This sounds horrible for user experience. That used to be Apple's claimed Raison d'être. It's sad how far they are willing to debase themselves to chase a few extra nickels. They are already one of the richest companies in the world. Surely they should focus on improving the actual quality of their products (particularly software), and developer experience and documentation, rather than further watering down their qu…
When the shareholders want infinite growth no matter the cost, this is what you get
> It's shocking that Apple hasn't done this trick yet when everyone else started doing it years ago. I pay Apple premium price for their phones. If they become as bad as the other, what’s the point to pay so much ?
You don’t think the hardware and software ecosystem are superior to the competition?
I’m not the person you asked, but what I’d say is that comparing two turds isn’t really meaningful. Sure, maybe one of the turds doesn’t have such a strong smell or has fewer flies, but it’s still a turd.
I could not agree more. It probably doesn't help that I just spend an hour trying to figure out how to update to 18.7.3 on my iphone. It turns out you can't. The only way to get security updates now is to upgrade to iOS 26. Apple no longer supports security updates to old major versions if the device is capable of running the new major release. Apple is no longer making choices that benefit customers, but ones that b…
If in the past it has, it was precisely to reach the present situation. It's naive to expect these companies to be pro-costumers. They would rape your mother if they could - the only reason they don't is because that would make you not buy their product and falsehoods.
> the only reason they don't is because that would make you not buy their product and falsehoods.
I’ve seen enough people defend these companies and their billionaire CEOs often and fervently enough, even in response to news that unilaterally fuck customers, that I’m not convinced people would stop buying even in your scenario.
More and more evidence that the a-holes with spreadsheets are taking over at Apple and they’re completely devoid of any ideas on the software side. I heard someone randomly say that they should replace Tim Cook with Scott Forstall. I chuckled at the idea but this might be a great idea. Apple is having its Ballmer moment. Google did too before AI lit the fire under their feet. Who is going to be Apple’s next Nadella?…
> completely devoid of any ideas on the software side. Maybe I’m too old, but if Apple fixed every single bug and added absolutely zero features until the day of my death, I would still be a satisfied customer. The problem is not lack of innovation, the problem is that everything barely works.
There are obvious exceptions, like for example updating certificates, but otherwise I’m with you. Or I was, for many years, until the release of Liquid Glass. Now fixing bugs is no longer enough, the OS has become an abomination. I’ll avoid “upgrading” for as long as possible, then I’ll probably have to abandon Apple platforms forever.
How is MacOS as enshittified as Windows? It doesn't have ads, doesn't push AI on you, their online services are trivial to ignore once and never think about again, etc. I haven't tried Tahoe, and sure, its new glass UI is shit, but merely incompetent UI design is not "enshittification" and is not in any way equivalent to what Microsoft does in Windows.
> their online services are trivial to ignore once and never think about again The workarounds to get rid of the nag to log into your icloud account on macOS are far more difficult than the workarounds to avoid using an MS account in Windows.
> The workarounds to get rid of the nag to log into your icloud account on macOS
Do you have an example? I have to set up macOS on the regular, and after saying no to iCloud on the setup screen, it never bothers me again.
They are very aggressive with trying to get me to “update” to Tahoe, though.
What’s interesting to me is that no matter how “hidden” the AD indicator may be, my brain always seems to very quickly train itself to swiftly skip such posts when scrolling/browsing. Or I could simply be another clueless victim of advertising. If only I could know the number of sponsored posts I never consciously acknowledge and am influenced by on the daily.
If the vast majority of people recognized ads and skipped them as more technically minded people do, they'd either not do that or step up a notch and make them even harder to spot. The reality is that these dark patterns do work for a large part of the users. We're the lucky few who can stay away though it is taxing and tiring.
The sickening truth is that most normals don't turn their attention in another way even when they recognize an ad for what it is.
This makes no difference, because I can’t remember the last time I installed an app other than for the occasional airline. From 2008-12 it was genuinely exciting to see what new apps were being released every day. Mobile games from that era had cultural impact. I bought $2 apps without a thought. But Apple incentivized monetization above all else and killed that excitement. Now you can’t find a tip calculator that do…
I agree, and my experience is the same as yours. However…
> This makes no difference
It makes no difference to us personally, but it does make a large difference to other people, many of whom may be friends and/or family we support. And it is another step in the shit road Apple is walking on, which will continue to affect us.
This is what basically everyone else has done over the past decade. Google used to put a different background behind ads in its search ( https://www.fsedigital.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Google... ). It made it really easy to tell what was an ad and skip over it quickly. Now it's a lot harder to quickly notice what's an ad and what isn't. Sites used to have banner ads. Now they show posts that look exactly like t…
Amazon is particularly wild because you can use the site without realizing %70 of your results are ads.
I can’t confirm that exact percentage, but yes—“prime” placements on Amazon are driven by Amazon Ads.
the Sponsored Brands banner at the top of the search results page, and
the Top of Search Sponsored Products slots.
The same thing is happening on the Android side. If you've made a game, it doesn't matter how high quality it is, how many awards it has won, etc. The only thing that matters is that it's live service, that it doesn't "have an end", that it can drive engagement and perpetual revenue. Quite a few testimonies from game devs: according to them, Google representatives pretty much told them this. See also: the requirement…
I see a parallel to how Google search created incentives for SEO and social network feeds created incentive for attention grabbing slop. Platforms optimizing for their own interest at the expense of both upstream and downstream. Is there any platform that does not use these dark patterns? I hope the agent era will allow users to bypass the crappy search responses and slop on feeds. But by the looks of it OpenAI is mo…
Of course they are. It was obvious from day one that ads were going to be shoved in. At first they’ll be obvious and clearly separated, then they’ll influence the responses you get without you even knowing. I can’t fathom why anyone ever believed that wouldn’t be the case.
We are a dying breed. A whole new generation has never known an App Store without ads. To them this is the norm.
The time that an “App Store” existed and didn’t have adverts was very minimal. Like OP I haven’t browsed the iPhone App Store for over a decade. Occasionally a web page will send me to their app directly and if I want it (very rare) I’ll get it, same with installing specific apps - Spotify, YouTube, WhatsApp etc. Apple used to charge money for a premium product where the customers were customers and not the product.…
> The time that an “App Store” existed and didn’t have adverts was very minimal.
The iOS App Store was introduced in 2008. Ads in it began in 2016. We’re in 2026. The App Store has had ads for longer than it didn’t, but the early period was not “very minimal”, it was almost half its current life time.