With Mountain Lion's iCloud Integration, Apple Strengthens the Garden Wall

snydeq writes "With WWDC around the corner, iOS 6 rumors are taking center stage, but the real action for developers may be around iCloud. Forthcoming OS X Mountain Lion will integrate iCloud into the formal file system, making iCloud usage much easier and thus more common, and thanks to iCloud Documents, which lets apps open and save documents directly in iCloud, developers will be able to better tap iOS-to-OSX document syncing in their apps, a la iWork. But there is a downside to this opportunity: 'For developers, it further enmeshes you in the Apple ecosystem, almost in the way that America Online did in its heyday. Case in point: OS X apps can use the iCloud Documents APIs only if they are sold through the Mac App Store.'"

Comments

Garden Wall?

[rueger]

I don't know y'all, feels more like Kudzu to me.....

Re:Garden Wall?

[Anonymous Coward]

Garden Wall is what it's called by Apple Fanboys. Apple users call it the Jail Wall. That's why your iOS devices need to be jail-broken, not garden-broken.

Re:Garden Wall?

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

Garden Wall is what it's called by Apple Fanboys. Apple users call it the Jail Wall. That's why your iOS devices need to be jail-broken, not garden-broken. (Score:1, Informative)

I wish Slashdot would interview the guy who decided to spend the mod point on this comment.

Re:Garden Wall?

[Lisias]

It's an improvement, really.

In the past, Microsoft used to take the bashing alone!

Re:Garden Wall?

[Ukab the Great]

Actually, us true Apple fanboys actually refer to it as the Posh Bunker. Walled garden is merely a media catchphrase.

Re:Garden Wall?

[Hognoxious]

Surely "The Cottage" would be more appropriate?

Re:Garden Wall?

[Sosarian Avatar]

Several years ago, it was a haven for people that enjoyed the relief from using a UNIX-like OS -- but that had nothing to do with Apple in the vast majority of cases, as they were using BSD or Linux. It certainly has been nice to see facts start ending the brief reign of the rabid Apple retards that would rather let Steve Jobs' corpse rape their dad than admit there could be anything negative about any of Apple's products.

Either way

[BitHive]

This signals the beginning of the end for something.

Re:Either way

[Nerdfest]

The large-scale acceptance of iOS's market-only software install was the beginning. This is just the inevitable progression of something that turned out to be very profitable.

Er.. I'm not sure how this is terribly different

[romanval]

the your documents on Google Docs or Office 365 (aside from the apps residing on the host CPU instead of a web app).

Anticompetetive

[ohnocitizen]

Any way you slice it, this is unethical. Restricting usage of an API to developers who sell through your platform (and thus give you 30%), giving your own private cloud service filesystem level integration... Imagine if Microsoft made either of these moves.

Re:Tim Cook's first big fuckup.

[ChrisKnight]

Don't lay this on Tim Cook. This was Steve Jobs's plan; Tim is just carrying on with it.

Here's my prediction: The version of OS X that comes after Mountain Lion will only let you install applications/software from the App Store. Again, Steve's plan; not Tim's.

Native TRIM support for non-Apple SSDs?

[DigiShaman]

With both Snow Leopard and Lion, I had to hack a file just to enabled TRIM on my Intel SSD. I have a feeling I'll have to do that again if I upgrade. Unless they've made attempts to correct that little "exploit".

Apple makes a good product, but only if you buy everything through Apple. I'm quite honestly surprised they even made replacing an HDD with a non-Apple brand even possible. I know some IBM Thinkpads will bitch at POST unless the drive's firmware has been signed by IBM.

It is just more of Macs becoming iDevices

[Sycraft-fu]

Apple doesn't want you to have a computer, they want you to have Apple devices where you buy stuff from Apple. They want you to sit around and consume the content they sell. They've been heading that direction for awhile now, this is just a continuation of it. It isn't likely to be too many more years before they lock it down entirely, and Macs are just large stations for accessing the Apple Store/iTunes.

Apple is all about the locked-in ecosystem where everything is their way, everything runs through them, and they get a cut of everything. This is just another step down that road.

