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Developers and the Fear of Apple
An anonymous reader writes: UI designer Eli Schiff has posted an article about the "climate of fear" surrounding Apple in the software development community. He points out how developers who express criticism in an informal setting often recant when their words are being recorded, and how even moderate public criticism is often prefaced by flattery and endorsements.
Beyond that, the industry has learned that they can't rely on Apple's walled garden to make a profit. The opaque app review process, the race to the bottom on pricing, and Apple's resistance to curation of the App Store are driving "independent app developers into larger organizations and venture-backed startups." Apple is also known to cut contact with developers if they release for Android first. The "climate of fear" even affects journalists, who face not only stonewalling from Apple after negative reporting, but also a brigade of Apple fans and even other journalists trying to paint them as anti-Apple.
Beyond that, the industry has learned that they can't rely on Apple's walled garden to make a profit. The opaque app review process, the race to the bottom on pricing, and Apple's resistance to curation of the App Store are driving "independent app developers into larger organizations and venture-backed startups." Apple is also known to cut contact with developers if they release for Android first. The "climate of fear" even affects journalists, who face not only stonewalling from Apple after negative reporting, but also a brigade of Apple fans and even other journalists trying to paint them as anti-Apple.
So what? Let them stonewall everyone, soon enough there won't be anyone left to talk about them.
And that can only be a good thing.
Haven't had the same experience; as a developer, we found apple to be particularly powerful, robust, and reliable versus the PCs we had prior. Then again, I'm pretty upset with Yosemite, and it's been years, so maybe the environment on the other side of that coin has changed in the interim.
I'm pretty sure Apple doesn't give a crap about what 99% of developers do or say.
The article says,
Why do Millennials tend to get so worked up about negativity? Why do they see it as a bad thing, even in cases when it's perfectly relevant and appropriate?
Typical Hacker News discussion is a great example of this. If anyone isn't gushingly positive about somebody else's work, even when this work is total crap, they'll be torn a new one and likely downvoted. They'll be labeled as "detractors" or as being "disingenuous", and basically shunned.
It's like Millennials can't handle any sort of criticism, even when it's completely correct and deserved.
Why are Millennials so often so thin-skinned?
It sounds like you're talking about Apple hardware rather than Apple as an organisation...given that the article is about the latter, you're kind of comparing apples with oranges (no pun intended....oh, OK, maybe just a bit intentional)
They are worth 700billion dollars. What would you consider a not dead company?
Yep, yep, sorry... Apple (as an organization) has consistently delivered hardware that we could count on, met or surpassed our needs (and alternative vendors), etc... then again, we haven't had any trouble with them when delivering apps for googleplay and ios side by side (re, the article), but they're not centric to our organization's offerings just yet, either.
At least in the fourth article, the one posted. I read the first three and found them to be largely unconvincing. I think you can like the flat look or not, like Material Design (barely mentioned, but brought up a few times) or not, and that's cool. But one of the main thrusts of his argument in the first three articles was that the defense of these designs was riddled with 'artspeak', a nonsense language used to dissuade criticism. I don't dispute it; I like Material Design (Android user here) but having watched the Material Design sessions from I/O 2014, I definitely got annoyed at all the 'artspeak' going on from the lead guy at Google (Duarte I think his name is). What's funny is that what rubbed me the wrong way about him was how 'Apple-ish' he sounded, so go figure.
But back to the first three articles -- they seemed riddled with a different kind of 'artspeak'. Churlishing comparing the simplish people imagery from Google with Children's books and comparing Apple's design to the child who can paint like Pollock didn't feel particularly high-brow.
Still, the over-arching point that I felt was useful was that criticism is not well-received at Apple (or Google from the sounds of it). That's a point worth dwelling on, especially since Apple in particular has the reputation of having the 'zealots' come out in force whenever anyone says anything ill of Apple. It was quite interesting to hear in the fourth article that -- unless I misunderstood it? -- there's someone at Apple whose job is to rile up the crazies when they get wind of that kind of thing on the interwebz.
But ultimately, the discussion about the problems of the App Store is more interesting. The 'race to the bottom' is something anyone with half a brain can see, and anyone who's a developer looks at that and must feel some gnawing fear. Maybe I'm wrong, but I feel like we're all pushed to mobile (if you're not on mobile, you're out of touch!) and when I look at the market, it gives me the willies. I don't think the Google Play Store is doing any better in that regard either. Worse, I don't have the foggiest idea of how to correct the problem, not even one that would take Herculean effort from either company to employ.
