Gosh, I’d hate to see what happens when you find out Jobs accepted Microsoft investment
He did not accept investment from Microsoft.
Microsoft took a minor non-voting stock position as part of a much larger package to compensate Apple for stealing code from QuickTime and used in Video for Windows.
Microsoft also paid a major amount (between $550 - $720 million - only SJ and BG knows the exact number), committed to port Internet Explorer to the Mac, committed to maintain Office for the Mac for a minimum of 10 years with an option for Apple to extend for a period (5 years if I remember right), let Apple get insight into and access to inspect all Windows code for a period of 10 years and let Apple use the portions of the code they needed, which was one of the reasons macOS server had Active Directory support for a while. There were other aspects to the agreement too.
The alternative for Microsoft would be that SJ took the theft as evidence to the case the DOJ had against Microsoft, and Microsoft would have been split.
You have NO idea of the damage Microsoft both tried to inflict and inflicted to Apple, IBM and others around that time. It was a real battle. Compaq was on the MS side of the battle.
Apple has given the public the impression they store data in their own datacenters, and as Apple provides these services around the planet and customers in different countries should be informed where their data actually is stored so they can make informed decisions if they want to use the service or not. It probably also has lead customers to believe they got an increased level of privacy (as spouted by Apple marketing), when in reality they got closer to Amazon Web Services, Google and Microsoft base level. If I knew my iCloud data was stored on Google servers, I would have ended the iCloud subscription immediately.
But of course for ex-Compaq Tim Cook, he don't see the difference.
I think you are confusing your interpretation of what Apple said. They never said they owned the servers that house iCloud data, plus they don’t go into detail with the public on what data is stored on those specific servers. Plus the fact that they use encryption which so far no one has been able to defeat makes it hard to present a case in which the plaintiffs or you were harmed.
I am not confusing anything. Apple has made multiple announcements of how they are building large data centers for iCloud and other services, and have even given tours of them for journalists.
It has been generally assumed that Apple mainly have been hosting iCloud on Microsoft Azure architecture, but the servers running it were fully deployed to Apple owned facilities and locations.
Data hosted in other cloud services will necessarily also end up in their backup systems where they never should have been. They can possibly also be decrypted there because Apple can decrypt iCloud hosted data and have done so in multiple cases for law enforcement. When the data end up in a third party backup system it can also be restored to a different location and potentially be compromised.
This is also about Apple's integrity and trustworthiness. They pretend to have a holier-than-thou stance on privacy, yet completely fail to inform the customers that their data might migrate outside Apple facilities. NOT good!
Maybe having distributed data across multiple trusted servers (such as Amazon Web Services) meets the Apple ideal of redundancy, as an engineer I see the benefit of this. This lawsuit needs to be thrown out.
Apple has given the public the impression they store data in their own datacenters, and as Apple provides these services around the planet and customers in different countries should be informed where their data actually is stored so they can make informed decisions if they want to use the service or not. It probably also has lead customers to believe they got an increased level of privacy (as spouted by Apple marketing), when in reality they got closer to Amazon Web Services, Google and Microsoft base level. If I knew my iCloud data was stored on Google servers, I would have ended the iCloud subscription immediately.
But of course for ex-Compaq Tim Cook, he don't see the difference.
I think you are confusing your interpretation of what Apple said. They never said they owned the servers that house iCloud data, plus they don’t go into detail with the public on what data is stored on those specific servers. Plus the fact that they use encryption which so far no one has been able to defeat makes it hard to present a case in which the plaintiffs or you were harmed.
I am not confusing anything. Apple has made multiple announcements of how they are building large data centers for iCloud and other services, and have even given tours of them for journalists.
It has been generally assumed that Apple mainly have been hosting iCloud on Microsoft Azure architecture, but the servers running it were fully deployed to Apple owned facilities and locations.
Data hosted in other cloud services will necessarily also end up in their backup systems where they never should have been. They can possibly also be decrypted there because Apple can decrypt iCloud hosted data and have done so in multiple cases for law enforcement. When the data end up in a third party backup system it can also be restored to a different location and potentially be compromised.
This is also about Apple's integrity and trustworthiness. They pretend to have a holier-than-thou stance on privacy, yet completely fail to inform the customers that their data might migrate outside Apple facilities. NOT good!
Maybe having distributed data across multiple trusted servers (such as Amazon Web Services) meets the Apple ideal of redundancy, as an engineer I see the benefit of this. This lawsuit needs to be thrown out.
There is plenty of opportunity to have redundancy within their own infrastructure given the number of data centers they operate. There is also the need to distribute the load across the planet with services geographically close to high concentration of users and or consumers.
