Epic is asking District Choose Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers to order Apple to evaluate — and approve if compliant with Apple’s pointers — Epic’s submission of Fortnite to the US App Retailer in a new court filing. The corporate argues within the doc that Apple is as soon as once more in contempt of the decide’s April order limiting it from rejecting apps over their use of outdoor fee hyperlinks.
In a letter from Apple that Epic shared late Friday, Apple writes that it received’t “take motion on the Fortnite app submission till after the Ninth Circuit guidelines on our pending request for a partial keep of the brand new injunction.” Epic claims the delay is retaliation for its authorized combat with the corporate, and notes in its submitting that Apple “expressly and repeatedly” instructed it and the court docket that it might approve Fortnite if the app complied with Apple’s pointers, which it insists its present submission does.
Epic claimed that was as a result of it may well’t launch within the EU due to Apple’s resolution to dam its US submission. Apple mentioned it had merely requested that it resubmit the app with out together with the US storefront, “in order to not influence Fortnite in different geographies.” However in a post announcing its new filing, Epic claims that might imply it has to submit a number of variations of the app, which it says is towards Apple’s pointers.
Epic is asking that the court docket implement its injunction, discover Apple in contempt once more, and require the corporate to “settle for any compliant Epic app, together with Fortnite, for distribution on the U.S. storefront of the App Retailer.”
The hitch right here is that all through this case, Choose Gonzalez Rogers hasn’t gone as far as to require Fortnite’s return to the shop, discovering in her 2021 ruling that Epic had nonetheless knowingly damaged its developer settlement with apple. 9to5Mac writes that the decide would seemingly have to agree that Apple is as soon as once more in contempt of court docket, as she did in her April thirtieth ruling. The distinction between every now and then — and what may work in Epic’s favor — is simply how aggravated she appeared with Apple within the textual content of that ruling.
Apple didn’t instantly reply to The Verge’s request for remark.