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Apple wants rights to the image of apples in Switzerland

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Re: Apple wants rights to the image of apples in Switzerland

#181

Post by hnbad »

imchillyb wrote: post #135
BowBun wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. The only mandate for a corporation is growth and revenue. These goals are at odds with the good of people and our planet, as we've seen countless times. Corporations consume most of our resources, produce the most waste, and damage _everything_ more compared to any individual. This won't change, because those with the power to do something benefit from the status quo and don't feel the damage they cause. Capi…

> ...Corporations consume... Humans are to blame, not some mythical piece of paper granting limited liability. Greed is the root of every evil on Earth. What is greed? Greed, is self over all else. Self over others. Self over environment. Self over all other considerations. Greed is what is killing, has killed, and will continue to kill this planet and its populace.

And yet humans are not unrestrained free rational actors but instead exist in systems of dominance and hierarchy. In most places of the world it's literally impossible for you to simply withdraw from society and live on your own in the wilds because there are no wilds, just somebody else's property. You're born into debt and servitude through the mere biologically reality of needing food and shelter and not having any way to access these without indebting yourself to someone else.

You do not need to be greedy to contribute to a system built on greed. Being born into that system, forced to contribute to it at the penalty of starvation and death and taught and raised not to question or even comprehend the system is enough.

Re: Apple wants rights to the image of apples in Switzerland

#182

Post by hnbad »

Jiro wrote: post #176
BowBun wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. The only mandate for a corporation is growth and revenue. These goals are at odds with the good of people and our planet, as we've seen countless times. Corporations consume most of our resources, produce the most waste, and damage _everything_ more compared to any individual. This won't change, because those with the power to do something benefit from the status quo and don't feel the damage they cause. Capi…

Trademarks are a government-granted monopoly and as such are inherently not capitalistic.

The purpose of states is to restrict access to capital, to protect private property claims. Trademarks aren't even physical things you can claim as property, they're legal fictions trying to enclose culture the same way we have enclosed the land. By your reasoning owning a plot of land, or a factory or a stack of money is a government-granted monopoly and as such inherently not capitalistic.

Re: Apple wants rights to the image of apples in Switzerland

#183

Post by DrScientist »

HWR_14 wrote: post #73
piva00 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We can thank Jack Welch for making it popular to consider shareholders as the most important cohort of people to be rewarded when a business goes well... His way of managing businesses completely infests MBA programs around the world.

That's a different question. But at some point, Apple spending the money to expand into a new product line is less effective than giving money to shareholders and letting them invest the money.

Then why buy Apple shares if you don't want Apple to invest your money?

Buy shares in a profitable company and then demanding that it channel all it's profits back to you isn't an investment - it's an attempt to grab a fruit (sic) of somebody else's earlier investment.

I do agree that sometimes, if the company hasn't got any good ideas for investment, then the right thing is to give the money back. However, overall I think shareholder/financial short-term-ism is largely destructive - limiting companies ability to invest.

But then those short term often shareholders don't have to pick up the cost of destruction - especially if they avoid paying tax ( the state/tax payer picks up the restructuring cost with unemployment benefit etc ).

Re: Apple wants rights to the image of apples in Switzerland

#184

Post by another2another »

colejohnson66 wrote: post #5
Springtime wrote: post #2

Was puzzling they didn't include an image of said logo[1]. IIRC I've observed this for some other articles in the past covering trademark disputes. Is there a common reason they might do this? [1] https://www.swissfruit.ch/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/sov_new...

Trademarks, unlike copyright, are "use and protect it or lose it". There's no "expiry" date on them like copyrighted things have because brands sometimes live for over a hundred years. Letting someone take your companies name and logo just because you're "too old" isn't fair. This is because trademarks, unlike copyright, aren't about science and innovation; they're about preventing consumer confusion. Not protecting…

>Some lawyer at Apple probably caught wind of this Swedish company and took action.

SWISS company.

