[karajorma]

Microsoft complains about antitrust behaviour from a big monopoly.

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/08/google-blocks-windows-phone-youtube-app-again-for-manufactured-reasons/

The good YouTube app for Windows Phone is once again causing problems. Microsoft pulled the app in May after Google complained that it didn't include ads. After working with Google, Redmond re-released the app a couple of days ago with ads this time. But Google still isn't happy, and the company has revoked the API key the app uses, thereby disabling it.

In response, Microsoft has published a lengthy blog post about the disagreements between the two companies. Entitled "The limits of Google's openness," the post calls into question Google's 2009 commitment to openness. Google claimed, in 2009, that its "future depends on the Internet staying an open system, and [Google's] advocacy of open will grow the Web for everyone—including Google."

Microsoft says that in creating the YouTube app for Windows Phone, it assumed that the same commitment to openness applied to YouTube. It has complied with Google's demands to show ads and to block access to videos where the creators have restricted distribution. These are changes that, Microsoft argues, should "bring Google new users and additional revenue."

However, Google remains unhappy. Microsoft describes five complaints made by Google. First, the advertising giant is demanding specifically that Microsoft rewrite the application to use HTML5. Microsoft doesn't elaborate on why Google has made this demand but points out that Google's own apps on iOS and Android do not use HTML5. The software company claims that this is a "manufactured" reason, invented only to ensure that the YouTube experience on Windows Phone is inferior to that on iOS and Android.

Second, Google claims that sometimes the Windows Phone app does not show the right ads. Content creators can specify various conditions on the ads that get shown, and Windows Phone apparently does not honor those conditions. Microsoft says that it honors them as best it can, but the app is subject to the constraints imposed by Google's own API.

Third, Google claims that Microsoft is not abiding by the API's terms and conditions. Microsoft says that this too is a reference to the decision not to use HTML5.

Fourth, Google is objecting to the decision to brand the application "YouTube." Although the application states clearly that it is not developed by Google, and although the old, bad YouTube app was also branded "YouTube" without complaint from Google, Google is now unhappy about the use of its name on the new app.

Finally, Google complains that the app offers a degraded experience. This is rather a peculiar claim. It offers a superior experience to the mobile website, and it offers a superior experience to the old, bad YouTube app that Google apparently didn't mind.

Until and unless a court decrees otherwise, Google is essentially free to do what it likes with YouTube. That includes making arbitrary demands (such as using HTML5, even though Google's own engineers have implicitly deemed HTML5 to be not good enough by not using it themselves) and imposing various restrictions (such as not documenting the advertising API so that third parties can comply with all the rules surrounding YouTube ads). Google is also under no obligation to honor those same demands itself.

Nonetheless, Google's behavior appears to be more than a little capricious. Other unofficial YouTube clients exist, and thus far Google appears not to have killed them off with the same vigor it has demonstrated while going after Microsoft's client.

If Microsoft's description is accurate, Google's implication that it is somehow protecting users from an inferior experience with this move is also absurd. The new application provides a YouTube experience that's meaningfully superior to any solution that Google has thus far blessed (aside from "using a different operating system entirely").

Microsoft's post closes with a statement that Redmond is happy to work with Google to address any "legitimate" concerns.

[Bobboau]

why is this a problem for MS to solve? has google refused to maintain an app themselves for windows?

[karajorma]

Pretty much. They're not at all interested in supporting anything beyond Android really. I suspect they wouldn't bother with iPhone if it weren't for the fact it would be ****ing idiotic to drive all the iPhone users to another website. With Windows phone or Blackberry I think the plan is to make the users move to Android in order to deal with not having all the Google Apps.

[Aardwolf]

What is this "revoked the API key the app uses, thereby disabling it" business? I do not understand how Google has the power to remotely disable a Windows Phone app.

[BloodEagle]

It's a form of identification for accounting purposes, apparently.

They probably have a core method (or function, I guess, if you want to split hairs) of the main loop phone home to see if the program / developer in question are blacklisted.  And in this case, Microsoft's YouTube app is.

[Colonol Dekker]

Android for life!

[headdie]

well what can i say, growing up through the 90s watching microsofts outrageous behaviour regarding little things like intellectual property, copyright and patent this is highly amusing.

it is also wrenching to see microsof in the right, wait.....[vomit].....sorry about that, apparently, lets just see if microsoft is as sweet and innocent as they make out in this

[Herra Tohtori]

I'm curious - why not just get a browser with flash OR html5 and use youtube with that?

[Klaustrophobia]

google can go right to hell as far as i'm concerned.

[BloodEagle]

Flash can die in a fire.

[Hobbie]

Apple can just rot on the vine.

[Bobboau]

yeah, **** apple.

[karajorma]

A metaphysical dichotomy can cause Android to overload and shut down.

I'm curious - why not just get a browser with flash OR html5 and use youtube with that?

Sometimes having an app is nicer. It often uses a lot less data than the website does (as rather than having to load a page to do something it's all right there on a button) and it also has better integration with the phone's features.

I know those are really minor issues but they are ones that MS really need to address if Apple and Android phones have an app. I'm a Blackberry 10 user myself so I know the problems MS face in a world dominated by those two OS's. Basically if Windows Phone is perceived as not having the apps people need, people won't use Windows Phone, so no one will develop for it, and it won't have the apps people need. It's a vicious cycle and the only way to stop it is to make sure the most important apps are supported. YouTube is one of those things that people seem to expect there to be an app for.

The thing when it comes to smartphones is that there really isn't a best smartphone. I always tell people that they should try the options out there and see which one works best for them rather than listening to recommendations from other people (including myself).

[Mongoose]

I think the real lesson here is that people who try to do any sort of prolonged web usage with smartphones deserve what they get.

[Colonol Dekker]

Don't be silly, I've been checking HLP on my phone since 07 using a K810i cybershot to start with.

Horses for courses.

[Nuke]

emp all the phones, and the internets too.

[Aardwolf]

So uh... couldn't they have just made an app that displays...

Code: [Select]

<html>
<body>
<iframe width="420" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/your video here" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
</body>
</html>

HTML5? Check.
Shows the right ads? Check.
Abides by terms and conditions? Check.
No more "degraded experience"? Check.

[BloodEagle]

In-line frames (actually, all frames) are deprecated.  So if they did that it wouldn't meet web-standards.

[Aardwolf]

...

I copied that line straight from the "embed" link on a YouTube video.

[BloodEagle]

Then I guess YouTube doesn't meet web-standards. 

Which doesn't surprise me in the slightest....