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The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has proposed significant interventions on Apple and Google, declaring both companies may hold “strategic market status” (SMS) in their mobile platforms.
This, the CMA says, gives them a stranglehold on the UK’s app economy — an industry it values at £36 billion annually, supporting around 400,000 jobs.
In other words: the app market matters. So much, in fact, that the CMA is promising a “proportionate, pro-innovation” approach to rebalance the digital playing field.
But here’s a question the CMA must answer:
If it recognises the dangers of algorithmic manipulation and platform power when it affects app developers, why won’t it act when the exact same abuses target independent publishers and media businesses like Vox Political?
The app market: protected and prioritised
In its announcement, the CMA acknowledges a litany of anti-competitive harms in Apple and Google’s control of the app ecosystem — including opaque search rankings, unpredictable review processes, coercive commissions, and default settings that favour their own products.
Let’s quote the CMA directly:
“Inconsistent and unpredictable app review processes can create uncertainty for developers, meaning delayed or failed launches… ‘Choice architecture’ (like default settings, pre-installation, prominence, prompts, and friction) may favour the firms’ own services, limiting competition and genuine choice for users.”
“Ensuring a fair and transparent app review process and app store rankings [would] give UK app developers certainty… Allowing the ability to ‘steer’ users out of app stores, for example to make purchases.”
This is important — and welcome.
But for independent journalists and small publishers, this reads like a checklist of what social media platforms are also doing to us.
Same tactics, different victims
Here at Vox Political, I’ve documented how Meta (Facebook) and other platforms have crippled our visibility through opaque algorithm changes, coercive monetisation schemes, and content suppression that appears linked to editorial line or political sensitivity.
I made a submission to the CMA, laying this out in full — including:
-
Posts no longer reaching followers unless they search for them
-
Offers to “boost” posts for high fees (highlighting deliberate suppression)
-
Income collapse from nearly six million annual visits (2020) to barely 1,000 hits per day now
Since then, readers have shared revelations that they only began receiving my content again when travelling abroad, suggesting the possibility of country-specific throttling.
If these same methods — algorithmic opacity, forced payments, hidden suppression — are unacceptable in app stores, why are they acceptable on the social platforms small publishers rely on to survive?
The double standard
The CMA says:
“The targeted and proportionate actions we have set out today would enable UK app developers to remain at the forefront of global innovation while ensuring UK consumers receive a world-class experience.”
Yet online publishers, journalists and content creators — especially those not aligned with establishment narratives — are being buried in digital silence.
We’re losing visibility, revenue, and the right to compete in the marketplace of ideas.
The Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers (DMCC) Act 2024 was supposed to protect all of us from this.
It’s time the CMA recognised that algorithmic suppression is not just an app store issue — it’s a crisis across the entire online ecosystem.
Call to action
If you’re concerned about algorithmic censorship and the silencing of independent media, now is the time to act.
Support Vox Political directly: I’m currently running a donation campaign with a free book offer as thanks. Your support keeps this platform alive.
Bypass the algorithm:
Join my mailing list so you never miss a post. Don’t let Big Tech decide what you’re allowed to see.
Click here to subscribe
Write to your MP: Demand that the CMA apply the same scrutiny to social media platforms as they do to Apple and Google.
This is not just about apps — it’s about democracy, free speech, and fair access to the public.
Share this post:
Algorithmic abuse: competition watchdog acts for app developers – but what about us?
Share this post:
The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has proposed significant interventions on Apple and Google, declaring both companies may hold “strategic market status” (SMS) in their mobile platforms.
This, the CMA says, gives them a stranglehold on the UK’s app economy — an industry it values at £36 billion annually, supporting around 400,000 jobs.
In other words: the app market matters. So much, in fact, that the CMA is promising a “proportionate, pro-innovation” approach to rebalance the digital playing field.
But here’s a question the CMA must answer:
If it recognises the dangers of algorithmic manipulation and platform power when it affects app developers, why won’t it act when the exact same abuses target independent publishers and media businesses like Vox Political?
The app market: protected and prioritised
In its announcement, the CMA acknowledges a litany of anti-competitive harms in Apple and Google’s control of the app ecosystem — including opaque search rankings, unpredictable review processes, coercive commissions, and default settings that favour their own products.
Let’s quote the CMA directly:
This is important — and welcome.
But for independent journalists and small publishers, this reads like a checklist of what social media platforms are also doing to us.
Same tactics, different victims
Here at Vox Political, I’ve documented how Meta (Facebook) and other platforms have crippled our visibility through opaque algorithm changes, coercive monetisation schemes, and content suppression that appears linked to editorial line or political sensitivity.
I made a submission to the CMA, laying this out in full — including:
Posts no longer reaching followers unless they search for them
Offers to “boost” posts for high fees (highlighting deliberate suppression)
Income collapse from nearly six million annual visits (2020) to barely 1,000 hits per day now
Since then, readers have shared revelations that they only began receiving my content again when travelling abroad, suggesting the possibility of country-specific throttling.
If these same methods — algorithmic opacity, forced payments, hidden suppression — are unacceptable in app stores, why are they acceptable on the social platforms small publishers rely on to survive?
The double standard
The CMA says:
Yet online publishers, journalists and content creators — especially those not aligned with establishment narratives — are being buried in digital silence.
We’re losing visibility, revenue, and the right to compete in the marketplace of ideas.
The Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers (DMCC) Act 2024 was supposed to protect all of us from this.
It’s time the CMA recognised that algorithmic suppression is not just an app store issue — it’s a crisis across the entire online ecosystem.
Call to action
If you’re concerned about algorithmic censorship and the silencing of independent media, now is the time to act.
Support Vox Political directly: I’m currently running a donation campaign with a free book offer as thanks. Your support keeps this platform alive.
Bypass the algorithm:
Join my mailing list so you never miss a post. Don’t let Big Tech decide what you’re allowed to see.
Click here to subscribe
Write to your MP: Demand that the CMA apply the same scrutiny to social media platforms as they do to Apple and Google.
This is not just about apps — it’s about democracy, free speech, and fair access to the public.
Share this post:
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