Re: Apple wants rights to the image of apples in Switzerland

#185

Post by pnt12 »

dehrmann wrote: post #97
driscoll42 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm in Business School and took a class in Finance. In a lecture the professor presented what to do if a company has too much cash, the options where: 1. Invest in positive NPV projects 2. Store some for a rainy day 3/4. Pay divdends or stock buybacks Only after did I think "You know, what about lowering prices or paying employees, these options are soley about shareholders". But... yes, managers are taught to think…

> But... yes, managers are taught to think about increasing shareholder wealth above all. Saving money for a rainy day helps employees, too. Investing in new projects does indirectly because staffing up those projects increases the demand for labor, so the price of labor goes up.

The good old trickle down.

Re: Apple wants rights to the image of apples in Switzerland

#186

Post by pnt12 »

NikkiA wrote: post #102
tough wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lawyers get paid regardless of the outcome. Is on their best interest to bring as many frivolous loosing lawsuits as Apple is willing to pay for.

Corporate lawyers also get paid whether they file lawsuits or not, so no, it's not really in their interests to file frivolous lawsuits.

People keep themselves busy (or soon they're out of their job). When there's no high or medium priority studs to do, people move to the low priority and do it, even if useless.

Re: Apple wants rights to the image of apples in Switzerland

#187

Post by theonlybutlet »

anigbrowl wrote: post #177
theonlybutlet wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's where anti-trust law should come in.

Why would anti-trust have anything to do with it?

Anti-trust law is designed to prevent a reduction in competition and monopoly, if a dominant players actions risk killing this competition off, it falls within its scope.

Anti-trust law hasn't really kept up with modern times but a this can take many forms. Just look at how many large "startups" run at large losses, many claim scale will offer cost efficiencies but in truth its to capture the market after which they can pump up prices, this is basically dumping. Vexatious litigation should also be included.

The last 30 years have been a golden-era for those wishing to abuse their position, but there is hope with increased focus around the world.

Re: Apple wants rights to the image of apples in Switzerland

#188

Post by as_bntd »

hanselot wrote: post #22

Welcome to Earth: Where the NEWS is our barometer for determining how far we are from 1984. It's articles like these that invoke a sense of surreal prescience. I remember experiencing this same eerie feeling back when I was still trying to convince my employer that WFH would be unavoidable. The CXO (I put X because I can't remember what made up executive role they had at the time) still shrugged it off as "Just a flu…

Hmm, are you calling out the clickbait of the article? I couldn’t fully understand.

Re: Apple wants rights to the image of apples in Switzerland

#189

Post by Jiro »

hnbad wrote: post #182
Jiro wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trademarks are a government-granted monopoly and as such are inherently not capitalistic.

The purpose of states is to restrict access to capital, to protect private property claims. Trademarks aren't even physical things you can claim as property, they're legal fictions trying to enclose culture the same way we have enclosed the land. By your reasoning owning a plot of land, or a factory or a stack of money is a government-granted monopoly and as such inherently not capitalistic.

Plots of land are physical things you can claim as property. Stacks of money are government creations in a sense, but I don't believe that without government creating fiat money, there would be no such thing as money.

Re: Apple wants rights to the image of apples in Switzerland

#190

Post by zilti »

bluepod4 wrote: post #139
zilti wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

If you hear this “idiotic” take so often, then you should have had something more logical or thoughtful to say instead of not knowing where to begin. For starters, your last clause “rather than to pay 10 cents more for something less wasteful” reeks of unintelligence. Think about it. You were replying to a consumer. You, yourself, admit that you hear this “idiotic” take often. That means that you’ve heard many consum…

By often, I mean often in such filter bubbles like the one you are stuck in. Really, most people out there don't give a shit, they are penny-pinching egotistical idiots who don't give a shit about what they cause, and then people like you come along, reinforcing them by telling them "it's not your fault, keep being a wasteful, careless consumer who cares about nothing but saving another 5 cent on that new shirt".
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