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Apple buys a company every three to four weeks

bbc.com

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Re: Apple buys a company every three to four weeks

#141

Post by GeekyBear »

acomjean wrote: post #138
qbasic_forever wrote: post #9

So ~15 companies a year? That doesn't sound outrageous for a company with billions and billions of dollars in the bank, and billions more coming in every quarter. edit: If anything there's probably immense pressure on Cook to buy buy buy more stuff. I don't think anyone inside Apple wants to have a repeat of stuff like old Apple maps or other products that just languished and died internally while external companies…

It’s fine... Until Apple buys the software tools your working with and then kills the support for running on anything outside the Apple ecosystem.

Or, until they buy an enterprise grade NoSQL server and open source it?

https://www.theregister.com/2018/04/20/apple_foundationdb_op...

Re: Apple buys a company every three to four weeks

#142

Post by GeekyBear »

internet2000 wrote: post #63
qbasic_forever wrote: post #9

So ~15 companies a year? That doesn't sound outrageous for a company with billions and billions of dollars in the bank, and billions more coming in every quarter. edit: If anything there's probably immense pressure on Cook to buy buy buy more stuff. I don't think anyone inside Apple wants to have a repeat of stuff like old Apple maps or other products that just languished and died internally while external companies…

Maps hasn’t languished at all.

Google Maps has been playing catch up for the past year on features Apple Maps added in 2018.

https://www.justinobeirne.com/new-apple-maps

Re: Apple buys a company every three to four weeks

#143

Post by purpmint008 »

kergonath wrote: post #129
purpmint008 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "behave anticompetitively" What is Apple doing when it bundles iMessage and SMS together? Deception and anti-competitive behavior, that's what!

How so? What is their nefarious plan and how do they go about it? If you are the one seeing the truth and you want to be taken seriously you need to do better than just throw around words like “monopoly” and “anti-competitive” with no justification whatsoever.

Bundling of iMessage and SMS = reduction in competition by integration.

Re: Apple buys a company every three to four weeks

#144

Post by mooreds »

elefanten wrote: post #110
mooreds wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You should read "Goliath" by Matt Stoller. In it he reviews the history of monopoly and how the US definition of it changed from the 1930s to the 1980s. Interesting historical read and it reinforced to me that both monopolies and competitive markets are societal constructs, not facts of nature. https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Goliath/Matt-Stoller/...

It's worth noting that he is a highly opinionated writer on the subject. Seemingly, his raison d'etre is to further antitrust -- though, in his case, it seems to be a vague, expansive and shifting notion. He effectively just seems to be against any "big" business.

He definitely has opinions. I found the history useful, but he has an viewpoint that he argues for.

Happy to hear recommendations for contrasting viewpoints if you care to share.

Re: Apple buys a company every three to four weeks

#145

Post by dang »

purpmint008 wrote: post #86
purpmint008 wrote: post #64

Apple is the biggest monopoly in the US right now. Hands down. They get to get away with everything! Google, Microsoft, Facebook, etc. all get hammered on the daily in the US and in the EU. But, Apple is a golden child that can do no wrong. Do you people not realize that they've created a peer-pressure device in the form of the iPhone by packaging SMS and iMessage into 1 app called "Messages"? How is that even legal?…

Keep downvoting me, fanboys! Long live the resistance!

Would you please stop posting unsubstantive comments? We're trying for something different here.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Apple buys a company every three to four weeks

#146

Post by kergonath »

purpmint008 wrote: post #143
kergonath wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How so? What is their nefarious plan and how do they go about it? If you are the one seeing the truth and you want to be taken seriously you need to do better than just throw around words like “monopoly” and “anti-competitive” with no justification whatsoever.

Bundling of iMessage and SMS = reduction in competition by integration.

I can read, and you’ve already written that. But there are logical bits missing between your premise and your conclusion. Is there any measurable effect? Is say WhatsApp adoption rate significantly lower on iOS because of this? How much more anticompetitive is it than just bundling a SMS app with every phone?

Anything a company does to improve its market share is a reduction of competition, the threshold for anticompetitive behaviour is higher than that. Not saying Apple never does anything anticompetitive (they do), but iMessage is a very stupid hill to die on.

Re: Apple buys a company every three to four weeks

#147

Post by dang »

throwaways885 wrote: post #124
dang wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sort of perception about community bias comes up with every $BigCo. Then the comments complaining about it get highly upvoted, undermining the supposed observation. I think it has more to do with how our emotions subtly influence how we weight what we read. We're more likely to notice the cases we dislike/disagree with and let the ones we like/agree with glide by without affecting our impression of the community…

Part of the concern is Apple spends a ton of money marketing themselves as "pro-privacy and pro-consumer, more than those "other" $BigCo's". I've seen people say they're immune to advertising and then beat the Apple drum many times.

There's an analogous argument to be made about every $BigCo though. People's perceptions of these, and of how the community relates to them, are hugely conditioned by their pre-existing feelings.

Re: Apple buys a company every three to four weeks

#148

Post by DaiPlusPlus »

biztos wrote: post #121
humbledrone wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It varies between no interview at all, and a full interview exactly like a new hire. Both are done. Interviews are more common these days, because if they're skipped, existing employees may resent the acquihire folks for not having to jump through the same hoops. This is another reason for the vesting payouts for employees. If there wasn't some reward, and you had to do a full interview, why not just interview somewh…

> existing employees may resent the acquihire folks for not having to jump through the same hoops I guess that makes sense, but it’s also a reason to view the hoops as less of tech screen and more of a hazing ritual.

I appreciate that having to whiteboard a recursive permutation generator is a rite-of-passage for most of us, it gets old, quick. One's ability to do well in a whiteboard interview is not the best indicator of one's ability to deliver value to the organisation. If I were a hiring-manager I'd prefer to go-over the candidate's portfolio of work rather than grill them over the computational complexity of a logic puzzle.

If some new people from an acquired company were to join and I heard they skipped the third-year CS undergrad oral finals simulation step I'd be glad that there's some progress being made - I wouldn't feel resentful at all.

"I had it bad when I was younger, therefore you should too" is amongst the worst our instinctive behavioral tropes.

Re: Apple buys a company every three to four weeks

#149

Post by purpmint008 »

kergonath wrote: post #146
purpmint008 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bundling of iMessage and SMS = reduction in competition by integration.

I can read, and you’ve already written that. But there are logical bits missing between your premise and your conclusion. Is there any measurable effect? Is say WhatsApp adoption rate significantly lower on iOS because of this? How much more anticompetitive is it than just bundling a SMS app with every phone? Anything a company does to improve its market share is a reduction of competition, the threshold for anticomp…

How about the Apple Music store being embedded into the default Music App? Blatantly anti-competitive against Spotify.

Re: Apple buys a company every three to four weeks

#150

Post by fzil »

tshanmu wrote: post #133
read_if_gay_ wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Introducing Apple Chicken.

New improved version, only gives you the runs if you eat it holding the wrong way....

imagine having to go to the genius bar to get your chicken cooked the right way
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