Re:It is just more of Macs becoming iDevices

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple doesn't want you to have a computer, they want you to have Apple devices where you buy stuff from Apple. They want you to sit around and consume the content they sell. They've been heading that direction for awhile now, this is just a continuation of it. It isn't likely to be too many more years before they lock it down entirely, and Macs are just large stations for accessing the Apple Store/iTunes.

Apple is all about the locked-in ecosystem where everything is their way, everything runs through them, and they get a cut of everything. This is just another step down that road.

Apple wants you to buy hardware. All the content, apps, and the walled garden are a means to this end.

Apple's financial reports illustrate this point. They generate little (as a percentage) in non-hardware sales.

Re:It is just more of Macs becoming iDevices

[Anonymous Coward]

Whats awesome is Microsoft's lame attempts at cloning Apple's latest business strategy.

It's like hearing your grandfather talk about how swell Lil Wayne's new record is.

Re:It is just more of Macs becoming iDevices

[Anonymous Coward]

WHAT?

Do I really need to do the research for you? Come on, man.

http://www.macrumors.com/2011/07/19/apple-reports-record-breaking-q3-2011/

iTunes Store: 5%
Other (who knows what this actually is): 4%
Hardware sales: 91%

Clear enough?

Re:It is just more of Macs becoming iDevices

[PopeRatzo]

They want you to sit around and consume the content they sell.

You have just described our entire culture.

We are no longer meant to be active participants, but merely passive consumers. And the latest innovations, we're not even consumers, but rather the consumables.

Facebook, for example. Its users are not its customers. Its users are the product they are offering to its real customers. This disconnect from the natural relationship of buyer and seller is a trend that leads us to a not-so-great place. The reason that Facebook's users are not its customers, is because people don't have any money, so the only thing they have to offer to the marketplace is their personal information, their habits, their discussions, their personal communications.

How much would you pay to use a service like Facebook? And why do you not have the choice? The notion that advertising is the only way to monetize the Internet is either an example of just how unimaginative our economic overlords really are. And cowardly. Because if it were a traditional buyer-seller relationship, then they'd actually have to offer something of value. They'd have to answer questions, provide a product or service of actual value. But that's too hard. And too honest.

Apple is going this direction too. Its customers are becoming less and less the people who buy their products and more and more the people who use their products to sell stuff to those of us who have their products.

We will see an Mac desktop OS that only allows installation of software purchased not from, but through Apple. Count on it.

Re:It is just more of Macs becoming iDevices

[petsounds]

The reason that Facebook's users are not its customers, is because people don't have any money, so the only thing they have to offer to the marketplace is their personal information, their habits, their discussions, their personal communications.

While this sounds very delicious in its sensationalism, the reason Facebook is free is the same reason all social media services are free -- you won't attract a critical mass of users if your service sits behind a paywall. People don't want to use a 'social' service in which their social circle has to pay in order to interact with each other.

This has nothing to do with people's ability to pay or not pay -- some community-driven pay-to-play sites seem to be profitable, e.g. eHarmony.com, Ancestry.com, Second Life. They aren't Facebook-level profitable, but they stay in business. The difference is that those social services are driven by discovery of new social contacts, not bringing your current circle over. And they offer features which people are willing to pay for. Sending messages, sharing photos, writing comments... these features are so ubiquitous now that they essentially have no intrinsic value, except for profile mining in the hands of unethical capitalists like the Facebook team.

Facebook is just a digital mirror of brick-and-mortar corporate conglomerates who offer seemingly much better value than local, customer-focused businesses. And people eat it up, thinking there's no downsides.

While I'm quite ardently against Apple's walled garden increasingly becoming a SuperMAX prison, at least customers are actually buying a product, and Apple's business goal is not selling your information. Their goal is selling hardware, and getting a cut out of every app store purchase. Apple just wants to keep you locked in, but I do believe MOST of the people who work there really are trying to make good products that help people. Every feature rollout on Facebook by contrast is another transparent attempt to get more data about your life.

Re:It is just more of Macs becoming iDevices

[Anonymous Coward]

Other (who knows what this actually is): 4%

That 4% is everything from apps like Final Cut to Safari's cut from Google ads to printed photo books from iPhoto or Aperture to backpacks sold in the retail stores. Hardware is where the money is.

