
How we screwed (almost) the whole Apple community - pohl
http://day4.se/how-we-screwed-almost-the-whole-apple-community
======
kevinalexbrown
They might be severely overestimating the stupidity of the masses [1] here by
only considering the those who actually responded in comments or twitter.

 _Either they perceived the news as truth, or called it fake, no grey zone in
between. The split between the two camps, was quite unequal. An estimate would
be that 90% regarded the screw as a fact and based all the further opinion on
that, only 10% were critical to accuracy._

This smells like massive response bias. I imagine most skeptical and critical
readers get tired of responding with the obvious "hmm, how do we know this is
true?" response.

A more interesting statistic would be how many people saw it and didn't find
it interesting enough to warrant further investigation. I believe I saw the
headline, rolled my eyes, and went back to work.

That's not to say lock-out isn't an important consideration, but it didn't
pass the "this can be verified" test, and anyway, it would be obvious enough
once the new iPhone came out.

[1] Edit: maybe the masses are stupid (I'm not convinced of this), but the
vocal rush to judgement of a few is not necessarily a representative sample.

~~~
Arwill
The exact point is that the critics remain silent, while the believers (or
those doing it on purpose) carry the false news forward. Then those posts will
appear on the search engines. Then those searching about the topic will become
convinced based on big number of similar posts.

~~~
nirvana
Attempting to correct misinformation, for instance, here on Hacker News, is
essentially impossible and pointless. This screw story, like many others ("MBP
Retina is unrepairable", etc.) play into an ideology[1].

And no facts, no matter how well sourced, can defeat ideology when the
ideologues have the down button and outnumber the critical thinker.

For instance, pointing out that Apple licensed the technology they got from
Xerox back in the day, a stone cold and indisputable fact, gets down voted
into invisibility and claims that it isn't true and that it was stolen, here
on Hacker News. The claim that Apple stole from Xerox has been repeated so
often and in so many cases that it has become "fact" in their minds. Another
example is the idea that Apple didn't invent any new technology with the
iPhone. They need this to be true, so they spread all kinds of nonsense (like
2001, a movie, is "prior art", which shows a significant lack of understanding
of what patents are)... and they believe it.

It isn't simply that people are gullible, its that ideology (and apple hating
is a prevalent ideology) is stronger than reality for so many people.

[1] Maybe religion is a better word, it feels more accurate, but is more
likely to be taken as a pejorative so I'm going with ideology.

~~~
mbreese
This sounds a bit like the problem of the proliferation of news on cable TV
and on the Internet. With there being so many choices for news, people tend to
migrate to the source that aligns with their preconceived notions. So instead
of being presented with information that may run counter to what they believe
to be the truth, they only get their views confirmed.

With so many sources available, it's difficult to correct misinformation.
People tend to believe what they want the truth to be, and now they have
sources to confirm it.

------
arn
fwiw, they didn't just submit to reddit and wait. They also submitted it to
(at least some) sites directly. Doesn't look like any dedicated rumors sites
actually published it. Getting fake rumor submissions is a daily occurrence
for rumor sites.

The actual stories were posted on smaller sites which questioned the
authenticity. And Wired actually did an article on custom screws and used the
image as a jumping off point: [http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/08/if-
theres-a-screw-the...](http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/08/if-theres-a-
screw-theres-a-way-custom-screws-wont-stop-the-diy-community/)

So you can look at as either a success or failure.

(disclaimer: I run MacRumors.com)

~~~
masterzora
Actually, this comment here is the one that makes me think. I realised when I
ran across it that I and, judging by the comments in this thread, others are
taking the article at face value as truth despite that same article having
just told us not to do that.

~~~
thebigshane
That direction of thinking will only drive you crazy. Skepticism is good but
don't take it too far.

Also there is at least some proof that it was posted 5 days ago:
<http://imgur.com/fkyQS> and
[http://www.reddit.com/r/apple/comments/xvnvo/a_friend_took_a...](http://www.reddit.com/r/apple/comments/xvnvo/a_friend_took_a_photo_a_while_ago_at_that_fruit/)

I suppose we can question that day4.se were really the ones who planted it...
but, does it matter who planted it? The conclusion is the same.

