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Your App Is Not Better than an Open Protocol

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Re: Your App Is Not Better than an Open Protocol

#61

Post by igorgue »

Retric wrote: post #40
randomsearch wrote: post #9

I think the question is - better for who? Clearly for many businesses, walled gardens, avoiding "openness", works. That might be because they use it to create an artificial moat to protect their business (arguably LinkedIn here), or because it's the best way to serve their customers (Steve Jobs' argument, not saying I agree). For customers, if the best experience is gained through a native app, then a native app make…

As much as the tech world loves to hate Apple, walled gardens are a huge part of why their stuff 'just works'. Suppose you want an app to play videos. If your app uses a custom format no problem. If you support an open standard, the file might not, it might require more processing power than you have, it's probably for a different screen resolution, it... In the end tech people are willing to trade stuff breaking occ…

You just can't prove that... Maybe because is by far not true.

For example, you can create an app that only uses LAME + VideoLAN encoders and supports two of their formats, MP3 and MPEG4 nothing else, cause you're sure those work on the hardware you're building, that's exactly what Apple does, and Ubuntu, and Windows.

Just use your LOGIC how the hell is an open protocol the reason why stuff breaks? If everyone is looking at it and it goes through a lot more review than closed standards, they're the reason why we have the internet and how it works.

Contrary to what you believe on, Apple actually uses tons of open protocols and standards, they made Webkit what it is, that's free and open source, they still work on it as far as I know, they have their fair share of closed ones too, but open has worked for them pretty well.

Re: Your App Is Not Better than an Open Protocol

#62

Post by gagege »

pixl97 wrote: post #46
astazangasta wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nonsense. Why does Apple have their own plug format instead of supporting USB? Is it somehow better? Easier? Blatantly not. This is just vendor lock in, the opposite of the fundamental ethic of the Internet.

> Is it somehow better? Apple's magsafe and lighting adapter plugs are far better than USB connectors. They are reversible and don't have tabs to break off on the device side.

Tabs?

Re: Your App Is Not Better than an Open Protocol

#63

Post by Retric »

igorgue wrote: post #61
Retric wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As much as the tech world loves to hate Apple, walled gardens are a huge part of why their stuff 'just works'. Suppose you want an app to play videos. If your app uses a custom format no problem. If you support an open standard, the file might not, it might require more processing power than you have, it's probably for a different screen resolution, it... In the end tech people are willing to trade stuff breaking occ…

You just can't prove that... Maybe because is by far not true. For example, you can create an app that only uses LAME + VideoLAN encoders and supports two of their formats, MP3 and MPEG4 nothing else, cause you're sure those work on the hardware you're building, that's exactly what Apple does, and Ubuntu, and Windows. Just use your LOGIC how the hell is an open protocol the reason why stuff breaks? If everyone is loo…

HTML is an open standard, try writing a strict HTML browser that fails on non-standard pages and then surfing the web. There is a huge difference between using HTML files internally generated by a process you control and trying to read anything calling its self an HTML file.

The same applies to MPEG4 there are plenty of files that work on one player but not another. EX: Wait you also want to open an 8k MPEG4 file on a phone?

PS: I wish everyone that suggests open solutions actually needed to implement one. Generally, when people say open solutions they really mean leverage some huge chunk of code that someone else wrote, or let me leverage your hardware and software for free.

Re: Your App Is Not Better than an Open Protocol

#64

Post by coldcode »

ebbv wrote: post #8
bkurtz13 wrote: post #2

So we should never create anything new, then?

That's clearly not what the author is saying. You can easily create something new while embracing standards. You can open your app up to existing standard means of consumption like RSS, email, SMS, etc.

So how do standards come about? Someone does something new. Which means it isn't a standard yet. Otherwise we would still be using 1980's technology "standards".

Re: Your App Is Not Better than an Open Protocol

#65

Post by pixl97 »

gagege wrote: post #62
pixl97 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is it somehow better? Apple's magsafe and lighting adapter plugs are far better than USB connectors. They are reversible and don't have tabs to break off on the device side.