Re:It is just more of Macs becoming iDevices

[peragrin]

So just like every other company then?

I haven't upgraded to lion yet for this reason. I don't want icloud, I want My-cloud. using my servers that aren't open to inspection by government agencies without a warrant.

the trick is not even android supports that yet.

Re:It is just more of Macs becoming iDevices

[Karlt1]

I'm simply stating a fact.

But from where I'm looking, the top Android devices cost the consumer as much as the iPhone. Why do I care if the carriers have to pay a larger subsidy to Apple as long as my monthly cost is the same?

Re:It is just more of Macs becoming iDevices

[Dusty101]

You don't have to use iCloud with Lion at all. I don't.

This is what Mac users WANT

[Gothmolly]

They want it to Just Work. They want to buy it, plug it in, go pointy-clicky and have it work. People have an expectation that computers and technological devices (tablets, phones, etc) work without screwing around with them.

Re:This is what Mac users WANT

[ducomputergeek]

Honestly, that's why I bought my first mac over 10 years ago. I wanted a Unix based laptop where all the hardware actually worked and since I've never really looked back. Why? Because for 10 years my macs have pretty much stayed out of my way and let me get work done. Which is something I've grown even more appreciative of as I've gotten older and want to spend time doing things other than messing with computers. Mac App Store, great, let's me know when app updates come out. Also guess what, I bought Cyberduck through the App store. I've used the program for years always meaning to donate, but that was a hassle through paypal since I don't link Paypal to my bank account. With the App store, it was one click and I was more than happy to give the cyberduck project money for their years of work. If updates for the apps I use on a regular basis it lets me know that an update is available with a pretty good overview of what changes have been made.

Re:This is what Mac users WANT

[lightknight]

Dude, using a computer is like driving a car, or performing CPR, or riding a bicycle, or learning how to swim. You do it once, you get it over with, you move on with life.

Now, it's true that I do not know your family; I do not know what would prevent them from learning what is considered an essential skill to life (I struggle with my own family). However, I might offer that it's because of learned helplessness, that because you are always there, that they've never felt the need to learn.

Perhaps we need to impress upon them that tech support is not our vocation. It's simply a favor, and not one that may be asked of us incessantly.

Give a man a fish, you feed him for a day; Teach a man to fish, you feed him for life; If you offer to teach a man to fish, but he says he much prefers you do the fishing for him, while he does the eating...well, you swiftly realize what kind of relationship you have there.

A lot about Apple's Directio Bothers Me,

[DrRobert]

But not this. They are providing a free network support service to vendors that sell through their store. Seems obvious, ethical, and fair. Dropbox is better and simpler anyway because all apps can use it with no API; however Dropbox SELLS its service and gives it away for free as a loss leader.

Re:A lot about Apple's Directio Bothers Me,

[Cinder6]

While I would like it if it were open to everyone, it actually does make sense. Apple needs to pay for iCloud somehow, and making sure that developers don't get a free ride is the easiest way to do it.

Furthermore, this is old news. We've known this since Mountain Lion was announced.

Re:Only app store apps can use iCloud?

[Anonymous Coward]

From the perspective of someone developing for iOS but with as much separation between their crap (APIs) and mine as I can get, this doesn't change things a whole lot, really. Apple has always loved getting people enmeshed in their APIs, it's just that in many cases they hadn't had the clout to do it until the past few years. Best as I can do, there's still a bunch of weed roots snuck into more and more of my own classes.
 
It's so bad that when I see they've added new functionality I'm now extremely reluctant to add it if there's any way at all to write it myself, even if I think I should be able to segregate the use of their APIs out from my main code. They have a way of making things that should be easily compartmentalized into terribly messy and ugly APIs that require you integrate them into your basic logic. My guess is this is an overall strategy that comes from the top, because otherwise many of their programmers are cooking-pans-on-the-head-ramming-into-each-other-for-fun level imbeciles. Then again, with the amount of awful bugs I'm experiencing in 10.7, it may well be the latter case.

Skydrive?

[JBMcB]

Isn't this pretty much exactly how Skydrive works, and isn't that being integrated into Windows 8? Nobody has been complaining about that...