Wood Shavings!
- Godai
As a developer, it is the performance that counts, so no Apple stuff. Easy as 1-2-3.
Apple users don't think like that. For them it's a status symbol and a sign that they're truly dedicated to the cult. They'll not only happily overpay for the latest version of whatever Apple is hocking, they'll STAND IN LINE FOR HOURS for the privilege. Most Apple users aren't making a logical decision, they're making an emotional one.
Apple isn't a technology company. They're a marketing company and religious cult that also happens to make technology.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
But... has Netcraft confirmed it?
Linux is for people who don't mind RTFM.
It would rather be the other way around Win X => Mac OS X. MS did some progress thanks to the new CEO Nabilla. Mac OS did not happen to have deep changes with Cook. Mac OS is still the best "everyone" OS though. (and Linux the best kernel, but that's another story)
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
We've got only 1 AC on /. but (s)he posts a lot of crap.
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
Climate of fear? Really?
I could buy Apple being more robust or more reliable (because it's probably WinDOS we're talking about here) but the idea of the PC being less powerful just sounds like you swimming in the kool-aid.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
The 'race to the bottom' is just utterly normal for any market with lots of competition. The only way to escape then is setting yourself apart enough to command higher prices instead of trying to undercut the cheapest offers and this in itself is a highly competitive field (as in: works only for a few apps, not for all).
Face it, apps are like cups of coffee: Either you sell just coffee and people will buy the cheapest one or you manage to add some (real or subjective) value to your cups of coffee so you can sell with better margins.
But yes, it's almost impossible to make a living from $0.99 apps.
Marco's comments, and other valid criticisms of Apple get taken way to seriously by the mainstream press and distort the intent and strength of the criticisms. Apple does many things right, they do some things wrong; in trying to correct behaviour you need to have it be correctible, not merely a bitch session of unaddressable issues without resolution.
If you criticize your child for making a poor decision you don't subsequently publish that criticism in national newspapers...
If they are being arseholes on this kind of level surely the FTC should get involved the way the did when MS were being arseholes.
The difference between MS & Apple is MS just want your money Apple seem to want your soul too.
Build a Man a Fire, and He'll Be Warm for a Day. Set a Man on Fire, and He'll Be Warm for the Rest of His Life.
Considering my macbook pro has outlasted the top of the line HP laptops I owned at only about 15% of a premium? Yeah, it's just all status.
Hate on Apple all you want to for whatever irrational reasons but Apple hardware is fantastic. That, in itself, makes it worth the price.
So Apple users are too stupid/brainwashed to decide for themselves ? Oh, the irony!
Time for bed, said Zebedee - boing
The whole Apple ecosystem is built, designed and operated like a cult. People on both sides of debate frequently refer to it as a "Church". It funnels more and more money from the fanatical congregation into the pockets of the leadership through convincing them that they absolutely, positively *need* to upgrade to the next Operating Thetan, erm, I mean "version". Seriously, Scientology could take lessons from them. WTF did you expect?
Forget to put on our tinfoil hat and take our medication this morning did we?
Maybe they just want to be liked...in the Facebook sense...not in the real world sense.
People who bite the hand that feeds them usually lick the boot that kicks them
Yep, yep, sorry... Apple (as an organization) has consistently delivered hardware that we could count on, met or surpassed our needs (and alternative vendors)
Devils Advocate here, look what Apple did by gutting the hardware specs of the latest release of the Mac Mini. In addition they had slowly been morphing their hardware into something that is pure commodity - no user changeable RAM, Flash etc so you have to pay the full Apple price for those items when you buy the complete system, and you are limited by what they offer on the Apple store. As a result their hardware offerings are becoming less desirable every year to the point that I am considering that my next apple computer will be a hackintosh.
And I say that with 2 Apple computers, an iPad, an iPod touch and an iPod nano on my desk (and a Mac Mini in the other room)
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
I'll diss Apple publicly anywhere, anytime. Their walled garden represents easily one of the top 3 threats to computing freedom, and if you're a developer they're nothing but bad news - a nasty middleman who will dictate what your app can do and take your money for the privilege of doing it. For developers, the app store is a microcosm of the American dream, they'll tell you that you can make it on merit, but only a tiny minority will, the rest will just tread water and only enrich Apple in the process.