~~~
masterzora
Please, examine the post to which I replied. The point is not a question of
whether the facts you laid out are true. You are correct in that they don't
matter so much. But consider in the context of the GP post: we have the
article appearing to lay things out fairly closely to "look how much everyone
believed us" versus the comment saying "well, not everyone". That is to say,
the message of the article still holds just fine, but it would still be fair
to carry this direction of thinking as far as "is their analysis totally on
the level?" Given that _this_ is more or less the message of the article, I
was just noting how, even with this very message in front of us, we aren't
necessarily heeding it as well as we could.

~~~
thebigshane
Ah, that wasn't quite clear. I agree, day4.se may not have had the effect they
claimed they had.

------
freehunter
Maybe a more accurate headline would read "How (almost) the whole Apple
community is screwed". On one hand, you have the people who believe this. On
the other hand, you have the ones who do not. In the middle is those who don't
care. We'll disregard them for this argument.

The people who believe the false rumor of a custom Apple screw are, at least
to a large extent, the people who wouldn't put it past Apple. There's a point
being made there; Apple has done a lot in their short history of mainstream
popularity to lock users out of their hardware and software. A custom screw
wouldn't be anything out of the ordinary. With this argument, Apple has
developed a notorious reputation and when people are believing this without
questioning it, it means the Apple community (as opposed to just Apple users)
is screwed.

The ones who would not believe it, I feel, are split into two camps. Ones who
saw no evidence of this being true, and ones who could not reconcile it in
their mind that Apple would be doing something like this. The ones who didn't
believe it because of a lack of evidence is the community Apple (and every
other company) needs on their side. The ones who didn't believe it because
they didn't want to believe it do so out of a blind love for Apple, and denial
that Apple could betray them. Even if this is a small number of people (you
can't deny they exist, though), it's still evidence that the Apple community
is screwed.

The first group is full of people who either hate Apple for similar-but-
opposite reasons to the last group or people who are suspicious of Apple's
history (especially after the newest Macbook Pro). There is merit in their
mindset, and that's not good for the Apple community. The last group is full
of done-no-wrong supporters, who will praise anything Apple creates for better
or worse. The lack of critical thinking and constructive feedback and
criticism is bad for the Apple community. Who knows if a review of a new
product is 10/10 because it's a good product or because it's an Apple product?

This is just my analysis, and I am happy to discuss alternative viewpoints.
For what it's worth, I'm not upset that these guys made a fake. It gives a
great view into the mindset of Apple news publishings and reactions.

~~~
smsm42
It's not Apple community. It's just people. The same rumor can be started
about anything popular with the same success. We had chain letters about
facebook charging for access and all kinds of other baloney long time ago.
snopes.com has loads of it. There's always some percent of people with low
critical thinking, and always some percent of irresponsible bloggers/press
which think spreading the rumor is always more profitable than fact-checking
it (and they are probably right - nobody ever got rich on ad dollars earned by
not publishing something).

~~~
arn
The flip side is, is it such a crime for blogs to publish these things that
seem obviously fake? Even when they qualify it?

We're not talking the New York Times here. We're talking Apple-fan blogs.

If I forward you a link by email of something interesting but probably fake,
do you get offended by me sending you something possibly fake? No, if you are
interested in Apple stuff, then you probably find it interesting, even if
fake.

Casual blogs are the equivalent of passing along interesting stuff found on
the internet, fake or not.

~~~
thebigshane
...Says someone in the business of spreading rumors.

You had the disclaimer on your top level comment but not this one:
"(disclaimer: I run MacRumors.com)"

~~~
arn
sure, I guess I didn't bother qualify the post, because I wasn't lumping
MacRumors in with the "casual Apple-fan blog" in my mind. That's perhaps why
we didn't post it.

------
rickmb
This whole thing can be reduced to "people who engage in idle gossip are
generally speaking not the sharpest pencils in the box".

Most people with half a brain just kept their mouth shut, so there's really no
way to draw any conclusion about the Apple community as a whole, unless you
can produce an accurate number on the people that ignored the whole thing.

------
jonknee
The funny thing is Apple does make their own screws. When they replaced my
back glass at the Apple Store they also replaced the screws so I would be
unable to service it later.

[http://www.ifixit.com/blog/2011/01/20/apples-diabolical-
plan...](http://www.ifixit.com/blog/2011/01/20/apples-diabolical-plan-to-
screw-your-iphone/)

~~~
runjake
Thanks for the link.

I'm a long-time customer of iFixit, but I've been really disappointed in
iFixit's attempts to shill their products with FUD (warranted or not) about
Apple. It reminds me of the "Chewie's" chewing gum scene in Clerks, where the
gum salesman is ranting about the cigarette industry.

Every critical post they make is a long diatribe followed by a shilling of
their products that does nothing to solve the larger problem. It's all about
selling their product. And hey, it's their right, but I find it tacky.

What's the point of their $10 "liberation" kit? It includes the pentalobe
driver for the screws they're replacing. Why would I _really_ need to replace
the screws at this point? I don't.

