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Proton joins suit against Apple for practices that harm developers and consumers

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Re: Proton joins suit against Apple for practices that harm developers and consumers

#61

Post by whstl »

resolutefunctor wrote: post #15

There is a lot I hate about building apps and releasing them on the App Store, and I'd be happy for there to be alternatives. But that said, I don't understand how its a monopoly. There is no requirement to build an app for iOS devices. There are other devices and means for software delivery out there. What makes their control of their own ecosystem monopolistic? As someone who has paid the apple tax for digital sale…

> There is no requirement to build an app for iOS devices

By this logic, there is also no requirement for one to eat and breathe, anyone can simply stop. The problem is the consequences.

Building an iOS app is requirement if you want to provide lots of services and compete on lots of market. The mobile phone OS landscape has become a duopoly, and society is free to impose certain obligations on those companies.

Re: Proton joins suit against Apple for practices that harm developers and consumers

#62

Post by _benton »

TulliusCicero wrote: post #59
_benton wrote: post #55

This is probably a controversial opinion but I actually use my iPhone because it's locked down with a curated app marketplace and secure payment system. I don't want alternative payment methods or app stores. So I find it distasteful that other companies are seeking to control Apple's product design through the legal system. They're essentially trying to make it impossible to purchase a product I want, which is more…

You're free to keep your own device locked down yourself and to only use Apple's own app store if you want.

If they have to make changes in software to allow an "unlocked" device that makes it inherently less secure.

Re: Proton joins suit against Apple for practices that harm developers and consumers

#63

Post by m463 »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #39

I don't think any big tech company has ever done anything as evil and predatory as Apple walling off iMessage, giving the impression that Apple phones were high technology, and interacting with peasant androids is what made group chats fragment and pictures and videos look like trash. Few things are more enraging than people being left out of chats with friends and family because they didn't bend over for Apple. Even…

Actually, iMessage happily harms apple customers all the time.

I know many MANY people who have lost chats with their loved ones (especially deceased ones) because there is no way to export and save their conversations.

I think this should be as easy as saving photos, which apple makes (somewhat) easier to export.

Back to email, it is pretty horrible to set up my local email server on an apple device. You have to go through these dialogs, apple servers have to be contacted (for "redirection"), and I usually barely get it working.

Re: Proton joins suit against Apple for practices that harm developers and consumers

#64

Post by ivell »

zaphar wrote: post #42
amelius wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But the core of my contention is that: if you make the platform that others run on and which creates entirely new economies and allows businesses to thrive, don’t you get to define the constraints that you want since it’s _your_ platform? What’s effectively happening here is that companies are using the courts to force the design of OSes in a certain way: That only open OSes can ever be made, not closed ones. Huh,…

The user can hack the product, install a different OS, Strike it with a hammer, or throw it away. Apple hasn't violated their rights in any way. Sure hacking it or installing a different OS are hard but rights are not meant to guarantee something is easy. I never bought the argument that user rights should dictate how a product hardware or software should be manufactured.

> I never bought the argument that user rights should dictate how a product hardware or software should be manufactured

Probably you meant it differently, but guaranties and warranties exist exactly due to this. Users have right to expect their device performs as advertised and in a reasonable manner.

Re: Proton joins suit against Apple for practices that harm developers and consumers

#65

Post by energywut »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #39

I don't think any big tech company has ever done anything as evil and predatory as Apple walling off iMessage, giving the impression that Apple phones were high technology, and interacting with peasant androids is what made group chats fragment and pictures and videos look like trash. Few things are more enraging than people being left out of chats with friends and family because they didn't bend over for Apple. Even…

> I don't think any big tech company has ever done anything as evil and predatory as Apple walling off iMessage

I think you might be living in a bubble, if this is the "most evil" thing you have heard of a big tech company doing. Go read up on IBM's history, especially in the 30s and 40s. Or a more contemporary example, read up on Embrace, Extend, Extinguish. Or Amazon's mistreatment of workers in both corporate and warehouse settings. Or Meta scraping data off your devices without permission to train AI.

And, though I know some folks here disagree, plenty of people around the world believe what's happening in Gaza is a genocide, and Big Tech has materially contributed to making it happen. Or, if you want another example of human cost, talk about how resources for electronics are mined, or how electronics are manufactured.

Saying, "the most evil thing big tech has ever done is make some chat bubbles blue" puts a whole lot of human lives below the color of some chat bubbles.

You can think Apple did a really bad thing by doing that, that's fine. No complaints. But to call it the most evil thing ever done erases an incalculable amount of human suffering.

