linuxplatform

Beats said:

ALL developers should be treated equally.

People here like to talk about "capitalism" only if it means Apple gets screwed. I would have said "fu** off" if they didn't wanna join my platform and double down on TV+.

dutchlord said:

Troubles ahead for Cook

What's the problem? Apple should be able to do whatever they want with THEIR store! People are just mad Apple is making money from their hard earned work.

1. "People here like to talk about "capitalism" only if it means Apple gets screwed." Not even close to being true. 85% of the commenters here agree with everything Apple does. A big chunk of those have an irrational seething hatred against anyone and everyone who can be construed as a competitor or looks out for their own interests instead of kowtowing to Apple's every demand no matter how unreasonable or hypocritical such as Apple's various creative ways to try to wiggle around issues with other companies' IP when they enforce their own IP against everyone else with an ironclad fist.

2. "if they didn't wanna join my platform and double down on TV+." Which did not exist at the time. In fact at that time Apple hadn't made a final decision on launching TV+ at all. It was one of the reasons why TV+ launched with so little content. (There were others but recounting that winding road would be very long and not relevant to the main discussion.)

3. "Apple should be able to do whatever they want with THEIR store!" No, that is very illegal. Granted, I know what you likely meant but that is still illegal.

4. "People are just mad Apple is making money from their hard earned work."  Hmmm ... even were that true, no more - and no different - from the sound and fury that you direct at each and every Apple competitor, in many cases for doing the very same things that Apple does all the time (for example, appropriating ideas from competitors). But no. This is what is actually going on.

A) Developers - most of them independent/small/struggling - are looking for more ways to make money on the iOS and iPadOS platforms that are critical for their survival. Many of them find the callousness of Apple advocates to their plight - when it was said developers' clear preference for iOS over Android and Windows Mobile that gave Apple such a massive advantage over the other platforms (one that Google was only able to barely and eventually overcome with massive market share and Microsoft couldn't overcome at all even after buying Nokia) to be appalling. From their perspective, Apple used them to go from being a moderate-sized tech company to the most profitable company in US (and one of the most profitable ones in global) history in less than 10 years, in the process created a new tech landscape dominated by them where there are no real alternatives (this longtime Apple developer points out that Tim Cook's claim that prior to the app store buying CDs from retail stores was the primary way to distribute software is 100% false and he is totally right as the App Store wasn't even the first widely used app store!) and now couldn't be bothered with them now that they aren't needed anymore because of their dominant revenue position. His argument is that the current way that Apple runs the app store heavily favors the large companies and big players. Before you say "of course that is the way it should be" ... remember that it was the trendy apps from smaller independent developers that made the iPhone and iPad "water cooler conversation cool" and gave it the key edge that it needed over Microsoft and Google to begin with. Developers would brag about how great it was not having to make software for Windows anymore and how they would never port their apps to Android no matter how much money it cost them because they hated Android and the people who bought their devices. Now the very people - as a class/group, not individuals - who played a huge role in the iPhone/iPad's rise to begin with by making them the cool and hip option to Microsoft's squareness and Android's seediness - are having real problems that there are no answers for.

The political mood on the left is that tech companies have gotten too big, powerful and profitable. The problem is that tech companies have for the most part studied antitrust law i.e the mistakes of the likes of Standard Oil, AT&T and Microsoft and come up with ways to get so massive and powerful without breaking existing antitrust laws. So right now the search is on for ways to justify "breaking up big tech" so they can pass laws down the line to get it done. Truthfully, their real target isn't Apple. Their real targets are A) Facebook and Google because they blame them for how the 2016 election turned out, reasoning that the answer is to make sure that no single company has that type of power in the first place and Amazon because of their effect on unions. However, were they to target those 3 while leaving the biggest tech company in the world totally exempt would make them look transparent. So the whole argument against Apple was "made up" as an attempt to avoid accusations of playing favorites. (Note that pretty much none of the rants against "big tech" that you see in the lefty online sites mention Apple. The reason is that those rants are being written on MacBook Airs and iPad Pros. None of them use Android or ChromeOS products, all the "cool kids" like them left Facebook ages ago and they believe that everyone left on Facebook are 50 year old right wingers from Texas and Kansas in their opinion, and Amazon just replaced Wal-Mart as the preferred target of the labor movement.) And note that Microsoft - more profitable than influential than Google actually is, a much bigger market share than Apple has and is best positioned to take advantage of any action against Google or Amazon - isn't being mentioned at all! So seriously, if there is a way to just "get Google and Facebook" because Hillary Clinton lost and "get Amazon" on behalf of unions everyone would be fine with that. Apple is not the real target. These people love Apple, their culture and especially their products. It is just that they had to throw in Apple too because if they hadn't that would have been Google/Amazon/Facebook's first line of defense ... "what about Apple they are bigger than all of us combined!?!?"

Because of this all Apple has to do is to avoid playing into their critics' hands. Unfortunately that is precisely of what they are doing right now, which is why even a number of sites that are just as pro-Apple as this one state that Apple needs to change their argument and strategy and fast.

I will defend Apple here.

