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Does it come with a Prodigy or AOL disc?

There's a HuffPost (formerly AOL News) app, and Prodigy is on iTunes. Is that close enough?

Does it come with a Prodigy or AOL disc?

There's a HuffPost (formerly AOL News) app, and Prodigy is on iTunes. Is that close enough?

I was going to write an answer assuming you were honestly asking,

I am honestly asking, if only I could get an honest response... judging by how much I have to correct here I'm not sure this is one. Note I will not sink to your Cleveland claim you are paid by Google to post negative and misleading Apple content.

The bottom line is that Apple absolutely abuses their control of the App Store to punish third parties trying to compete with them. Maps is a simple example

Not very simple, since Apple heavily promotes other third party apps - including mapping apps. In the Tokyo City apps guide in the App Store for example, they promote a number of non-Apple transit and mapping apps even though you could use the built in Maps.app to do much the same thing.

anywhere iOS detects an address, that address will always open in Apple Maps

From Apple apps yes, however third parties can (and do) give you a choice which mapping app to open up directions for - and you can also easily copy an address from an app like Contacts which pastes cleanly into Google Maps for searching. Again, not so clear...

I have an app called CardHop to manage contacts, it lets you specify if address should open in Apple Maps, Google Maps, Waze, City Mapper, etc. It has as full access to contact data as the built in Apple App. So if not opening an address in Google Maps is an issue to you, move away from Apple apps presenting address links.

For example, if you plug your phone into a car equipped with CarPlay and turn the car's audio on, this will always launch Apple Music,

Maybe that happens with CarPlay (I cannot verify) but my experience with cars is that plugging the phone in via USB with a third party app playing music continues to play that music.

Again, why is it a surprise if you use Apple applications they would favor using things like Apple Music? If that is an issue move to other apps, no penalty to do so.

There are various ways that Apple hooks their apps into iOS that third parties simply cannot do. As an example, they recently released a "Shortcuts" app that allows you to automate various tasks in iOS. However, this only works on Apple apps and a very limited selection of third party "partners."

  From iOS 12 ANY app has been able to add shortcut support, It relies on Siri Shortcut support which any app can add.

From the link:

"Your shortcuts will be available in the new Shortcuts app"

SiriKit is also heavily limited. You can't use SiriKit to replace Apple's default services.

It is limited, though not "heavily", they are just slowly rolling out what they call "intents" as to the kinds of things it can support. Note in that link it says a SiriKit intent for CarPlay can change the car's audio source, for example...

even if you don't use Apple as the payment processor, you're required to send them 30% of all revenue.

What an utter load of crap, you are claiming Amazon sends 30% of purchases made in my Amazon app to Apple? If you don't purchase it through an Apple app, you owe Apple nothing. Your claim is madness.

Apple, of course, doesn't have to pay the Apple Tax, because they would only be paying themselves.

What iOS apps does Apple charge for again? I'm waiting... oh that's right, the answer is zero. So they have only expense, but no revenue, from iOS apps (Apple does have some expensive pro apps on the Mac).

It would be great to see the EU slap Apple down on this

You don't seem to have read the summary correctly about who is investigating, it would appear to be just the Dutch government.

I was going to write an answer assuming you were honestly asking,

I am honestly asking, if only I could get an honest response... judging by how much I have to correct here I'm not sure this is one. Note I will not sink to your Cleveland claim you are paid by Google to post negative and misleading Apple content.

The bottom line is that Apple absolutely abuses their control of the App Store to punish third parties trying to compete with them. Maps is a simple example

Not very simple, since Apple heavily promotes other third party apps - including mapping apps. In the Tokyo City apps guide in the App Store for example, they promote a number of non-Apple transit and mapping apps even though you could use the built in Maps.app to do much the same thing.

anywhere iOS detects an address, that address will always open in Apple Maps

From Apple apps yes, however third parties can (and do) give you a choice which mapping app to open up directions for - and you can also easily copy an address from an app like Contacts which pastes cleanly into Google Maps for searching. Again, not so clear...

I have an app called CardHop to manage contacts, it lets you specify if address should open in Apple Maps, Google Maps, Waze, City Mapper, etc. It has as full access to contact data as the built in Apple App. So if not opening an address in Google Maps is an issue to you, move away from Apple apps presenting address links.

For example, if you plug your phone into a car equipped with CarPlay and turn the car's audio on, this will always launch Apple Music,

Maybe that happens with CarPlay (I cannot verify) but my experience with cars is that plugging the phone in via USB with a third party app playing music continues to play that music.

Again, why is it a surprise if you use Apple applications they would favor using things like Apple Music? If that is an issue move to other apps, no penalty to do so.

