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Apple's Haves and Have Nots, Around the World
Rambo Tribble writes "As this story in the Economist notes, Apple's policies regarding international sales are often confusing and outdated. Apparently, Apple either hasn't been aware of political and social changes in the world over the last 20 years, or doesn't wish to acknowledge them."
Soulskill rightly notes that at least some of the complained-about policies boil down to Apple's adherence to local copyright and licensing laws.
That's interesting, do you mean to say laws differ from country to country, WOW!
If anyone has some more intelligent takes or even substantial information other than the article that was linked, please inform me and I will gladly read :)
We should start a new Slashdot and return control to the geeks. It actually wouldn't be that hard to get some users to
Apples website is generally a shambles. I'm trying to develop iPhone applications and it's useless and difficult to navigate.
Also try looking at the technical specifications of the iPhone - it's just a bulletpoint list of features- hardly 'technical'
Basically their website sucks, and the sucking doesn't stop there with Apple
Divide a cake by zero. Is it still a cake?
The only thing I managed to really garner from this article is this, it's about Apples country restrictions on music and movies.
If the economist did a bit more research independently they would see it's a rights management issue from the content generators. Music and film in both the US and UK tend to restrict certain things like to their respective countries on a belief it's the only way everyone gets their dues.
It's the reason the silly regional encoding exists for the encryption on almost every DVD; my Discovery Channel Living With Wolves DVD lacked any sort of encryption.
Partly the irrational fear that artists won't get their rightful dues, because of currency exchange rates. Piracy fears I think are the biggest concern on the media companies not letting stuff out of the country digitally.
Along with the fact they make probably loads licensing manufacturers in other countries to make them locally and get around tariffs.
Complaining about inequality in Western Europe? What do they think this is, socialism?
Slashdot: News for Apple, Apples that Matter
Sometimes when something sucks it's not them - it's you.
The treaties are for the states, not the companies. The second issue is that at the moment the intellectual property market is split up due to the licensing agencies that are authorised to handle different states.
The EU is doing something about this though, and we can most likely expect to see something happen during the current commission, the last one took substantial steps in this area, but clearly not enough.
"Civis Europaeus sum!"
As an aside, wtf is up with the bizarre tone of the article? "What has Apple got against eastern Europe?" "Cold warriors"? WTF? Seems a rather strange take on disorganization inside a mega-corporation. Or is this all a giant case of projection, where journalists attribute their own undesirable feelings onto others?
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
For those complaining that Apple screws over it's non-US customers, take a look at the apple store Japan. Despite the really strong yen most things in the Apple store in Japan cost about the same(esp. when you consider that the 5% tax is already included) as they do in the US store, while those in Europe tend to cost a lot more.
Obviously part a big part of the discrepancy is the sales tax, but doing business in Europe just plain costs more. Shipping from China(where most of Apples stuff is made) to Europe is obviously more expensive than shipping to Japan or the US(largely because there isn't really a direct sea route), but thats only part of the reason.
European consumers and employees tend to enjoy a lot more protections under the law then those in the US and Japan. For instance tt costs more to hire(and fire) the European workers that man the warehouses and shipping facilities, Apple is responsible for paying to properly dispose of all electronics it sells, European consumers can make Apple pay for a much wider range of repairs to products then can consumers in the US or Japan etc.
Not saying whether or not these protections are good or bad, but many Europeans don't seem to realize that they certainly aren't free. If you want these protections then you are going to have to be willing to pay for them, otherwise if you want them then stuff is going to cost more, end of story.
Monstar L
Presumably the author already knows that the UK listed prices are so high because VAT is included, since they're legally required to include VAT in the advertised price....right author?
The most obvious answer, from a quick look at the list is that the current list of countries reflects countries where Apple judges that it will make enough ROI to make it worthwhile investing the large sums of money it takes to make for an Apple "experience". For Apple that means translating all its documentation and website/store and also setting up local call centres and localising its products. Given that there are many small countries with small Apple brand recognition in Eastern Europe, I would think that that would be the most realistic answer.
