>Corporations almost never change their behaviors because of protests and people bitching about them.

Yes, because protests almost never reach critical mass when talking on the scale of a billionaire conglomerate.

The 3% rule is at effect here. if Apple made 200 billion last quarter (I don't know the exact numbers), we'd need at least 6 billion dollars worth of damage to make them listen, and make it clear it's because of this.

Even if the average IOS spender spent 1000/month (averaging in some super whales), we'd need 6 million users to stop spending for this to start having an effect. Can we get 6 million users to do that? I don't think so, but I'd love to be proven wrong.

>The thing is the end consumer is mostly hidden from the problems of Apples over charging, it deeply affects the companies selling services on the Apple platforms.

Yes. But that isn't proof that protests don't work. It's proof that people are ignorant to these situations. Making them aware is the hardest part in all this, and I'm sure corporations know this.

>every other company ends up paying a huge Apple tax because pulling out hand the competitor a huge market.

Companies work too, but we have even less coordination on this. And their incentives match Apple's. Patreon proper does not actually get directly impacted by this unless a bunch of creators pull out.

But the rare chances companies do push back, it works quickly. Just look at the Unity situation a few years back for a modern example.

My impression is that Apple as a corporation is really sensitive to their public image. I happen to believe that some corporations are actually highly sensitive to dollar losses but I also think what Apple worries about is a kind of downstream effects of brand image being lost.

I don't think that's all it would take but I kind of see Apple worrying that their products will start to be like fur in the 1980s or something... something that gradually fades and loses its brand value.

I guess in the end I sort of agree with the OP that boycotts can work and fretting about numbers initially leads to this kind of chicken and egg problem. If you try it it might work, if you try it repeatedly it's more likely to work, but if you never try it will never work.