App A has some bad features - poor privacy and security - but it performs a useful service that doesn't exist otherwise - parental controls - so we will ignore the bad features in service of the greater good.

App B was made by us and contains the useful service - parental controls - while eliminating the bad features - privacy and security.

While App B does not exist then allowing App A to exist is the lesser of two evils. But when App B exists why put up with App A anymore? While it may have been to reduce competition IMHO one doesn't have to be an Apple fan to come to the conclusion that it was a legitimate decision based on Apple's standards. If it is Google - who for years promoted lack of security and privacy as a feature before finally relenting - stating "yeah we killed App A right after App B came out in the interests of our customers' privacy and security" then hammer them. But Apple legitimately has "plausible deniability" here.

Now the Random House app on the other hand ...

Huh? There have been apps that will allow you to do this with Android devices available for years. I presumed that this functionality already existed in iOS/iPadOS via third party apps also.

Beats said:

Looks like a generic Apple ad.

Hoping the AirBuds look less like AirPods.

Groan. Oh for pete's sake. That 2010 "rounded corners" thing was legit but since then ...
Apple copied Samsung's phablet form factor (after mocking it).
Apple copied Samsung's OLED screens (after mocking it).
Apple copied Samsung's curved screens (after mocking them).
Apple copied Samsung's multi-tasking and went from 2 to 6 cores and increased RAM to support it (after calling it bad gimmicky design).
Apple copied Samsung's Galaxy Note Pro's huge (at the time) screen, multi-tasking and stylus/2-in-1 accessory support with the iPad Pro (after mocking all of it)
AirPods? Samsung was their first with the Gear IconX (renamed Galaxy Buds)
Apple Watch? Samsung was there first with a fitness-focused device with a "rounded square" OLED screen and LTE support (again all initially mocked, and Samsung's refreshes have all served to make their line look less like the Apple Watch).
Apple Pay? Google Wallet was on Samsung phones years prior, and Samsung Pay's solution is actually superior because thanks to MST support it can be used at the many checkouts with credit card readers but no NFC tap-and-pay
Apple Card? Before you call Samsung an Apple copycat here remember both Google and PayPal had their versions years prior
For the (soon) future: all the years of bashing TouchWiz/One UI now look ridiculous with iOS 14, doesn't it? And an in-screen fingerprint reader? That too just like wireless charging (remember AirPower, their abandoned attempt to improve on the tech used in Samsung phones, called "true wireless charging")? 

Meanwhile, lots of Apple's innovations since then have been met with a shrug by Samsung. Apple TV competitor? Nope. Homepod competitor? Nope. HomeKit competitor? Actually Samsung had their IoT platform in place years earler. So ... Force Touch? Nope. (Smart move ... Apple doesn't even talk about it much anymore.) FaceID? Nah ... they let Google humiliate themselves trying to emulate a feature that not a single Android consumer wanted anyway and tons of Apple consumers don't even use. So that leaves ... the headphone jack as Samsung's most significant imitation of Apple in years. Of course, Apple fans may feel a bit salty over Samsung's commercials mocking Apple for dropping the headphone jack for years only to (without fanfare or apology) silently adopt the feature (or lack thereof). But considering that Apple device owners have been benefiting so much from features first introduced and popularized by Samsung since 2013, they should call it even.

And even more so, they should stop accusing Samsung of copying. It isn't true. Instead, the contrary is true. Not just Apple merely getting their version of the same product to market a bit after Samsung, which was the case with the AirPods which launched a few years later with a significantly different form factor (less convincing with the Apple Watch, which launched nearly 2 years later and was very similar to the path that Samsung struck out on after it was clear that Android Wear would fail). But Apple copying a whole batch of features, form factors and design languages that they trashed previously but only for "their" products to far more closely resemble Samsung's than what Apple originally released.

The best part: Samsung is the only Android OEM that Apple does this with/to. Apple never lifted a single thing from Nexus/Pixel. Not a lick from (poor) HTC (who seems to be making phones again, though only availabile in a few countries). Not a bit from LG. Motorola? Sony? Huawei? Xiaomi? OnePlus? Nah. Even things that those companies actually do first, Apple only picks them up after they have been in a Samsung Galaxy phone for a couple of years first. Example: some Android phones have had in-screen ultrasonic fingerprint scanners as far back as 2015, but Samsung putting them in the Galaxy S/Note 10 devices last year made them good enough for pilfering. It is so blatantly obvious yet no one talks about it! Especially not Apple fans in the tech media. Oh wait, everyone in the tech media is an Apple fan! Including a bunch of writers on Android sites. (Pretty much all the alleged Pixel fans are. Not that Pixels are bad - then again considering several class action lawsuits on hardware and software issues involving Pixels maybe they actually are bad! -  but rather Nokia, OnePlus, Huawei and even Motorola are making devices that are far more compelling to people who like Android phones, which is why they all sell far more of them than Google does Pixels despite most of them spending a fraction of what Google wastes advertising Pixels. The only reason they like Pixel so much is because Google ridiculously and blatantly attempts to emulate Apple with them ... without realizing that anyone who wants an iPhone can and simply should just buy one and that people who buy any Android phone over $350 does so because they don't want an iPhone.)

