22july2013

Apple should respond, “Mark, you have exactly the kind of software company we are trying to protect our users from. So we will take your insult as a complement.”

As the article says, it's not that the developer has to update the app, but that "the requirement to update only applies to the App Store listing itself." In other words, old apps haven't updated their App Privacy information on the app store in years. It's not that the app is bad, it's that the app developer has not told potential purchasers what data the app is obtaining from the user. It makes me wonder if developers of apps like Motivato are obtaining user data and sending the data to FaceBook for a bounty fee. Indie devs who complain about privacy label requirements are probably Facebook shills. It's like driving public roads without a driver's license, and then complaining that Apple has infringed on their "rights" because they are "sovereign developers."

The move doesn't impact me because I would never download any app that doesn't have an App Privacy section in its App Store description. Apple's motivation here is simply to plug one of the holes in its walled garden. They should have done this over a year ago. Shame on Apple.

Twelve months ago my Apple Watch 6 notified me of a heart problem, so when I called my doctor she said to go to the emergency room immediately. I did that, and while I can't say definitively that I would be dead without my Apple Watch 6, I can say that I got the treatment I needed and that may have been a factor as to why I'm alive today.

goofy1958 said:

harrykatsaros said:

aderutter said:

This will have far reaching effects, so really hope Apple & Google simply pull the app-store from South Korea.
I

100% agree. Pull the stores and leave South Korea scrambling until consumers rip the government a new one for trying to fix something that wasn’t broken. People retaliating against this legislation will prevent other countries from attempting to do the same. Allowing alternative stores opens up the platform to a world of hurt. There’s a reason I don’t use Android. I don’t want my experience as a consumer to be ruined or compromised because some clueless government bureaucrats half way around the world went on some bullshit self righteous crusade in seek of good press.

Just because other app stores are allowed, doesn't mean that you have to download apps from them.  Stick with the Apple app store, and there is no change for you (or me).  I would never go to another app store other than Apple's, so not a big deal to me.  If people want to be stupid and download unknown apps from another site, that is on them, and one thing I really hope Apple does is have some sort of disclaimer that if you do, you may void your warranty.

You make a fair case for consumer freedom. But you don't realize that corporations also have freedom to not be required to provide the software and services to allow for third party app stores. How would you like it if you sold lemonade on your street and were told by the government that you had to sell your neighbor's lemonade and give the profits of that lemonade to your neighbor? Apple works very hard and deserves the right to not have to share its app store profit with its competitors.

A lot of people here are inferring that a hostile question from a judge means that the judge's decision will reflect her questions. This is a presumptuous belief. Many judges ask difficult questions so that their opinions, which are going to be favourable to the person being spoken to, have all the possible angles covered. I learned this from reading the US Supreme Court transcripts.

Or maybe she's an idiot judge. Both explanations are possible.

Apple doesn't say exactly which iOS features are locked down, but I'd like to prompt some concern by making comparisons to the kind of information a devious company can get from a telephone call, or from someone using a mouse on a website.

When a person answers the telephone with "Hello?" they are giving away all kinds of information that the caller, who is often a robo-dialer, can use against you. That one word gives away your age, your sex, your language, and more. Even your accent might be able to geo-locate you within 100 miles. In England, they can currently geo-locate you (using your accent) within 20 miles (before BBC TV was widespread, the geo-location distance from your voice was 5 miles.) They can record all the information they can infer from your response, and sell that information to other companies. These companies aren't even subject to UK law because they aren't based in the UK.

These days, javascript code running on a website can easily tell your height (because the curvature of the arc when you move your mouse a long distance gives away the length of your wrist or forearm, depending on how you move your mouse.) And your height has a correlation to your sex. So they can tell your sex from your mouse's motion. The correlation isn't 100% accurate, of course, but it's good enough to improve the effectiveness of ad choices. All the inferences they make from innocent-looking data are deep trade secrets. Like the phone example above, these companies can be foreign-located, and therefore unrestricted in obtaining and recording personal data from you like your religion, race, handicapped status, health, prescriptions, gender orientation, etc.

Web browsers also say "Hello" in their interaction with websites. If you want to see some of the things they offer to the web server, may I suggest visiting this site: (I have never seen this website prior to one minute ago. I don't know much about it.) These are some of the things that Apple probably blocks.

https://privacy.net/analyzer/ <--

Exactly which of the 200 requirements in the App Store Guidelines do they want revoked? All of them? Here's one I picked at random:

2.5.9 Apps that alter or disable the functions of standard switches, such as the Volume Up/Down and Ring/Silent switches, or other native user interface elements or behaviors will be rejected. For example, apps should not block links out to other apps or other features that users would expect to work a certain way.

How evil it is of Apple to make any requirements, like this one. It inhibits competition! It makes Apple a monopoly!

There are at least 50 large companies in China building products using unmonitored AI software and exporting them to the EU for profit. Does the EU plan on banning any of them? Eg, DJI.

ATLMacFan said:

chutzpah said:

Meh, I'm not sure what else you'd expect him to say. 

I usually like when they say something like, “the future of computing is here. We started this journey years ago and now we have worthy competition that will continue to fuel our passion for tomorrow.” Something like that

Zuck didn't "start this journey", however. The first VR headset was built in 1968 by Ivan Sutherland. Search Google with the phrase:...

Augmented Reality: "The Ultimate Display" by Ivan Sutherland, 1965

And witness the first VR in action here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVUgfUvP4uk

It sounds like the right hand doesn't know what the Lufthansa is doing.