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Apple becomes the first $1T company

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#341

Post by tonyedgecombe »

mikestew wrote: post #200
georgespencer wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And another I recall, although not sure to whom it is attributed: "If you asked Porsche owners what they'd like to improve in the car, they'd all say more leg room, a bigger trunk, and better safety features. Congratulations, you just designed a Volvo."

Is that really what Porsche owners would say, though? I've owned a couple of Porsches in the past, and if you asked me, my answer would have been "MOAR...POWER. TIRES...MOAR STICKY." If I wanted a Volvo, I'd buy a Volvo. Or maybe I didn't get the joke.

I read recently that most BMW owners don't know that their cars are real wheel drive. The enthusiasts are the minority, the majority are the status seekers.

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#342

Post by StillBored »

DaiPlusPlus wrote: post #217
simonebrunozzi wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And if I remember correctly, NT's kernel was a microkernel. It seemed to be the best choice for the future, back then.

Windows NT was a hybrid: the graphics and windowing system is in the kernel for performance reasons (try running X on commodity hardware in the early 1990s) whereas Windows CE was all microkernel.

I wish people would stop saying its a hybrid because of the graphics being moved into the kernel...

That doesn't make it a hybrid anymore than having the filesystem in supervisor/kernel space does. Its a hybrid because its designed/layered like a micro-kernel with the individual subsystems appearing to do message passing and using subsystem managers (I/O manager, process manager, object manager, etc) which monitor/etc the message flows. Yet, instead of doing context/privileged switches when it passes messages/IRP's it simply makes abstracted function calls which hand ownership of the message to other subsystems that exist in the kernel's address space. This means you get a most of the abstraction/stability effect of having a micro-kernel without paying the context switch and message copy penalty.

NT has a crazy awesome design, which is somewhat obscured these days, but has yet to really be surpassed by anyone (IMHO).

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#343

Post by penagwin »

themihai wrote: post #193
penagwin wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's simply not possible. The IRS themselves state that "tax evasion" is illegal, but "tax avoidance" isn't. A "loophole" is the use of deductibles to lower the amount you pay in taxes, that you choose to try to get. For example, you could get lower taxes by "getting married", even if you're just friends you can get lower tax rates, etc. That's a "loophole". Are we supposed to prove they "really wanted to get marri…

>>For example, you could get lower taxes by "getting married", even if you're just friends you can get lower tax rates, etc. That's a "loophole". Are we supposed to prove they "really wanted to get married"? Now apply that to potentially all deductables..... Ha ha ... What about a trillion dollar company paying less than 0.9% tax in countries where tax is minimum 13-19% ? Are we supposed to prove they really tried to…

We both agree on the problem that they should be paying more. I suggest that fixing "loopholes" isn't the solution, and instead may consider a "hard-minimum" for multi-billion dollar companies. No deductions beyond x%.

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#344

Post by penagwin »

trumped wrote: post #243
penagwin wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's simply not possible. The IRS themselves state that "tax evasion" is illegal, but "tax avoidance" isn't. A "loophole" is the use of deductibles to lower the amount you pay in taxes, that you choose to try to get. For example, you could get lower taxes by "getting married", even if you're just friends you can get lower tax rates, etc. That's a "loophole". Are we supposed to prove they "really wanted to get marri…

I knew that my opinion would not be popular here as most users are pro corporate... but either way, your definition of loophole is wrong

We both agree on the problem that they should be paying more. I suggest that fixing "loopholes" isn't the solution, and instead may consider a "hard-minimum" for multi-billion dollar companies. No deductions beyond x%.

Deductions do have a use, they may encourage them to "go green" or whatever. But yeah there needs to be an actual minimum.

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#345

Post by komali2 »

kamaal wrote: post #336
komali2 wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I never ate my favorite food during highschool (sushi) I'd probably have an extra 2k in the bank I could have spent on Apple. If I hadn't ever played WoW, I could have had 540 to spend on Amazon. I probably also wouldn't have been as fat growing up. If I had not paid for that dumbfuck YOLO trip to Singapore near the end of college, I'd have 2k to throw at Netflix. Or, actually, BP, this was right during the spill.…

Off-late HN has been getting a lot of posts of the types: "X% Americans live paycheck to paycheck" "Y% American have nothing saved up for retirement" "Z% Americans don't have $SMALL_AMOUNT for an emergency" etc etc. Your post perfectly explains why.

