverdance- tomorrow n...
17/07/2025
Blanche Barton, Peter Gilmore, Scott Cummings, Sundance Institute Director of Programming Kim Yutani, and Peggy Nadramia throwing horns. (Stephen Lovekin/Shutte...
17/07/2025
Spotify's goal with audiobooks is to help grow the publishing industry and create the best possible experience for booklovers, which is why we're launch...
17/07/2025
An advanced large solid rocket motor hot fire test conducted at L3Harris' Camden, Arkansas, site....
17/07/2025
L3Harris payloads and components have been on board every U.S. GPS satellite-more than 70 missions since the 1970s. Our technology is at the core of GPS availab...
17/07/2025
L3Harris' pack of launched effects is comprised of multi-role vehicles that ...
17/07/2025
NEW YORK - July 17, 2025 - Gracenote, the content data business unit of Nielsen, has announced the appointment of Ryan Moore to the new role of Chief Business O...
17/07/2025
READING, Pa. Network technology startup Miri Technologies has added David Cohen as vice president, business development. He'll be tasked with expanding the ...
17/07/2025
Berklee Wins CASE Award for Standout Digital Campaign The Alumni Affairs team's Variations Signature Series earned recognition for offering an authentic p...
17/07/2025
Early Thursday morning, the U.S. Senate voted to cut federal funding for PBS and NPR in a bill that also included cuts for foreign aid. In a 51-48 vote, the act...
17/07/2025
GREAT Britain and Northern Ireland Pavilions across IBC2025 (12 15 September, RAI Amsterdam) feature a remarkable 34 companies, each providing unique, innovativ...
17/07/2025
WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. The Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers today introduced its Content Provenance and Authenticity (CPA) in Media Study Group (S...
17/07/2025
NEW YORK Despite widespread concerns about a soft advertising market, NBCUniversal said it closed its 2025-26 upfront negotiation cycle with a record ad sales v...
17/07/2025
NEW YORK Television advertising remains an effective means to market and influence younger baby boomer and Generation X consumers approaching retirement age, ac...
17/07/2025
ALLENTOWN, Pa. & JERSEY CITY, N.J. Service Electric Cable TV and OpenVault have announced that the operator is deploying the OpenVault Proactive Network Manage...
17/07/2025
WASHINGTON Following up on his first major policy speech just two ago, Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr is promising to buck the usual summ...
17/07/2025
Luxembourg, 14 July 2025 - SES received the final regulatory approvals for the SES-Intelsat transaction, including the US Federal Communications Commission.
O...
17/07/2025
Berklee Alumni Nominated for 2025 Emmy Awards Twenty-seven Berklee alumni received nominations across categories in sound mixing, sound editing, and compositi...
17/07/2025
Back to All News
What We Watched the First Half of 2025
Entertainment
17 July 2025
Global
Link copied to clipboard
Today, we're sharing our latest Eng...
17/07/2025
Cast your vote in 2 categories for Ivory 3 American Concert DIvory 3 American Concert D is in the 2025 MIDI Innovation Awards and we are honored to be nominated...
17/07/2025
SVG Sit-Down: OpenDrives' Sean Lee, Michael Wilsker, and Jason Matousek on E...
17/07/2025
Oracle's Geoff Tognetti on Staying Ahead of the AI Curve Through Further Ado...
17/07/2025
NBA's Summer League Is a Hot Bed of AI, Immersive Innovation Testing Audio mixing, intelligent camera framing are among AI-driven efforts By Ken Kerschbaum...
17/07/2025
SVG's TranSPORT Conference Returns to NYC on Oct. 21; Register Today! By SVG Staff
Thursday, July 17, 2025 - 8:29 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
St...
17/07/2025
Gravity Media chosen as group name for merged OB business By George Bevir
Wednesday, July 16, 2025 - 11:30
Print This Story
Gravity Media executive chairm...
17/07/2025
SES Closes Deal to Acquire Intelsat, Creating New Giant in Satellite Connectivit...
17/07/2025
How MLB Pulled Off That Unforgettable Hank Aaron Tribute at the All-Star Game Vintage content, state-of-the-art projection/processing combine in marvelous mile...
17/07/2025
Wuppertal July 17, 2025
Riedel Communications Powers Handa Opera on Sydney Har...