There are various ways that Apple hooks their apps into iOS that third parties simply cannot do. As an example, they recently released a "Shortcuts" app that allows you to automate various tasks in iOS. However, this only works on Apple apps and a very limited selection of third party "partners."

  From iOS 12 ANY app has been able to add shortcut support, It relies on Siri Shortcut support which any app can add.

From the link:

"Your shortcuts will be available in the new Shortcuts app"

SiriKit is also heavily limited. You can't use SiriKit to replace Apple's default services.

It is limited, though not "heavily", they are just slowly rolling out what they call "intents" as to the kinds of things it can support. Note in that link it says a SiriKit intent for CarPlay can change the car's audio source, for example...

even if you don't use Apple as the payment processor, you're required to send them 30% of all revenue.

What an utter load of crap, you are claiming Amazon sends 30% of purchases made in my Amazon app to Apple? If you don't purchase it through an Apple app, you owe Apple nothing. Your claim is madness.

Apple, of course, doesn't have to pay the Apple Tax, because they would only be paying themselves.

What iOS apps does Apple charge for again? I'm waiting... oh that's right, the answer is zero. So they have only expense, but no revenue, from iOS apps (Apple does have some expensive pro apps on the Mac).

It would be great to see the EU slap Apple down on this

You don't seem to have read the summary correctly about who is investigating, it would appear to be just the Dutch government.

That's only true where Apple likes it. Try writing an app that uses NFC, somehow Apple can but you can't.

That's not true any more, they actually opened that up with some recent version of iOS, either 11 or 12. There's now a CoreNFC library you can use to access the NFC chip.

Almost.

Except you can only use it to read a very strict subset of NFC data, and it's unidirectional communication, you can't transmit anything back.

You also can't use it for payment processing or use any workaround that would bypass the "read only" restriction, due to App Store requirements, so you can't for example use it to set up a WiFi connection to do actual transmission of data "out of band."

The 'I was just following orders' defense went out at Nuremberg.

Apple is a profits-first company just like Google. You can see this clearly as they won't withdraw from OIC nations that hang people for the crime of being gay. (Four stores in Brunei alone!) Not on the list of companies boycotting Brunei. Apples Investor Relations team would love to hear from you, Im sure.

... can they finally bring a sane, performant and usable audio API please? One that I can use directly from Java, without being forced into native code, please. Maybe they could look at this for some ideas.

It was. It was also a long time ago.

But well within the bounds of "never". I'd also suggest that, despite the slashdot delusion, that the iPhone was rather innovative. And how long before all credit cards start sporting the features of the Apple Card? (I included that last one to make sure that each slashdotter has a reason to "explain" why I'm an idiot fanboi.)

Yes, the Newton was innovative. It also didn't work very well (a co-worker had one back in the day) and was a commercial failure. Apple does better when they can put a shiny patina and world class marketing on someone else's idea. Once others established what a pad *should* do, and what people really wanted, Apple came back with the ipad and did quite well.

On the Apple card, I don't know, how long? According to this, it's not a card, it's an app that lives on your iphone and does things similar to google pay or samsung pay. In point of fact, it appear to be a rebranding of Apple Pay with a few new features. Of course, being Apple, there will be a portion of the population who have never owned anything but an iphone who will immediately jump to the conclusion that Apple invented the concept. And that's fine. It makes Slashdot entertaining.

And, although I have access to the latter two money apps, (got rid of my iphone 6 over a year ago, currently carrying a Samsung note 9) I have no interest in using them. A physical credit card never runs out of battery, and it doesn't need cell service.

OK, went through a maze of links and was finally able to find something that confirmed what you're saying.

Money quote:

The Apple TV app will be available on Samsung smart TVs beginning this spring and on Amazon Fire TV, LG, Roku, Sony and VIZIO platforms in the future.

I note that, other than Samsung (for obvious reasons) the list is in alphabetical order.

Odd that they're working with their fiercest rival in the mobile space right now and giving them an exclusive. Maybe they're mellowing a little.

Chromecast is missing but I really wish Google would stop pushing it anyway. But that's another discussion.

The APR is actually 13.24% to 24.24%

(Scroll down to very end and read fine print to see)

That seems about average to me, but I still think the other features are exciting and helpful enough they will get good traction.

Relax, sport. You can enable or disable the irregular rhythm detection, it 's your choice, your control.

But the thing is, I bought a *phone*. I did not buy a service, I did not buy a license.

Nope, definitely a license on that software.

They are selling a physical product and then deciding how you are allowed to use it.

