I gotta say that that was a very good observation. And I agree with most of your statement.
It's the cost trap you've fallen into. Are senior engineers _really_ more expensive if you consider
the possible re-factoring that may need to be done by inexperienced young professionals?
I'm the IT guy for the fast-foot restraunt across the street from Apple's main campus.
If you're flipping burgers, you're not an IT guy. I have several friends who are still working at the drug store after getting laid from their first software engineering jobs in 2001. They too claim to be software engineers even though the only thing they program these days are the scanner prices.
What an elititst little twit! I'll bet you're a lot of fun at parties. Oh, wait, I forgot; you don't have any friends TO invite you to parties...
All I can say us that I hope YOU get to "enjoy" an economic-downturn-inspired layoff that ends your tech-sector career. It's no fun, and is often a (negatively) life-changing event, from which you may NEVER recover.
I've written software since the 70s. Never had a problem getting a job. In '08 I left a good company to join a startup, cuz I was young and stupid and wanted a million bux. Startup flamed out after a year. No sweat, I'll just get another job.
Since '10 you wanna guess how many companies I've interviewed for? 0. Exactly 0. Nobody even wants to interview a 50+ person, let alone hire them. I've got 30 years experience with embedded systems. I've written several Linux device drivers. I've written 3x more for systems other than Linux. I've designed systems from back of the napkin descriptions. I'm pretty good at maybe 10 languages, expert in 3-5. Biggest of all, I understand the importance of SCM and bug tracking.
I'm not gonna shoot myself or anything, but I've got friends my age in the same boat I'm in. Unemployed for years, no health insurance, no income, nobody wants to interview us. Our golden years are looking like fools gold to us.
I could put my name on your story with very few changes.
I, too, had my embedded career of nearly 40 years evaporate in January, 2009, due to the economic downturn, never to return.
I now write Windows ERP Application Software (and was damn glad to get THAT through a handshake deal, after going through all my unemployment and all my 401k with no interviews).
I no longer Make Things Go.
Plus, Embedded work is now nearly 100% short term Contract work, spread out all over Hell-and-Gone. Doesn't work unless you are 20 years old, and all your possessions fit in a knapsack.
So your argument is that Google had to choose between an open source license or having a say, and opted for open source?
Yes, that is completely true.
If you think that there aren't "Additional Terms" in those "OEM" License Agreements between Google and the phone manufacturers, over and above the standard Android License that you or I would be bound by, you are as ignorant as goat piss.
There are no additional license agreements on Android. None. There is an additional license agreement, called the "Mobile Application Distribution Agreement", or MADA, which OEMs who wish to use Google's proprietary, closed source apps and services on top of Android must sign. That agreement is what I referenced in my first post in this thread, which is renegotiatied periodically and gives Google some limited leverage with the OEMs. That didn't exist at all back when Apple was strong-arming the carriers.
So, you are privvy to the OEM agreements between Google and the handset-mfgs?
I think not.
And Apple did not "strong-arm" anyone. They negotiated intelligently, and with the END-USER in mind. Hence, no Crapware on iPhones, WORLDWIDE, REGARDLESS OF CARRIER.
Google COULD have had that, too; and COULD have it come "Renegotiation" time; but CHOOSES NOT TO.
THAT is the world of Contracts. They can ALWAYS be CHANGED.
Because most if not all was ever in apple's hands. By the same form of logic, the US recycled $40M worth of gold from phones last year. And the US is a representative republic, so I recycled $40M worth of phone gold last year. Can't quite seem to remember where I left it.
So, since the population of the U.S. Is basically 320 Million, and the amount claimed was $40 Million, that works out to 40000000 / 320000000, or roughly 12.5 CENTS per human in the U.S.
Read the actual opinion instead of the news article. On the substantive issue of using intelligence data collected under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the FISC came out in favor of the FBI/NSA being able to use that data to investigate non national security ordinary crimes.
Sigh. Why am I not surprised. But I was SOOOO hoping for a Sudden Outbreak of Common Sense (or at least Constitutionality). And you're right. I was busy at work and just skimmed TFS. Thanks!