For users, it's the worst of '90s computing powered by the latest technology - a store full of shitty shovelware that you have to pay for or be annoyed by ads or restricted by a "trial version." And now you can suffer the latest shovelware technologies such as "freemium" gaming and rampant privacy violation! But because it's on a tablet this time, they think it's OK for some reason...the dumb fucks.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Let's be honest, this behavior of a company shunning a person/publication because they criticized the company isn't new. Many companies do this all the time. Electronic and car companies employ have been employing this behavior for quite some time. I'm not saying it's right, it's just the way business is. The company is in the market of selling something and if you bad mouth it or hurt the company, why should they give you access to them or their products. Now the difference is that developers are actually providing something that can help the companies sell more products. But from Apple's perspective there are new developers that can replace any that decide to leave. I imagine that they don't want to lose those developers, but right now it's not hurting their bottom line.
I think with people like Marco Arment and other people that were mentioned in the article, they know some of the guys that are working on iOS or MacOS and may of felt bad cause they criticized their work. As a developer my self, I never want to release a buggy product and work my hardest to fix as much as I can, but sometimes that choice is out of my hands. And obviously given that some of these people make their living off of writing about Apple, I think it's understandable they may be concerned that their words could hurt their reputation with the company and thus their living could be impacted. But that's a risk when you take a stance on something that impacts someone else.
If things get bad enough there's an actual 'revolt' against the platform, that would be something.
Agreed though there is no evidence I can see that such an event has happened or is likely in the near term.
Am I right in thinking the iPhone market-share is decreasing?
No. Apple's marketshare has been remarkably consistent for about 5 years. Apple also gets >50% of the smartphone industry profits which is arguably more important.
"Performance" in that context is highly subjective. Apple stuff does what I want pretty much out of the box; Android phones don't. For some people, it will be the other way around. These days I have more money than time to dick around with devices, so I am willing to pay top euro for whatever device works best for me, even if it is overpriced (in terms of profit margin).
As a developer, I understand that the race to the bottom is even worse on the Play store, at least it was a while ago, perhaps the App Store has caught up by now.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
I have been around here a long time too. Never seen an Apple product that seemed good enough to justify the high price. When I was given Apple kit at work for a development project I found the restrictions they imposed on what I could do with it - in order to preserve their control and profits - frustrating and damaged my productivity.
I found the skeuomorphic interface annoying and inferior to what I was used too with GNOME on Linux.
I don't hate Apple products - I just don't think they are any good.
Jobs was heavily into the kind of 'eastern religion' where you go spend a month with an expensive Guru. If he hadn't gotten started by successfully selling blueboxes to steal long distance time from the phone companies, you might today pass him by at the Airport beating on a drum.
Yeah, way to paint hundreds of millions of people with a brush that is appropriate for maybe 500 people.
For every one person who stands in a line, there are 100 that think that guy is an idiot, but still prefer to use Apple products to the competition. But go on trying to paint the picture that everyone that uses their stuff is some zealot that kneels facing Cupertino five times a day. That grew old in the late 90s.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
Aluminum works just as well and you don't have to order it from a Scientific Reagents Supply House.
And if you look into the memes surrounding what you typed above, you'll find that the tinfoil hat stuff refers to the cult members.
And Steve should have taken his meds. If he hadn't been such a crackpot cultist he'd likely be alive today.
I concur completely on your description of that age group. Sad it is, and quite disturbing. I've noticed over the last 5-10 years how a sort of "groupthink fog" has enshrouded Millenials.
A groupthink fog engendered by conforming to the whims of "social", instead of thinking for themselves.
However, I must point out, anyone who would be under the 24/7 influence of the smartphone/app/FB/twitter/texting paradigm they have been brought up in would end up the same way.
Interesting times indeed.
We play the game with the bravery of being out of range
Not at all, the parallels are pretty obvious if you think about it and as a business model it's working very well for Apple just as it has for many religions. They're not the only organization doing this, far from it, but Apple is just so much better at it than anyone else around at present. Steve Jobs wasn't some real-world parallel of Tywin Lannister who shat high-value dollar bills; those tens of billions in cash Apple is sitting on came from people who paid into the cult by buying Apple's hardware, and in many cases bought essentially the same hardware all over again just because the version number changed and a few things got slightly better... then did so again... and again. They didn't *really* need to, but they were obviously convinced that they had to, so just like a cult in other words.
I'm not faulting it; it's clearly working very well for Apple and their shareholders, but acting shocked and surprised that breaking ranks with such a setup puts you on the receiving end of a fatwa or jihad (to stick with religious parallels) from those still on the inside? Those are the people that are off their meds.
