I work for an investment firm as a back end researcher and by yesterday afternoon , my bosses were basically laughing at this outdated and idiotic indictment and the fact that the actual attorney general was made to stand there and read these outdated charges .
Your bosses should look at the Microsoft stock from 1995 to 2014. Antitrust cases don't help investors.
Antitrust cases don’t necessarily hurt investors. For Microsoft, the big headwinds for their stock during that period was due to the internet bust, the GFC, and Ballmer.
The GFC? What's that?
I think MS' biggest issue post DOJ was that Windows was a performance, security and malware nightmare in the 00s, and they lost the search war to Google. There weren't that many happy Windows customers. Firefox was a way to protect yourself while browsing the web. Chrome replaced FireFox as the browser of choice for safer browsing and it supported Google services the best. Even Apple thought Safari had a chance of taking share on Windows.
It was not uncommon for Windows users to experience performance rot and they had to reformat their drive and re-install Windows to get performance back. Some had to do this every few months. Oh, it always needs to said, it was not safe to browse the web using Windows in the 00s. It was very easy to for a user to innocently install some piece of unremovable malware where the easiest fix was a reformat and re-install because the malware inserted itself somewhere in Windows boot sequence. I repeat, the easiest solution was to reformat you hard disk and reinstall everything!
The fact that MS survived with their office automation and PC OS monopoly unscathed is testament to their "durability" to borrow an anti-trust term, and the toothlessness of the DOJ settlement. A PC operating system can not be successful without MS Office. MS can kill macOS and Macs simply by not updating Office for Mac.
Theoretically, Office for Web can enable a PC OS with a full featured browser to gain share, but MS can dial that down by limiting Office Web features, which is what they currently do.
The only vector of attack left for a PC OS competitor is "free". Linux. Google Chrome PCs has search money to bankroll that. But a genuine operating system vendor for PCs, whose model is to sell licenses? Dead. No chance. The DOJ did nothing there.
Yeah, XP was a disaster for security and that really was huge.
But I also think Ballmer strongly believed in using every trick in the book to bully customers into using Microsoft products whether they wanted to or not. That came at the expense of making products that people really wanted to buy. MS Office is a great example. Under Nadella, it seems to me that MS has been focused on making Office the best it can be and available to as many people as possible. The Mac versions of key Office apps have been *much* better under Nadella than under Ballmer.
Ballmer did too much damage to Windows Mobile/Phone for Nadella to be able to save it. Ballmer's attitude was basically, "FU, customer -- you're going to have to use Windows Mobile whether you want to or not because we're Microsoft and it's Windows and that's all there is to it!" His sense of entitlement was enormous. He completely dismissed iPhone and Android.
I think Ballmer did well as MS CEO save for two losses. MS went through their anti-trust unscathed. They still hold their monopoly positions in office automation and PC operating systems. Whether you can say that was a hard job or an easy job, who knows. But Windows and Office are like 20b to 30b per year cash cows, each. Then, Ballmer successfully vectored MS into the game console market with XBox, and got most console games to use DirectX, ensuring a long term games "moat" by having them use a proprietary API.
His biggest loss was losing the search war with Google. I don't know exactly what they could have done. Google had first mover advantage and time to market was huge for this type of thing. The security nightmare that were Internet Explorer and ActiveX only exacerbated the search war. If no one wanted to use IE because of malware risks, it meant MS lost doubly so because it meant people wouldn't use MS search either. Chrome has been on a steady climb to 70+ percent of web browser usage since it came out. 20% belong to iPhone Safari, and Google is paying Apple tens of billions to be the default there too.
The best thing to do was to make IE a good app that was safe to use, but ActiveX became entrenched in the 90s, and maybe they couldn't because of legacy support?
With Google monopolizing search, allowing them a billion+ dollar honeypot, it enabled them to offer Android for "free". That defacto destroyed MS's OS licensing model for Windows Mobile, and any other phone OS vendor for that matter. Tough to compete with free. This is where I can agree with you that Ballmer had a 1990s Windows strategy tax (everything has to be Windows) and couldn't step away from what made them successful in the 90s.
The other big mistake was taking 3 years to responding to the iPhone. It needed to be 1 year like Google did with Android. Their OS licensing model could have worked if they had a nice Windows Mobile release in 2008, not 2010. Google became entrenched within about 2 to 3 years.