At what point do we say that the surveillance and treating everyone as a terror suspect is a disgrace and demand that this stop?
IMHO, about 10 years ago; but I must admit I am VERY surprised to hear a FISA-Court Judge dress-down the "intelligence" community. And publicly, to boot!!!
The reason is that if they are not regulated and monitored (what you call handcuffing) they will exceed the scope of their mandate. They will spy for political, personal, and criminal reasons. They will do things with their powers other than rooting out terrorists and keeping people safe.
The only problem with your statements are that they are written in the future-tense.
When it reaches the point where you are forced to cooperate and keep quiet about it at basically gunpoint, it's too damn late for being "concerned". What's next, "strong condemnation"? NSA, FBI and CIA (and others) are criminal organizations, and should be disbanded, stripped of all resources, and those responsible should be tried for running an organized crime syndicate, simply enough. What the hell does your "troubled" accomplish? Zip. It's to keep you idiots in the illusion that they are doing something about it.
JFK vowed to "shatter the CIA into a million pieces", and look where it got HIM...
Oh please, if the FBI had found anything even remotely useful they would be publicly beating Apple and lawmakers over the head with it. This whole saga is nothing more than a political wedge to extend their powers of search and seizure.
Google controlled *none* of those phones, and had no place at the table with the carriers.
To quote Pink Floyd: "Don't give me that do goody-good Bullll--shit."
You OBVIOUSLY don't understand "Licensing", or are being willfully-ignorant. Take your pick.
1. Google had FULL control over the *OS* in those phones (because they FULLY control the *License* under which the phone mfgs. could USE Google's OS, and they were free to place ANY terms in said License Agreement).
2. Google could have *EASILY* Requested a "Place at the Table", again as a condition in the LICENSE Agreement.
3. If you think that there aren't "Additional Terms" in those "OEM" License Agreements between Google and the phone manufacturers, over and above the standard Android License that you or I would be bound by, you are as ignorant as goat piss.
Google had no power, because Google didn't make phones at all, and had no interaction whatsoever with carriers.
That's absolute horseshit.
Google may not have had DIRECT influence with the carriers; but once Apple negotiated the deal with AT&T, they certainly had INDIRECT control, in that EVERY other Carrier OTHER THAN ATT was clamoring for one or more of the "me too" 'iPhones' that the Samsungs, HTCs and LGs of the world were developing. And WHO controlled the OS for all those iPhone-knockoffs?
Where any technically competent person can protect their data and not rely on Apple, who are known government accomplices when it comes to handing over user data, to protect them. In fact by default the Android passcode system is far more secure than Apple's 4 digit numeric variant.
1. Apple is known government accomplices, hahahahahahaaaa. The Hate is strong in this one...
2. Apple's Passcode allows up to 52 alphanumeric and punctuation character Passphrases using iOS' 104 character keyboard. Here's an article that shows just what that means, time-wise. Add to that the increasing wrong-guess delay (not to mention the 10 try limit), and you have what might be referred to as "your basic impossibility". If you'd spent as much tiime reading the multitudinous posts on Slashdot that pointed those facts out as you do spewing Apple Hate, you'd know that.
When hardware encryption fails, software encryption will just get stronger.
Now, I came to comment in this article, because I'm curious if there has been any information on what they found on the phone. Is there anything of interest, or are they just keeping silent about it, because they didn't find anything of note, as many had thought before they broke into it?
Their silence tells you everything you need to know.
No iOS device has been supported as long as the 4S has.
My iPad 2, which is at least a year older than my iPhone 4s, would beg to differ with you.
Both run iOS 9, and in fact, Apple's SUPPORT of these older devices included a recent Update to iOS 9 SPECIFICALLY targeted at improving performance on older devices, specifically the iPhone 4s and the iPad 2.
So yeah, I'd call THAT "Support"!
BTW, that's why I skipped iOS 8. It DID have performance issues on the iPad 2. But they fixed it with (IIRC) iOS 9.2.1
Meanwhile the iPhone 4S I also use is up to date on the latest iOS with no sign of support being dropped just yet, despite this phone being of a similar age as the Galaxy Nexus.