No it is both hardware and software but go ahead, wipe the software off it and do what you wish, go install Linux on it or something.

If you tried that your app would be removed.

https://developer.apple.com/ap... Yes, really, here's the relevant line right here, you are required to use the Apple Payment unless you have an agreement to something else.

Yes.

And you can read about it in the very same report.

https://www.apple.com/supplier...

Well that is just great for everyone who started buying digital music after 2009. What about us old fogies?

At some point there was an option available to "upgrade" previously DRMed music to tracks without DRM, I think for an extra fee. One can also do some tricks with "iTunes match" to get higher bitrate, non-DRM versions of music from Apple. However, this only works for music that is in Apple's current catalogue - I think if your have DRM versions of music that Apple no longer sells, you can still re-download it, but it is still the old DRMed file.

Anyhow, here are some directions from Apple on how to upgrade tracks to "iTunes Plus" - https://support.apple.com/en-c...

Because the T2 chip blocks access to the internal SSD when the security level is set to off,

I thought you could disable secure boot on the Mac, which should let you install any OS you like on the internal SSD...

I fully admit I've not tried that though so it could be there's some other aspect to that I did not know about. But this article sure makes it look like that setting has the effect of letting you boot into Linux on a T2 Mac.

Macs do support 5k/60Hz, you are right that you use thunderbolt but only insofar as you need to get a thunderbolt3 to dual DisplayPort adaptor.

Since from that adaptor you can use DisplayPort, you can use any 5k monitor that has DisplayPort. Some may require both DisplayPort cables to be connected (see first link I posted as it talks a little about that).

The site explains that Lightning port is not going anywhere and Apple is resistant to changing the included accessories to maintain production costs.

Just remember Apple is claiming to be eco-friendly while producing hundreds of millions of unnecessary, proprietary, and redundant connectors instead of using an industry standard USB-C cable that would accomplish exactly the same purpose AND waste less in the process. Not to mention that USB-C can transfer data faster (480Mbps vs 10Gbps), transfer more power (12W vs 100W), be double ended, and work with other devices.

When Lightning was introduced it was an improvement over the truly awful microUSB connectors. USB-C has eliminated any reason for Lightning to continue to exist other than profit seeking and vendor lock in.

If you have access to the Apple account, you can remote wipe the phone, which removes the pin. However you still have to log into the device with the Apple account ("Activation Lock"), which as I indicated had been taken over by the thief.
https://support.apple.com/kb/P...

Try this:

LibreOffice
Apache OpenOffice
Softmaker FreeOffice
WPS Office
(they have a whole office suite, not just the word processor)
Abiword
SoftMaker Office
(again, they have a whole suite, not just the word processor)
Pages (for Mac)
(Apple does other office apps, too, but they don't seem to
market a unified suite)
Atlantis Word Processor

I didn't realize that "regular people" couldn't file bug/security reports with Apple

You kind of can via the Feedback forms.

Though for something this serious going through bugreport was a better idea, who knows how long it would have taken to be noticed going through Feedback...

Isn't it a message to every enterprise everywhere that Apple are in total control of your platform and can disable your work without notice or warning, rendering any investment you made worthless?

"Without notice or warning"? They flagrantly disregarded the cardinal rule of the license they agreed to, which is spelled out in plain language in the subtitle, first paragraph, second paragraph, definitions, appropriate use section, etc. of the license. The license is even subtitled "for in-house, internal use applications". It really couldn't be any clearer. You can make pretty much anything you want for internal use, so long as it remains internal.

If I were a corporation looking to deploy an internal app, I'd be looking at non-apple options. Having your internal platform disabled could cripple smaller business to the point of threatening their viability.

Why? Is your hypothetical corporation breaking the cardinal rule too? The only people who need to be worried are those who haven't been using the license in good faith. So long as you're using the license as it was plainly intended to be used—to develop and use apps internally—you have nothing to fear, despite suggestions to the contrary.

By "pulled for any reason", you apparently mean "flagrantly disregarded the cardinal rule of the license, which is spelled out in plain language in the subtitle, first paragraph, second paragraph, definitions, appropriate use section, etc. of the license to which they agreed". The license Facebook agreed to is subtitled "for in-house, internal use applications". It really couldn't be any clearer. You can make apps for internal use, so long as they remain internal.

I'd be freaking out if my enterprise app was based in i devices right now.

Why? Are you breaking the cardinal rule of the license as well? Apple continues to let companies make internal apps to do anything those companies feel like, so long as those apps remain internal. Facebook broke the cardinal rule, so their certificate was revoked. No one using the license in good faith is in any sort of danger here.