Re:Skydrive?

[shutdown -p now]

The most recent version of SkyDrive just shows up as a folder on your PC. Any app can read and write files to it using normal filesystem APIs, and they get automatically synced. And, of course, said app doesn't have to be distributed through the Windows Store.

Re:Tim Cook's first big fuckup.

[Nerdfest]

OS X being based on Unix is to help them (not as much development required) not you.

Doesn't Matter

[Jane Q. Public]

"Don't lay this on Tim Cook. This was Steve Jobs's plan; Tim is just carrying on with it."

It doesn't matter whose idea it was. It is still a bad idea. They are making exactly the same mistakes that Microsoft did, for the same reasons Microsoft made them, and from which Microsoft has not, to this day, recovered.

Cook or Jobs, either one should know better. I could see this coming from a mile away, and they have had plenty of warning. If Apple keeps this up, the results will not be good for them.

Re:Doesn't Matter

[Anonymous Coward]

It doesn't matter whose idea it was. It is still a bad idea.

Yeah, because it really sucks if when your machine gets stolen, you're able to get all your apps and your files back from a server in North Carolina or Oregon. Seriously, doesn't Apple know that people enjoy the hassle of losing data? WTF are they THINKING?

Re:here is the bargin

[Nerdfest]

In Apple's case, it's actually give me your freedom and your money.

You just dont get it, even after all this time.

[FlyingGuy]

YOU are geeks / nerds / techies / whatever label you prefer. Apple does not even count you as part of their customer base.

Apple is selling the coolest tech for largest market segment. You buy an apple device and it JUST FUCKING WORKS out of the box. and like it or not that is what people want. They don't want to have to do what you love to do and they HATE doing.

They want a device that just does what they need to do, and like it or not apple devices do just that.

Re:You just dont get it, even after all this time.

[Bill_the_Engineer]

I do agree with you that the motherboards are fabricated by the same people who make the motherboards for Dell and others. However, the motherboards are made to Apple's specifications just like Dell specifies their motherboard designs. I also agree that the individual components are manufactured by third-party vendors that sell to just about everybody.

The key difference between the brands is that Apple wants quality to be associated with their branding and will make design choices and parts selections that ensure that they keep their image. They charge a premium for their equipment so they have enough margin to chose quality over economy.

Dell, on the other hand, wants to offer the most bang for the buck. They are competing against beige box assemblers and make design choices that allows them to offer a reasonably powerful machine at very low cost. Their margins are small so they do cut corners to keep the price low. For the average hobbyist and home user that uses Windows, Dell makes a nice machine. The average user will upgrade to a newer machine in about 3 years and the Dell will *probably* last long enough until a Windows game/program/operating system comes out that will require a new computer anyway.

I prefer Apple, but I do purchase and use both brands (non-Apple usually equals Dell), however lately I've been buying Supermicro instead of Dell. I have powerpc Apples that are still functioning well, and the Apple laptops (even the white plastic MacBooks) are still in use. The Dell laptops haven't faired so well. The Desktop machines are still mostly working, but most of the cheap ass parts were replaced (I believe the chassis and the motherboard are the only original equipment). The laptops however are crap. The new Dells with the smart card reader looks promising (we purchased 5) and we hope they do better than the other Dells.

Overall the Apple branded equipment are better made. I had a couple of lemons that Apple gladly swapped out and the replacements have been trouble free.

Long story - short. Your milage may vary but to say there's little difference between Dell and Apple branded computers is pretty naive.

Re:You just dont get it, even after all this time.

[ducomputergeek]

Poor windows support? I'm running Windows 7 Pro (Bootcamp partition) and OSX right now via Parallels seamlessly at the moment. I do my android development on the windows side of the house as well as some work in Visual Studio. Sure, if I have to build something large I'll boot into windows, but for most of I work I can run Windows throughout he virtual machine just fine. Furthermore I can travel with just my laptop and do my work from anywhere I have an internet connection (which with my mobile hotspot is pretty much anywhere I have a cell signal).