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
Come on. Not so big of a deal.
Got them moderator blues I blieve I walk out the do', With these mod-points I been gettin', I 'most never post no mo'
Their walled garden represents easily one of the top 3 threats to computing freedom,
How do you figure? Not saying you are right or wrong but I'm not seeing a credible argument backing up this assertion.
and if you're a developer they're nothing but bad news - a nasty middleman who will dictate what your app can do and take your money for the privilege of doing it.
"Nasty middleman"? As if Apple provides no value here. Apple created the f-ing platform, both hardware and software as well as the distribution system. It is WILDLY successful and popular. If you don't like how they do it, go somewhere else. Android or Blackberry or Microsoft are all options. Whether you like it or not, Apple reviewing apps does keep malware and other shitty or problematic apps out of the ecosystem. Are there downsides to this? Absolutely. Is Apple sometimes unfair? No doubt about it. But let's not pretend that there is no benefit either. Apple has created something that a huge number of people value very highly and are willing to pay for. There is nothing wrong with being a middleman as long as you are providing value and Apple clearly does to a lot of people. Maybe you don't value what they are selling (and that's totally fine) but many others do.
For developers, the app store is a microcosm of the American dream, they'll tell you that you can make it on merit, but only a tiny minority will, the rest will just tread water and only enrich Apple in the process.
Let's be frank. 99.999% of the apps on the app store are crap (see Sturgeon's law) and do not deserve any of our money. Just because you put something out there doesn't mean it is automatically valuable to anyone else. If someone is delusional enough to think that developing a crappy piece of software entitles them to anything then I have no sympathy.
For users, it's the worst of '90s computing powered by the latest technology - a store full of shitty shovelware that you have to pay for or be annoyed by ads or restricted by a "trial version."
So every developer is supposed to live the dream and somehow be part of the 1% and they all develop undiscovered gems but you admit that most of the software is actually crap not worthy of purchase. So which is it? You're contradicting yourself. If the developers develop something worth buying, people tend to buy it. If they make shovelware then they deserve to lose money. Neither is Apple's fault or responsibility. Apple just makes both possibilities available. It's up to the developer to make something people will actually give a shit about.
I'm surrounded by Apple users. iPads, iPhones, iThis and iThat...
Have been for years.
I was going to get an iPhone after my BB became annoying...
I got a Galaxy instead.
Yes, they are both very tied into their respective "camps". And I understand the evil ways of Google too well...
However, I cannot stand Apples UI.
I have never understood the appeal of being forced to do things a certain way, when there are other devices that allow multiple ways to achieve things on a device.
Never understood the appeal.
We play the game with the bravery of being out of range
They are valued at 700billion in the stock market. "What do I consider a bloated balloon??"
RadioShack's new CFO was touting money in the bank numbering in tens of Billions and several tens of Billions above that worth in assets when the new CEO took over 2 or 3 years ago. Guess where RadioShack will be at the end of the week? Any RS that remains open will either be converted into a Sprint Store with an electronics section or possibly a GameStop. The rest will be gone.
Another take would be: How long does it take for depleted Star to go from stable, to Gas Super Giant to (Super)Nova? Just because they've got net worth of 700bn doesn't mean that they have the fuel to keep that from blowing up or imploding in their face.
Page one of Google search for "Apple Church" throws up The church of Apple. No shit. And a parody Apple news site. I like this one. Plus a couple of serious articles full of worlds like devotion, mecca, evangelical fervor, reverence... you get the idea.
Human Rights, Article 12: Freedom from Interference with Privacy, Family, Home and Correspondence
Must be the magic fairy dust foxconn spreads on the exact same parts and the competing PC.
IMO this is an example of exclusive dealing arrangements and restricting free trade.
15 USC Code 1 Trusts..
Every contract, combination in the form of trust or otherwise, or conspiracy, in restraint of trade or commerce among the several States, or with foreign nations, is declared to be illegal. Every person who shall make any contract or engage in any combination or conspiracy hereby declared to be illegal shall be deemed guilty of a felony, and, on conviction thereof, shall be punished by fine not exceeding $100,000,000 if a corporation, or, if any other person, $1,000,000, or by imprisonment not exceeding 10 years, or by both said punishments, in the discretion of the court.
From that, $100 mil is a slap on the wrist, wait, a mosquito bite for Apple.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/we...
