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Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

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Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#181

Post by anc2020 »

michael_dorfman wrote: post #95
stcredzero wrote: post #8

Summary: If you need to "originally" write your code in Swahili, while listening to Milli Vanilli, while reclining in a patch of mud, and then you need fifty oompa loompas to translate the Swahili into C, that is none of Steve Jobs f#ck^ng business.

And Steve's response, I imagine would be: if you want to sell your app in my store, it's my business. If you don't like my rules, develop for a different platform. Seriously: if Barnes and Noble decides it only wants to sell fiction by authors whose last names begin with "Q", wouldn't we just consider it a bone-headed move, and not the cause for moral outrage? The iPhone is not the only smartphone on the market, and…

> If you don't like my rules, develop for a different platform.

Okay.

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#182

Post by Lazlo_Nibble »

j-g-faustus wrote: post #49
commieneko wrote: post #2

No, Steve Jobs is not insane, this interpretation of the new rule is insane. Apple is merely (!) trying to control what tools people use to create software on their platform. I can understand why they want to do this, just as I can understand why I might, or might not want to comply. The legal terms used are to give Apple the tools it needs to get compliance. The only real issue is: do you want to develop for this pl…

> I can understand why they want to do this I can't. Except as a land- and power grab in the "all your toil are belong to us" category. I can understand that Apple attempts a strategic move to avoid becoming just another platform for Flash. I can understand that Apple may want to cut down on the number of submissions, and are assuming that those that go to the trouble of learning Objective-C/C/C++ are the "real profe…

> But Apple has no right to any opinion whatsoever regarding how I create those deliverables - that is my business, and remains so until I submit it.

So, companies in the 1980s had no right to any opinion whatsoever regarding whether or not the products they sold benefited the apartheid regime in South Africa? Amazon has no right to any opinion whatsoever regarding whether or not the books they sell are printed on paper made from trees harvested from virgin rainforest? Target has no right to any opinion whatsoever regarding whether or not the clothes they sell were produced in sweatshops?

There are a lot of arguments that can be made against this new rule, but the argument that Apple doesn't have the right to impose the rule in the first place is utter and complete nonsense.

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#183

Post by cookiecaper »

thenduks wrote: post #38

I don't get this at all. Why does everyone act like the iPhone should be as 'open' as an OS on your computer? Did everyone forget that when the iPhone shipped you couldn't write apps at all ? You can't write apps in Erlang for your Zune, your PS3, your cable modem, your microwave, your car or your apartments alarm system... no one cares. Yes, Apple wants (insists, even, if this ToS becomes final) you to use their too…

There may not be an out-of-the-box solution for writing Erlang apps on Zune, but what if someone wanted to make one? There'd be no problem. They'd still have to compile down to something that Zune understands and that's all that's necessary. Cross-compilers and language-to-language compilers are a big part of computer science, they are cool and great, and it is none of Apple's business how you build your program as long as it doesn't cause trouble.

If Ford made "drives a Ford" a requirement for all of its employees, would that be fair? Couldn't you just say "they want you to use their stack"? It is totally evil.

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#184

Post by commieneko »

kpanghmc wrote: post #171
commieneko wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, that's like Sony telling you that you have to use their development garden, which, the last time I looked into console development, they did... I'm pretty sure the agreement says nothing about what kind of keyboard you should use :) But if Apple wanted to specify that in their license, that's entirely within their rights.

You're missing the point. Just because it's legally within Apple's rights to do this, doesn't mean that we have to be happy about it.

No, you're missing the point, this discussion isn't about what we would like. This is about whether Apple is insane or within their rights to do what they did. There are lots of other discussions on this site about whether it's a good idea, or whether developer's should like it.

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#185

Post by rbanffy »

Jeema3000 wrote: post #133
rbanffy wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's worse than anything MS ever did. Perhaps for some values of "ever". Now, seriously, this is a boneheaded, monopoly-exploiting, move. If Apple wanted to one-up Microsoft, they would demand that every cell-phone operator that sells iPhones to drop all Android phones. On a second step, they would demand telcos to stop selling phones from manufacturers that offered Android-based phones. That would be a truly Micro…

...and then we wake up the next day and Google search and YouTube have "mysteriously stopped working" in all Safari browsers...

