What a waste of everyone’s money.
U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly
291–300 of 1001 posts
Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly
#292I don't even want to open NYT after they sued for copyright infringement on their old news, after entrapping the models with the first phrase.
Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly
#293For folks who don't have time to read a 90 page document, the case rests on specific claims, not just the general claim that iPhone is a monopoly because it's so big. Here are those claims: 1. "Super Apps" Apple has restrictions on what they allow on the App Store as far as "Super Apps", which are apps that might offer a wide variety of different services (specifically, an app which has several "mini programs" within…
The messaging interop point is probably DOA since Apple has stated that they will be adding RCS support to iMessage.
The smartwatch point is interesting and not an argument I've seen made before, but it's a very good example of Apple's vendor lock-in.
Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly
#294I assert it is trivial to not buy Apple products, easy to make alternatives to Apple products and easy to buy feature equivalent devices to Apple products. In lieu of this what is the problem? If the government has a problem why not say any code should be able to be run on any device? Honestly I’m curious - what’s the problem? There are android phones that are superior to iPhones and let you run anything you want. Wh…
Your mobile device is a gateway to much of the world. You seem to think it would be okay for a car manufacture to make it impossible to use your car except to drive to business that pay the car maker 30% of every purchase. I'm guessing you'll say people should be able to opt into such a car if they want but if that car has 60% of the market now it's effectively influencing the entire economy. Prices of groceries are 30% higher. Prices of clothing are 30% higher. Any company who wants people to come to their store are forced to sign up to pay the car company 30% or else they won't have access to 60% of the population.
Can you see the issue now? It doesn't matter that people could by other cars. It matters that Apple's market is so large that its influence is too big to be left as is.
Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly
#295I assert it is trivial to not buy Apple products, easy to make alternatives to Apple products and easy to buy feature equivalent devices to Apple products. In lieu of this what is the problem? If the government has a problem why not say any code should be able to be run on any device? Honestly I’m curious - what’s the problem? There are android phones that are superior to iPhones and let you run anything you want. Wh…
My theory: the problem is iCloud encryption at rest. The solution is to hang this over Apple until they relent.
I agree with this wholeheartedly. The USA is a surveillance state and Apple’s security posture combined with its market share is a considerable hindrance. The arguments against anti-competitive and consumer-hostile mechanisms ad nauseam pale in comparison to this. I very much want to see real numbers, perhaps survey data, supporting the narrative that customers are locked in, unhappy with their experience, or otherwise underserved by Apple. Because IRL, I see nothing but happy customers.
Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly
#296Apple has about 60% of the smartphone market in the US, and about 25% globally. That's a pretty big stretch to call it a monopoly. There are many non-apple phone options that many consumers easily avail themselves of. And at least one other OS choice as well. All of these are fully supported by the entire ecosystem of telcos. Seems like bullying to score political points to me.
Standard oil was at 64% when it was broken up in 1911. Absolute market share isn't the only factor that goes into determining monopoly. You also get different numbers from different definitions. Apple controls 100% of the iOS market, or ~80% of the mobile subscription market, etc.
>> Standard oil was at 64% when it was broken up in 1911. [...] Apple controls 100% of the iOS market [...]
I find it maddening that a lot of people replying to your fair point have chosen to ignore the first half and decided to exclusively focus on the latter, when that part was clearly meant as an example of how market definitions can have an impact.
A fairly recent example of the latter being a commonly mischaracterized or (by members of the public) outright dismissed concern was MSFTs dominance in the Cloud Gaming market, which was often met either with "but MSFTs share of the gaming market overall is less" or the even less applicable "but nobody uses Cloud Gaming anyway", even though neither should count towards whether something rises to anti-competitive behavior in a given market.
Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly
#297Apple frustrates the hell out of me with their deceptive tactics to create walled gardens while pretending not to. They feign ignorance to keep you stuck and create the illusion of open doors out of their walled garden that are actually broken and they have no interest in fixing. I've been paying for iCloud for my wife's iphone for the last several months because of how difficult Apple makes it for us to export our p…
Not the answer you want but with an iPhone backup you can extract all the images .
Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly
#298I assert it is trivial to not buy Apple products, easy to make alternatives to Apple products and easy to buy feature equivalent devices to Apple products. In lieu of this what is the problem? If the government has a problem why not say any code should be able to be run on any device? Honestly I’m curious - what’s the problem? There are android phones that are superior to iPhones and let you run anything you want. Wh…
> easy to make alternatives to Apple products Please, go do it. You'll be very rich very quick and I'll eagerly buy your products once you succeed. Unfortunately you'll find out it's not actually easy at all when you realize that consumers care about weight, size, temperature and battery life which are all things apple excels at. Their hardware is really quite good, unfortunately the software is horribly crippled.
> Unfortunately you'll find out it's not actually easy at all when you realize that consumers care about weight, size, temperature and battery life which are all things apple excels at. Their hardware is really quite good, unfortunately the software is horribly crippled.
They really don't. iPhone is a status symbol, especially for the new up-and-coming consumers (teens)
Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly
#299Should this make it through, what would this mean for operating systems? Would it mean that Windows and Apple would have to be able to run Windows, Apple, and linux software?
Side thought, many Americans will purchase an Apple products as a means of projecting their identity/lifestyle. Apple, to many, is a luxury tech product company and is used to project their self image to the world.
Remove the exclusivity of their products only being able to integrate with one another, then the image of exclusivity ("part of the club") starts falling apart.
If any of this happens then Apple's in a pretty shit spot. That's a big if tho
Re: U.S. sues Apple, accusing it of maintaining an iPhone monopoly
#300The super apps point is very interesting. The quotes in the complaint from Apple are exactly right: super apps are sucky and don’t follow native platform conventions. The DOJ then says this is a good thing and pro-consumer innovation. If only they knew the tactics WeChat and others use in China to keep users trapped. (For example: have you ever tried to send an Alipay link through WeChat? Good luck!)