Exclusive dealing agreements require a retailer or distributor to purchase exclusively from the manufacturer. These arrangements make it difficult for new sellers to enter the market and find prospective buyers, thus depressing competition. However, because companies widely-use requirements contracts, which essentially are exclusive dealing agreements, for purposes that promote competition, exclusive dealing arrangements only face rule of reason scrutiny..
Section 2 makes illegal a firm's refusal to deal with another firm if the refusing firm refuses for the purpose of trying to monopolize the market. Meanwhile, section 1 prohibits a group from refusing to deal with a particular firm. A group refusal to deal is known as a group boycott. Because of seemingly contradictory Supreme Court decisions over the years, the question of whether group boycotts are subject to the rule of reason or a per se rule has been left murky.
Apple with it's walled garden can certainly dictate who's allowed in but I think there could be legal grounds for challenging that in court. Sure Apple can say "we're protecting our customers" but at the same time they're restricting competition and free access to markets, namely the app store.
Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
In an article about 'developer fears of Apple' it probably isn't tactful to boast about the loot Apple rakes off the top.
Who'se boasting? I have no affiliation and no particular affinity with regard to Apple. The fact that a few developers are terrified of Apple is not evidence of a widespread problem and the fact that Apple is hugely profitable is pretty much the worst kept secret on the planet.
It isn't expensive anymore to use an eCommerce framework to sell direct to your customers.
Care to wager on that? (Disclosure: I'm a certified cost accountant.) Just because you can set up some software to do ecommerce does NOT mean that it is cheap to reach consumers. In virtually any software company you care to mention, only about 10-20% of cost is in engineering and development. The VAST majority comes of cost to a software company comes from Sales, General and Administration with Sales accounting for the lion's share. Doesn't matter what software company you mention from Microsoft on down to little tiny firms, the basic cost structure is roughly the same. Gross margins are usually somewhere between 60%-80% and net margins are somewhere between 10%-30% with sales and marketing making up most of the difference between the two margins. Microsoft for example spends about 2X as much on SG&A as they do on R&D. If you think selling software is cheap you have never tried to sell software on any sort of scale.
Selling software is not merely a matter of setting up an ecommerce platform. Even ignoring the technical issues, there has to be a reason for people to go there in the first place. That requires marketing (read $$$) even for a very good product, much less the shovelware that accounts for most mobile apps. You'll easily spend as much or more as Apple takes in most cases setting up a system that probably won't work as well and which almost definitely will be more annoying to customers.
Competitors gonna compete! I built my app for a competitor first and now they won't talk to me? Oh noes!
That's some grade-A whining right there.
Most devs build our apps for our customers, not for OS manufacturers.
Got them moderator blues I blieve I walk out the do', With these mod-points I been gettin', I 'most never post no mo'
Fuck apple's walled garden approach
Personally I'd rather have my idiots at home glued to the TV than out doing idiotic things
Apple is more robust? Tell that to the 100s of thousands of people with 2011 macbooks which overheat and die, even after multiple motherboard replacements. It has reached class-action status because Apple is unwilling to acknowledge any defect.
We have a 2011 macbook here that has had the motherboard replaced 4 times, and is now out of warranty and Apple wants $1200 to replace it again. Fortunately we found a place that will "re-ball" the chips that keep separating from the motherboard, for $250 a pop. Still quite horrible for a laptop that cost too damn much to begin with.
Apple is notorious for removing cooling to make their product more "beautiful". That is quite the opposite of "robust". Their latest macbooks have no fans at all, and I doubt that will go well for them in the long-run based on past experience. But, their laptops have to be "beautiful" or people won't buy them.
You're a troll, but you're not wrong.