If you count "support" being an OS that runs so poorly on it that the phone nearly becomes useless, sure. Apple "supports" old devices by increasingly making them more and more useless if you update the software on them, hoping to annoy you into blowing another $800 on their "latest and greatest" phone that adds no new features other than not being intentionally crippled by Apple.
You're talking in generalities. Apple just released an update to iOS 9 specifically designed to improve performance on older devices, clear back to the iPad 2. And the iPhone 4s has a more powerful SoC than the iPad 2 I am typing this on.
Google played ball with the carries when Apple pretty much told them to fuck off. Apple devices are updated until they're considered quite obsolete. Android devices are stuck in an uncertain limbo.
I'm not saying mistakes were made. Google simply filled a demand and they have a good product that serves billions.
The lesson everyone should take away, though, is that carriers are the fucking problem.
While I agree with your first point, the Carriers are the problem ONLY because Google wanted to suck them off sooooo bad it let them walk all over them. They apparently didn't realize they were actually in a HUGE position of power, being the only other viable alternative to IOS (which Apple wouldn't license to third parties under ANY circumstances). They COULD have nipped the crapware and update issues in the bud; but NOOOOOOOO...
One of the big obstacles to regular updates is that many OEMs, especially the larger ones, have so many different devices to update. What looks to consumers like one product may actually be dozens of separate SKUs, for different regions or carriers, with slightly different hardware features, etc., and these different SKUs often run slightly different software. So it's not a matter of "the build", but rather dozens of builds for each "model", each of which has to be tested by the OEM, and then tested again by the carrier.
And this is one of the biggest reasons why Android sucks and iOS rocks.
Google wax apparently too stupid and short-sighted to look into the future a little bit, and see the all-too-predictable outcome of losing control over their "Brand". And make no mistake: Most people DO know that Android means Google.
So, now that Android has a reputation as a festering shithole of Carrier-Infused Crapware, Fragmentation, and rampant Malware, how can Google's reputation and "brand" NOT suffer?
Perhaps NOW we know the REAL reason why "Alphabet Soup Corporation" was created, eh? They are trying to gradually distance themselves from the (now-tainted) "Google" brand...
But when pressed by Representative Anna Eshoo, a California Democrat, for the source of that claim, Cohen [Captain Charles Cohen, commander in the Indiana State Police] only cited news reports. "That takes my breath away," a visibly frustrated Eshoo said. "That is a huge allegation."
As an Indianan, I am not surprised at that LYING BASTARD Indiana State Police "Commander". WTF is he even DOING on this Committee?
All the parts the other poster already pointed out. He's right, the web-site is wrong. I'm not going to waste my time googling for you. I know he's right and the article is wrong, because I'm old enough to remember most of it.
And bear in mind I'm saying this as someone who's often accused of being an Apple Shill. I have no reason to defend Microsoft.
Choose to believe we're both wrong if you want. Your loss if your historical knowledge remains ill-informed.
I'm old, too. But unless I'm the victim of Oldtimer's , I seem to remember that stuff going down about that way. I must admit that I never paid that much attention to the DOS crowd, though. Been an Apple guy since the Apple 1, and still have the Apple 1 to prove it...;-)
So, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on this. Maybe I'm wrong. But we're talking about MS; so, meh.
I don't know about Quicktime, but he's not an idiot for doubting that site, given that the DOS claims are indeed horse-shit.
Which part?
Most, if not all, of the facts in the Roughly Drafted article, including the stuff about Gary Kildall AND CP/M and DOS and IBM and Compaq are contained in many other articles and books.
So, if you have demonstrable proof to the contrary, I'm all eyes...
Slashdot Mirror
I gotta say that that was a very good observation. And I agree with most of your statement.
It's the cost trap you've fallen into. Are senior engineers _really_ more expensive if you consider the possible re-factoring that may need to be done by inexperienced young professionals?
CAP === 'quantize'
Precisely.,It's called "False Economy".