I work for an investment firm as a back end researcher and by yesterday afternoon , my bosses were basically laughing at this outdated and idiotic indictment and the fact that the actual attorney general was made to stand there and read these outdated charges .
Your bosses should look at the Microsoft stock from 1995 to 2014. Antitrust cases don't help investors.
Antitrust cases don’t necessarily hurt investors. For Microsoft, the big headwinds for their stock during that period was due to the internet bust, the GFC, and Ballmer.
The GFC? What's that?
I think MS' biggest issue post DOJ was that Windows was a performance, security and malware nightmare in the 00s, and they lost the search war to Google. There weren't that many happy Windows customers. Firefox was a way to protect yourself while browsing the web. Chrome replaced FireFox as the browser of choice for safer browsing and it supported Google services the best. Even Apple thought Safari had a chance of taking share on Windows.
It was not uncommon for Windows users to experience performance rot and they had to reformat their drive and re-install Windows to get performance back. Some had to do this every few months. Oh, it always needs to said, it was not safe to browse the web using Windows in the 00s. It was very easy to for a user to innocently install some piece of unremovable malware where the easiest fix was a reformat and re-install because the malware inserted itself somewhere in Windows boot sequence. I repeat, the easiest solution was to reformat you hard disk and reinstall everything!
The fact that MS survived with their office automation and PC OS monopoly unscathed is testament to their "durability" to borrow an anti-trust term, and the toothlessness of the DOJ settlement. A PC operating system can not be successful without MS Office. MS can kill macOS and Macs simply by not updating Office for Mac.
Theoretically, Office for Web can enable a PC OS with a full featured browser to gain share, but MS can dial that down by limiting Office Web features, which is what they currently do.
The only vector of attack left for a PC OS competitor is "free". Linux. Google Chrome PCs has search money to bankroll that. But a genuine operating system vendor for PCs, whose model is to sell licenses? Dead. No chance. The DOJ did nothing there.
Great Financial Crisis. This and the internet bust obviously hurt all companies, not just Microsoft.
The fact that this antitrust lawsuit was four years in the making is an embarrassment. It is more akin to something a comment troll concocted in 5 minutes. The smartwatch argument is the stupidest, android watches are locked to android like the AW is locked to the iPhone and android users are generally happy with their watches. And if one wants to buy a Garmin, it will work across devices. iMessage is probably the strongest point but by the time it goes to trial it will be a non-issue.
People are concerned about privacy and safety on-line, And for the price of a Taylor Swift ticket consumers have their choice of an iPhone or a capable android device. Again DOJ what are you doing about TicketMaster?
I don’t see the harm from the consumer perspective. And the DOJ should not be in the business of picking winners and losers as businesses battle-it-out as long as choice is maintained and there is no collusion.
And a 15-30% cut for profit apps is the industry standard. And remember Apple charges only a $100 developer fee for the vast majority of non-profit apps.
I hope Apple fights this tooth and nail. As another commenter that I read started, any loss of market share to Apple (an. American company) will just open up that portion of the market to asian companies. I suspect Garland would be happy to have us use Huawei Hero phones.
This is a complete waste of tax payer money. And of course Trump will exploit this (if he is smart).
I work for an investment firm as a back end researcher and by yesterday afternoon , my bosses were basically laughing at this outdated and idiotic indictment and the fact that the actual attorney general was made to stand there and read these outdated charges .
Your bosses should look at the Microsoft stock from 1995 to 2014. Antitrust cases don't help investors.
Antitrust cases don’t necessarily hurt investors. For Microsoft, the big headwinds for their stock during that period was due to the internet bust, the GFC, and Ballmer.
The problems for MS started in 1995 - 5-6 years before the bubble and Ballmer. MS didn't get any boost from the bubble. For management and development to get sidetracked by legal issues is not good for a company.
I don’t know how much management and development was sidetracked by the legal issues — this was handled by the legal department. Microsoft also had a 90+% market share, which caused more scrutiny than what Apple is dealing with. And I don’t know how well liked Microsoft was with consumers back then compared to Apple today.
I would love to read a detailed account about everything that went on back then. I think the longer term problem started when Ballmer became CEO but Gates didn’t step down until years later — there wasn’t a clear leader, so their infighting led to missing the rise of Google and other opportunities.