Not that I really care all that much about Apple at the moment. I'm a Mac sys admin and I'm kind of burned about the shit that Apple calls a server OS and the related hardware.
Apple makes just 1 of each product for the whole world in almost every case. The only difference between an iPhone bought in San Francisco and one bought anywhere else is the government in question. There are not "US editions" and "international editions." Apple does not even make proprietary Verizon or Sprint iPhones to serve the US cell market of 3 overlapping monopolies, they run on AT&T only in the US because it's the only US carrier that is compatible with the world. So not only are these criticisms of Apple misguided, they're entirely opposite. International customers should be praising Apple for providing them with the exact same product.
Apple even sells power adapters that are worldwide-compatible. They have a "World Travel Adapter Kit" which is simply a set of various international plugs. You simply pull the US plug off your MacBook, iPad, iPhone, or iPod adapter and plug on the correct plug for where you are and it just works.
Is there any other US corporation that is so internationally-minded?
As a New Zealander, living in a country of a voluminous FOUR million, it sucks being left out. Yes, the NZ release of the iPad has been announced...but its been a long time for many NZ Apple fans, I bet many worldwide have been annoyed.
:)
The first iPhone sold in NZ was the 3G. I imported an Original iPhone, it ended up costing me $790 NZD ($564 odd USD) all up, and I run it on a prepaid plan, no set monthly costs. The 3G iPhone would have cost over 1000 NZD new, so I saved A LOT of money, *AND* had a product months before it was released in my country. A Win Win situation!
Sadly my iPad will have cost me more than if I had waited, but I stick by my decision to buy an import when I did. I've had my iPad for a couple weeks now, and an extra hundred odd dollars is worth it to me. I remember going slowly insane over the NZ iPhone wait...hearing every single blog on the internet (even the gardening sites!) talk talk talk about the iPhone...how great it is, how wonderful, who needs Jesus when we have this wonderful iPhone....I'd rather pay a couple hundred more than have to put up with that for months, especially when the dates are "to be confirmed".
But hey, if the worst thing you have to whine about in life is that you have to wait a couple months for the latest gadget....perhaps I shouldnt be complaining
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All the computers are shipped from China via the Netherlands anyway, so having business in each country seems like a bad idea. Why not have a single EU store and headquarters, much like in the US? Besides, because of free trade within the EU, a swedish customer can just order one from Germany - and pay German taxes - no swedish VAT added, for example.
FYI, in the US (or at least NY), there's a state sales tax, then each county has their own sales tax on top of that. The NY state sales tax is 4%, the remaining 4.25% you found was for whatever county you were looking at. Presently the county sales tax range from 3% to 4.75% in NY.
And there are some items which the state doesn't charge tax on, but some counties do.
Plus, some sales are taxed based upon where you live, not where you made the purchase. If I purchase a car in a county where the total sales tax is 8.75%, I'll only pay 8% because I the county I live in is 8% and the county the vehicle is first registered in is used for the tax.
Actually, there are companies that try to fill the gap. They have an address in US that you can use when ordering in an US-only online shop, and they will re-mail it to you in Europe. It is not cheap and a bit complicated, but it works.
Also, if you read my comment carefully, I used the word "half" a lot. There are many online shops that have no problem with shipping to eastern Europe. I can get my stuff online, it is just much less convenient.
The problem here is really simple. People in countries that are being left out have a strong feeling that the decision many companies make, not to ship to these countries, is often not based on rational reasoning. Yes, we can use the gap as an entrepreneurial opportunity, but that is beside the point. The point here is that we want to alert the companies that reconsidering their policy may be beneficial to them as well as to us.
(Try to walk in my shoes for a moment: You find something interesting on Amazon, try to order it... bang, not shipping this there. You search for it on google, try a few other shops, and maybe the third one will ship it. Even though you succeed, you still feel... discriminated.)
The article showed a setup window for iTunes for Windows. It seems to imply that there was a lack of languages. Is this a limitation on the Windows version? For languages, I can see far more options on OS X than listed in the article. Furthermore are they limitations on Windows?
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.