I'm the IT guy for the fast-foot restraunt across the street from Apple's main campus.
If you're flipping burgers, you're not an IT guy. I have several friends who are still working at the drug store after getting laid from their first software engineering jobs in 2001. They too claim to be software engineers even though the only thing they program these days are the scanner prices.
What an elititst little twit! I'll bet you're a lot of fun at parties. Oh, wait, I forgot; you don't have any friends TO invite you to parties...
All I can say us that I hope YOU get to "enjoy" an economic-downturn-inspired layoff that ends your tech-sector career. It's no fun, and is often a (negatively) life-changing event, from which you may NEVER recover.
I've written software since the 70s. Never had a problem getting a job. In '08 I left a good company to join a startup, cuz I was young and stupid and wanted a million bux. Startup flamed out after a year. No sweat, I'll just get another job. Since '10 you wanna guess how many companies I've interviewed for? 0. Exactly 0. Nobody even wants to interview a 50+ person, let alone hire them. I've got 30 years experience with embedded systems. I've written several Linux device drivers. I've written 3x more for systems other than Linux. I've designed systems from back of the napkin descriptions. I'm pretty good at maybe 10 languages, expert in 3-5. Biggest of all, I understand the importance of SCM and bug tracking. I'm not gonna shoot myself or anything, but I've got friends my age in the same boat I'm in. Unemployed for years, no health insurance, no income, nobody wants to interview us. Our golden years are looking like fools gold to us.
I could put my name on your story with very few changes.
I, too, had my embedded career of nearly 40 years evaporate in January, 2009, due to the economic downturn, never to return.
I now write Windows ERP Application Software (and was damn glad to get THAT through a handshake deal, after going through all my unemployment and all my 401k with no interviews).
I no longer Make Things Go.
Plus, Embedded work is now nearly 100% short term Contract work, spread out all over Hell-and-Gone. Doesn't work unless you are 20 years old, and all your possessions fit in a knapsack.
SSRIs
So your argument is that Google had to choose between an open source license or having a say, and opted for open source?
Yes, that is completely true.
If you think that there aren't "Additional Terms" in those "OEM" License Agreements between Google and the phone manufacturers, over and above the standard Android License that you or I would be bound by, you are as ignorant as goat piss.
There are no additional license agreements on Android. None. There is an additional license agreement, called the "Mobile Application Distribution Agreement", or MADA, which OEMs who wish to use Google's proprietary, closed source apps and services on top of Android must sign. That agreement is what I referenced in my first post in this thread, which is renegotiatied periodically and gives Google some limited leverage with the OEMs. That didn't exist at all back when Apple was strong-arming the carriers.
So, you are privvy to the OEM agreements between Google and the handset-mfgs?
I think not.
And Apple did not "strong-arm" anyone. They negotiated intelligently, and with the END-USER in mind. Hence, no Crapware on iPhones, WORLDWIDE, REGARDLESS OF CARRIER.
Google COULD have had that, too; and COULD have it come "Renegotiation" time; but CHOOSES NOT TO.
THAT is the world of Contracts. They can ALWAYS be CHANGED.
Because most if not all was ever in apple's hands. By the same form of logic, the US recycled $40M worth of gold from phones last year. And the US is a representative republic, so I recycled $40M worth of phone gold last year. Can't quite seem to remember where I left it.
So, since the population of the U.S. Is basically 320 Million, and the amount claimed was $40 Million, that works out to 40000000 / 320000000, or roughly 12.5 CENTS per human in the U.S.
Read the actual opinion instead of the news article. On the substantive issue of using intelligence data collected under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the FISC came out in favor of the FBI/NSA being able to use that data to investigate non national security ordinary crimes.
Sigh. Why am I not surprised. But I was SOOOO hoping for a Sudden Outbreak of Common Sense (or at least Constitutionality). And you're right. I was busy at work and just skimmed TFS. Thanks!
What are the ramifications if they get caught? We are not going to see a change until officials go to jail for domestic spying.
Then we're not going to see a change, sadly.