And restrictive about getting things on a box? Okay a couple times I've had to create ACC versions of MP3's for whatever reason. Usually took less than 5 minutes for iTunes to do the conversions and whatever song I wanted was on the iDevice of my choice. Mostly though, any of the music I want to buy is already on iTunes and for $1.29 a song I get what I want. Click buy once and it automatically syncs and downloads to my iPhone, Mac Book Pro, iMac, and iPad. I've sat and watch it do it to all 4 devices at the same time.

I have no problems connecting to other macs or PC's on my home network. OSX seems to find my HP windows 7 box as well as my FreeBSD file server without any problems.

Re:You just dont get it, even after all this time.

[FlyingGuy]

You arrogant little piss ant!

There are people I know personally that I am willing to bet the contents of my 401K that are WAY smarter then you are and they could give a shit less about repairing, hacking, or twiddling with the i[whatever] because that is not their interest.

Just because you get a woody playing with hardware like it was a blow up doll, does not mean the rest of the world does.

Now go sit in your mothers basement and have a great big huge glass of shut the fuck up.

Its about having apps screened not about sales

[perpenso]

Any way you slice it, this is unethical. Restricting usage of an API to developers who sell through your platform (and thus give you 30%), giving your own private cloud service filesystem level integration... Imagine if Microsoft made either of these moves.

Its about having apps screened and approved not about sales. Free apps (gratis) from the App Store can use iCloud for storage too.

Re:Its about having apps screened not about sales

[stephanruby]

Its about having apps screened and approved not about sales. Free apps (gratis) from the App Store can use iCloud for storage too.

You mean free to the consumer, not free to the developer. The last I checked, there was still an annual fee for being a developer on iOS, even if you were publishing a free app.

Re:Tim Cook's first big fuckup.

[Daniel Dvorkin]

you simply won't be able to run X11 apps on Mac OS X any more

None of the articles in the results from your linked Google search actually seem to agree with that statement.

Re:Tim Cook's first big fuckup.

[Anonymous Coward]

You should read what you quote:

"With Mountain Lion, Apple seems to eliminating its dedicated support for the X11 application, instead redirecting users to the open source XQuartz project, which it will continue to support."

Re:results

[Jane Q. Public]

"All the rest of the tech world is second class until someone decisively shows that one of the emperors is wearing no clothes."

Funny thing is: Facebook stock today closed at barely over its opening price. Why?

Sorry, but the Tech Bubble was over 10 years ago. Nobody in their right mind buys stock at 100 times price/earnings ratio, unless they expect the company to grow, very fast.

The problem is: Facebook can't grow very fast. They probably have near their peak audience right now, considering that more and more people are getting fed up with them and their corporate "me first" policies.

And for once, not many people were fooled. Actually, the starting price of 38 was way too high... I would not have bought at a quarter of that much.

So yeah, Zuckerburg was out there actually kinda naked today. He might not have been wearing no clothes, but apparently he was wearing sheer underwear.

Easy = Bad

[Stiletto]

Only on Slashdot would making software usage "easier and more common" be seen as a bad thing.

Re:And yet Apple is popular around here..

[evil_aaronm]

I know - don't feed the trolls. But this is utter BS. "While limited" - how? On my MacBook Pro, I can run the suite of Office tools; I can compile and run common X11 apps; I can even connect serial devices and do bit-level twiddling if I want. I can open a shell and run bash or ksh scripts until the cows come home. I can edit HD video and multi-track audio. So, how am I limited by using Mac OS?

And then implying that all nerds must be SM freaks - referring to the configuration contortions that Linux users often have to go through to get just about anything to work? - is just ridiculous. Because, surely, any self-respecting nerd would rather fuck around trying to get drivers to work for some video card or printer rather than just do some actual work. Seriously? Ok, maybe things are better, now, with Linux; I wouldn't know - I stopped banging my head on the table some years ago, and bought a Mac. Now? I just focus on what I need to do rather than what configuration file I need to play with to get X11 up and running.

Maybe you just don't understand that some of us have more important things to do than mine, refine and then cast the materials needed for every metal and plastic piece of the mobo, then solder them by hand, one eye blindfolded, left handed, if you're normally right handed, to be considered a "true nerd." Maybe an abacus would make you feel more manly. Knock yourself out. I'll just put my formula into a spreadsheet, get my results to my boss, and then move on to the next assignment.