I thought this was a recent iFixit trend, but I see they've been using these
tactics for a while.

~~~
kwiens
Kyle from iFixit here. I just wanted to say that we just present our
perspective. The way we see things has evolved from taking apart thousands of
gizmos and learning from people all around the world what goes wrong with
hardware. We're constantly inspired my creative repairs.

Our goal is to help people get things fixed, and encourage designs that are
long lasting.

You're certainly welcome to disagree with us. I don't think we're any more
opinionated than Apple's designs are. We have a different perspective, and we
share it. We back up our opinion with relevant products. People only buy them
if they find them useful.

The Liberation kit was a fun way for everyone to get involved in the process.
We also sell standalone Pentalobe drivers—so if you want to keep your original
screws, you can do that too. Having Phillips screws on your phone is actually
quite convenient—most eyeglass kits have the small Phillips drivers, so if
you're in much better shape if you ever need to open your phone up to dry it
out while you're on a trip. The liberation kit is effectively the same thing
Apple techs use when you take it in for service and they swap out your screws
for Pentalobe ones.

iFixit isn't about marketing gimmicks. We didn't build the world's largest
repair manual and open source it just to sell tools. We're trying to change
the world.

Repair is win-win-win. You save some money by making something work again, the
manufacturer wins because their product is useful longer, and the environment
wins because it didn't end up in a landfill.

I'm convinced that what the world needs now—more than ever—is a free, open
source repair manual for every thing. That's what we're building, and it gets
better every day.

~~~
slurgfest
By publicly suggesting that Apple did something wrong, you guarantee yourself
a large number of enemies.

~~~
Ziomislaw
and even larger amount of followers ;)

------
WiseWeasel
What's funny is there's no indication from the drawing that the screw would
only work in one direction; it just needs a special screwdriver, and you have
to spend 10 minutes figuring out its proper orientation. When manufacturers
ship non-standard screws, they simply create a market for non-standard
screwdrivers. I had to get a three-pronged screwdriver to get into my Wii, and
it presented little obstacle. Given the difficulty of actually using this
particular design however, a discerning reader, and especially a tech
journalist should be able to see that this is completely stupid and
impractical. Apple is not in the business of employing technicians to spend
half their days orienting screwdrivers.

------
laconian
This is the brave new world of SEO in our media. Once reputable news sources
are more than willing to throw all their credibility out the door so that they
can be the louder wall of an echo chamber for the sake of impressions.

~~~
pavel_lishin
Didn't the article point out that most of the "major" news sources covering
this pointed out that this was an unconfirmed rumor?

~~~
alanh
That doesn’t affect SEO, does it?

------
shocks
I wish web designers would stop putting light grey text on white backgrounds.

------
BenoitEssiambre
Does anybody else hate those pale, faded out font colors? It does make the
page look better when you are glancing at it not trying to read anything but
it sure makes reading textual content (the actual point of blogs and most
websites) much more difficult.

~~~
missing_cipher
Check out: <http://www.readability.com/bookmarklets/>

Here's how it looks: <http://awesomescreenshot.com/02fd25oe4>

~~~
lmm
Wow, those humongous margins are far worse than the low contrast. Is there a
customizable equivalent around?

~~~
_ikke_
There is readable [1]. It gives you a bookmarklet with your personal
preferences.

[1]: <http://readable.tastefulwords.com/>

------
silvestrov
The media is hungry: there is simply not enough news to report to fill the
pages, and real news is dull and requires a lot of effort to understand and
write about.

So the media have to grasp every rumor, every speculation, everything which
can be made into a scandal.

They would never, ever, say "nothing to see here, pass on". That would be
loosing sales for them.

------
shadowmatter
"A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its
shoes." - Mark Twain (attributed)

------
incision
"When someone presents a bit of loose facts on Twitter, I usually respond with
something like ”64% of the facts on the Internet is 48% incorrect according to
52% of respondents”, completely made up numbers out of my head, but it makes
people think a little extra."

I really hate that particular brand of quip.

I find it most often employed by people who want to effortlessly dismiss some
statistic that they happen to disagree with.

I'm not claiming that's the case here or that Twitter is full of solid,
factual information. Rather, that it's a worthless way to respond. At least
the original posts in such cases, no matter how loose provide a context for
someone inclined to search out of the facts.

------
kawaguchi
Even if I doubted the veracity of the news, I would still be unhappy about
even the concept of an "unremovable" screw on my Apple hardware and my
comments would reflect my dissatisfaction with this idea itself, irrespective
of veracity. By assuming that people talking on Google+, facebook, twitter,
etc. are buying the idea hook, line and sinker, it ignores the likely
possibility that some people may just be reacting to the idea itself and hope
that their comments, along with the rest of the masses, would dissuade both
Apple (in this hypothetical situation) or any company that would attempt a
similar design in the future.

