Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. The app industry is as hot as ever, with a record 218 billion downloads and $143 billion in global consumer spend in 2020. Consumers last year also spent 3.5 trillion minutes using apps on Android devices […]

Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy.

The app industry is as hot as ever, with a record 218 billion downloads and $143 billion in global consumer spend in 2020.

Consumers last year also spent 3.5 trillion minutes using apps on Android devices alone. And in the U.S., app usage surged ahead of the time spent watching live TV. Currently, the average American watches 3.7 hours of live TV per day, but now spends four hours per day on their mobile devices.

Apps aren’t just a way to pass idle hours — they’re also a big business. In 2019, mobile-first companies had a combined $544 billion valuation, 6.5x higher than those without a mobile focus. In 2020, investors poured  $73 billion in capital into mobile companies — a figure that’s up 27% year-over-year.

This week, there was a lot of headline-making app ecosystem news, including Google’s impactful decision to drop its Play Store commissions, an App Store lawsuit over scammy apps with fake ratings, battles over Apple’s App Tracking Transparency and the arrival of a notable new feature on YouTube — a TikTok rival called Shorts.

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Top Stories

Developer sues Apple over lost revenue due to App Store scams

Kosta Eleftheriou, a co-founder of the Fleksy keyboard app, has been raising awareness about App Store scams in recent weeks, after his own app was targeted by copycat subscription scammers leveraging fake ratings and reviews to gain traction. This week, Eleftheriou filed a lawsuit that attempts to hold Apple accountable for his own app’s lost revenue, saying that Apple promises developers a safe and trustworthy marketplace, but then allows these scammers to operate to the detriment of legitimate apps like his own. Though some news articles positioned the case as some sort of antitrust lawsuit, it’s really more focused on scammers and the accountability Apple has for how its App Store operates, which apps are listed and how well it’s managed and policed. Eleftheriou is asking Apple to compensate him for his lost revenue and other damages as a result of Apple’s ill-run app marketplace, as well as what he claims are unfair App Review rejections.

Google Play drops commissions to 15% on some earnings

Google has followed Apple’s lead in reducing commissions for the Google Play store. But in its case, it has dropped commissions from 30% to 15% on developers’ first $1 million in revenue. Apple, by comparison, starts charging 30% once the developer tops $1 million. Google said 99% of developers who sell goods and services through the Play Store will see a 50% reduction in fees. According to App Annie data, very few Google Play developers make more than $1 million — in fact, only 2,035 developers do on Google Play, compared with 3,611 on iOS. To put this in perspective in terms of revenue, developers making up to $1 million in consumer spend only comprised 5% of total Google Play consumer spend in 2020, the firm noted.

Apple’s ATT scores a win in France

Apple fended off an attempt by advertisers in France who wanted to derail the IDFA change in iOS, which will require users’ permission in order to track them. The complaint had attempted to contrast Apple’s ATT (App Tracking Transparency) requirements for third parties with Apple’s own, where its first-party apps are allow to track by default for the purpose of personalizing ads in various Apple apps. France’s competition regulator decided Apple’s plans “don’t appear to be abusive” and said it can’t intervene just because some apps may see a negative impact. But the authority did say it will investigate Apple further to determine if any of its changes are “self-preferencing.”

YouTube launches its TikTok rival in the U.S.

The short-form video experience known as YouTube Shorts first launched in India, where TikTok has been banned, in September. It’s now coming to the U.S. in its first major expansion. The feature, still in beta, offers a very TikTok-like experience both in terms of recording content and viewing. Users can tap to record video segments for up to 60-second long videos, and use a small handful of editing features like text captions, countdown timers and speed controls. Meanwhile, viewing the videos is also presented in a TikTok-like format with vertical feeds of video where you can double-tap to like, duck into comments or tap on hashtags or sounds to participate in trends.