The fact that this antitrust lawsuit was four years in the making is an embarrassment. It is more akin to something a comment troll concocted in 5 minutes. The smartwatch argument is the stupidest, android watches are locked to android like the AW is locked to the iPhone and android users are generally happy with their watches. And if one wants to buy a Garmin, it will work across devices. iMessage is probably the strongest point but by the time it goes to trial it will be a non-issue.
People are concerned about privacy and safety on-line, And for the price of a Taylor Swift ticket consumers have their choice of an iPhone or a capable android device. Again DOJ what are you doing about TicketMaster?
I don’t see the harm from the consumer perspective. And the DOJ should not be in the business of picking winners and losers as businesses battle-it-out as long as choice is maintained and there is no collusion.
And a 15-30% cut for profit apps is the industry standard. And remember Apple charges only a $100 developer fee for the vast majority of non-profit apps.
I hope Apple fights this tooth and nail. As another commenter that I read started, any loss of market share to Apple (an. American company) will just open up that portion of the market to asian companies. I suspect Garland would be happy to have us use Huawei Hero phones.
This is a complete waste of tax payer money. And of course Trump will exploit this (if he is smart).
Trump can't even post a bond maybe he can get Truth Social to help losing.....
The fact that this antitrust lawsuit was four years in the making is an embarrassment. It is more akin to something a comment troll concocted in 5 minutes. The smartwatch argument is the stupidest, android watches are locked to android like the AW is locked to the iPhone and android users are generally happy with their watches. And if one wants to buy a Garmin, it will work across devices. iMessage is probably the strongest point but by the time it goes to trial it will be a non-issue.
People are concerned about privacy and safety on-line, And for the price of a Taylor Swift ticket consumers have their choice of an iPhone or a capable android device. Again DOJ what are you doing about TicketMaster?
I don’t see the harm from the consumer perspective. And the DOJ should not be in the business of picking winners and losers as businesses battle-it-out as long as choice is maintained and there is no collusion.
And a 15-30% cut for profit apps is the industry standard. And remember Apple charges only a $100 developer fee for the vast majority of non-profit apps.
I hope Apple fights this tooth and nail. As another commenter that I read started, any loss of market share to Apple (an. American company) will just open up that portion of the market to asian companies. I suspect Garland would be happy to have us use Huawei Hero phones.
This is a complete waste of tax payer money. And of course Trump will exploit this (if he is smart).
Trump can't even post a bond maybe he can get Truth Social to help losing.....
And you think that is good what that crazy woman is doing to Trump? If she starts seizing property, she will re-elect Trump .
Dan Niles has always been wrong! Specifically, he’s been coming on CNBC for 20 years, telling people he’s shorting Apple, time after time after time. This while the stock was ascending like a diagonal, making its run to all time highs. This guy has to be broke. Let’s see all those losses, Dan!
A quote from Steve Ballmer that I didn't find before now, but it says everything: "Being the object of a lawsuit, effectively, or a complaint from your government is a very awkward, uncomfortable position to be in. It just has all downside. People assume if the government brought a complaint that there's really a problem, and your ability to say we're a good, proper, moral place is tough. It's actually tough, even though you feel that way about yourselves."
A company like Apple where employees and customers take pride in the company doing mostly right stuff - planet friendly, user friendly, privacy protecting, LGBTQIA+ etc. And then employees are now supposed to be happy working for a company that is fighting for the right to avoid USB-C and fighting against all major fully developed democracies? You signed up to do good for humanity but is now spending your life for a corporation that only have friends in communist China. That one is tough.
The fact that this antitrust lawsuit was four years in the making is an embarrassment. It is more akin to something a comment troll concocted in 5 minutes. The smartwatch argument is the stupidest, android watches are locked to android like the AW is locked to the iPhone and android users are generally happy with their watches. And if one wants to buy a Garmin, it will work across devices. iMessage is probably the strongest point but by the time it goes to trial it will be a non-issue.
People are concerned about privacy and safety on-line, And for the price of a Taylor Swift ticket consumers have their choice of an iPhone or a capable android device. Again DOJ what are you doing about TicketMaster?