I find a number of facts to be in basic conflict in the report. Most developers can't make a living through the app store, yet they are afraid of Apple for some reason - even though they cannot make a living. First the App store makes it fairly simple for every tom, dick and harry to write an app and put it on the store shelves. They don't need to package it, they don't need to setup their own web-sales site.... The problem is that you have a bunch of app developers that think if they write some small app that a trail of customers will beat a path to them and buy it, they think that any stupid app will make money. A lot of small apps will drive down prices for those apps, the smaller the easier to make the app the more competition. I remember 30 years ago that there were many substantive applications to do some basic functionality... word processing. I don't know how many different ones were created, but there were quite a lot. I know my father had 9 installed on his Windows computer just to compare them himself (head of an institution) to see which ones were any good. Most of those companies went bankrupt quickly - even though there was substantive (much much more than most apps in the store) development put into them. Unfortunately the current generation seems to think they are somehow privileged and if they write something they should be able to make a living at it... it is not the way the world works. You have to compete, you have to invest time developing an app that you are passionate about, you have to risk losing time/money on the venture. You have to market your own app outside of the store, and you have to differentiate your product from all others. If you are really lucky and you do all those things correctly, then maybe you can be one of the few that can turn it into a viable business. What it strikes me is that there are a lot of cry babies out there that either have not invested enough or have enough skills to make a go of it. Apple does not owe you anything -- it is up to you to market it. You have to approach it like Apple would which means you have to differentiate your product and worth more to people to buy it than the other products -- even if the other products are lower priced. All the app store did was give you a place where someone can enter the credit card and buy it.... Apple does not owe you anything. As far as developers being afraid... guess what.... it is not that much different than normal business.... When I do business I don't go out of my way to stab companies that I am working with -- it is just not good business. I usually approach it with two faces.... one for when I am dealing directly - where I am more honest and then one that is a public face where I don't air any dirty laundry because it is not good business.
Really? I had to get a new battery for it, but my 2010 HP Envy 15 Macbook competitor is still running fine, and has a faster GPU than they ever had. And I've even been able to upgrade the RAM and replace the hard drive in it, hauled it with me on an airplane twice a week for over a year, and generally used the hell out of it.
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
Hate on Apple all you want to for whatever irrational reasons but Apple hardware is fantastic. That, in itself, makes it worth the price.
"better than HP" does not mean "fantastic". You've got to be better than the high-end Toshibas and Lenovos of the world, not just HPs. HPs have never been known for being particularly good, only for HP being willing to pack the highest-end parts into the machines. Their case design is usually beyond awful. That's one place Apple shines, but they're not the only ones.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Perhaps this was true at a time when Apple's user base was rather small, but they're shipping hundreds of millions of phones and far, far more computers than they ever had before. In the U.S. they have something near a 50% market share for smart phone purchases. Calling it a cult at that point seems more than a little disingenuous.
So does half of all US smart phone consumers belong to a cult?
Samsung spends far more on marketing than Apple.
Are they abandoning the Radio Shack brand? Because I specifically went into the local RS store a few miles from here last week and everything seemed just the same. The store clerk looked like a corporate borg, replacing the old 'local folks' types who used to clerk there, but the merchandise and signage all looked the same.
Bing's first search result for 'Apple Church' is an app called 'Church' in iTunes. Go figure.
The second link is to the 'Church of Apple' site. First article there is one that absolutely gushes about the Apple Watch.
If Steve were alive the Watch would already be in the glass display case next to the Newton. But fans will gush, because it's a lifestyle, not a choice.
WHY would you expect HP *anything* to last?
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
you can loudly proclaim "This sucks!" with no fears of reprisal from MS or the community. But god forbid you ask why you can't remove useless built-in iOS apps.
Do your homework before building a hackintosh. I've built several over the past five years, and Apple is quietly making them less compatible, at the moment by restricting iMessage and Facetime to machines with legitimate serial numbers. For my next machine, still a few years down the road, I'll save up the extra dollars and buy the one I want from Apple, properly outfitted from the start.
So... You're trying to prove the article's point with clever satire?
Lucky you. I guess you weren't affected by the GPU failures in that line of laptops. Overheating is pretty common.
Forget to put on our tinfoil hat and take our medication this morning did we?
Can't think of a response the argument presented? Just resort to Ad Hominem attacks against the writer instead.
The real question is, at what point do anecdotes become statistically important? How man individual stories do we need to hear before a trends start to emerge? Maybe there's nothing to it, but gather enough personal experience and at the least you will see if and where further investigation is warranted.
Dude...By the end of March RadioShack is dead. D-E-D - dead. They've filed chapter 11 bankruptcy and are liquidating. On Saturday, Sunday, and Monday the local RS stores near me will be having a grab-bag event where you can fill a small bag for $5, a medium bag for $15, and a large bag for $50. Anything that fits is yours. My local store has a crap ton of R-Pi's and Arduino Kits and shields left, and no one around me wants them. I'll be able to buy out the entire stock with a $15 bag or two... that's over $500 - 1,000 worth of equipment.
As far as the continued brand name: Sprint bought something like 1700 stores at auction on the 16th of this month, GameStop got a few others, the rest of the stores in the nation will be shuttered. The ones that remain will be RadioShack in brand only, and if I read correctly, it'll be something like "RadioShack by Sprint" or some crap like that. The stores GameStop bought I think are going to be losing the brand altogether.