At what point do we say that the surveillance and treating everyone as a terror suspect is a disgrace and demand that this stop?
IMHO, about 10 years ago; but I must admit I am VERY surprised to hear a FISA-Court Judge dress-down the "intelligence" community. And publicly, to boot!!!
You KNOW it must be bad, when...
The reason is that if they are not regulated and monitored (what you call handcuffing) they will exceed the scope of their mandate. They will spy for political, personal, and criminal reasons. They will do things with their powers other than rooting out terrorists and keeping people safe.
The only problem with your statements are that they are written in the future-tense.
The ends don't justify the means if the end result of those ends means that in the end you become the very thing you were fighting against. THE END.
Exactly!
It's called "Blackstone's Formulation".
When it reaches the point where you are forced to cooperate and keep quiet about it at basically gunpoint, it's too damn late for being "concerned". What's next, "strong condemnation"? NSA, FBI and CIA (and others) are criminal organizations, and should be disbanded, stripped of all resources, and those responsible should be tried for running an organized crime syndicate, simply enough. What the hell does your "troubled" accomplish? Zip. It's to keep you idiots in the illusion that they are doing something about it.
JFK vowed to "shatter the CIA into a million pieces", and look where it got HIM...
Oh please, if the FBI had found anything even remotely useful they would be publicly beating Apple and lawmakers over the head with it. This whole saga is nothing more than a political wedge to extend their powers of search and seizure.
What he said.
Google controlled *none* of those phones, and had no place at the table with the carriers.
To quote Pink Floyd: "Don't give me that do goody-good Bullll--shit."
You OBVIOUSLY don't understand "Licensing", or are being willfully-ignorant. Take your pick.
1. Google had FULL control over the *OS* in those phones (because they FULLY control the *License* under which the phone mfgs. could USE Google's OS, and they were free to place ANY terms in said License Agreement).
2. Google could have *EASILY* Requested a "Place at the Table", again as a condition in the LICENSE Agreement.
3. If you think that there aren't "Additional Terms" in those "OEM" License Agreements between Google and the phone manufacturers, over and above the standard Android License that you or I would be bound by, you are as ignorant as goat piss.
Google had no power, because Google didn't make phones at all, and had no interaction whatsoever with carriers.
That's absolute horseshit.
Google may not have had DIRECT influence with the carriers; but once Apple negotiated the deal with AT&T, they certainly had INDIRECT control, in that EVERY other Carrier OTHER THAN ATT was clamoring for one or more of the "me too" 'iPhones' that the Samsungs, HTCs and LGs of the world were developing. And WHO controlled the OS for all those iPhone-knockoffs?
Google.
Where any technically competent person can protect their data and not rely on Apple, who are known government accomplices when it comes to handing over user data, to protect them. In fact by default the Android passcode system is far more secure than Apple's 4 digit numeric variant.
1. Apple is known government accomplices, hahahahahahaaaa. The Hate is strong in this one...
2. Apple's Passcode allows up to 52 alphanumeric and punctuation character Passphrases using iOS' 104 character keyboard. Here's an article that shows just what that means, time-wise. Add to that the increasing wrong-guess delay (not to mention the 10 try limit), and you have what might be referred to as "your basic impossibility". If you'd spent as much tiime reading the multitudinous posts on Slashdot that pointed those facts out as you do spewing Apple Hate, you'd know that.
When hardware encryption fails, software encryption will just get stronger.
Now, I came to comment in this article, because I'm curious if there has been any information on what they found on the phone. Is there anything of interest, or are they just keeping silent about it, because they didn't find anything of note, as many had thought before they broke into it?
Their silence tells you everything you need to know.
No iOS device has been supported as long as the 4S has.
My iPad 2, which is at least a year older than my iPhone 4s, would beg to differ with you.
Both run iOS 9, and in fact, Apple's SUPPORT of these older devices included a recent Update to iOS 9 SPECIFICALLY targeted at improving performance on older devices, specifically the iPhone 4s and the iPad 2.
So yeah, I'd call THAT "Support"!