------
engtech
of course, the real problem is that Apple will read this rumour and then get
the idea of implementing these screws to lock consumers out of their devices
and achieve the utopia of "no consumer serviceable parts".

------
mpchlets
This sounds a whole like like the Sokal Affair - take a look at it on
wikipedia if not familiar. And all before the Internet.

------
Apocryphon
This seems awfully irresponsible.

~~~
omh
In what way?

~~~
Apocryphon
Spreading false rumors, especially a potentially damaging one.

------
rhizome
The author could have saved a lot of time and effort in coming to the
conclusion that distance from the truth is problematic. Jean Baudrillard wrote
about it in "Simulacrum and Simulation" 40 years ago, which was adapted into a
movie called "Multiplicity," starring Michael Keaton.

------
Cl4rity
First of all, this problem isn't unique to tech journalism or the Internet.
Stuff like this has happened in old media several times in the past--where's
the outrage for that?

Secondly, the spread of misinformation, when it does happen this quickly, is
usually rectified just as quickly. The good thing about most reputable tech
blogs is that updates happen quickly and often. Anything you might have
accepted as fact one day might be dispelled the next.

Aside from Apple's stock tanking several years ago when Ryan Block published a
news story on Engadget about delayed iPhone shipments, when was the last time
anyone was hurt by this sort of misinformation, anyway?

------
josteink
I think it's fair to say the Apple community got exactly what it wanted here.
This sort of "trick" wouldn't be playable on any other community, because its
rabid fanboys tend to care about other things than screws.

Apple fanboys however... They care about the margins of product-announcement
papers and reads the future from them like gipsy-queens reads tea-leaves. It's
an impressive performance, but still oh so pointless.

Because they miss the important thing: A screw is an implementation detail.
What you want is open access to the bits which matters: SIM, battery, storage,
platform and bootloaders.

Provide me with that and I couldn't care less what screws you use.

------
chernevik
A more interesting question is the drawbacks of taking time to scrutinize, or
making more conditional statements, or waiting for confirmation. Meme
direction seems to be set pretty early, and hard to move once set. It's a
commonplace of politics that you have to react within the news cycle or the
story gets away from you, and everyone agrees this is not a good thing.

So anyone taking the time to actually think through a bit is surrendering
time, at an important moment in the discussion, to less careful people.

------
mpchlets
This reminds me of the Sokal Affair:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sokal_affair>

Very similar idea - and all before the Internet.

------
conductr
What role does truth play?

I think most readers understand that apple news is rumor (unless it comes from
apple). So the reader doesn't really care if the news is true. They want are
stating their opinions as if it were true. They may not explicitly say "i know
this is probably fake, but if not, apple can go screw themselves."

Similarly, the publishers are purely reporting the existence of this
conversation to their readers. Like "hey, this is what folks are talking
about, you might be interested".

------
JamesLeonis
My grandfather sends me those political chain emails asking if they have any
validity. He's pretty skeptical and deletes the majority of these, but every
now and again he wants more information. That's where I come in. Last night I
responded to one where the author attacked his opponent's credibility without
any cited sources, for or against. I wrote him a long response about the need
for sources, as well as the need to check the source's credibility.

What this article points out is how the news media is very hungry for new
stories, and their need to publish as soon as possible. This means unverified
information passes through the journalistic filter. This also points out, like
the emails above, that people will generally fall for confirmation bias in
many cases. Even HN has bouts of the echo chamber. It's really hard to
counter, even when you are actively guarding against it.

Manual critical thinking and checking sources _all the time_ is very mentally
draining. I would bet that most to all of us have some form of automatic
first-pass mental filter that immediately questions "facts" contained in email
chain letters, or the latest fad technology if it has too many buzzwords, or
Facebook posts. That is a shortcut we've developed so we don't have to
manually think about every bit of information that comes across our desks. It
goes immediately to the mental round file.

Unfortunately, there are people out there that do not have this filter. Maybe
they haven't mentally trained to look for these kinds of problems. Maybe they
were referred to the story by a trusted source, like a good friend or a
prominent publication. Maybe the information fell precisely into their
particular confirmation bias that it bypassed their skepticism. Political
advertising _thrives_ on this problem. Unscrupulous con men thrive off this
problem.

But it happens to us all the time. I fall for it all the time, even though I
try to find the "real" facts and am generally skeptical of most things. Thus
it doesn't surprise me that people fell for the screw hoax, because Apple is
traditionally very secretive and has a history of locking out DIYers. That
screw fit Apple's MO to a T, and thus likely slipped through many of the
internet bullshit filters and went viral. It happens. It will happen again.