The story was submitted as anonymous, in order to avoid problem with Apple. I rest my case.
Get my e-mail after a captcha test in: http://tinymailt
The reality is that those things are actually becoming less important for the consumer market. I hate to be of the '8GB should be enough for anybody' ilk, but for the kind of things that people are actually doing, that's probably true.
Think of it this way: the Macbook is the laptop you should be recommending to MOST people that ask you for advice. You only deviate from that advice if they have some sort of restriction or requirement. There are times where you might want to recommend the air, and for nerds you should recommend the pro. But the stock Macbook is going to be my recommendation every time without any extra info.
Similarly, if you need something with upgradable RAM, you're simply not the market for a Mac Mini anymore. I had my Mom buy a new Mini last year when her old one kicked it. She will never need to upgrade the RAM. For the things she does (playing MP3s, watching YouTube, email) the machine is vastly overpowered for her needs. That they make it in very few configurations is less of an issue because it's reached appliance status. You may as well complain that your fridge doesn't come with an upgradable cooling unit and spare bays for future extensions. It's just not that sort of tool when you're talking to most people.
For my part, I'm still on an early 2009 iMac with a 2013 Mac Mini that runs headless. 8GB of RAM really IS enough for 100% of what we do at home. I'd only want more RAM because it's one of those things that it's always nice to have more of just so you don't have to care about what's running, but it's not really necessary. I'm already running a lot more things than I need to.
"the industry has learned that they can't rely on Apple's walled garden to make a profit."
Profit was never guaranteed. Anywhere. I wonder what part of the lessons in economics and capitalism did these "Industry" people miss out on? Did they fail the class too? Did they just skip class all together?
You still have no way of operating the GUI elements. Phones have a touchscreen interface.
When the phone is in "pretend to be a desktop" mode, with a Bluetooth keyboard and an external monitor, its touch surface would behave like a trackpad. People who have used Apple's Magic Trackpad would have little trouble adapting.
And in carrying all those bits, you might as well have brought a laptop
I didn't carry a monitor. I carried a phone, a ZAGGkeys Flex keyboard, and an HDMI video cable, and I'm using someone else's monitor that happens to be in front of me.
Samsung spends far more on marketing than Apple.
They have done that in the past, at times massively. Right now Samsung mobile revenues are down, and if they spent the same money on advertising they spent in the past, the would actually lose money. Profits are down as it is.
The semiconductor part that has actually grown in revenue and profit doesn't really need that much marketing.
They are valued at 700billion in the stock market. "What do I consider a bloated balloon??"
Apple made $18bn profit in the last quarter. $72bn per year. That's 10 percent of the stock price. With the money they have in the bank, they can earn the current shareprice in profits in about 8 years.
Now tell me what machine beats a 15" Retina MacBook Pro.
The main thing that's happened is that simple horizontal applications are approaching a price of $0. The answer is don't code simple horizontal applications if you are looking to make money. That doesn't mean the whole model is broken but that there is massive oversupply of particular types of applications.
Apple app store payouts are about $5b growing at a rate of about $1b / year. I'm having a hard time seeing a medium sized and rapidly growing revenue stream as not existing. It is absolutely concentrated though that's true. Where it isn't concentrated is money from vertical and custom applications which far exceed the app store payouts.
But what was RS's revenue and net profit?
Apple just posted $18bn in net profit over 3 months. That was in an article titled "US technology giant Apple has reported the biggest quarterly profit ever made by a public company."
They're pulling in 182 billion a year in sales. Their revenue is bigger than the GDP of my country.
If they were a country, their net profit puts them at 91 when compared to the profit of countries.
How do you compare Apple to RS, who have been losing millions every year for many years.
Their last profit was back in 2011, at $72M, 2012 was a loss of $140M and $400M loss in 2013
I could buy Apple being more robust or more reliable (because it's probably WinDOS we're talking about here) but the idea of the PC being less powerful just sounds like you swimming in the kool-aid.
As someone who did tech support for Macs many years ago, I cant buy them being more robust or reliable.
And this was back in the early 00's where suggesting a Mac had a problem meant Apple sent hired goons to your office. You didn't complain that it took two weeks to get a PSU for an Imac... because it was just better (TM).