I don’t see the harm from the consumer perspective. And the DOJ should not be in the business of picking winners and losers as businesses battle-it-out as long as choice is maintained and there is no collusion.
And a 15-30% cut for profit apps is the industry standard. And remember Apple charges only a $100 developer fee for the vast majority of non-profit apps.
I hope Apple fights this tooth and nail. As another commenter that I read started, any loss of market share to Apple (an. American company) will just open up that portion of the market to asian companies. I suspect Garland would be happy to have us use Huawei Hero phones.
This is a complete waste of tax payer money. And of course Trump will exploit this (if he is smart).
I don’t expect my Apple Watch to work with Android phones, but my Garmin cannot send text replies because of Apple’s anticompetitive practices (it can with an android phones). I understand the locking of imessage in general and agree this part of the suit is silly, but if I’m using my iPhone to send from my watch it should not be restricted, so I think the watch stuff might actually be one of the strongest assertions, not the weakest.
PS- Four years ago, when this was started, Biden was not the president and Garland was not the AG.
FYI: Merrick Garland is a centrist/moderate and so is Amy Klobucher who was the Senator spearheading the tech regulation legislation that never gained enough traction in 2021 and 2022.
This is not tech regulation. This is trying to turn Disneyland to Yosemite national park because the people at going to Yosemite on a $25’ticket might feel left out looking a Disneyland and people visit g there in a $200 ticket .
all while not realizing most people visiting both parks freely chose to go there and are very happy with their choice.
My point is that both the lawsuit and the prior regulatory legislation were not really coming from a single party. Klobuchar's regulatory aims had bipartisan support with people like Chuck Grassley, Lindsey Graham and Josh Hawley supporting it along with Dick Durbin and Richard Blumenthal etc. And the state Attorney Generals that are on board with Garland in the lawsuit are a mix of Democrats and Republicans as well. You've got states like California and New York but also Oklahoma and Tennessee.
But my own personal opinion is that much of the legislation/lawsuit is entirely misguided. Example: trying to say that the App Store commission is a form of rent seeking is just complete bark-at-the-moon nonsense. Rent seeking is trying to get $$ and providing nothing in return (like lobbying for a tax write-off from the government). Apple had to create the OS + iPhone hardware + App Store + APIs/tools etc. in order for developers to be able to sell iOS apps. That's not providing nothing in return.
FYI: Merrick Garland is a centrist/moderate and so is Amy Klobucher who was the Senator spearheading the tech regulation legislation that never gained enough traction in 2021 and 2022.
This is not tech regulation. This is trying to turn Disneyland to Yosemite national park because the people at going to Yosemite on a $25’ticket might feel left out looking a Disneyland and people visit g there in a $200 ticket .
all while not realizing most people visiting both parks freely chose to go there and are very happy with their choice.
My point is that both the lawsuit and the prior regulatory legislation were not really coming from a single party. Klobuchar's regulatory aims had bipartisan support with people like Chuck Grassley, Lindsey Graham and Josh Hawley supporting it along with Dick Durbin and Richard Blumenthal etc. And the state Attorney Generals that are on board with Garland in the lawsuit are a mix of Democrats and Republicans as well. You've got states like California and New York but also Oklahoma and Tennessee.
But my own personal opinion is that much of the legislation/lawsuit is entirely misguided. Example: trying to say that the App Store commission is a form of rent seeking is just complete bark-at-the-moon nonsense. Rent seeking is trying to get $$ and providing nothing in return (like lobbying for a tax write-off from the government). Apple had to create the OS + iPhone hardware + App Store + APIs/tools etc. in order for developers to be able to sell iOS apps. That's not providing nothing in return.
I kind of think the commission is for consumers. It's a cost that developers have to pay to be on the platform. The platform and commission protects us from developers. Apple imparts rules on developers largely for our benefit, not developers. As is their want, it necessarily benefits Apple as well. As long as Apple's rules benefits customers, the system works. A few issues here and there, but overall, a nice enterprise.
Apple enforces easy subscription cancellations. If you subscribe for some service using the Apple platform and the App Store, unsubscribing is one click easy. This will be one of the first things that goes away if Apple is forced to open up App Store rules. Oh, I get a free 1 month subscription for this service after downloading your app? Great, let's try it. Click. After one month, I would like to cancel please. Well, please go to the website and there will be an unsubscribe option in your account, ..., hidden somewhere there. Good luck finding it. Oh, I need to call? Calling. A pleasant conversion with an LLM answering service ensues.
