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Killed by Apple

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Re: Killed by Apple

#121

Post by JKCalhoun »

"Clips"? The lightning connector?

To some of these I say, good riddance.

On the other hand, I spent a lot of time with "iTunes U" as both an engineer on the project and as a user. I was sad to see it shut down. (I made the last code changes to the last version of iTunes U that shipped.)

While on the team, I also did what I could to try to keep iTunes U alive—fight against its pending "sunsetting". The Education team owned iTunes U but we were also trying to find our way with a new app, "Schoolwork". Schoolwork didn't have content like iTunes U—it was more like Canvas. An instructor created assignments with it and then assigned them to their students.

A desperate Hail Mary play I made was to facilitate the bridging of "iTunes U" and "Schoolwork". The idea was that an instructor could assign portions of an iTunes U course within Schoolwork. Links within the assignment would launch iTunes U, take the student to the specific course and then the specific chapter…

I hoped someone might then see what an asset all this free content iTunes U (well, Apple) hosted. (MIT courses on computer science, to name just an example.)

In the end when it was clear we were tilting against windmills trying to keep iTunes U going, I relented and spent time trying to help enable a mechanism that allowed iTunes U content owners to export their courseware to Canvas-style courses. A handful of content owners took us up on that. I don't know ultimately what ever happened to all that content though.

Some of it no doubt ended up on Coursera or similar. But that iTunes U courseware, for the decade or so that it existed, was absolutely free and often top-notch… That will be missed.

And unlike the music, books, movies, the iTunes U content was all free. The most nefarious thing you might try to ascribe to Apple was that they were hoping the free content would somehow sell more iPads…

Re: Killed by Apple

#122

Post by fsflover »

linhns wrote: post #89
paprikanotfound wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I came here to comment the same. I'm still using my iphone SE 2nd gen and it's still receiving software updates. Calling it dead is a bit misleading imo.

Fellow user here. It still surprises me on durability and usefulness. Its small size fits into my trousers’ pockets and even if it falls out, it won’t brake like a Samsung.

Nevertheless, when Apple decides to kill "your" hardware, you will have no recourse. You are forbidden to manage and update it yourself.

Re: Killed by Apple

#123

Post by caseyohara »

hatsix wrote: post #6
bel8 wrote: post #2

Many of them are hardware which is understandable. It would be nice, but perhaps hard to do, to have a list of "sherlocked" apps and services.

Or acquisitions where they immediately killed the product... RIP FingerWorks TouchStream

RIP Dark Sky

Re: Killed by Apple

#124

Post by frizlab »

bhj wrote: post #94
frizlab wrote: post #80

Lightning Connector was not killed by Apple though. Not really.

Is there any evidence that it was "years of regulatory and industry pressure" that did it? When Apple introduced Lightning it was as the "modern connector for the next decade" and... that's exactly what happened.

I personally agree, but the general public seems to think the EU had something to do with it.

Honestly this regulation should never have happened IMHO…

Re: Killed by Apple

#125

Post by k310 »

criddell wrote: post #105
horsawlarway wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the company that explicitly closes its ecosystem can also run the more open ecosystems legally, and those open ecosystems can't legally run the closed one. That's a knock against Apple, not a bragging point.

I've come to believe Apple's way is probably the only sustainable way. I'm a Windows user who also develops for Windows desktop and it's kind of sad that even though Windows has a way larger desktop share, there just isn't much going on compared to MacOS. Every week I read about some cool new or updated MacOS application and I can't remember the last time I read something similar about a Windows application (other th…

Quoth Steve Ballmer: "Developers, Developers, Developers!!!!!"

Don't find and watch that video unless you have a therapist on the line.

Re: Killed by Apple

#126

Post by kalleboo »

ajdude wrote: post #60
andrewmutz wrote: post #8

Hacker news holds Apple and Google to different standards, so I doubt this post will get much traction. (I'm still angry about how I must use an iPhone if I want to be able to text high quality video to people I don't know very well)

Apple has done a much better job at maintaining their stuff compared to Google. Even this list is mostly just old hardware that fell out of service. And even then, I can still sync my 20+ year old firewire ipod with the most recent Apple Music (formally iTunes) on my m4 MacBook with the right converter.

Sadly they finally dropped support for Firewire in macOS 26, BTW. The USB models still work though.

Re: Killed by Apple

#127

Post by kalleboo »

LetsGetTechnicl wrote: post #72
b3lvedere wrote: post #31

Still love my Apple Airport Extreme APs. They just work.

I wish they'd bring those back so simple and easy to set up. Could use some more functionality like VPN's and such but otherwise a great product line-up. Now it seems every AP looks like an alien spacecraft.

> Now it seems every AP looks like an alien spacecraft.

Ironic if we're talking about the Apple Airport series https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bb/Early_Ai...

Re: Killed by Apple

#128

Post by afandian »

VogonPoetry wrote: post #118
afandian wrote: post #3

They removed the speed and pitch adjuster in QuickTime player, some time in the past decade, I forget when. That was a useful feature to me. It's not on the site, and I don't care _quite_ enough to figure out how to add it. That's the problem with built-in software that "does it all" and crowds out the market for other software. One day it might not do it all. (VLC can do this, but not as simply as I used to be able…

It is still possible to adjust the speed in QuickTime Player: from .5 to 2x. Not available via Quicklook, but definitely there in the player, either in the menu bar or by clicking the >> in the video window.

So it is. I could have sworn it was missing at least for a couple of years. Or maybe I just couldn't find it.

Pitch is still missing though.

Re: Killed by Apple

#129

Post by orloffm »

I've bought 3 iPhone SEs and am very happy with my decision. There is simply no other phone on the market now that is easy on eyes. iPhones 17 and Pixels are absolutely unbearable. Most LCD Androids switch to some new screens with shimming where they flicker colors to support wider gamut or whatever.

Re: Killed by Apple

#130

Post by urtie »

Well, there was a neat feature that Mac OS X 10.4 and 10.5 had that got killed because the iPhone couldn't do it: you could call and send SMS through integration with a Bluetooth enabled phone. That functionality was then removed, and reintroduced a decade later with great fanfare, but only if you had an iPhone.
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