Apple didn't ban Facebook's app because it was spying on users or because it was offensive. Apple banned Facebook's app because it was being used by end users. Except in some VERY narrow cases that don't apply here, end users are expressly forbidden from using apps licensed under the terms of the Apple Developer Enterprise License Agreement—which is appropriately subtitled "(for in-house, internal use applications)"—that Facebook agreed to.

Companies are welcome to make anything they want for internal purposes, be it an app for inventory management, an app to order food from the in-house cafeteria, or an app to make coordinating human sacrifices to Satan easier, so long as the app remains internal. Facebook broke that cardinal rule.

Replying to myself since a lot of people seem to be under the woefully incorrect impression that Apple's license terms are in some way vague about this stuff. They aren't. Not at all. Facebook agreed to the Apple Developer Enterprise License Agreement, which—I can't make this stuff up—is actually subtitled "(for in-house, internal use applications)". I'm not even kidding. And it appears it was last updated in October, well before this scandal made the news.

Emphasis is mine unless otherwise noted.

The Purpose section, right at the top of the document, starts with:

Your company [...] would like to use the Apple Software (as defined below) to develop one or more Internal Use Applications (as defined below) for Apple-branded products[...] and to deploy these Applications only for internal use within Your company [...]

In the very next paragraph is this note:

Note: This Program is for internal use, custom applications that are developed by You for Your specific business purposes and only for use by Your employees and, in limited cases, by certain other parties as set forth herein.

So how do they define "Internal Use Application"? Like this:

“Internal Use Application” means a software program [...] that is developed by You on a custom basis for Your own business purposes (e.g., an inventory app specific to Your business) [...] and solely for internal use by Your Employees or Permitted Users, or as otherwise expressly permitted in Section 2.1(f). Except as otherwise expressly permitted herein, specifically excluded from Internal Use Applications are any programs or applications that may be used, distributed, or otherwise made available to other companies, contractors [...], distributors, vendors, resellers, end-users or members of the general public.

So, basically, you can't distribute your apps outside your company. But just in case someone thinks they're being sly with mention of "Permitted Users" and "Section 2.1(f)":

“Permitted Users” means employees and contractors of Your Permitted Entity who have written and binding agreements with You or Your Permitted Entity to protect Your Internal Use Application from unauthorized use in accordance with the terms of this Agreement.

I.e. Not the sorts of people who were using the app in question. Not at all. And what about Section 2.1(f)? Section 2.1 lists out the comprehensive set of acceptable uses. They basically boil down to these:
- 2.1(a)(b)(c)(d)(g): Developers/testers working on the app are allowed to do typical developer/tester stuff for development/testing purposes
- 2.1(e): Your company's employees can install provisioning profiles to use the app for internal use only
- 2.1(f): Your customers can use the app, but only when they are "on [y]our physical premises" or under "the direct supervision and physical control of [y]our [e]mployees"

And then right after that section, they add:

Except as set forth in Section 2.1, You may not use, distribute or otherwise make Your Internal Use Applications available to Your Customers or to any third parties in any way

All of which is to say, Apple really couldn't get more explicit about the fact that this license is only for internal use only, which Facebook was grossly and flagrantly violating. The only way they couldn't have known better was if Facebook literally skipped the bolded subtitle of the document, the first paragraph, the second paragraph, all of the definitions of terms, and a section that was pointed to numerous times throughout the document that spells out appropriate uses.

Does Tim Cook actually monitor Twitter and look for posts with a #TIMCOOK tag and then read them?

Since anyone with an ounce of brain will realize the answer is a big fat NO, shouldn't it also be obvious that tagging a Twitter post with someone's name is completely worthless, and that if you wanna report a fucking bug, you should go to that company's bug reporting website and do it there? Apple has one, it took me all of 2 seconds to Google for it: https://bugreport.apple.com/

Actually it should be obvious to people by now that Twitter itself is completely worthless. Just let it die, please?

Well, maybe he should. It might be good for him to get his head out of his ass, I mean reality distortion field, and see what is actually going on with his products.

Especially since both the official Apple Support account and product security teams take longer than a week to respond... which basically is non-responsive on a bug of this magnitude.

Does Tim Cook actually monitor Twitter and look for posts with a #TIMCOOK tag and then read them?

Since anyone with an ounce of brain will realize the answer is a big fat NO, shouldn't it also be obvious that tagging a Twitter post with someone's name is completely worthless, and that if you wanna report a fucking bug, you should go to that company's bug reporting website and do it there? Apple has one, it took me all of 2 seconds to Google for it: https://bugreport.apple.com/

Actually it should be obvious to people by now that Twitter itself is completely worthless. Just let it die, please?