Less commerce. Less money will flow. Apps and services will be more expensive if App Store rules are broken up the way developers want.
So the Verge hand picks opinions that fit their narrative — means nothing. Anyone with half a brain can see that the case is weak, and this should tell you enough about the “experts” that you’re referring to.
So the Verge hand picks opinions that fit their narrative — means nothing.
How is this in any way different to articles (not only opinions) on this site? Fine to see @bulk001 add to the debate. To fully reject it with a "means nothing" is not OK. This is not a convent.
I work for an investment firm as a back end researcher and by yesterday afternoon , my bosses were basically laughing at this outdated and idiotic indictment and the fact that the actual attorney general was made to stand there and read these outdated charges .
Your bosses should look at the Microsoft stock from 1995 to 2014. Antitrust cases don't help investors.
As a long-term (multi-decade) investor, I am somewhat unfazed by short term trouble, even trouble that spans a decade of time. Consider well this graph...
If you invested in MS stock in 1999, you would have been upset for quite a while. But as you pointed out, from about 2014 and later, things dramatically changed. It's all an upward change too. In fact, the value of the MS stock you purchased in 1999 increased by 800%.
When you invest LONG TERM, even a DOJ anti-trust suit matters little. That doesn't mean the DOJ suit is smart or completely harmless. It's not. Garland should be ashamed of himself. And if Trump gets elected in November, he should influence his DOJ to drop the case against Apple, even if that "influence" only amounts to a change in the Attorney General.
Nevertheless, had someone the choice between Apple stock and MS stock back in 1999, one would have been smart to have purchased AAPL instead.
AAPL increased in value 19,268% from Dec. 1999 to today in late March 2024.
One thing that is similar between the two tech stocks is their similar exponential rise from 2014 and later.
At the end of the day, both Microsoft and Apple are two of America's greatest success stories. Their net positive contributions to global society should be honored and praised, not torn to shreds by a band of rogue lawyers who haven't the faintest idea what to do in life outside filing yet another frivolous lawsuit they try to make the public think isn't frivolous. Americans benefit a lot from Apple. Every American should be outraged at the DOJ right now. I am.
Although Tim Cook didn't found Apple, Apple's founder, Steve Jobs, is no longer with us. And although Woz is still around, it really as Steve who built the "business" that was originally started on the foundation of Woz's amazing tech. But let's be honest here. Tim Cook has done an incredibly good job since the death of Steve in 2011. And yes, I say that in large part as a pleased AAPL investor. Anyone with pocket money can buy AAPL stock, so there's nothing exclusive about owning stock of any kind. But Apple has done far more than just please investors. Most people couldn't imagine life without the Mac or iPhone, and those aren't simply addictions either. A lot of amazing and practical work has been done on Apple products. Anyone with an Apple Silicon Mac or a Vision Pro can attest to the fact that devices keep getting better and useful in new ways too.
If Rush Limbaugh was able to be honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, so should Tim Cook. Biden should bestow that honor on Cook in a televised ceremony while also lambasting his Attorney General. That will never happen, but my goodness would it be fantastic to see! Again, we need to embrace and praise our home grown success stories, not litigate them to death.
The charges have no legs to stand on. They have only been brought as a vendetta against Apple, for not allowing the government back door access 😡 Fact is the DOJ & FBI have become a political arm of the the democrat White House administration, it was incompetent under Barr, now both have become an arm of the government to pursue it's opponents and let real criminals off scot free 😡
So the Verge hand picks opinions that fit their narrative — means nothing.
How is this in any way different to articles (not only opinions) on this site? Fine to see @bulk001 add to the debate. To fully reject it with a "means nothing" is not OK. This is not a convent.
People don’t need to rely on “experts” to form an opinion. They can just read the initial complaint from the DOJ. It’s an 88 page document, double spaced and in relatively large font.
The experts know the case law, the lawyers know the procedures and processes, but the arguments are what convinces judges and or jury and those arguments are plain “English” arguments. If it is a jury trial, these are supposed to be regular people, the lawyers will be using readily understandable arguments.
