colinng

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has warned Apple and other tech companies that they need to exercise care when dealing with governments over important issues, such as the San Bernardino fight between Apple and the FBI over a locked iPhone, suggesting the firms may be inviting intervention for overtly arrogant actions...

Doing the right thing for the right reason, regardless of how unpopular it is, is not arrogant. Talking to the press and performing libel against someone who is doing what is just, I think, is the very arrogant. 

As part of the same interview, Bill Gates also mused on how the progress of technology is empowering smaller groups of people to cause harm to others. Suggesting the potential for such groups to gain access to nuclear weapons and to cause biological terror and cyber attacks, Gates notes it is a good thing for children to access genetic technology in a laboratory, "unless a few people decide to make human-transmissible smallpox and spread that into the world."

Nice of him to talk about the imagined harm - and conveniently forgetting to mention all the real harm that he did against the American populace. Forgetting the monopoly abuse are we? The strategic embrace-and-extinguish business practice of acquiring of competitors and shutting them down? Spreading all that FUD? 

Do you think donating to a charity undoes all that harm? The mafia probably donate to charities too. 

Bill got to where he is by doing what is best for himself; he is considered smart because he had a slightly longer timeline in mind than his competitors. It would not surprise me if the three letter agencies leaned on him a bit. 

In his view, the three letter agencies hold tremendous (unchecked) power and we should all submit to them.

Before anyone talks about how encryption is only used by criminals, paedophiles, and so forth, please remember this debate was over long ago in 1994, but the powers at be keep wanting the people to surrender their privacy: 

http://www.businessinsider.com/phil-zimmermann-pgp-essay-2016-2

There is a saying, “a policeman’s job is easy only in a police state.” 

Oh this Apple page mentions how some independent filmmakers shoot with iPhone: 

https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2018/01/emerging-la-filmmakers-create-short-films-with-small-budgets-and-big-ideas/

Includes such tidbits as:

Fortunately, their metadata was automatically organized after being imported straight into Final Cut Pro X from Shot Notes X and Lumberjack, along with the secondary source audio via Sync-N-Link X, which spared days of hand-syncing.

gmgravytrain said:

But even with Google taking those losses they're again about to overtake Apple in overall value. At least Google and the other major tech companies keep trying to be competitors to Apple.

Apple (and I would say most tech companies) succeed when they do a good job, which requires focus. Buying a search company (when you’re not competing in search) is the opposite of focus. You’re buying culture mismatch and other headaches. 

Pixar made tons of money, Apple made tons of money, why didn’t Steve merge them? Because it would have been a terrible idea. Yes Apple planned to go toward Media (the iTunes Store was made so iPod owners would have a good market to buy songs, and simple pricing of $0.99 per track - greedy record execs forced the change to $1.29 vs $0.69 to make sure all their popular tracks earned them 30% more and give you this fake feeling that you had any choice.) 

This is why Apple puts it out on record, in almost every press release, that, Apple, from time to time, makes acquisitions of small tech companies that are part of their vertical focus. Small because then the good culture of the larger organization predominates. In their focus because, hey, if you make smartphones, then cameras, TouchID, FaceID, flash controllers - are integral to your product. There’s no drop down menu to change your flash controller like there is  to change your search provider. 

It is not not about money (why not invest in BitCoin too?) but rather about finding a sensible path, and taking the right kinds of risk. Risk where all the headache and worry grow your ability to execute. 

Worrying how or whether FaceID will work —> good headache for Apple. Worrying whether government policy in Korea will change your BitCoin valuation —> distraction. Worrying about search engines —> distraction. 

tmay said:

Make the French a special version that's bigger, heavier, and yeah, more power, and see how it sells compared to existing designs. People prefer thin and light for the most part. 

If this is just an investigation, let it be. 

But if Halte l’Obsolescence Programme gets a judicial ruling, be glad that vengeful people don’t run Apple. 

It’s awfully tempting to put in a France-only iOS update that just puts everything back, and a dialog that says, “due to a lawsuit launched by
Halte l’Obsolescence Programme to prevent us from improving power management on iPhones with worn-out batteries, your phone is more likely to crash when the battery is cold or below 75% charge. Click this link to lodge a complaint against the commission. If we get this lawsuit reversed we will reintroduce the improved power management. You can also prevent the crashes by having your battery replaced at an Apple store or an Apple authorized repair centre.” 

Idiots.