This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Wednesday, March 27th,

2024. I'm Caleb Brown.

What does the DOJ want out of Apple?

The agency's lawsuit against the company on antitrust grounds is a direct

attack on Apple's walled garden approach to iPhone apps, claiming the company is effectively

a monopoly in some markets. It is Jennifer Huddleston and Patrick Hedger of the

taxpayer protection alliance discuss the elements of the case.

Jen I want to start with you. Was this suit expected? It was and it wasn't. We know that the DOJ has been investigating Apple for some time.

It kind of seemed almost inevitable given that we've already seen antitrust cases brought against three of the four leading

tech companies that have been under investigation.

But I do think the exact nature of this suit was a little bit surprising for a couple of reasons.

First, we've already seen the case in Epic v Apple be found in Apple's favor that was largely dealing with the

question of App Stores and potentially fees in App Stores and payment

processors and many of the questions that have been

brought up around the App Store itself.

And so the DOJ's case instead is focusing on these other demands that are not exactly what one would expect.

There's been a lot of attention paid, for example, to the fact that it is very concerned about

the social stigma of when somebody has a green bubble in a group chat.

Pat, when we start thinking about the different models that hardware and software producers engage in to try to eat somebody else's lunch in some

marketplace.

You know, Walt Mossburg, formerly the Wall Street Journal, pointed out some of the key elements

that the DOJ is complaining about

...