This initial press release from the DOJ is in plain English and plain arguments (ie not arcane law arguments). Just read them. The only good thing you can say about it is that it will probably not be the set of evidence and probably not the set of arguments used in the court case.
The DOJ complaint, it’s more of a press release, has factual errors like saying the 2007 iPhone had a price of $299, suspect market constructions like the market Apple is monopolizing is the “performance smartphone” market which is as close as possible to saying Apple has a monopoly on iPhones without saying it, and stretched arguments like Apple has raised the prices in the “performance smartphone” market or it is too hard to switch to Android because people have to learn how Android works.
The DOJ complaint language is following the USA anti-trust playbook of establishing a company is a monopoly, employing practices that suppress competition, raising prices on consumers and making it hard to switch. So, that’s the essential narrative of the complaint document, but that’s the story the DOJ wants to tell. What’s the truth or the facts? The court case will sort it out, and I can tell you the court case will get things wrong too.
For people who have followed the tech industry for the past 30 years, they can spot the DOJ’s misinformation, lack of understanding of how markets work, lack of understanding of how products and technology work, etc. It reads like it was written by an 11th grader who crammed the night before to finish a paper. It barely had any footnotes, and well researched documents is nothing but footnotes and references.
The thing that is always juicy will be the emails though. Those are going to be crazy. This will be where lawyers earn their money.
I don't think the real danger to Apple's business practices will come from the DoJ. Look out for class-action/competitor lawsuits claiming antitrust violations, and I expect there to be several.
Comments
His biggest loss was losing the search war with Google. I don't know exactly what they could have done. Google had first mover advantage and time to market was huge for this type of thing. The security nightmare that were Internet Explorer and ActiveX only exacerbated the search war. If no one wanted to use IE because of malware risks, it meant MS lost doubly so because it meant people wouldn't use MS search either. Chrome has been on a steady climb to 70+ percent of web browser usage since it came out. 20% belong to iPhone Safari, and Google is paying Apple tens of billions to be the default there too.
The best thing to do was to make IE a good app that was safe to use, but ActiveX became entrenched in the 90s, and maybe they couldn't because of legacy support?
With Google monopolizing search, allowing them a billion+ dollar honeypot, it enabled them to offer Android for "free". That defacto destroyed MS's OS licensing model for Windows Mobile, and any other phone OS vendor for that matter. Tough to compete with free. This is where I can agree with you that Ballmer had a 1990s Windows strategy tax (everything has to be Windows) and couldn't step away from what made them successful in the 90s.
The other big mistake was taking 3 years to responding to the iPhone. It needed to be 1 year like Google did with Android. Their OS licensing model could have worked if they had a nice Windows Mobile release in 2008, not 2010. Google became entrenched within about 2 to 3 years.
Yeah, I remember the re-installs — not fun!
He also said to buy Nvidia last year at 300….
Has the guy had some bad calls? Sure, but he has has many right calls as well
People are concerned about privacy and safety on-line, And for the price of a Taylor Swift ticket consumers have their choice of an iPhone or a capable android device. Again DOJ what are you doing about TicketMaster?
I don’t see the harm from the consumer perspective. And the DOJ should not be in the business of picking winners and losers as businesses battle-it-out as long as choice is maintained and there is no collusion.
And a 15-30% cut for profit apps is the industry standard. And remember Apple charges only a $100 developer fee for the vast majority of non-profit apps.
I hope Apple fights this tooth and nail. As another commenter that I read started, any loss of market share to Apple (an. American company) will just open up that portion of the market to asian companies. I suspect Garland would be happy to have us use Huawei Hero phones.
This is a complete waste of tax payer money. And of course Trump will exploit this (if he is smart).
I would love to read a detailed account about everything that went on back then. I think the longer term problem started when Ballmer became CEO but Gates didn’t step down until years later — there wasn’t a clear leader, so their infighting led to missing the rise of Google and other opportunities.
Trump can't even post a bond maybe he can get Truth Social to help losing.....
"Being the object of a lawsuit, effectively, or a complaint from your government is a very awkward, uncomfortable position to be in. It just has all downside. People assume if the government brought a complaint that there's really a problem, and your ability to say we're a good, proper, moral place is tough. It's actually tough, even though you feel that way about yourselves."
