Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

GreatFire is tracking Apple iOS applications for instances of censorship

applecensorship.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 78 posts

Re: GreatFire is tracking Apple iOS applications for instances of censorship

#11

Post by soneil »

scarface74 wrote: post #5

I don’t get the purpose of “VPN apps” as opposed to just signing up for a VPN service and setting it up in iOS settings.

The easiest way would simply be for their website to template out a .mobileconfig. It’s just xml, it’d be relatively painless, even more so than trying to fill in the settings yourself.

The only sensible reasons I could see for an app are either to deliver the content to the user in the manner the user is most accustomed to, or to be able to integrate billing as in-app subscriptions, etc.

Re: GreatFire is tracking Apple iOS applications for instances of censorship

#13

Post by scarface74 »

dmix wrote: post #7
scarface74 wrote: post #5

I don’t get the purpose of “VPN apps” as opposed to just signing up for a VPN service and setting it up in iOS settings.

That's silly. That's like wondering why people use awful streaming sites to watch movies and not download high quality torrents instead. Ease of use, easy of discovery, learning curves, etc.

What’s hard about going into settings and then

General -> VPN -> add configuration and entering

- Server

- remote ID

- Username

- Password

This is less setup than adding an email account.

Re: GreatFire is tracking Apple iOS applications for instances of censorship

#14

Post by thaumasiotes »

intopieces wrote: post #6

Will Apple allow their trademark to be used in this way? Or does it fall under the “____ sucks” provision of free speech?

It falls under the "nominative use" defense to an assertion of trademark infringement. Free speech has nothing to do with it.

Trademarks are intended to provide consumers with the confidence that the products they're buying really come from the producer they claim to come from. As such, you're prohibited from assembling your own computer and branding it Apple; you've never been prohibited from referring to Apple.

Re: GreatFire is tracking Apple iOS applications for instances of censorship

#16

Post by celeritascelery »

scarface74 wrote: post #13
dmix wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's silly. That's like wondering why people use awful streaming sites to watch movies and not download high quality torrents instead. Ease of use, easy of discovery, learning curves, etc.

What’s hard about going into settings and then General -> VPN -> add configuration and entering - Server - remote ID - Username - Password This is less setup than adding an email account.

You have obviously never Worked tech support.

Re: GreatFire is tracking Apple iOS applications for instances of censorship

#17

Post by aboutruby »

scarface74 wrote: post #5

I don’t get the purpose of “VPN apps” as opposed to just signing up for a VPN service and setting it up in iOS settings.

VPN is just a generic term for accessing all of the internet. The software used is much more complex (hiding from the Great Firewall) (shadowsocks for instance)

Re: GreatFire is tracking Apple iOS applications for instances of censorship

#18

Post by masonic »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #14
intopieces wrote: post #6

Will Apple allow their trademark to be used in this way? Or does it fall under the “____ sucks” provision of free speech?

It falls under the "nominative use" defense to an assertion of trademark infringement. Free speech has nothing to do with it. Trademarks are intended to provide consumers with the confidence that the products they're buying really come from the producer they claim to come from. As such, you're prohibited from assembling your own computer and branding it Apple; you've never been prohibited from referring to Apple.

Why do retail entities refer to the Super Bowl by pseudonyms (e.g "The Big Game") rather than its true name?

Re: GreatFire is tracking Apple iOS applications for instances of censorship

#19

Post by joe_hoyle »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #14
intopieces wrote: post #6

Will Apple allow their trademark to be used in this way? Or does it fall under the “____ sucks” provision of free speech?

It falls under the "nominative use" defense to an assertion of trademark infringement. Free speech has nothing to do with it. Trademarks are intended to provide consumers with the confidence that the products they're buying really come from the producer they claim to come from. As such, you're prohibited from assembling your own computer and branding it Apple; you've never been prohibited from referring to Apple.

It was my understanding that this doesn’t cover using a trademark in a domain name. I could be wrong; my only experience of this is that “WordPress” is a trademark, and therefore it’s generally accepted that any WordPress related product is not allowed to use the trademark in their domains.

Re: GreatFire is tracking Apple iOS applications for instances of censorship

#20

Post by Elidrake24 »

lucb1e wrote: post #9
dmix wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's silly. That's like wondering why people use awful streaming sites to watch movies and not download high quality torrents instead. Ease of use, easy of discovery, learning curves, etc.

That one probably also has something to do with getting letters from MAFIAA if you torrent but not if you use streaming sites.

You have no problems with the RIAA once you move to Private Trackers, but that does take a considerable time sink and a bit of dedication to breach. So point still stands.
Post reply on HN