It would be fun to watch those three trying to out-evil each other...

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#187

Post by danparsonson »

ghshephard wrote: post #141
danparsonson wrote: post #21

The key is where they say "Applications must be originally written in Objective-C, C, C++." Take a pause and think about what that "originally" really means. Developers are not free to use any tools to help them. If there is some tool that converts some Pascal or, Ruby, or Java into Objective-C it is out of bounds, because then the code is not "originally" written in C. Yes it is "originally" written in C - when the…

The "Originally" clause was placed in their _precisely_ to forbid code converters.

Can I ask what your authority is on that? It seems that most people agree with you but I don't understand why!

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#188

Post by thenduks »

wvenable wrote: post #144
thenduks wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Considering the level of polish on the Cocoa Touch frameworks and the surrounding tools at release I'd say Apple was planning the AppStore long before the mob started RABBLE-RABBLE-ing about it. Still, I am absolutely not saying you shouldn't be allowed to complain. My point is only that I don't see what there is to complain about. I wouldn't complain about this any more than I would about not being able to write app…

> My point is only that I don't see what there is to complain about. I wouldn't complain about this any more than I would about not being able to write apps for my current crappy cellphone. Really? When I had a crappy cellphone, I complained that the WAP browser was constrained to my provider's walled garden. I managed to crack it enough get out and even write my own WAP applications. So not only did I complain, I di…

I think you've touched on our disconnect.

I'm not complaining about your complaining - I don't think you should stop or anything like that. I'm simply voicing my opinion just like you are. It's all good.

On to your points. If I was upset at my phone's browser (and believe me, my phone's browser shouldn't even be called a browser) I would just look for a better phone, one with a browser I liked. Same with the DVD player. I don't think that's what we're talking about here though. It's more like your DVD player vendor was saying "you can circumvent the FBI warnings, but only if you do it while singing the alphabet backwards"... well, if I cared about the FBI warnings that much and had the time to spare and otherwise enjoyed that DVD player, I'd just do it the way they wanted. I just have better (from my perspective, of course) things to worry about than "HEY, they should let me remove those warnings while singing anything I want!"...

To get back to specifics and away from stupid analogies: It is true that I'd prefer to write an iPhone app in Ruby than in Objective-C. I just don't think that my preference is Apple's problem. They're just doing fine without me, after all. This could come back to bite them, but then again it might not. So I'm perfectly happy to agree to disagree here.

So to reiterate. I don't think this is not significant, just that it is not significant to me. I didn't mean for my comment to be taken literally as a "no, you should all stop caring", even if I came across that way.

Cheers.

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#189

Post by msg »

michael_dorfman wrote: post #95
stcredzero wrote: post #8

Summary: If you need to "originally" write your code in Swahili, while listening to Milli Vanilli, while reclining in a patch of mud, and then you need fifty oompa loompas to translate the Swahili into C, that is none of Steve Jobs f#ck^ng business.

And Steve's response, I imagine would be: if you want to sell your app in my store, it's my business. If you don't like my rules, develop for a different platform. Seriously: if Barnes and Noble decides it only wants to sell fiction by authors whose last names begin with "Q", wouldn't we just consider it a bone-headed move, and not the cause for moral outrage? The iPhone is not the only smartphone on the market, and…

We are the authors with last names not Q.

We are the ones being rejected and leaving the platform.

Look at what is being rejected: our personal ideas of the best ways for us to do work, our molding of the computer to the vision in our head.

If they told Van Gogh he had to work exclusively in the medium of gummy, he wouldn't take it quietly. After he cut off his ear and threw it at Steve Jobs, he'd pick up his paints and move to a new country where they let artists be artists and programmers be programmers.

Yes, we know this is boneheaded by Apple. And yes, in a just world, fiery judgment would rain down on this business strategy.

We are trying to persuade others of our point of view. Legality doesn't enter into it. We want understanding, we want minds, we want defectors.

Re: Steve Jobs Has Just Gone Mad

#190

Post by smallblacksun »

danparsonson wrote: post #187
ghshephard wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "Originally" clause was placed in their _precisely_ to forbid code converters.

Can I ask what your authority is on that? It seems that most people agree with you but I don't understand why!

Because embedded interpreters in iphone apps are already banned in another part of the developer agreement?
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