The best we can do is try our best to root out false information, and accept
that we will be fooled from time to time.

------
mmanfrin
This isn't limited to Apple, this isn't limited to tech. The small fish eat
the lies of the smaller fish, and in turn get eaten by the medium fish, and a
rumor turns in to a meal down the road for aggregator-type media sites. This
happens with tech, but also with gossip, news, politics, everything.

This isn't new, either. This is just a cyclical case of lazy journalism.

------
mladenkovacevic
Just listen to the news tonight and count how many times dramatic reports are
immediately followed by "...independent sources say".

------
atruepoint
It's really interesting to look at the ways in which media distribution models
have changed--especially the level of perceived authenticity in television 40
years ago vs now. As the internet becomes a greater and greater form of
information dissemination, new models are going to need to develop in order to
provide truth in media.

------
mpchlets
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sokal_affair>

------
bryanlarsen
For more information on how the media is manipulated in the 21st century,
check out Ryan Holiday's book: [http://www.amazon.com/Trust-Me-Lying-
Confessions-Manipulator...](http://www.amazon.com/Trust-Me-Lying-Confessions-
Manipulator/dp/159184553X)

------
jconley
Clearly the game of Telephone has never been able to have a higher impact than
it does today with the speed and scale of the social internet.

But I think there is one question left unanswered: Why are we assuming this
story itself is in fact true? Because it's written on a blog? :)

------
lnanek2
Reminds me of this book: Trust Me, I'm Lying: Confessions of a Media
Manipulator [http://www.amazon.com/Trust-Me-Lying-Confessions-
Manipulator...](http://www.amazon.com/Trust-Me-Lying-Confessions-
Manipulator/dp/159184553X/)

------
pavel_lishin
I wonder how often companies pull stunts this against their competitors.

~~~
lazugod
Would the Mojave bait-and-switch count? Like this article, it was intended to
be publicly revealed. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mojave_Experiment>

------
shasta
I see what happened. Apple, attempting to mitigate the damage caused when
drawings of their new incompatible screw design leaked, has found a couple of
patsies to claim it was a hoax.

------
benthumb
>We must become more critical of what we read and think 'Is this reasonable? '

The problem w/ this prescription is that just b/c something is 'unreasonable'
to us doesn't make it untrue.

------
printer
_"Apple is the world’s largest company"_. Last time I checked Apple was listed
somewhere around 30 (20th for most profitable). Maybe Day4 didn't check there
facts...

------
splicer
This reminds me of a Dilbert episode:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEOOFanQms0>

------
davecap1
Hold on. How do we know this article is even true?!

~~~
brendonjohn
Funny, after reading i thought this too, so did some google'n... how do we
know google isn't in on this too? <.<

------
smooradian
All the more reason why we need to teach kids in elem schools now how to
identify real info and research sources. What a mess.

~~~
kwiens
(iFixit here.) We told every reporter we talked to that it was a fake. But we
didn't get very many calls.

------
blhack
Could somebody explain what makes any of this stuff "security"?

Go ahead and make some weird top secret screw. We'll 3D print a drive for it.

------
rco8786
Does anyone else have a really hard time reading this? Need a little more
contrast on the font color, por favor.

------
eyevariety
Make the body font on your blog bigger - its all out of proportion with the
rest of the site design.

------
beweinreich
I think it'd be hilariously ironic if a story came out next week claiming this
story to be a fake.

------
gawi
On the net, everyday is April 1st.

------
Uchikoma
Didn't hear about this. Apple user. Guess the "(almost)" is a very large or
small almost.

------
Hominem
Apple is the world’s largest company, so they can take a few knocks.

Claims the article, by what measure?

~~~
pohl
It was true for a moment by market cap. That's probably where they got the
notion.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_corporations_by_market_...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_corporations_by_market_capitalization)

------
jere
They're called _rumors_ a for reason. People expect most rumors to be bullshit
anyway.

------
isyiwang
Please change title to: How we (almost) screwed the whole Apple community

kthxbye

------
vacri
Another day, another blog with low-contrast text.

------
Kilimanjaro
So if I post an article about RIM betting the farm in a new phone based on
Solaris and the stock tanks because of the domino effect in the news, am I
liable?

Yep, the poster should be in jail.

------
ozataman
This is absolutely hilarious. Come up with some !@#% that doesn't make any
sense and watch the hordes make it the most important news since the invention
of agriculture!

------
dvliman
unrelated discussion. did anyone think this site is hard to read? the font
size and color...

------
jamesmcn
It's funny because it's a pun.