Apple already has many, many people working closely with China as far as suppliers of everything goes. They already have a shipping pipeline so I seriously doubt for Apple it's going to take 6-14 weeks to get parts... I'm sure they would of course have some buffer of supplies, but Apple can more than afford to build up a base of supply on hand.

I'm not just pulling that figure out of my ass. Yes it REALLY does take that sort of lead time after receipt of order in a lot of cases. Even for Apple. Yes Apple can do some things to expedite but ultimately it takes time (typically 4-8 weeks) to make product for a spot buy and the product is going to get put on a boat and it takes 3-5 weeks for a boat to get from China to the US minimum. No they aren't going to put the parts on a plane unless they absolutely have to because that costs FAR more per part. Products don't get made instantly so it takes another few weeks to actually make the product even if they are able to start immediately upon receipt of the order (rare). Even if Apple places a blanket order, that just let's the company plan production but it still takes time to make it and it still takes time to ship it.

Let me give you an example from my company. We build a wire harness that has plastic connectors on each end. The connector parts are made in China and then shipped to Mexico for final assembly. Then they are shipped to a US distributor and then on to us. We order them 50,000 pieces at a time under a General Motors pricing contract. The company making them is a huge multinational, the distributor is a huge company, and the ultimate customer is GM so we're not talking about dealing with sweatshops here. Lead time is a non-negotiable 14 weeks after receipt of order for what really is a rather simple and standard part. Even GM could not accelerate this.

We get the connectors for about $0.35 each - if you were to buy one yourself through distribution (think Digikey or Mouser) it would cost you over $2.00 each. And if they were out of stock it would take them... 14 weeks to get more. Why? Because the company that makes them has a finite capacity to make parts so it takes them 8 weeks to work through their backlog of orders and then another 4-6 weeks to get the product to us. This is TOTALLY normal in manufacturing.

It's not like everything has to come from China - Apple spend $60 billion last year American suppliers... No reason that cannot grow, as long as Apple is willing to let some component costs raise - which I'm sure they are for a Mac Pro.

No Apple is not going to be willing to budge much on component costs without very good reason. Apple has margins to protect to keep their stock price high. Big companies don't get that way by being lazy with component costs. That link you provided is just a lazy regurgitation of an Apple press release and is VERY misleading. That is Apple taking credit for any US based company they have a supplier relationship with and counting every job at that company in Apple's favor, whether or not the actual products are made in the US. You might consider getting your data from an independent source with something resembling objective analysis.

Apple does exactly that with the old Mac Pro, and presumably the new one.

That's just the exception that proves the rule. One high margin, low volume product made in the US (that Apple hasn't updated in years) does not a trend make. Apple is doing that more for the press value than because it makes economic sense. When they start assembling iPhones or MacBooks in the US then you might have a point. It's not just Apple either. Pretty much nobody does high volume assembly work of commodity products in the US unless it is something that can be heavily automated with a multi-year production run.

How is it 'minimalist' being locked to a vendor's ecosystem

What locked? From Apple page, it is clearly said 'unlocked' phone.

Aside from everything? How about erase the stupid proprietary OS, boot like a normal computer and let people use the goddamn machines they paid for, however they want and privately?

WTF ARE YOU SMOKING?

I assume you are implying that Linux isn't a Proprietary OS? No, instead it is like over 100 slightly different Proprietary OSes... And if that wasn't true, then how come no one can create binary Application packages that will install/run on ANY Linux Distro??? Sounds to me like each incompatible Linux Distro is exactly a "Proprietary OS".

I also assume that by "Boot like a normal computer" you are referring to the T2 "Secure Boot" procedure? You are ignoring the fact that that is easily disabled (by design), as is the ability to defeat "Evil Maid" booting from external drives:

https://support.apple.com/en-u...

Not sure at all what you mean about "Let people use the goddamn machines they paid for, however they want and privately". There are ZERO restrictions on what you can run on your Mac, and where you can install it from. Again, simple GUI settings and Alerts (in GateKeeper) control your personal comfort-level between "completely safe" and "uninhibited" on an App-by-App basis:

https://support.apple.com/en-u...

And as far as "Privately", Apple has the hands-down best track record in that regard. Better than "Joe's famous Linux Distro" with all of 12 followers? Probably not: But when compared to all the other major OS vendors, you betcha!

Aside from everything? How about erase the stupid proprietary OS, boot like a normal computer and let people use the goddamn machines they paid for, however they want and privately?

WTF ARE YOU SMOKING?