In other words: I can get down and dirty with a Mac, if I need to. Most of the time, I don't need to. I'm cool with that. You keep punching those bit codes into your Altair, though; we're all real impressed.

Re:Tim Cook's first big fuckup.

[Grayhand]

Here's my prediction, you are dead wrong. "The version of OS X that comes after Mountain Lion will only let you install applications/software from the App Store." More paranoia than reality. After spending better than a decade growing their OS and finally challenging Microsoft on the desktop front they shoot themselves in the foot by forcing all sales through the app store? They'd loose half their customers overnight. First off no one would upgrade to to Mountain Lion and most would hold off buying new equipment. Third party vendors would be shutout so the backlash would be epic. It may be a wet dream over at Apple but no one is that monumentally stupid. The number of pissed off customers would dwarf the Vista revolt. Why lock the barn door while more are trying to squeeze in? There's simply no rational reason to do it and there are major downsides. Sure they will keep trying to make it or attractive to use the app store but shutting out other vendors would be shooting themselves in the foot with a nuke. They'd also be putting an antitrust target on their chests so any gain would be offset by customer backlash and the next ten years in court.

Re:Tim Cook's first big fuckup.

[ChrisKnight]

"you simply won't be able to run X11 apps on Mac OS X any more"

This is patently false. Apple is no longer supporting X11, but they are recommending that people install an open source X11 for OS X called XQuartz. So, you will be able to run X11 apps in Mountain Lion.

http://www.macrumors.com/2012/02/17/apple-removes-x11-in-os-x-mountain-lion-shifts-support-to-open-source-xquartz/
http://xquartz.macosforge.org/trac/wiki

Re:Grab Apple

[Swampash]

Yeah man, the most valuable public company in the world sure fucked up good.

Re:Er.. I'm not sure how this is terribly differen

[sammyF70]

genuine question, which indirectly might answer yours : can you easily access iCloud from non-Apple devices?

Re:Er.. I'm not sure how this is terribly differen

[shutdown -p now]

You can integrate any app with Google Docs - it doesn't need to be sold only on Android Marketplace.

(no idea about Office 365)

Re:Tim Cook's first big fuckup.

[shutdown -p now]

You have to use iCloud if you want to compete apps which have iPad versions that can open their documents from the cloud.

In other words, it's classic tie-in - using their dominance on the tablet market to get developers in line on the desktop. To remind, from June 1 onward, all apps sold in the Mac App Store have to be sandboxed - in other words, it becomes a full-fledged walled garden, just like iOS.

Re:I don't believe in a complete iOS-ization

[m_gol]

It would be really difficult to reliably block terminal access

Why would it be difficult? They can do it in exact same way they did it on iOS, which, after all, is also Darwin-based.

I meant difficult not as in "difficult to implement" but difficult to fit into their whole OS ecosystem. Apple would have to shut down their server flavor, they would have to ditch terminal completely, they'd disable PHP, Apache, X11. They would have to make their OS incompatible with any programming environments as Python, Perl, revision control systems... Finder probably would have to go away (or just be re-implemented so that it can't go into unprotected territories). Their root handling would have to be reimplemented (too easy to hack), etc. It CAN be done but it I doubt they would just ditch it all just in one second (that's why I wrote about 5-6 years which gives about 2 OS X versions; still too small but I'm being cautious). But I may be biased, I have personal interest to believe what I say. ;) Linux GUIs are buggy and I wouldn't like to have to go back.

Re:results

[jo_ham]

I can't tell if this is satire.

They are not gaining any new market share they are losing it

This is untrue. They have been increasing their marketshare in computers for the past 6 or so years consecutively, in an industry that is stagnating in growth or even shrinking in some years. In the smartphone arena their marketshare is pretty stagnant, but their real-world numbers are increasing (the size of the market is growing, but their new users are cancelling out that proportional change). They are currently trading share back and forth with all other Android handset makers combined (which mainly means Samsung, who have the lion's share of that). They're certainly not in a position where they're panicking over marketshare and needing to "milk the religiously dedicated apple addict base" because that assumes that the bulk of their products are bought by these addicts, but that brings us to...

