When Apple announced Apple Intelligence (AAI), the company plainly stated that it would be in English only, with more languages rolling out later—probably not before next year. With that, Apple also implied, and later confirmed, that the launch of AAI would follow a similar pattern as that of other new products: USA first, then expand into other regions carefully, but as quickly as safely possible. In the weeks since AAI was announced, Apple released a statement that blames the DMA for the delayed rollout in Europe, and many European commentators are fuming.

The European market is weak and risky

I am a European commentator of many things Apple—but I’m not fuming. Why am I not sitting here, hacking angrily into my keyboard, calling Apple names? Well, let’s explore this:

The European market is, comparatively, unimportant to Apple when viewed side-by-side with the US, Chinese, and Indian markets. It is also a high-risk market. Yes, because of the DMA and how "Spirit of the law” legislation works.

Spirit of the law vs. letter of the law

Where other regions carefully craft legislation within which a company has obvious boundaries within which it can operate at relatively low risk, the European Union is a region where the law works as follows:

The government(s) find an intent for a law they then draft. The text of the law attempts to explain how the legislative powers imagine this intent should be translated into action. The text of the law is sometimes left unclear on purpose, to give the government’s enforcement bodies sufficient wiggle room to execute the intent of the law, rather than the letter. Some will say this is a terrible system because it introduces uncertainty and others will argue that it reduces bloat because that way you don’t need to have amendments for laws to re-word the law to express the intent more clearly. There are many more pros and cons to letter of the law and spirit of the law practices, like case law, which is a nightmare in the US, but I’ll avoid becoming philosophical. The reality is more nuanced and complicated than my summary, and legal experts will likely object to how I put it, but that’s the gist of it—as far as I understand it.

The intent of the DMA and the consequences of uncertainty

The EU has made it plain what the intent, usually called “Spirit of the law”, of the DMA is: To enforce, within specific, and very large companies, behaviors that enable competition and punish anti-competitive practices. EU spokespeople have repeatedly reiterated this intent publicly, as they did again in this situation.^[1]

This intent means that select companies, called gatekeepers, are sailing in uncertain waters whenever they release a new feature that might be seen as sabotaging fair competition within their platform. This produces uncertainty, which directly translates into risk for the gatekeeper.

Apple announced that AAI would be rolled out later for EU customers, because of the DMA. Apple is taking time to evaluate the risk of getting fined by the EC (European Commission) and to take measures that enable competition. This means the DMA is working, whether we like how it is working or not.

As a result, we have some fuming European commentators, angry at Apple for delaying AAI. I am willing to bet the same commentators would be cheering on any fines the EC might impose if Apple released AAI in the EU and was found guilty of anti-competitive behavior.

We, the European Apple fanboys, can’t have it both ways—but clearly “we” think we should have it both ways. We overestimate the European region’s market relevancy, just like the EC does with its arrogant method of calculating fines based on global revenue instead of European revenue. For Apple to take that risk, however, the EU market is not important enough.

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