Senator Warren doesn't have a plan to break up Apple, but still wants to pretty badly
Senator Elizabeth Warren has posted a call for Apple's "stranglehold monopoly" on the smartphone market to be broken up, despite the iPhone peaking at only half the US population.
Senator Warren
Following her siding with Beeper as it broke iMessage security and used Apple's servers without payment, Senator Warren has now attacked the iPhone's existence. Claiming that Apple uses "dirty tricks" in not providing iPhone features to people without iPhones, Senator Warren also explicitly blames the company for ruining relationships.
"That's right, non-iPhone users everywhere are being excluded from group texts, from sports teams chats to birthday chats to vacation plan chats," she says. "And who's to blame here? Apple."
It's time to break up @Apple's smartphone monopoly.
Also, c'mon, let's stop leaving green text people out of the group chats. It's just not right. pic.twitter.com/pr61Idf9yK-- Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren)
Senator Warren has a background in commercial law, and her father was a salesman. So her indignation that "Apple even takes a cut every time you use Tap to Pay," seems disingenuous.
Tap to Pay is an Apple-developed system for iPhone users to be able to make contactless payments. It began in Apple Stores, but has now rolled out to other vendors, such as PayPal.
She doesn't seem that concerned that PayPal and the credit cards take a part of each sale.
Then the Senator's stated belief that Apple is ruining relationships because not everyone can use iMessage is inflating the importance of the iPhone's default messaging service. It's also ignoring that the blame is on the use of old text messaging technology, and that Apple has committed to supporting RCS in order to improve messaging with Android users.
"It's time to break up Apple's monopoly now," she concludes, despite Apple not really having one beyond the fact that people who own iPhones have Apple devices.
Inflammatory rhetoric and no policies
As before her statement does not yet lead to any specific plans. It's just more hot air from a politician that doesn't know enough about technology to regulate it effectively, and yet, still thinks that they do.
The Senator does say that she backs the Department of Justice's case against Apple -- "that's the right thing to do." Separately, she has also criticized Big Tech firms and asked the Biden administration to work to prevent Americans' data ending up in the hands of foreign adversaries.
Yet for all the rhetoric in her social media posts, there is no specific call to action, and no detailed proposals for reasonable solutions. In fact, there's nothing of any substance at all.
Even regarding breaking up Apple's non-existent monopoly, it's not clear how Senator Warren believes Apple and its iPhone could be separated, and it still be good for the consumer. In all likelihood, she thinks this is an attention-grabber, and might help her eventual re-election campaign. The statement has the substance and quality of shredded paper blowing in the wind.
Apple has not commented on her post, nor should they.
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Imagine, for example, if Apple's processor team was made a separate company, and was required to sell chips to, and make chips for, whomever wants to buy: Samsung, Google, Microsoft. Apple's spent maybe a decade and a half investing in building a processor advantage, and just as it's reaching its big fruition, boom, let's force them to give it over to all their competitors.
Unlike Judge Rogers who mostly ruled for Apple in Epic Games's suit, saying "success is not illegal," I think Warren believes that success is illegal. Or least for one particular company it is.
* I shouldn't have written that. Being old isn't in and of itself a reason that you can't understand newer technologies, but because one has spent so much of their life with a status quo of technology and the speed at which newer technologies have been evolving it's harder to understand for anyone who isn't actively trying to understand them -and-doesn't have the natural aptitude, education in science, and desire. There are plenty of impressive commenters on this forum that are buck the average trend of their age group.
https://www.klobuchar.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/2022/1/icymi-more-than-35-tech-companies-come-out-in-support-of-klobuchar-grassley-legislation-to-stop-big-tech-self-preferencing
Also interesting that these lawfare attacks on Apple (in the US) are just before election time ... shakedown, anyone?
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/elizabeth-warren-wealthy-native-american/
She's misguided about Apple, however. A lot of people are misguided about Apple, even among regular commenters here. Even though it's right there for everyone to see, people simply do not understand that Apple functions differently from other tech companies. Its devices are produced as complete units, software and hardware developed together. As @darelrex pointed out above, it's not divisional. After all these years, it's surprising that no other company in this sector has copied that model, but it sets Apple apart, and makes people erroneously believe that it's "stifling competition" in areas where it's not designed to have competition in the first place. Apple operating systems do not compete with other operating systems for placement on third-party hardware. Apple hardware does not compete with other hardware for adoption by third-party operating systems. Because it remains a unique characteristic, people do not "get it," which leads to Sen. Warren's confusion, as well as the confusion of regulars here, who are constant posting things about what Apple should do that will never be things that Apple will do, because Apple doesn't work that way.
The one percent vs the other one percent. The upper class isn't listening to those lower down on the totem pole.
I don't have to use Apple products. There is very little that keeps me in the Apple fold but encapsulated in that "little" competitive advantage is more respect for my privacy, generally more thoughtful user interface interactions, and forward thinking (sometimes too forward) design.
I could buy a Windows or Linux based PC or an Android phone and meet 80 % of my needs if not more. They say "the extra mile is rarely crowded" and Apple will typically go that extra mile.
This is just mostly about pure Politics in that I'm being fleeced fleeced in so many ways that are relevant to my quality of life yet the Magician in DC tells me my problem is large corporations like Apple.
This existed before Elizabeth Warren and will continue long after she's decaying bones in the Earth. Citizens simply do not have a viable mechanism to advance the issues pertinent to them. Representative Governments only only representative in that they are human and citizens and so are you. Brass Tacks ...your needs don't really matter unless you're coming with enough currency to get a seat at the table.
Ah, America. What hath become of thee?
Land of the Free? Perhaps not when a growing majority of citizens seek to take freedom away from any individual or corporate entity which they deem a threat.
Home of the Brave? Meaning, those "brave" citizens who FEAR America's home-grown success stories when they become exceedingly successful.
Anyone who agrees with the senator and Victor Mortimer would be wise to do the following:
1. Stop using all Apple products and services, to fall in line with your sentiment that Apple is too large and needs to be broken up.
2. Sell all your AAPL stock, including all mutual funds which have AAPL in them. Never buy any stake in AAPL again.
3. Stop reading AppleInsider and posting in its forums.
4. Start an organization to make your own dent in the universe, showing the world that your ideas are as great as you think they are.
Perhaps then you will have a position that people can appreciate.