BTW, that's why I skipped iOS 8. It DID have performance issues on the iPad 2. But they fixed it with (IIRC) iOS 9.2.1
Meanwhile the iPhone 4S I also use is up to date on the latest iOS with no sign of support being dropped just yet, despite this phone being of a similar age as the Galaxy Nexus.
If you count "support" being an OS that runs so poorly on it that the phone nearly becomes useless, sure. Apple "supports" old devices by increasingly making them more and more useless if you update the software on them, hoping to annoy you into blowing another $800 on their "latest and greatest" phone that adds no new features other than not being intentionally crippled by Apple.
You're talking in generalities. Apple just released an update to iOS 9 specifically designed to improve performance on older devices, clear back to the iPad 2. And the iPhone 4s has a more powerful SoC than the iPad 2 I am typing this on.
Google played ball with the carries when Apple pretty much told them to fuck off. Apple devices are updated until they're considered quite obsolete. Android devices are stuck in an uncertain limbo.
I'm not saying mistakes were made. Google simply filled a demand and they have a good product that serves billions.
The lesson everyone should take away, though, is that carriers are the fucking problem.
While I agree with your first point, the Carriers are the problem ONLY because Google wanted to suck them off sooooo bad it let them walk all over them. They apparently didn't realize they were actually in a HUGE position of power, being the only other viable alternative to IOS (which Apple wouldn't license to third parties under ANY circumstances). They COULD have nipped the crapware and update issues in the bud; but NOOOOOOOO...
One of the big obstacles to regular updates is that many OEMs, especially the larger ones, have so many different devices to update. What looks to consumers like one product may actually be dozens of separate SKUs, for different regions or carriers, with slightly different hardware features, etc., and these different SKUs often run slightly different software. So it's not a matter of "the build", but rather dozens of builds for each "model", each of which has to be tested by the OEM, and then tested again by the carrier.
And this is one of the biggest reasons why Android sucks and iOS rocks.
Google wax apparently too stupid and short-sighted to look into the future a little bit, and see the all-too-predictable outcome of losing control over their "Brand". And make no mistake: Most people DO know that Android means Google.
So, now that Android has a reputation as a festering shithole of Carrier-Infused Crapware, Fragmentation, and rampant Malware, how can Google's reputation and "brand" NOT suffer?
Perhaps NOW we know the REAL reason why "Alphabet Soup Corporation" was created, eh? They are trying to gradually distance themselves from the (now-tainted) "Google" brand...
But when pressed by Representative Anna Eshoo, a California Democrat, for the source of that claim, Cohen [Captain Charles Cohen, commander in the Indiana State Police] only cited news reports. "That takes my breath away," a visibly frustrated Eshoo said. "That is a huge allegation."
As an Indianan, I am not surprised at that LYING BASTARD Indiana State Police "Commander". WTF is he even DOING on this Committee?
You and I would. Everyone else would switch to Samsung.
Where they could all then enjoy that bastion of user privacy and security that is Android...
All the parts the other poster already pointed out. He's right, the web-site is wrong. I'm not going to waste my time googling for you. I know he's right and the article is wrong, because I'm old enough to remember most of it.
And bear in mind I'm saying this as someone who's often accused of being an Apple Shill. I have no reason to defend Microsoft.
Choose to believe we're both wrong if you want. Your loss if your historical knowledge remains ill-informed.
I'm old, too. But unless I'm the victim of Oldtimer's , I seem to remember that stuff going down about that way. I must admit that I never paid that much attention to the DOS crowd, though. Been an Apple guy since the Apple 1, and still have the Apple 1 to prove it... ;-)
So, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on this. Maybe I'm wrong. But we're talking about MS; so, meh.
I don't know about Quicktime, but he's not an idiot for doubting that site, given that the DOS claims are indeed horse-shit.
Which part?
Most, if not all, of the facts in the Roughly Drafted article, including the stuff about Gary Kildall AND CP/M and DOS and IBM and Compaq are contained in many other articles and books.
So, if you have demonstrable proof to the contrary, I'm all eyes...