Originally they used Akamai as their CDN for iTunes. I am not sure what/who they use right now. It could be AWS, which should also be less controversial with Apple customers.
I hate suing of any kind, regardless of who was damaged or how. Perhaps I would think differently about that if the Western world wasn't so litigious as it is now, but I can't help how I feel. Suing at the rate we do is just insane.
With that said, I'm afraid this lawsuit does have some teeth in that even I myself had been under the strong impression that all iCloud data was stored exclusively on Apple owned and operated servers. If we are honest with ourselves, we must admit Apple has been at least a tad disingenuous about servers and storage. That doesn't mean I support the lawsuit. It just means Apple should have either been more open with us or stored everything exclusively on Apple owned and operated servers, like we all thought they were doing in the first place. I think this matter is at least as serious as the aging battery, power throttling issue that hit the global news a year ago. Sometimes it doesn't seem that being transparent is a good thing, but when news like this hits the fan, then the realization strikes. Apple could have handled this better, just like they could have handled info about power throttling better.
It doesn't matter if Apple never made it 100% clear they don't store data on 100% Apple-owned and operated servers and that we the public should have assumed Apple stored data outside Apple. Legal jargon that few if any people read doesn't matter either insofar as few people read it, and such information isn't even spoken about in the tech media, whose job it is to sleuth out those details for us. Public perception and "the general understanding" matters most. I had the perception, like most of you, that Apple stored our iCloud data on Apple servers. It doesn't matter if my believing that was in error. That was the perception that Apple allowed the general public to believe. Surely Apple knew the general consensus, and if they didn't, Apple surely does now. Again, I don't support the lawsuit by saying that. I just wish it had been made more clear by Apple how iCloud data was stored. That's all.
This captures the salient issue to address. To simplify, Apple misled. The need to drill down to a level of detail that demonstrates how Apple did not mislead demonstrates being misleading.
"Apple" is a fictitious entity that can only be addressed through the mechanism that created it and that's the courts. For all the sometimes eloquence of its practitioners, the courts are composed of the same frail, fear-filled, inauthentic humans as everywhere else. The courts are blunt instruments dealing with fictions most people don't distinguish as fiction in an attempt to get at truth. Given this, reaching a state of clarity in any conversation is remote.
Of course, this admits the foolishness of this reply as online forums are usually less clear than the courts
One correction with the above post, "...but I can't help how I feel." That's not entirely true, feelings follow thought, and you can (even with it being not easy) direct your thoughts and, by extension, how you feel. Also, to approach a less "brain bound" view of thinking, read the excellent "The Extended Mind."
I suggest whatever upset we experience around issues like this stem from what it tugs at within each of us when we look at all that is incomplete and unfulfilled.
Comments
Microsoft took a minor non-voting stock position as part of a much larger package to compensate Apple for stealing code from QuickTime and used in Video for Windows.
Microsoft also paid a major amount (between $550 - $720 million - only SJ and BG knows the exact number), committed to port Internet Explorer to the Mac, committed to maintain Office for the Mac for a minimum of 10 years with an option for Apple to extend for a period (5 years if I remember right), let Apple get insight into and access to inspect all Windows code for a period of 10 years and let Apple use the portions of the code they needed, which was one of the reasons macOS server had Active Directory support for a while. There were other aspects to the agreement too.
The alternative for Microsoft would be that SJ took the theft as evidence to the case the DOJ had against Microsoft, and Microsoft would have been split.
You have NO idea of the damage Microsoft both tried to inflict and inflicted to Apple, IBM and others around that time. It was a real battle.
Compaq was on the MS side of the battle.
Originally they used Akamai as their CDN for iTunes. I am not sure what/who they use right now. It could be AWS, which should also be less controversial with Apple customers.
"Apple" is a fictitious entity that can only be addressed through the mechanism that created it and that's the courts. For all the sometimes eloquence of its practitioners, the courts are composed of the same frail, fear-filled, inauthentic humans as everywhere else. The courts are blunt instruments dealing with fictions most people don't distinguish as fiction in an attempt to get at truth. Given this, reaching a state of clarity in any conversation is remote.
Of course, this admits the foolishness of this reply as online forums are usually less clear than the courts
One correction with the above post, "...but I can't help how I feel." That's not entirely true, feelings follow thought, and you can (even with it being not easy) direct your thoughts and, by extension, how you feel. Also, to approach a less "brain bound" view of thinking, read the excellent "The Extended Mind."
I suggest whatever upset we experience around issues like this stem from what it tugs at within each of us when we look at all that is incomplete and unfulfilled.