I think you're misunderstanding the GP. They're talking about services provided
entirely by other people, e.g. buying ebooks from Amazon. In that light, here are the responses to your bullets:
- the hardware I already paid for
- this should be included in the price of the hardware (and certainly is in the case of Apple)
- I don't use the Books app, I use the Amazon Kindle app
- I never listened to a podcast on my iPod
- I don't use the Podcasts app, I use the Spotify app
So in the case of Amazon/Spotify, what value is Apple delivering beyond paying for download bandwidth in order for me to download the app (which is like, $0.000001 of bw costs)?
- the hardware I already paid for
- this should be included in the price of the hardware (and certainly is in the case of Apple)
- I don't use the Books app, I use the Amazon Kindle app
- I never listened to a podcast on my iPod
- I don't use the Podcasts app, I use the Spotify app
So in the case of Amazon/Spotify, what value is Apple delivering beyond paying for download bandwidth in order for me to download the app (which is like, $0.000001 of bw costs)?