A company like Apple where employees and customers take pride in the company doing mostly right stuff - planet friendly, user friendly, privacy protecting, LGBTQIA+ etc. And then employees are now supposed to be happy working for a company that is fighting for the right to avoid USB-C and fighting against all major fully developed democracies? You signed up to do good for humanity but is now spending your life for a corporation that only have friends in communist China. That one is tough.
But my own personal opinion is that much of the legislation/lawsuit is entirely misguided. Example: trying to say that the App Store commission is a form of rent seeking is just complete bark-at-the-moon nonsense. Rent seeking is trying to get $$ and providing nothing in return (like lobbying for a tax write-off from the government). Apple had to create the OS + iPhone hardware + App Store + APIs/tools etc. in order for developers to be able to sell iOS apps. That's not providing nothing in return.
Apple enforces easy subscription cancellations. If you subscribe for some service using the Apple platform and the App Store, unsubscribing is one click easy. This will be one of the first things that goes away if Apple is forced to open up App Store rules. Oh, I get a free 1 month subscription for this service after downloading your app? Great, let's try it. Click. After one month, I would like to cancel please. Well, please go to the website and there will be an unsubscribe option in your account, ..., hidden somewhere there. Good luck finding it. Oh, I need to call? Calling. A pleasant conversion with an LLM answering service ensues.
Less commerce. Less money will flow. Apps and services will be more expensive if App Store rules are broken up the way developers want.
Fine to see @bulk001 add to the debate. To fully reject it with a "means nothing" is not OK. This is not a convent.
If you invested in MS stock in 1999, you would have been upset for quite a while. But as you pointed out, from about 2014 and later, things dramatically changed. It's all an upward change too. In fact, the value of the MS stock you purchased in 1999 increased by 800%.
When you invest LONG TERM, even a DOJ anti-trust suit matters little. That doesn't mean the DOJ suit is smart or completely harmless. It's not. Garland should be ashamed of himself. And if Trump gets elected in November, he should influence his DOJ to drop the case against Apple, even if that "influence" only amounts to a change in the Attorney General.
Nevertheless, had someone the choice between Apple stock and MS stock back in 1999, one would have been smart to have purchased AAPL instead.
AAPL increased in value 19,268% from Dec. 1999 to today in late March 2024.
One thing that is similar between the two tech stocks is their similar exponential rise from 2014 and later.
At the end of the day, both Microsoft and Apple are two of America's greatest success stories. Their net positive contributions to global society should be honored and praised, not torn to shreds by a band of rogue lawyers who haven't the faintest idea what to do in life outside filing yet another frivolous lawsuit they try to make the public think isn't frivolous. Americans benefit a lot from Apple. Every American should be outraged at the DOJ right now. I am.
Although Tim Cook didn't found Apple, Apple's founder, Steve Jobs, is no longer with us. And although Woz is still around, it really as Steve who built the "business" that was originally started on the foundation of Woz's amazing tech. But let's be honest here. Tim Cook has done an incredibly good job since the death of Steve in 2011. And yes, I say that in large part as a pleased AAPL investor. Anyone with pocket money can buy AAPL stock, so there's nothing exclusive about owning stock of any kind. But Apple has done far more than just please investors. Most people couldn't imagine life without the Mac or iPhone, and those aren't simply addictions either. A lot of amazing and practical work has been done on Apple products. Anyone with an Apple Silicon Mac or a Vision Pro can attest to the fact that devices keep getting better and useful in new ways too.
If Rush Limbaugh was able to be honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, so should Tim Cook. Biden should bestow that honor on Cook in a televised ceremony while also lambasting his Attorney General. That will never happen, but my goodness would it be fantastic to see! Again, we need to embrace and praise our home grown success stories, not litigate them to death.
They have only been brought as a vendetta against Apple, for not allowing the government back door access 😡
Fact is the DOJ & FBI have become a political arm of the the democrat White House administration, it was incompetent under Barr, now both have become an arm of the government to pursue it's opponents and let real criminals off scot free 😡
The experts know the case law, the lawyers know the procedures and processes, but the arguments are what convinces judges and or jury and those arguments are plain “English” arguments. If it is a jury trial, these are supposed to be regular people, the lawyers will be using readily understandable arguments.