I assume you are implying that Linux isn't a Proprietary OS? No, instead it is like over 100 slightly different Proprietary OSes... And if that wasn't true, then how come no one can create binary Application packages that will install/run on ANY Linux Distro??? Sounds to me like each incompatible Linux Distro is exactly a "Proprietary OS".

I also assume that by "Boot like a normal computer" you are referring to the T2 "Secure Boot" procedure? You are ignoring the fact that that is easily disabled (by design), as is the ability to defeat "Evil Maid" booting from external drives:

https://support.apple.com/en-u...

Not sure at all what you mean about "Let people use the goddamn machines they paid for, however they want and privately". There are ZERO restrictions on what you can run on your Mac, and where you can install it from. Again, simple GUI settings and Alerts (in GateKeeper) control your personal comfort-level between "completely safe" and "uninhibited" on an App-by-App basis:

https://support.apple.com/en-u...

And as far as "Privately", Apple has the hands-down best track record in that regard. Better than "Joe's famous Linux Distro" with all of 12 followers? Probably not: But when compared to all the other major OS vendors, you betcha!

Apple supports open source projects such as CUPS, Swift, Bonjour, Webkit... there are quite a few large projects. Check out https://developer.apple.com/op... . They design their own chips which are used in iPhone and iPad devices as well as a security / TouchBar chip used in their laptops. Those chips have industry-leading benchmarks. Other than Samsung they are one of the few that design their own chips.

Their products ARE different... that's why we buy them. Give them a try and see if it's for you... return them if you don't like them. Not everything is for everybody but lots of people have tried their products and are happy with them. Who knows you may be pleasantly surprised.

Apple Pay is more secure and private than using a credit card because the merchant receives a random card number.

Apples own documentation clearly states sellers are given the phones unique device account number.

https://support.apple.com/en-u...

Most of that rant sounds like that of someone who doesn't understand what's going on under the covers.

Including yourself apparently.

Unless you're living in the dark ages and paying with cash for everything, you're actually safer and more private with Apple Pay.

Actually what's safer is not brandishing Apple smart phone/watch in public everywhere you go. Look at me I'm carrying expensive shit. No thanks some of us have more sense than that.

I think the question seems a little strange as if you have an iPhone you'd be using Apple Pay, otherwise some Google variant.

But personally I really like Apple Pay, because it's easy to set up, use, and I feel is really secure.

Great news too is that soon (if not now?) ApplePay support is coming to Target and some other places - Target was one of the last big holdouts of places I go.

Note that Target will also finally be supporting Google Pay and Android Pay as well, so we ALL win here!!

Another thing I will say in favoritisms of Apple Pay is that Apple Pay over the web works really well and I use it if at all possible (it uses your device to authorize payment).

I have trouble sorting out Tim Cook's privacy principals so frequently espoused in press releases, op-eds and quips to the press from Apple's business agenda oriented towards marketing their platform as "privacy friendly".

It'd go a long way towards taking Cook and Apple as sincere if Apple would, in great detail, share with us what data they collect on their users, how they use it, and what data they allow Apps to collect, and what if any strings they attach to that data (which I doubt they can enforce anyway).

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208501

Understand and control the personal information that you store with Apple
As part of our commitment to your privacy, we’re making it easier than ever for you to review and take control of the data that you store with Apple. Data and privacy tools
We’ve introduced new data and privacy tools on your Apple ID account page. Sign in to your Apple ID account page on a Mac, PC, iPhone, or iPad. Then scroll down to Data & Privacy and select "Manage your data."
The complete set of self-service data and privacy tools is available to customers in over 240 countries around the world:
Get a copy of the data that you store with Apple that's associated with your Apple ID. Deactivate your Apple ID temporarily. Delete your Apple ID—and the data associated with it—permanently. Request a correction to your personal data.
Additional privacy improvements
To ensure that we’re meeting our own high standards for protecting the data we store on your behalf, we’ve conducted a comprehensive review of the instances where we collect and hold your data. As a result, Apple products now include new and updated data and privacy statements that make it easier than ever to understand how Apple will use your personal information. We show you these statements before you sign in with your Apple ID or turn on any new features that use your data.
We’re proud of our commitment to privacy and will continue to apply our industry-leading, privacy-by-design standard to ensure that great experiences don’t come at the expense of your privacy and security. For more information, visit apple.com/privacy.

Here you go:

https://www.cultofmac.com/5499...
https://privacy.apple.com/

https://www.apple.com/iphone/compare/

And Apple stores took down the signs showing which model is which and the prices. I went in December to buy a new phone, but I couldn't tell which model was which or how much they cost. This will make their model confusion even worse.

>"Samsung smart TVs run Tizen, Samsung's wacky custom operating system."

