Apple made it difficult to change Hulu membership due to a tweet

Apple made it more difficult to upgrade its Hulu subscription plan – say, to add live TV – after realizing that the company was offering a way to automatically unsubscribe via the App Store .

According to a new email that surfaced as part of Apple’s lawsuit with Epic Games, the company gave Hulu access to its subscription API, but did not realize that people could use Hulu to switch to Hulu’s billing system. To help (and to avoid Apple’s in-app purchases) until 2018 when the feature was mentioned in a tweet that caught a high-up eye on Apple. You can see the tweet below:

Hulu’s motivation for providing automatic revocation should be clear. When you take a slice of every subscription and upgrade to Apple by directing a subscriber to your site and billing system, why should you keep it longer? And why isn’t it easy to do that by automatically canceling that pesky old subscription?

Apple has a problem with this.

Matt Fisher, VP of the App Store, Cindy Lynn, the first email in a thread from iTunes’ EPM, sets the scene. Saw phil David Bernard’s tweet Commented on the unexpected feature and asked why Hulu would also be able to automatically unsubscribe at the first time. He is likely to be a filler, Apple’s partner oversees the App Store and anyone wanting answers and results from both Fisher and Lynn quickly.

In the thread, Lin went on to explain that in 2015, Hulu had access to the unsubscribe and withdrawal APIs, which may have allowed it to enable the feature. Apple originally gave access to the streaming service so that it could support immediate upgrades to a “[two] Apple had developed its upgrade and downgrade feature for in-app purchases.

Pete Distad, an executive in-charge of Apple’s video business, and Carson Oliver, director of App Store business management, were aware of some issue with Hulu’s membership. Interestingly, Hulu was an SVP of marketing and communications before joining Apple. However that relationship would not have helped. “I think we need to take immediate steps to prevent further abuse of the API,” Oliver wrote, ending his email.

Hulu no longer has the ability to automatically unsubscribe and no longer offers in-app purchases. Upgrading your plan requires a visit to Hulu’s website or a phone call. Apple’s developer guidelines now explicitly forbid customers to subscribe in any way other than in-app purchases.

Image: Apple

It’s funny that Apple seems to have found out about what Hulu was doing through a tweet, but here’s another example of how Apple’s hold on the App Store over the years Has strengthened, and how its relationship with some people has changed, with its shop having the largest number of businesses selling its goods.

In 2015, Apple was set to take a small portion of its commissions on Netflix and Hulu subscriptions if they were made through an Apple TV. But by 2018, it was considering taking action against the company to protect its control of in-app purchases. Some Apple employees also apparently considered other drastic measures to retain Netflix when it was kicking the dust about in-app purchases in the same year.

Apple is likely to keep video services using in-app purchases only as badly as it would like to stop video services. Sometimes, they cut a deal – such as Amazon received. Other times they use the available tools to their advantage … at least until Apple checks their Twitter feed.