Pretty much anything you can get from a Mac these days can be gotten from another manufacturer for less money... Except the wank factor of course.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
o /etc/hosts file listings of local web servers (ie 192.168.1.100 mysite.org) no longer work.
o PPC emulator is gone, so have to run virtual earlier OS in order to run all my PPC software (which otherwise works fine)
o PITA turning off the utterly stupid and broken "app nap" for nearly every realtime app after finding they won't run correctly
o UDP broadcast reception limited to one client (not a limit that makes sense, or is present, for instance, under linux)
10.6.8 -- the last OS version that supported PPC. I stuck with it as long as I could. Then I moved, and now I'm really, really sorry.
(not the original poster)
He sure isn't. My lady has an iPhone 5; I have a Samsung Galaxy Note 4. Guess what she's about to buy? Hint... not another iPhone... We both also have recent iPads. Quite familiar with iOS.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
There's a questionable assumption buried in that: The assumption it takes a year to put out an app. It certainly should not. Unless the developer really, really sucks. And in which case, perhaps that should be considered with regard to remuneration.
A good dev can put a working skeleton of an iOS app or a full blown mac app up in a matter of hours. I can do it in minutes. Filling it with whatever one wants it to do doesn't generally take all that long, certainly not a year, unless you're building something as extended and construct/art heavy as Angry Birds, and in that case... you're likely to make more than 50k.
Now, as for those who are filling the app store (Android too, I'm not discriminating) with 50mb apps that hardly do anything at all... well, there you go. Given the level of what they've produced, perhaps it does take them a year. But I can't say I'm terribly worried about them, either. :/
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
It could be Apple hate, or, it could just be showing weaknesses in the Apple ecosystem. It could be self-righteousness, or it could just be reporting the reality of a situation. Don't be so quick to conclude one way or the other.
Apple have done some great things in the past, I'm sure we can all agree. You've certainly mentioned a few. It doesn't mean they're perfect, nor any other system out there. They've still got problems, and this Fear of Apple appears to be one of them. It can only lead to the downfall of Apple, so it's actually in their best interest to air the issue and possibly get a resolution out of it.
As for The Linux Desktop, technically speaking, it's ready. Been that way for years. Gnome and KDE deliver on the Desktop Experience well enough, I'd be comfortable recommending them to my parents. In fact, I have. My father uses a Gnome desktop, and he's fairly below average when it comes to computer literacy. The one thing holding back the Linux Desktop is marketing. That's where open source is the weakest. Convincing others that they need this product ... it's where open source fails, and Apple reigns supreme. Unfortunately, I don't see it changing any time soon.
When I was shopping for a new laptop as my development machine last year, I bought an Apple MacBook Pro because it was about the same price as high-end PCs. Then I installed Ubuntu with rEFInd. I rarely use the OSX boot. It's made well, and dang it, everywhere I go all the kool kidz have Macs, but few of them are running Linux. My last two laptops were HPs that fell apart, they looked like they were in a demolition derby.
Do your homework before building a hackintosh. I've built several over the past five years, and Apple is quietly making them less compatible, at the moment by restricting iMessage and Facetime to machines with legitimate serial numbers.
This. My Hack was fantastic (I built it to be able to have a proper, upgradeable graphics card on a "Mac"), but the fact that imessage no longer worked made it infeasible as a main machine.
Apple isn't the Deep State. It's MO is not to have "senior officials" make breathless claims to the WaPo or the NYTimes to be written down as fact in the Sunday edition. Their MO is to have the "big reveal" at a public event.
So 1) what you're talking about doesn't exist 2) ignores the plethora of clickbait in trolling Apple. See: John Dvorack in the 90's, or for the damn kids out there....just about any story on Slashdot. Like this one.
Because you're a Hateboi. Too bad Apple has placed at or near the top of hardware reliability since the Jurassic age.
If you're a sophist who thinks that a 7 lbs plastic brick is the same thing as a 3 lbs machine aluminum laptop because they have the same processor, sure. Comparable products cost comparable prices.
Your projection is noted. Look, Zombie Jobs isn't holding a gun to your head. If you don't like Apple products....try...not buying them. I have no use for a large-screen phone or one with a curved screen, but you don't see me whining at length about Samsung the company. I just buy what I want that does what I want.
Try it some time.
Foxconnn will build what you pay for. You want a cheap POS? They'll build you one. You want decent components that wont die two years after the warranty? They'll build that too.
Really. Everyone has their anecdotes, but Apple has long been at or near the top of hardware reliability.