I’m not that much, I want this monopoly to end of both of them. But indeed, Apple has far better lawyers and they know that the Judges are bloody idiots in the field of computer science. So they can get away with murder if they want to (and kind of are, if you know how their products are made).
This is why Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Amazon, Twitter… all of them… can do whatever they want and will not be stopped. And Facebook and Amazon are the ones that scares me the most there, people seem really very willing to hand over all of their life to those companies.
If Apple wanted a way to gatekeep who develops apps, they would have created a games console.
If it was about protecting their customers, they would have put the same Jail technology into MacOs, just like what Microsoft is doing with the Trusted Platform Module ‘Pluton’ for Windows 10 and Xbox. And that’s partly why Apple will not ditch IOS in favour of MacOs for iPads or iPhones, despite wanting to use the M1 chips.
What is it gonna be? iPhones and iPads are laptop replacements or are they toys?
I know in my workplace I have contradicted myself by saying “I don’t want IOS devices because they are toys and not not adequate computing devices”, but the majority seem to think that they are good enough or better than an actual desktop PC or laptop or even a Wintablet or Android tablet.
Even ChromeOS is less locked down than IOS, as you can install WINE.
But actually, I would be happy for Xbox, Nintendo and PlayStation to give you the option to install a desktop OS.
Nothing is as locked down as IOS, you can’t even develop for the damn platform without having some sort of MACOS machine. Which is totally unacceptable, but somehow Apple Cultists (not fans, those are reasonable), keep defending the shit. It is far worse than ANYTHING Microsoft did with IE and WIndows Media Player. This is total abuse of monopoly.
So to develop for IOS you need a MacOS device (legally one build by apple, but you can cheat and get it working via Virtual Machines or a Hackintosh… but if you grow big enough Apple WILL bann you over it.). Apple will favor their own services over yours, Apple Music has more acces to Apple’s own hardware than any competing service. The same goes for NFC technology based solutions (like banking) Apple demands a cut for you to be able to access it, you’ll have to do it via their services (even though you don’t on others). Blue tooth? Same thing…
Apple constantly gives their own services an advantage, which is not only similar to what MS used to do… but goes BEYOND it. FFS man, you can’t even repair their devices anymore, they got a chip in there that has to be “programmed” to accept the spare part! And only Apple and certified repair shop (read big conglomerates not the little guys) get that hardware. They used “security” as an excuse, but it totally is them wishing to be a “Don” in the Godfather and wanting to wet their beaks on EVERY little thing and in between. I mean they don’t even put a small little plastic sheet between their keyboard like other manufacturers. That would prevent splash water damage! They just blame the user instead!
And all the investments you do in their platform? Can be undone by them, if they cancel your account for “not agreeing to their practices!”, it’s madness! Not even IBM, Oracle and Novell went this far in their practices. Yet they keep getting away with it as their cultists will defend them to their grave (Fashionistas most of them, and again, I don’t mean the fans.). It’s madness, and until we get a proper knowledgeable judge, this stuff will keep happening.
I mean I’ve read the cultists excuses like “What is stopping you from going Android, they are not a monopoly! You can very easily switch”. iMessage alone is keeping people from switching!
But hey, I’m just a plebeian that “can’t afford their products!”. Gosh, Wozniak deserves so much better than this. If only Commodore had been led with more integrity and intelligence, then we’d still have Amigas and not this crappy shit.
I wonder if it is just the DoJ and the extensive lobbying these 3 are doing that is preventing any serious cases against them (Apple, Amazon and Google).
In the 2000s the DoJ was one step away from breaking MS. And now, these three have been generally treated with kids gloves for an extensive period . The entire Ballmer period was a shitshow partly due to Ballmer and partly due ot the fatigue of dealing with the DoJ.
Don’t forget Facebook. Those schmucks even take your data without your permission. If you have a friend with Snapchat, Whatsap or ANY OTHER Facebook subsidiary on their phones? Their addresslist will be leeched straight onto the Facebook servers, and every message you send or they send will go their too. They say “end to end encryption”, they don’t talk about what happens at those ends of course. A message isn’t encrypted until it’s send ;).
Really this shit is right on the border of legality and often goes beyond it. But people keep signing off on it for “convenience”.
Just cause Apple make a huge profit from App Store and IOS device sales, doesn’t necessarily mean that they are in the wrong.
However it is obvious Apple abuses their position to squeeze maximum profits from developers and its customers. They have a double standard in features for developers and competing Apps. They treat their devices as if they are just licencing the right to use them, not own them.
Their devices are incompatible and heavily integrated into their ecosystem and as an IT Manager I find it frustrating to manage Apple devices at my school.
The Safari browser is bundled with every IOS device and you have to use the Webkit renderer.
No convenient way to sideload Apps.
But funny enough, I blame Apps like Tindr, who artificially refused to make Windows 10 Mobile ports, and now they are crying that Apple doesn’t pay fair. They made IOS bigger than it needed to be. I think if Windows 10 Mobile was still here, it would have carved 20% of the market and then Apple will have less leverage.
It’s funny how this tidbit keeps coming up over the years and people never believe it, but yep, the Xbox division has never made a profit. They’ve been in the red since the original Xbox. The console exists because MS wills it to; if they killed it tomorrow the shareholders would throw a ticker tape parade.
There’s just never a distinct line item you can use in their filings though, because they always bury Xbox inside of another division to obfuscate the numbers.
Found this image that shows the most played games on EGS are either free-to-play games or paid games that have been previously offered for free on the platform. I think this is expected. What’s interesting is noticing that once you take these games out of the equation, the actual number of people playing actual paid games must be very low. Epic still has a long way to go with their store.
