gatorguy

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  • What Apple products will get hit the hardest by Trump's new tariff orders

    So, the tariffs were announced in April and then delayed for 90 days. At the point where the tariff were delayed we were promised "90 deals in 90 days"  In that time Trump claimed he had made deals with 200 countries despite there not being 200 countries to actually make deals with. This week we will hit the 90 days with exactly two deals made. 
    Not even two finalized deals AFAICT. What we have at the moment is the framework for two potential deals rather than signed trade agreements. Quite the dealmaker....
    Toroidalsconosciutomuthuk_vanalingam
  • Foxconn mysteriously tells Chinese workers to quit India and return to China

    anthogag said:
    Zuckerberg could be paying Chinese workers to quit Foxconn to help stop the spread of Apple Intelligence.
    ??? 
    "...Foxconn has been telling Chinese workers to return (to China), for about the last two months. So far over 300 Chinese workers have left, and one source claimed that most people remaining are support staff from Taiwan."

    Cesar Battistini Mazieromacgui
  • Trump's new China trade deal is still bad for US business & consumers

    bwik said:
    Who pays a tariff fully depends on whether there is a substitute supplier or buyer.  The columnist confidently declares buyers pay for tarriffs.  Yes, they do, if there is no alternative supplier anywhere on Earth who sells a comparable product.  But most products do have alternative sellers.  This means the seller must pay some of, or in many cases, near 100% of the tariff.  Don’t take my word for it (two degrees from leading universities in this subject).  Ask ChatGPT.  
    What successful seller would absorb 100% of any costs, tariff or not, without eventually passing it on to a client, customer, or retail buyer? Ain't happening IMHO, but please do post an example of where import taxes, AKA tariffs, would not be factored into the price of a product a consumer buys.

    By definition a tariff is a tax imposed on foreign-made goods, paid by the importing business to its home country's government. You seem to disagree, so a couple of examples please.
    danoxdewmethedba12Strangersronn
  • Trump Mobile drops false 'made in America' promise

    sdw2001 said:
    I was going to post that this article is misleading by saying that "However, President Trump is still in control of the trust and has the ability to make decisions that affect the company."  Because, obviously, the only appropriate way a trust could be set up would be as a blind trust (like every other president used) where they explicitly relinquish control over their business/investments.

    But then I fact checked this and I was a fool to give Trump any benefit of the doubt. Trump didn't set up a blind trust at all; he retains "significant influence or control over the activities of the trust."

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/danalexander/2025/05/06/trump-organization-admits-president-still-controls-his-business-in-new-filing/
    You can’t really set up a blind to trust with active businesses like that. And not every other president did that. President in the early days of the republic had one desk for business and one for the country. Literally in the same room.

    Every President for 50 years not-named-Trump has put their businesses into a blind trust. Is conflict of interest not a thing if your name is Trump, but the public expects better optics from all the others? Legal and ethical are of course different standards, and doing so is not a legal requirement. IMO it should be.

    Remember how Joe Biden was demonized by Trump for his son Hunter potentially making any money from Presidential connections? Donald Trump has frequently accused Hunter Biden of using his father's name and position for financial gain. Trump's campaign, for example, ran an ad stating: "The question is not why Hunter Biden used his name to get these gigs. It's why Joe Biden let him do it."  Yet here we now with a different ethical standard. Is that OK with you?
    MplsPronnlordjohnwhorfinbaconstangmuthuk_vanalingam
  • Car makers reject CarPlay Ultra as an Apple overreach

    MplsP said:

    AppleZulu said:
    cropr said:
    sflagel said:
    sflagel said:
    it is ludicrous for a car manufacturer to give Apple access to all its car systems, which will invariably lead to Apple becoming the gatekeeper to the entire tech stack of a car. This in addition to the branding impact. CarPlay is not the end of evolution, for example, the music app is well on CarPlay. Audi music controls are much better. 
    Who said all? We’re talking about user-facing information systems. Car manufacturers have farmed out components and subsystems from day one. Brakes, batteries, transmissions, gauges, radios, generators, on and on. More to the point, putting Bose, Harmon-Kardon and many other name brand audio systems is a selling point. Why should this be any different?
    CarPlay Ultra is not just the display of car metrics, it also is the interface with, e.g., A/C, suspension settings, drive modes, alarm modes, etc. Apple CarPlay Ultra is upstream from the control systems and chips; before long, Apple will be dictating which chips the car manufacturers should use and what software architecture they should build. There is a big difference between buying batteries from Bosch and letting Apple control the central nervous system of the car.
    Are you sure of that.  I thought CarPlayUltra is offering an API to the car internal system, but it does leave the choice of any car component to the car manufacturer.

    But I do agree that car manufacturers are reluctant to hand over control to an external party who manages the display and its UI for everything that is not music.  What if  Car Play Ultra drives, for whatever reason, a car critical component in a such a way that the car is about to crash.  Who will take responsibility?

    The car manufacturer might not have the best skill to develop a great UI on a touch screen, but a car manufacturer has much higher skill level  than Apple when it comes to handling car critical exceptions in real time.
    I'm pretty sure that's not what Ultra is meant to do. It will Apple-ize the instrument cluster display (with carmaker-branded customization) and perhaps let you control some things like A/C via touchscreen or Siri, but I don't think they're moving control of features like adaptive cruise control, emergency braking or lane assist onto your iPhone. Displays related to these things might be tweaked with Apple fonts and color schemes, but the features themselves would still live in the car, and revert to the car's default display if your iPhone crashed while you're driving. I'm pretty sure the carmakers' and and Apple's lawyers would be in complete agreement about that. 
    This. If you are confused, watch one of the videos. 
    As far as I can understand, one of the more obvious differences between Android Automotive and CarPlay Ultra is that Apple requires an iPhone running iOS12 or higher and Apple Services to make it work. Using Android Automotive does not mean automakers also have to accept Google Services, or that the owner must have an Android phone. But if you do have a phone it will operate the same whether it's Android or iOS. Apple CarPlay Ultra will not.

    I see things as Apple trying to limit the advantages of in-vehicle smartphone use to iOS devices since the CarPlay Ultra interface won't work without one, disadvantage anyone who owns not-an-iPhone. Android Automotive doesn't care.

    TLDR: Android Automotive works as the UX whether the owner has an Android phone, iPhone, or no phone at all. CarPlay Ultra will not.  If my understanding is wrong, feel free to post a correction source. 
    muthuk_vanalingam