Tabs?

http://cdn.ndtv.com/tech/images/gadgets/Samsung_Galaxy_S5_fl...

If you look close at in the connector on this S5 you can see there are two separate 'tabs' that are rather fragile if you are not careful removing and inserting your power cable. I've seen these break on phones before.

http://images.anandtech.com/doci/8554/DSC_1380.jpg

The iphone connector has no small fragile pieces like that.

Re: Your App Is Not Better than an Open Protocol

#66

Post by _pmf_ »

amelius wrote: post #17
mangecoeur wrote: post #6

Perhaps a bit naive - these companies that start by embracing open standards then pull back from them are just pulling a classic bait-and-switch, with a bit of freeriding off open-source efforts thrown in. They bootstrap their user base and arrive to market quickly by using tools built by others. Then once they grow and gain market and mind share, they can start closing themselves off, walling the garden. And it's ju…

Here's an idea: there should be a maximum number N of employees a company can have. This enforces companies to think about the greater good, because if you're in a company that is split because of size, you might end up in a different company. Also, a maximum on the number of employees stimulates the "modularity" of the market: large conglomerates with internal markets will not be possible anymore. I'm not sure of al…

This does not matter at all, because if the separate companies have the same owner structure (which they will have), the segregation will be just on paper.

Re: Your App Is Not Better than an Open Protocol

#67

Post by haubey »

Retric wrote: post #52
TeMPOraL wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I want a VCR that can play any VHS I have and that I can plug to any TV I can find - not something that plays only iCassettes on BananaCRT which is expensive and my friends don't have.

Does it need to play video's from ArVid VHS tapes? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ArVid So, your happy with the VHS and don't need to play Beta tapes. PS: Sounds like your happy with a walled guarden and want something that just works. Did you get a Blueray player or a conbo that also handels HD-DVD's?

Slightly different, I think. VHS and Beta were competing formats, but you could play any VHS tape in any VHS player. That was the point the parent was making, I think.

Re: Your App Is Not Better than an Open Protocol

#68

Post by [deleted] »

amelius wrote: post #17
mangecoeur wrote: post #6

Perhaps a bit naive - these companies that start by embracing open standards then pull back from them are just pulling a classic bait-and-switch, with a bit of freeriding off open-source efforts thrown in. They bootstrap their user base and arrive to market quickly by using tools built by others. Then once they grow and gain market and mind share, they can start closing themselves off, walling the garden. And it's ju…

Here's an idea: there should be a maximum number N of employees a company can have. This enforces companies to think about the greater good, because if you're in a company that is split because of size, you might end up in a different company. Also, a maximum on the number of employees stimulates the "modularity" of the market: large conglomerates with internal markets will not be possible anymore. I'm not sure of al…

[deleted]

Re: Your App Is Not Better than an Open Protocol

#69

Post by Retric »

haubey wrote: post #67
Retric wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does it need to play video's from ArVid VHS tapes? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ArVid So, your happy with the VHS and don't need to play Beta tapes. PS: Sounds like your happy with a walled guarden and want something that just works. Did you get a Blueray player or a conbo that also handels HD-DVD's?

Slightly different, I think. VHS and Beta were competing formats, but you could play any VHS tape in any VHS player. That was the point the parent was making, I think.

Sure, I muddled the point but ArVid VHS tapes ARE VHS tapes. Like how some CD players also let you use MP3 CD’s.

Re: Your App Is Not Better than an Open Protocol

#70

Post by TazeTSchnitzel »

_pmf_ wrote: post #66
amelius wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's an idea: there should be a maximum number N of employees a company can have. This enforces companies to think about the greater good, because if you're in a company that is split because of size, you might end up in a different company. Also, a maximum on the number of employees stimulates the "modularity" of the market: large conglomerates with internal markets will not be possible anymore. I'm not sure of al…

This does not matter at all, because if the separate companies have the same owner structure (which they will have), the segregation will be just on paper.

Right. See, for example, how the fact that some of the more stringent aspects of French labour law only apply to companies with 50+ employees leads to lots of 49-employee French companies.
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