Re: Proton joins suit against Apple for practices that harm developers and consumers

#66

Post by _benton »

whstl wrote: post #44
andrewinardeer wrote: post #20

I'm not an Apple enthusiast—my rarely used iPad mini is my only Apple device—but let me play devil’s advocate. If a company invests billions in R&D to create hardware and its integrated software, shouldn’t it have the right to control who or what interacts with it? Why should I be forced to open up the carefully designed ecosystem I’ve built? If my pitch is premium, high-speed hardware and intuitive software so user-…

> shouldn’t it have the right to control who or what interacts with it? In their own machines they can do whatever they want. Once they sell it to you, not anymore.

Are you legally prevented from controlling your device in any way you wish after purchase?

I think people are conflating ease of modification from legally being able to do so. If it's legal, then Apple retains no control over the device.

Re: Proton joins suit against Apple for practices that harm developers and consumers

#67

Post by FredPret »

bitpush wrote: post #49
FredPret wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- You don't need to have an iPhone - You agree to the letter of the ToS when you click "I Agree" when you set up the iPhone, - You also already agree to the spirit of the App Store when you buy it. After all, it's not some big secret - You can get by with webapps for the most part anyway - You can buy an Android, a flip phone, or pull a power move and have no phone Buying an iPhone and then demanding that it has to w…

> Buying an iPhone and then demanding that it has to work Buying something used to mean something. If you're still beholden by company rules of a product you _bought_, you have been leasing/renting it. If I buy a house from a builder, and it came with a requirement that you can only use Amazon Ring cameras, or builder-approved groceries - you'd be pretty pissed.

No, I just wouldn't buy that house.

But you're right, maybe we should invent a new word for a purchase that is encumbered by legal agreements or subscriptions.

Re: Proton joins suit against Apple for practices that harm developers and consumers

#68

Post by energywut »

bitpush wrote: post #54
BowBun wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't think any big tech company has ever done anything as evil and predatory Don't you think this is _maybe_ an overstatement? I was annoyed about this for years but reading your take is borderline satirical.

From the lawsuit > For example, when a user purchases an iPhone, the user is steered to use Apple’s default email product, Apple Mail. It is only through a complex labyrinth of settings that a user can change her default email application away from the Apple “Mail” application towards an alternative like Gmail (Google) or Proton Mail. > At least for mail a user can in theory modify the default setting. On the calenda…

> That's pretty evil & predatory to me.

That's not what the parent is asking. The OP said it was the most evil ever done.

Big Tech does predatory and evil stuff all the time. That's not what's being claimed. The OP is claiming that this specific thing is the worst, the singular event that is above and beyond all others.

Re: Proton joins suit against Apple for practices that harm developers and consumers

#69

Post by danaris »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #39

I don't think any big tech company has ever done anything as evil and predatory as Apple walling off iMessage, giving the impression that Apple phones were high technology, and interacting with peasant androids is what made group chats fragment and pictures and videos look like trash. Few things are more enraging than people being left out of chats with friends and family because they didn't bend over for Apple. Even…

This is hopelessly exaggerated and bad-faith.

First of all, when Apple created iMessage, there was no possible way for them to predict that friend groups would use it as a reason to treat members of their groups poorly due to using Android phones.

Second of all, Apple did not deliberately make interacting with non-iMessage users in group chats "look like trash" in order to exclude them. Apple went out of its way to make it possible for iMessage to interoperate with the ubiquitous (in the US) SMS, with reduced features because SMS did not support the better features. If, instead, Apple had just made iMessage not interoperate with SMS at all, you'd be screaming about that instead.

Third of all, if people are leaving others out of chats, that's not Apple's fault. That's something for those families and friend groups to work out amongst themselves. "Hey, guys, I don't have an iPhone, and don't really have the money to get one, so maybe we could use GroupMe/GChat/WhatsApp/Signal/IRC/email/smoke signals/meeting in person/any of the myriad other ways of communicating instead?" A) "Oh, sure, that shouldn't be a problem!" (everything is solved) B) "What? No, we're not going to change anything just because it makes it impossible to actually include you in stuff. That's a you problem!" (turns out, the problem is your friends are assholes)

Apple cannot by any reasonable standard be held to blame for the way bullying, status-seeking teenagers treat each other.

Re: Proton joins suit against Apple for practices that harm developers and consumers

#70

Post by bitpush »

energywut wrote: post #65
Workaccount2 wrote: post #39

I don't think any big tech company has ever done anything as evil and predatory as Apple walling off iMessage, giving the impression that Apple phones were high technology, and interacting with peasant androids is what made group chats fragment and pictures and videos look like trash. Few things are more enraging than people being left out of chats with friends and family because they didn't bend over for Apple. Even…

> I don't think any big tech company has ever done anything as evil and predatory as Apple walling off iMessage I think you might be living in a bubble, if this is the "most evil" thing you have heard of a big tech company doing. Go read up on IBM's history, especially in the 30s and 40s. Or a more contemporary example, read up on Embrace, Extend, Extinguish. Or Amazon's mistreatment of workers in both corporate and…

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