22july2013

GeorgeBMac said:

22july2013 said:

GeorgeBMac said:

22july2013 said:

rezwits said:

Dang come on NVIDIA, spend the $66 Billion.  Darn we almost had um...  

p.s. and not get a dime of ROI

Actually, if they create their IPO on a US Stock Exchange, as the article claims, it still is a small win for America, since there is also a Tokyo Stock Exchange.

But, as the United States militarizes its industries and uses them as weapons of (cold) war, this would be a loss to the world.

According to today's America:

"If it's an American technology, we (the government) gets to determine who has access to it".

So much for freedom.  So much for free markets.   So much for capitalism.  Good-bye!  Nice knowing you!

I read your post three times and was unable to determine how it relates to my comment or what you even mean. Can you speak more plainly in the future?

Were you not aware that part of the fear with NVIDIA was that, once ARM was controlled by an American company that it would also then be controlled by the American government to threaten and intimidate other countries and companies -- just as we have done with other  so called "American technologies"?

But the FTC is part of the American government and as such it was the American government that STOPPED this deal. Yet you were arguing, and always argue, that the American government is evil because it wants control of everything. But this case proves the exact opposite of your claims. This is why I don't understand your point.

A company that "goes public" is not really "independent." It still has bosses, which are the board of directors. And it has many accountability rules because it's publicly traded. A truly "independent" company would have to be one that's privately owned.

The largest privately owned company in the US is Cargill. About 90% of Cargill is owned by the descendants of the Cargill family founders. They make about $3B/year profit on revenue of about $110B/year.

The main advantage of a privately held company is that (at least in the USA) they don't have to release annual reports, which their competitors can read and use to compete with them. Another advantage to being privately held is that the company can switch strategies very quickly for long term purposes without worrying about regulations for providing quarterly earnings. Privacy means keeping secrets about sources of profit from the competition.

Over 99% of all companies in the US are privately held (and the percentage is rising because the number of companies on US stock exchanges has dropped by 75% in 20 years.) Of course, private companies tend to be smaller, and more secretive, but from what I can determine, altogether they make up a similar amount of profit as the sum total of all public corporations. So they are as important to the economy as pubic companies.

bestkeptsecret said:

They should get Don McLean to write the title song!

Or they could use his original song and retitle the show "Ms. American Pie." A little digital audio editor editing could probably fix the original 1970 song and convert it as such. It could become a new official release of Don McLean. In that case, the title "Mrs. American Pie" is just Apple's working title, in order to keep this secret.

The honorific "Ms" (meaning what it does today) predates Shakespeare! (I didn't know that until today.) There were a few attempts in the last 400 years to apply it more regularly, but it wasn't until Gloria Steinem used it in 1972 for the title of her magazine that the word became quite popular. In 1976, the superhero "Ms. Marvel" was created. A little later, in 1984, the term won some support of conservatives because of the case of Geraldine Ferraro.

But the year is 2022 (50 years after Steinem's magazine) and there still isn't a consensus of whether to use it or not. There are three positions:

1. Use it by default (e.g., Judith Martin, aka Miss Manners,)
2. Don't use it (e.g., The Queen's English Society,) and
3. Use it if the person being spoken of wants it used (e.g., The New York Times.)

If Apple and Don McLean take my advice in my first paragraph, it could be a seminal moment in the history of "Ms." (No pun intended there.)

This puzzle looks interesting, but they made a mistake. The device doesn't really have to twist at all. It just needs to be able to detect pressure from the hands to know what the user is trying to twist, and then change the colour of the sides to show the result of that twist. Hence, no moving parts. Hence, half the price. Hence, more buyers.

mjtomlin said:

22july2013 said:

mjtomlin said:

Agree with both comments above…
I also think Apple could start lowering their fees, especially for subscription services. 

Thanks, but don't you agree that Apple's $0 charge for free apps needs to be subsidized by the charge for the bigger companies?

Apple charges all developers $99 a year to distribute their apps in the App Store, regardless of price. If a developer wants to make money by selling that app, then Apple should be able to charge a fee for each transaction made. Apple is completely entitled to determined what that fee is as long as the developer is aware of those fees when joining the developer program.

Believing that doesn’t preclude me from thinking Apple might be better off if they lowered those fees as an option to get rid of all these antitrust accusations.

I notice you ignored my question, which was whether Apple can "subsidize" its services for its developers of free apps (eg, iCloud services) using the 15% to 30% fees that come from the non-free apps. I read your post three times and I couldn't find the answer. Once again you talk about what Apple should be doing (you said, "Apple might be better off if...", and you said "Apple could start lowering its fees") but that's missing the point of why Apple has to do anything other than what it wants to do. Why don't you want Apple to have the right to make a bad business decision? Why do you deny Apple any freedom? Who should be the individuals that get to tell Apple what they can do?

Apple has the right, in my opinion, (and so does Google) to conduct business the way it wants, even if it's not optimal for your purposes or for anyone's purposes. Some people seem to think that companies shouldn't have the same freedoms that individuals do. If Apple doesn't want to have any app stores on iOS, they shouldn't be forced. You have lots of other choices you can make when you buy a smartphone.