thrang

I don't care how forward thinking one believes they are, but this is laughably stupid....

StrangeDays said:

thrang said:

What they need to fix is the bug when setting an Hompod as a Default Speaker for an Apple TV - when "paired" this way, the HomePod "Hey Siri" is, while not completely disabled, largely useless (you cannot "Hey Sir" requests for Music and Podcast playbacks, though oddly it will still give you the weather or control Home devices)

While I understand there may be a few scenarios where playback control priority can be a little challenging to assume programmatically, an easy scenario to fix is to allow HomePod Siri full functionality if the associated Apple TV is asleep. Right now, if the AppleTV is asleep and I ask that HomePod to play something, you simply get a "Sorry, I'm having a problem connecting to Apple Music " or something like that.

If I start playback on another HomePod, and they ask it to also play on the problem child, it works. Same for initiating on the phone - 

So the control logic is a bit half-assed right now...

I’ve noticed odd things like this before (I use my HP pair as default speakers for ATV). I’ve submitted bugs...it would be nice if they can get it sorted out. 

I got a senior Apple support specialist last week on the phone, who acknowledges this is as designed, though engineers are working on improvement (he agreed it is poor implementation).

Apparently the issue arose as part of the solution in developing the Home Theater Audio option in ATV for system-wide output. So it appears Apple "knows" it's an issue, but aren't publicly acknowledging it.

If you happen to have a stereo HomePod pair set as default to an Apple TV, Siri will work - this is because only one of the two speakers is "captured" by the ATV in Default Output mode - the second speaker receives the other channel ATV audio via a wireless connection between the two Homepods. Thus, the "non-captured" speaker in the pair is free to listen to Siri commands in the room, will will play back requests in stereo (I have a stereo pair in another room, and discovered this by chance, and it was later confirmed by Apple)

There are inconsistencies in logic and behavior in several ways as it currently stands. Its definitely improved over the past year or so, but not allowing Siri playback to a HomePod speaker paired with a ATV (especially when not playing content or asleep), is a very weird miss.

A business is supposed to succeed, often to the detriment of others who fail to compete. Are we supposed to now stifle the winners because they succeeded? All these companies were pimples on the ass of a mosquito at their start, and, in the case of Apple, faced very real moments of complete failure more than once. But now, look at one they have done. It should be a textbook example in business schools.

What brain could envision an Apple "broken up"? How? And why? The OS and HW are so well integrated, its EXACTLY one of the reasons they are so successful. Their semi-walled garden ecosystem is EXACTLY what so many of their customer appreciate and want. The security of such an approach REQUIRES certain controls and limitations, and there is no benefit for governments to tell an innovative technology company to "open up". IT'S THEIR BUSINESS. IT WORKS. LOOK AT THE SUCCESS AND DESIRES OF THE CUSTOMER BASE. If it didn't work, people would not gravitate to it. And I'm no fan of Google or Facebook, but if people want to use them with full knowledge and consent as to the data collection and tracking they impose, that's their choice. 

Apple is one of the largest companies in the world, but generally holds a minority market position in most of the segments they operate in. They just happen to do extremely well in the highest margin segments of those markets.

If someone breaks the law, Apple or anyone else, they should of course be investigated and be held accountable if guilty. But you can't artificially create competition. In the mobile space, what happened to Nokia? What happened to Blackberry? What happened even to Microsoft? They made poor choices or didn't innovate in a timely fashion, and lost. That's their fault.

davgreg said:

I will believe Apple is stupid enough to dilute the brand by selling cars when I see it.

Of course they have already diluted the brand with streaming content.

flydog said:

jdw said:

Sorry, but when you are in business, you seek to limit your competition.  Label it Anti-trust or Anti-competitive if you like, but it's only reasonable to buy Instagram as a matter of good business.  And what may be a near Monopoly within the USA is most assuredly not in China, which is a massive country everyone needs to ponder.  China gains when America loses.  And America is not gaining by breaking up its big tech firms.  What you see in the news on this topic is merely a game of envy and revenge and the illusion of "protecting the little guy and increasing competition for the good of all consumers."

It's clear that you have zero understanding of even the fundamental concepts of antitrust law.

FaceBook is not being sued because it tried to limit competition.  FaceBook is being sued because it used illegal means to limit competion, and harmed consumers as a result. 

I can't find any concrete details of "illegal means" so far.

I'm no fan of Facebook, don't have an account, and think the big issue of user data and the opaque nature of how that's manipulated and sold is the real issue that should be addressed.

If there is evidence that Facebook "forced" otherwise independent companies to sell to them, or illegally harmed them in some other way, that's one thing. But most start-ups WANT to be noticed and bought out. That's their payday, their lifelong goal. It doesn't make any sense that the NY AG was warbling about Facebook "buying up" the competition... (and the big acquisitions were government approved as Facebook points out).

So would the government propose PREVENTING small companies from selling themselves to larger companies in the name of some greater good? Better they go out of business? Should companies not offer people more money to jump ship and join them (poach, to use a negative phrase). Thus, should be telling individuals your income potential will be limited for some greater good?

I'm dubious until we see a lot more evidence presented.