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Apple admits it ranked its Files app ahead of competitor Dropbox

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Re: Apple admits it ranked its Files app ahead of competitor Dropbox

#171

Post by vel0city »

Railsify wrote: post #4
crazygringo wrote: post #2

These are exactly the kinds of issues antitrust legislation needs to be updated to handle. I have no issue with a company running a store and selling its own products within, but it has to provide a level playing field. It's good they fixed it -- that the VP in question didn't know it had been done and then nixed it -- but this shouldn't even be legal in the first place.

Would that extend to grocery stores, where would you force walmart to put their own brands?

It costs me less money travel-wise to go to a non-Walmart grocery store. Within the same cost comparison of traveling, I've got about four different brands of groceries all within a similar price range.

If I had an iPhone, it would be a several hundred dollar proposal (at least!) to shop at a competing store.

Re: Apple admits it ranked its Files app ahead of competitor Dropbox

#172

Post by spicybright »

kwdc wrote: post #151
MetaWhirledPeas wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While this is an abuse of their monopoly powers, to me this is less bad than locking out 3rd party app stores. I never heard much complaining about that before Epic did their thing.

The whole point of gaining monopoly status is to be able to use and apply these kinds of manipulations. This doesn't make it right however. Epic is one of a few large enough to make the necessary waves to have an impact. But behind Epic are thousands of unhappy app developers. Most of which are otherwise ignored. Also, complain too loudly and Apple has plenty of indirect ways to harm you. This is also an outcome of m…

Indirect? They can shut down an app for any reason with no recourse if they wanted.

Re: Apple admits it ranked its Files app ahead of competitor Dropbox

#173

Post by NicoJuicy »

ummonk wrote: post #114
stefan_ wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think you read the article. Apple boosted their generic Files app above Dropbox for the query Dropbox . That is the controversy.

Yeah but even before reading the article I figured this was an algorithmic mistake, and apparently it is: "While Apple didn’t challenge the idea that Files was unfairly ranked over Dropbox, the company says the reality was a simple mistake: the Files app had a Dropbox integration, so Apple put “Dropbox” into the app’s metadata, and it was automatically ranked higher for “Dropbox” searches as a result."

If(query=='dropbox') BoostInternallApp('files')

Not really sure how that can be a "mistake"

Re: Apple admits it ranked its Files app ahead of competitor Dropbox

#174

Post by hattar »

JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #168
mercer wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Much as I tend to be in favor of language evolving, I react almost viscerally to 'compute' as a noun. It is a major irk.

When people say they grok something it hurts me deep inside.

Why?

Re: Apple admits it ranked its Files app ahead of competitor Dropbox

#175

Post by mhh__ »

rovr138 wrote: post #66
nobodyknowsyoda wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Slightly off topic, but I do love the translucent terminal on the Mac. It is very cool

Pretty sure gnome-terminal and terminator both have this.

And powershell (if I understand what is being described).

Re: Apple admits it ranked its Files app ahead of competitor Dropbox

#176

Post by spicybright »

threeseed wrote: post #76
codesternews wrote: post #28

Apple has made life of small developers hard. Mac software and app industry has died. Even after notarising apps they show malicious popup to users. Same practices has adapted by apple like search ad etc etc. They make competing services and steal ideas of developers and those app dies. For eg screen time for Moments app. They have unfair advantage and small developers could not complete. Only handful of indie develo…

> Mac software and app industry has died And yet for me there are far more apps than there has ever been. > steal ideas of developers Nobody owns an idea. > They killed the industry. This notion that Apple killed the mobile apps industry which it arguably started is ridiculous. We have companies like Instagram, Snap, WhatsApp, Niantic etc who built billion dollar businesses on the back of the iOS platform. And a wide…

You still need a $100 a year developer subscription to develop your app though, right?

Re: Apple admits it ranked its Files app ahead of competitor Dropbox

#177

Post by mhh__ »

simondotau wrote: post #161
intricatedetail wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They also don't pay the same taxes as small businesses. The market is completely rigged. Apple should be split and fined.

If the market is rigged, blame the market. I don’t like many of the accounting tricks Apple pulls either, but as long as Apple’s competitors are pulling the same tricks, singling out Apple doesn’t solve the problem. Yes Apple are a huge company, but they are utterly minuscule relative to the overall economy.

I'm not sure if Apple are utterly miniscule + they only have to lobby for a very select few.

Re: Apple admits it ranked its Files app ahead of competitor Dropbox

#178

Post by Const-me »

JimDabell wrote: post #147
webmobdev wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "suddenly" is in the context of this new practice of charging all developers (big or small) annual fees and demanding a recurring cut of their profit. Before this unnatural practice became prevalent, any computer user and / or Linux / Windows / Mac / Android developer could create and distribute software on the respective platforms for free without any such financial consideration. My point is let's not normalise…

> Before this unnatural practice became prevalent We’re talking about computer hardware and software. Complaining that it is “unnatural” makes no sense. > any computer user and / or Linux / Windows / Mac / Android developer could create and distribute software on the respective platforms for free without any such financial consideration. This isn’t true. The first Android device was launched to the public after the A…

The consoles are niche entertainment devices. They also have many alternatives: multiple stores on PCs, and several newer cloud-based products. For this reason I'm OK with the stores in xbox/playstation/nintendo.

With smartphones it's different. Phones are not niche devices, they are ubiquitous and have killed whole industries like consumer photo/video equipment and portable audio.

From consumer point of view, no reasonable alternatives have left. It's for this reason I'm not OK with Apple and Google abusing their monopoly.

Re: Apple admits it ranked its Files app ahead of competitor Dropbox

#179

Post by mhh__ »

crazygringo wrote: post #2

These are exactly the kinds of issues antitrust legislation needs to be updated to handle. I have no issue with a company running a store and selling its own products within, but it has to provide a level playing field. It's good they fixed it -- that the VP in question didn't know it had been done and then nixed it -- but this shouldn't even be legal in the first place.

Speaking of anti-trust, surely Apple must be getting close to (or beyond) what Microsoft were? Total control over their users, hidden APIs, apparently biased store, rentseeking etc.

My £0.02 is that if they aren't already over the line the line should be nudged against their favour.

Re: Apple admits it ranked its Files app ahead of competitor Dropbox

#180

Post by spicybright »

hnick wrote: post #78
bombcar wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don’t see the brands they don’t carry at all. Only the brands they carry get displayed and they often make more money on the name brands anyway.

I've heard from a friend (in Australia) if you don't frequently buy placement you get bumped, and buying placement can be a losing proposition. They raise the price to squeeze all margin so it's just on the edge of making it affordable. You have to say yes to losing money during the promotion ("you'll make it up with brand awareness!") to claw it back by staying on the shelves in between. Otherwise another brand, or…

Does shelf height play that big of a roll in sales?
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