Um, it isn't "wacky" nor really "custom". It is a Linux distro developed by the Linux Foundation. You know, one of the most important supporting organizations for one of the most important and widely used operating systems in the world.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Tizen can also run Android apps (with a compatibility layer). It is true that Samsung is the only one who is making LOTS of use of it right now. And since Apple already supports Android for iTunes, it shouldn't be a huge feat to make it run in Tizen.

https://support.apple.com/en-u...

Not that I am a fan of iTunes, but I can see where having such support would benefit both Samsung and Apple.

They're even incredibly open about it if you check out their Privacy Policy:

We also use personal information to help us create, develop, operate, deliver, and improve our products, services, content and advertising, and for loss prevention and anti-fraud purposes. We may also use your personal information for account and network security purposes, including in order to protect our services for the benefit of all our users. Where we use your information for anti-fraud purposes it arises from the conduct of an online transaction with us. We limit our uses of data for anti-fraud purposes to those which are strictly necessary and within our assessed legitimate interests to protect our customers and our services. For certain online transactions we may also validate the information provided by you with publicly accessible sources.

We may use your personal information, including date of birth, to verify identity, assist with identification of users, and to determine appropriate services. For example, we may use date of birth to determine the age of Apple ID account holders.
From time to time, we may use your personal information to send important notices, such as communications about purchases and changes to our terms, conditions, and policies. Because this information is important to your interaction with Apple, you may not opt out of receiving these communications.

We may also use personal information for internal purposes such as auditing, data analysis, and research to improve Apple’s products, services, and customer communications.

We may have received your personal information from other persons if that person has shared their content with you using Apple products... We may also validate the information provided by you when creating an Apple ID with a third party for security and fraud prevention purposes.

For research and development purposes, we may use datasets such as those that contain images, voices or other data that could be associated with an identifiable person. When acquiring such datasets, we do so in accordance with applicable law in the jurisdiction in which the dataset is hosted.

We may collect information such as occupation, language, zip code, area code, unique device identifier, referrer URL, location, and the time zone where an Apple product is used so that we can better understand customer behavior and improve our products, services, and advertising.

We may collect information regarding customer activities on our website, iCloud services, our iTunes Store, App Store, Mac App Store, App Store for Apple TV and iBooks Stores and from our other products and services.

We may collect and store details of how you use our services, including search queries. This information may be used to improve the relevancy of results provided by our services. ...we may collect data about how you use your device and applications in order to help app developers improve their apps.

Apple shares personal information with companies who provide services such as information processing, extending credit, fulfilling customer orders, delivering products to you, managing and enhancing customer data, providing customer service, assessing your interest in our products and services, and conducting customer research or satisfaction surveys.

To provide location-based services on Apple products, Apple and our partners and licensees may collect, use, and share precise location data, including the real-time geographic location of your Apple computer or device. Where available, location-based services may use GPS, Bluetooth, and your IP Address, along with crowd-sourced Wi-Fi hotspot and cell tower locations, and other technolog

What about KeepassX?

Or KeePassXC Password Manager? Question: keepassxc ... can we trust it ?

KeePassXC for Beginners says "Android users, consider KeePassDroid.
iPhone users, consider MiniKeePass".

But electron based apps can ...
I simply fail to see what you want to say.

Electron based Apps use HTML and JavaScript. They run in a watered down Chrome.
What the fuck has that to do with accessing native APIs?

And what is this nonsense about: https://developer.apple.com/de...

Chrome can use those "drawers" hence the web app running inside of Chrome can ... sigh.

Are you actually a software developer or just a stupid troll?

Not really... in general, products that develop a defect due to faulty manufacturing will not be repaired for free unless the product is under warranty

Even Apple themselves have done this with poorly manufactured products.

https://developer.apple.com/de...

That would be a bit of marketing genius if it were true.

But unfortunate for everyone who doesn't buy $800-1000 phones.

Then just get an iPhone XR for as little as $449, or an XS for as little as $699.

And as a bonus, you'll actually get UPDATES (and a Secure OS) for 5 or more years:

https://www.apple.com/

I'm really at a loss as to why people pay $800-1000 for a smartphone in today's market.

My most expensive smartphone was my first one, an HTC Legend, I think I paid around $600 for that one. I used it for 5 years (it still works, although the power button is screwed up so turning on/off is annoying and you can't run any up-to-date software on it - the phone is now 8.5 years old).

My next phone, a huge upgrade in every way, was an Asus ZenPhone (ZE500) and that cost me around $280. It lasted me a good 3 years, the main reason I decided to replace it was the fact that I dropped it on the street and broke its screen (it's still usable btw). It did have a few other issues (was geting a bit slow, had some strange software bugs, and some mechanical issues with the power button and the SIM card slot), but had I not broken the screen I could've easily used it for another year.