So yeah. Samsung copying Apple was like the early Obama era news. Which in a few weeks - about 100 days to the election right? - may well be two whole presidents ago.

1. The people who back Apple's position refuse to acknowledge the ability to install third party apps and app stores on macOS.
2. The people who back Apple's position refuse to acknowledge that Apple has a monopoly over the ability to install apps on iPhone and iPad hardware that they would never countenance were the shoe on the other foot.

Example: suppose Microsoft had blocked iTunes back in the day because they didn't want competition for its Zune Player. You folks would have screamed bloody murder.
Example 2: suppose Google had blocked Apple Music and the "switch your Android to iPhone" app for obvious reasons (the way that Apple bans every single app that has Android in the name forcing Google to rename several of their apps from Android to Google). Again, you folks would scream bloody murder.

Also, for the person who claims that Apple is so successful because of its security/privacy/quality control that comes from its monopoly on apps on its mobile hardware: please note that Google Play, the Amazon AppStore, the Samsung AppStore, Tencent, Xiaomi, 360 Mobile, Baidu and Huawei (the latter 5 being the top app stores in China) are very successful to the tune of billions of revenue a year. Claiming otherwise requires the bizarre "it is only successful if it is #1" standard that no Apple fan applies to any other product as Apple is most certainly not #1 - or even close - in PCs, speakers, headphones, TV boxes, streaming networks or cloud services. The whole "Apple dominates the premium smartphone market because of its security" ... looks at it backwards. Instead, Android is able to support no less than 10 profitable app stores precisely because you can get a $200 (or less) Android phone and install most of the apps that are available on the far more expensive iPhone. That is why the antitrust actions against Google over Android look totally different than the ones against Apple over iOS. With Android, there is a thriving competitive marketplace over Android apps. (Granted most of the action is in Europe and Asia, but even in America there is competition between Google and Amazon.) The EU lawsuits over Google's only willing to provide certain apps to Google Android devices was because lots of entities wanted to be able to install competing app stores but still have access to YouTube. So this is one situation where Apple fanboy rhetoric is absolutely in opposition to objective market reality. Developers do make money off third party app stores on Android, especially overseas. Those folks want that same opportunity on iOS.    

The truth: Apple maintains their monopoly on software on iPhones, iPads, Apple TV and Apple Watch because they can get away with it. There are plenty of security and privacy issues that result from enabling third party applications on macOS. Apple allows them anyway because they have to. If they didn't allow third party apps on Macs then Macs would be as big a commercial failure as was Windows 10S (which only allowed Microsoft Store applications to be installed). There were rumours that Apple was going to lock down Macs to their App Store down the line once Apple Silicon matured, but Apple knows that were they to do so, developers and other professionals who need third party software - especially Linux tools installed using brew - would abandon the platform like the plague. Those users never needed Final Cut Pro X and other first party Apple software to begin with, find Office 365/Google Docs/LibreOffice "good enough" and would switch to Linux full time. 

So in an actual monopoly trial or proceeding, Apple would be asked why iPhones are so locked down but Macs aren't and they would have no suitable explanation because everyone knows that the only difference is market conditions. 

That being said I hope Apple somehow wins this trial and is able to retain their monopoly. I was a longtime Windows guy who migrated to Android, ChromeOS and Linux because those platforms better fit my needs. (I use macOS, true, but in the same way that I would were I running Ubuntu. Prior to switching to macOS, I was replacing Windows with Ubuntu on my machines anyway.) For this reason, I support users - and companies especially startups and small ones - having as much choice as possible that allows them to have quality options to meet their needs and wants as cheaply as possible. So I want Apple to be able to continue to make and sell devices that they lock down and monopolize for the benefit of consumers and businesses who need it and want it for whatever purpose they need and want it. People who don't want Apple's locked down mobile ecosystem have other choices (which despite what lots of Apple fans think is a very good thing). It should stay that way. 

But if Apple wins, it won't be based on the totally bogus nonsense that they peddle that is only based on the U.S. market anyway, and that Apple fanboys regurgitate without any critical thinking or real knowledge of what the non-Apple tech landscape (again especially outside North America) looks like. Apple needs to abandon their current line of defense - which will fail - and come up with one that will work. I don't know, maybe they need to come out with two classes of device. One class that retains its current locked down state. Another class that allows third party app stores for those who want it. They could even charge more for the "Open iOS" devices and claim that the reason for the surcharge is because of the increased expense of providing privacy and security on an open platform (and they could point to Google and Microsoft as exhibits A. and B.). Then when absolutely positively no one buys the Open iOS devices, Apple can shut the program down (just as Google shut down their "Google Play Edition" program for third party devices with pure Google Android loaded with no third party or carrier skins or apps because no one wanted them) and let the lack of user and enterprise interest in the types of devices that Sweeney wants be their best defense against monopoly charges. But if the more expensive Open iOS devices actually sell? Even better. More money for Apple ... and one less reason to buy a Samsung Galaxy S instead of an iPhone.