The bulk of their products come from apple addicts who funnel a substantial portion of their digital recreational dollars through them, without making real world price comparisons.

That really depends on whether you consider someone an "addict" if they value something that you don't. Just because you think an Apple product is too expensive for what it is doesn't mean that anyone who buys one hasn't weighed up the other options. They may simply have different criteria than you.

It also depends what you mean by "bulk" - if you mean in terms of the different numbers of product lines, then possibly they are all bought by "addicts". If you mean where their money comes from, then you're wide of the mark since that is the iPhone, and it sells far more than the total number of other Mac products combined, so they can't all be being bought by "apple addicts". They've sold over 100 million iPhones, and the numbers keep going up. Far too many to be simply the same fans just buying the new one every time it comes out - they're growing their user base. A large majority of people with an iPhone are first time Apple users, purely through a numbers game (subtract the total number of Apple computers from the total number of iPhones sold). I'm sure a lot of them had iPods, but Macs? The numbers simply don't add up. Hardly a "religiously dedicated apple addict base" (although there will clearly be some of those).

Re:Tim Cook's first big fuckup.

[jo_ham]

Well, you can use Dropbox on iOS too.

iCloud is free to use, so however Apple chooses to implement it is their business.

App sandboxing is for security - not sure why you're trying to spin that as a negative, although it has already had some potential casualties (like apps that listen for specific keyboard shortcuts globally and perform actions while in the background).

And why would they be trying to get developers "in line" on the desktop? If they're already developing apps on the store then they now have the ability to add iCloud integration easily, and if they were developers making apps that aren't distributed through the store then they're exactly the same way off as they were before, still free to integrate with other cloud services if they want. If you're already a developer selling iOS apps then it's hardly a stretch to use the Mac App Store for your desktop app, assuming you want iCloud integration. If you really don't want to then you can just use something else like Dropbox.

What do you think Apple should do? Enable iCloud access for free to any app, regardless of source? Is the requirement to have it distributed through the store to enable use of cloud storage on their servers really all that onerous?

Re:Tim Cook's first big fuckup.

[shutdown -p now]

iCloud is free to use, so however Apple chooses to implement it is their business.

That would be true even if it weren't free. Their service, their rules. Doesn't mean I can't say that the rules are nasty.

App sandboxing is for security - not sure why you're trying to spin that as a negative, although it has already had some potential casualties (like apps that listen for specific keyboard shortcuts globally and perform actions while in the background).

I don't mind app sandboxing as such, so long as it's something that's not shoved on either the user or on developer. In this case, Apple forces the hands of developers who might have preferred to distribute their apps outside of the app store (e.g. because they need certain features not available in the sandbox), but now have to also consider the fact that not going for sandbox means that they miss on iCloud. A good model would have non-sandboxed apps have a strict superset of features accessible to sandboxed apps - there's simply no reason, technical or ethical, to do otherwise.

What do you think Apple should do? Enable iCloud access for free to any app, regardless of source?

Sure. Dropbox does that on all platforms. SkyDrive incidentally does that on Windows (due to it being transparent - it looks like just another folder in the system to which any app has access as usual).

Re:results

[TheLink]

Funny thing is: Facebook stock today closed at barely over its opening price. Why?

Because FB didn't get conned?
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/21/opinion/21nocera.html

A huge opening-day pop is not a sign of a successful I.P.O., but rather a massively mispriced one. Bankers are rewarding their friends and themselves instead of doing their fiduciary duty to their clients.

Car analogy: If your IPO shoots up a lot, it's like you PAYING someone to list your car for sale at a good price, but instead they under-price it, their close friends buy it and immediately sell it for twice the price.

Re:Tim Cook's first big fuckup.

[gnasher719]

And? They already killed Mac OS X Server and removed X11 support, I somehow doubt Apple really cares about anyone that uses Mac OS X because it's UNIX.

You're posting nonsense. MacOS X Server is well and a live. They killed the XServe hardware which sold only about 300,000 units a year from what I heard. They are selling the Mac Mini Server, and MacOS X Server will run just fine on any Mac Pro. X11 support is available, and Apple tells you were to get it.