Where in my post did I indicate that I live paycheck to paycheck, have nothing saved up for retirement, or don't have an emergency fund?

Shitloads of Americans are in a tenuous fiscal situation because our education system has been gutted, our healthcare system is a bad capitalist joke, and thus wealth disparity is shockingly bad here. These used to be things that affected me, but now I'm fortunate enough to be a software engineer and so they don't.

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#346

Post by scarface74 »

kamaal wrote: post #337
scarface74 wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like Apple’s simple transaction model - I give them money and they give me stuff. My desires and thier incentives are mostly aligned. Everything Google does is about advertising and collecting data. Those two things don’t align with my desires.

>>Those two things don’t align with my desires. They align with the needs and wants of billions of people. Now Apple might be ahead. But its not hard for them to lose all of that. Apple as of now is not useful to the masses in most countries. Google is. There is a reason why companies like Dell and Microsoft ruled so much in the 90s to the 2005. Once you exhaust Steve Jobs's established product lines, you are just se…

There is a reason why companies like Dell and Microsoft ruled so much in the 90s to the 2005. Once you exhaust Steve Jobs's established product lines, you are just selling expensive cosmetic shining gadgets offering little in extra value compared to Samsung or Dell. At that time is when Google like companies will outshine Apple.

Dell and Microsoft won when the user is not the customer - enterprise sells. Apple brought in the “consumerization of IT”. People have been predicting the death of Apple and the failure of the iPhone for 8 years. They swore Android and especially Samsung was going to take over. Samsung in fact is seeing price pressure and they are struggling - not Apple.

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#347

Post by dijit »

walterbell wrote: post #137
dijit wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 30% fee is not baseless. Steam charges 30% to be on its store. Same with PlayStation and Microsoft Store. Seems like it’s the standard distribution fee.

Apple was the first to lead with this egregious fee. They should be forced to unbundle the fee into optional components, e.g. five components of 6% each, minimum 2 components must be chosen (12%). That would subject each service fee component to competitive quality/demand forces within Apple, e.g. app search, trials/CRM workflow, app distribution. Developers and users can both exert choice on the subset of fees appli…

Apple's App Store wasn't a thing when Steam Launched, same for the first party bundled licensing. (Playstation, Microsoft et al.)

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#348

Post by sidcool »

It is an achievement in almost all facets of success. It is a perfect story of the great American dream. Most products throughout their history have been world class. Congratulations Apple and good luck for the future.

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#349

Post by _pferreir_ »

coryfklein wrote: post #315
_pferreir_ wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> in a fair and competitive market would it be impossible for a company to grow to a $1T valuation? It depends on your definition of "fair". In my view, such a market would be regulated as to avoid that companies become too big to the point of turning into black holes that suck everything around them. Money attracts top talent and allows companies to buy out possible competitors. That in turn generates more money.

Please explain in what way Apple is "a black hole that sucks everything around it".

Maybe Apple is not even the best example, but look at Google or Facebook. How many potentially successful competitors have they bought off? How much more diverse could the market be if they hadn't been allowed to do so?

Re: Apple becomes the first $1T company

#350

Post by reanimated »

kamaal wrote: post #337
scarface74 wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like Apple’s simple transaction model - I give them money and they give me stuff. My desires and thier incentives are mostly aligned. Everything Google does is about advertising and collecting data. Those two things don’t align with my desires.

>>Those two things don’t align with my desires. They align with the needs and wants of billions of people. Now Apple might be ahead. But its not hard for them to lose all of that. Apple as of now is not useful to the masses in most countries. Google is. There is a reason why companies like Dell and Microsoft ruled so much in the 90s to the 2005. Once you exhaust Steve Jobs's established product lines, you are just se…

>Steve Jobs is no more, and its already showing. It's interesting how many years people will still repeat that. He's gone for 7 years now. If Tim Cook wasn't fit for the job, it wouldn't have grown from $350 billion the year then Jobs leave Apple to where it is now.

>Macbook Pro already shows some of these problems It really doesn't. Apple has their fuckups time to time, like Pippin, G4 Cube, Ping, Maps or 'you're holding it wrong' iPhone 4.

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