YouTube believes the feature has potential because it’s connected to the larger YouTube ecosystem, including YouTube Music and the main platform itself — you can subscribe to YouTube channels right from Shorts, for example. But Shorts lacks a lot of what makes TikTok successful for the time being, like its numerous AR effects and editing tools, sound sync and its ability for creators to react and respond to other videos through stitches and duets.

Weekly News

Platforms: Apple

Apple will allow the Russian government to pre-install apps on the iPhone starting on April 1, 2021. In accordance with a new law, Apple users will be shown a dialog box at setup that prompts them to install web browsers, antivirus, messenger and email apps. Users can choose to deselect these apps or delete them from the device later.

Report claims Apple may soon deliver standalone iOS security updates. According to code found in the latest iOS 14.5 beta, Apple could be preparing to introduce a way to update older iPhones with critical security updates without requiring users to download new versions of iOS. This could be helpful in patching older devices where users don’t download iOS updates for fear of slowing down their phone.

Apple says the App Store now supports 300K jobs in the U.K., up 10% YoY, as well as 250K jobs in Germany and another 250K in France. The figures were released in response to increased antitrust scrutiny by regulators, as a way to demonstrate the App Store’s contribution to local economies.

Platforms: Google

App Annie data shows how few Google Play developers will pay the higher 30% commission after the policy change, announced this week. Google says developers’ first $1 million in revenue will be commissioned at 15%, not 30%. This covers the vast majority of the Play Store’s developer base, as only 2,035 developers make $1 million or more.

Google updates its People API, which will replace the Contacts API being deprecated on June 15, 2021. The new API will now support two new endpoints for batch mutates and Contacts searches, the company said.

Google updates its parental controls for Android, Family Link. The updates acknowledge that not all screen time is the same, by allowing parents to set some apps — like those used for virtual school — as “always allowed” and not counting toward daily limits. It also updated reporting to better show where kids were spending time outside of these necessary apps.

Google is now allowing third-party developers to build Tiles for Wear OS smartwatches. Tiles are small, fast-loading experiences that can deliver specific, timely information users need, but can be tapped to open a related app on the watch or phone for a deeper experience.

E-commerce

Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg said his company has been preparing for the Apple IDFA changes by investing in more commerce products on its own platforms, like Facebook and Instagram Shops. In a Clubhouse session on Thursday, he announced Facebook has 1 million active Shops which are used by 250 million people every month.

Social

Twitter is testing a way for users to watch YouTube videos from within the home timeline directly on iOS devices, instead of being redirected to YouTube. Finally! The test was made possible through YouTube’s iFrame Player API, which Twitter gained access to.

TikTok will no longer allow users to opt out of personalized advertising starting on April 15th. The app alerted users to the change via a notice that appeared on screen at launch. This means uses will see ads based on what they watch and engage with on TikTok.

TikTok may add a group chats feature sometime early this year, according to Reuters. The feature is already a part of the Chinese version of the TikTok app, Douyin, and would make the app more social.

Instagram adds new teen safety tools as competition with TikTok heats up. TikTok has been making its app safer for teens and this week Instagram followed suit — but instead of locking down teens accounts by default, it made it more difficult for adult predators to reach teens on Instagram, through a variety of alerts and blocking features.

Leaked recordings detail conservative donor Rebekah Mercer’s role at right-wing social app Parler, where she joined meetings to rally employees to fight against the shut down of free speech, and other matters, Bloomberg reports. 

Facebook is preparing to add an age-gate to Instagram that would allow for a curated, and likely COPPA-compliant, under 13 experience, according to a report from BuzzFeed. TikTok today does the same thing, following its FTC fines. Instagram could be doing the same to ward off any FTC investigation into underage use of its app as well as to better cater to the younger users who are already on Instagram today.

Messaging

China banned Signal. The encrypted messaging app became unavailable on the mainland on March 16, following a ban of the Signal website the day prior. The app had been one of the few Western social networks that was accessible in China without a VPN.

Telegram is working on an audio experience that allows users to create voice chats in Telegram Channels that you can join either with your personal profile or channel profile. The feature is in beta testing and no official announcement has been made.