A few months ago I got a Motorola Moto G for about $350. Again, a big upgrade in every way...works absolutely great. All this makes sense to me, as technology improves you should be able to get more bang for less buck. This is generally the case, I mean check out what you can get now in a Xiami phone for $200 (my girlfriend has one). Yet, the prices of the flagship models seem to be increasing (Apple breaks the price ceiling with each new generation top of the line iPhone) while adding rather dubious "features", such as the lack of a headphone jack, incompatibility with existing peripherals, phones so thin that they bend in your pocket and which you then need to embed in a two-times thicker case to ensure they don't break...I don't see why I should ever pay more than $500 for a smartphone again.

Then you're in luck!

The iPhone XR is available from only $449!

https://www.apple.com/

Jus' sayin'...

I noticed that for XS XR etc, apple added an asterisk saying the diagonal measurement is without the rounded corner. They didn't say that for the original X....

Actually, they did for the X as well, as shown, by the very page the lawsuit references, in footnote 1: https://www.apple.com/iphone/c...

This paves the way for my lawsuit against Ford, who for decades has advertised "5.0" liter engines that are 4,942cc, or "4.9" liters, if you're going for one-decimal accuracy. I'll be rich!

First of all, dickheads, you don't need to say "about" when describing a dimension to the ten-thousandth of an inch. Secondly, anyone who can spot the difference, unaided, between a 5.8-inch screen and a 5.6875-inch screen at arm's length wins a free trip to Uranus.

Thirdly, Apple has this note right on their page, directly below the dimensions:

The iPhone XS display has rounded corners that follow a beautiful curved design, and these corners are within a standard rectangle. When measured as a standard rectangular shape, the screen is 5.85 inches diagonally (actual viewable area is less).

And their lawyers are better than yours, so I'm sure that's enough to get this suit tossed out on its metaphorical ass.

Samsung and LG uses those same camps

Not exactly - Apple at least tries to monitor the camps to help the workers some.

Samsung and LG, use the *unmonitored* camps. Let that sink in.

I'm sorry that your Apple stock took a major hit, but that's the risk.

Has it? I wouldn't know, I just buy it every so often and in 20-30 years I may sell some.

The dividends certainly have not taken any hits, they keep increasing...

Thanks for reminding me to buy some more with the dividends, if it's really down I am in luck!

Fact is, Apple hardware is based on the designer BYOD market. Everything Apple does is antithetical to Dell. Dell sells real PowerEdge servers, complete with fault tollerence PSUs, ECC RAM,

I thought you were going to say Dell was antithetical to Apple because it was mostly super cheap and crappy. Imagine my surprise when you went the other way arguing Dell has higher quality systems! Ok, you do you I guess!

By the way, Apple uses ECC RAM in a number of pro products... If you didn't even know that why on earth should I, or anyone, take anything you have to say seriously?

Even though I didn't read the rest of it, just what you wrote there sure seems to point to Apple being able to make great use of the people at Dell that do work on higher end systems.

Apple does also design their own chips as well you know, and I'm certain there are a lot of firmware developers at Dell that probably know what they are doing.

Apple sells designer hardware that's WAY over priced.

No, just generally built with better components and engineering.

Yes they sometimes charge more to upgrade some aspects like RAM, but for the hardware you are getting what you pay for.

Dell sells servers - Apple does not.

Apple sells the Mac mini, so you are wrong.

Dell sells Windows PCs - Apple does not.

Apple explicitly supports Windows on any Apple desktop hardware, so you are wrong.

Dell is diversified for the corporate enterprise market as an IT solution provider - Apple is not.

Well that was sure a load of bullshit, but in any case Apple does have enterprise support in multiple ways, including remote management, and internally facing applications - so you are wrong.

Dell sell cheaper hardware that's functional and modular - Apple does not

All Apple hardware is functional. Can you upgrade video cards in Dell laptops? No? HMM, guess they are not ALL modular as you claim then. And Apple will soon have a newer Mac Pro that is fully modular...

So you are basically on the edge of being wrong there, we'll just call it wrong because of your past errors.

It's like saying Harley Davidson will open up an office next to Toyota and poach the best employees.

I think you meant that to sound silly but what would be odd about a company working on very compact internal combustion engines wanting to hire someone who had worked on very compact internal combustion engines?

Here's my advice to you - if you don't understand computers OR car analogies well, you are better off not posting on Slashdot until you understand at least one well (probably best to start with car analogies, this being Slashdot and all).