

Apple is Finally Evil - abossy
http://eptiger.blogspot.com/2008/09/apple-is-finally-evil.html

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tptacek
When was Apple ever not "evil"?

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sunkencity
Yeah, Apple has always been as evil as Microsoft, but with better PR.

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netcan
Evil but cooler?

BTW, Apple's complaints about Microsoft have always been 'tasteless' not
'evil.'

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whatusername
Slashdot's complaints about "M$" have always been "evil" though..

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131072
I don't understand why Apple gets a free ride for manufacturing weapons
components (via their acquisition of PA Semi) and having a CEO that owns a
large chunk of Disney, which is barely more than a swear word among the same
people who appreciate their products on a technical level.

The iPhone SDK issues are merely disappointing in comparison. You don't see
two year old blog posts from the same group of people flaming Apple for not
providing a wireless device of any kind for them to develop on, which is
surely a bigger injustice by their logic. Where were these people when I
wanted some apps for my RAZR?

I think the Venn diagram of people who are affected by Apple's iPhone
development policies, and the group of people who complain about them on the
internet has a very small intersection, and if you add the group of people who
can actually code, you could probably buy the lot of them a round of drinks
for twenty bucks.

Personally, as a veteran of the war of mendacity against common sense that is
SOAP, I support anything that gets Dave Winer upset.

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unalone
How is Disney a swear word? It churns out a lot of popular crap and it has
Pixar making probably the best movies out there now. Steve Jobs made it
company policy not to release "direct-to-DVD sequels". Remember that? Without
that, Disney quality jumped a LOT (which, I know, just says how awful they HAD
been). Meanwhile, they've reinstated their 2D animation department, which is
BIG fun news and which might bring back the good old Disney.

Why should we criticize them for making weapons components or for owning
Disney? That has nothing to do with their products.

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131072
Disney is typically cited as a major force behind the never-ending extension
of copyright (the famous 'keep mickey out of the public domain' strategy).
Disney has also put considerable resources into lobbying for ever-more-
oppressive legal measures such as mandatory DRM hardware in computers. They
are no friend of the typical hacker. Steve Jobs, as a major shareholder and
board member, could influence this if he so chose. Apple also chose to
continue its weapons-grade product lines when it purchased PA Semi. Maybe they
have a contract they can't get out of, but they may well have had the choice
to shut down or spin off those products.

You can agree or not with those arguments, I'm not advocating for or against
them. They don't affect my purchasing decisions (the best tool for the job in
my current circumstances is a MacBook Pro so that's what I have). I make my
living working for banks that no doubt finance far worse things. If Disney
returns to form animation-wise I'll reward them with movie ticket purchases.
It just seems to me that all the people posting "Apple is finally evil"
linkbait nonsense could choose meatier targets than mistakes in developer
relations, and the fact they choose not to means they're not even any good at
being wrong.

It's crappy linkbait blog post pollution that irritates me, not anything that
Apple's doing.

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delackner
"Maybe they have a contract they can't get out of"

It really does pay to inform yourself before ranting. Worst case, you spent
some time but your argument becomes more clear. Best case, you prevent
yourself saying something uninformed and untrue.

In this case, yes, Apple tried to close the military product line, and the US
military strongly insisted that PA Semi continue producing their existing
military products.

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sunkencity
I'm a bit sceptical about the googlephone being the good guy. I wish he hadn't
started on that. It's very tempting to pit the google phone against the
iphone, but to be fair the only good guy in town is openmoko. The problem with
openmoko though is that the interface is utter crap, but it's the best bet for
a "free" platform for developers.

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litewulf
I'm curious how the openmoko is more open than the android platform?

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cstejerean
I'm guessing because the hardware itself is open and fully hackable whereas
with android all you get is a Java SDK?

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geuis
This is just IMHO: The whole "rant on Apple's app store policies" meme has run
out of mileage. Its kinda getting like Rickrolls, except not as funny. I know
several developers that have successfully gotten apps into the store. One of
them is doing _VERY_ well. His opinion when I asked him about this was
basically, "Apple states it all pretty clearly in the documentation when you
sign up. Some types of apps (podcaster for example) are obviously going to run
up against functionality Apple already has implemented, if in a different
form. You just don't develop for those areas." It seems like mostly the only
people who have been yelling, complaining, bellyaching, and blogging about
Apple's policies are the ones that can't read the frakking docs. The
developers who are all doing quite well don't have a big problem with the
restrictions.

Bottom line, the iPhone SDK wasn't developed by an organization like W3C. It
was built by a company that wants to make a profit. They own the incredibly
popular platform. If you want to play, you play by their rules.

Otherwise, you can write apps for Android. You can sell your apps to the 1/10
of a percent of people that will buy the clunky HTC Dream and similar devices
that do or will run the Android platform. I'd love to see Android running on
the iPhone. That would give the great hardware plus the open OS. I would stick
with the iPhone OS, but the option should be out there.

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comatose_kid
Totally agree. The iPhone is to developers as the iPod is to music owners.
Sure, music owners could hawk their wares on any number of music stores, but
only a deal with Apple would give them access to the huge iPod base.

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TrevorJ
This comes across as a bit rant-ish, but I can absolutely see his point. Apple
has a fine line to walk in terms of continuing to present it's users with the
level of quality applications they are used to however the lack of clarity
from Apple about the approval process coupled with the NDA means that nobody
can even learn from other developer's experiences.

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eptiger
Sorry, it was a bit rant-ish and I openly admitted to it :) I almost never do
that, but I was so tired of reading about all the junk Apple was doing to make
developers' lives harder.

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ojbyrne
Google "Power Computing."

