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Google doesn't get 'social', but Apple doesn't understand the Internet

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Re: Google doesn't get 'social', but Apple doesn't understand the Internet

#21

Post by Lewisham »

Samuel_Michon wrote: post #11

Apple understands the internet, it just doesn't like what it sees. There's a lot of smut, hate speech, pirated content, and malware out there. Just as Google has tried to do with its search engine, Apple is building a system that makes it easy to find quality content. Content that is legal, age rated and doesn't harm your devices. A lot of families value those qualities over 'absolute freedom'.

I would disagree. Apple fundamentally doesn't understand the Internet. MobileMe/.Mac has been a decent disaster for a long time, not even able to meet the quality levels of services that Google gives away for free. That's not because Apple chooses to not like bits about the net, that's because Apple doesn't seem to have any idea what its doing in that space.

I'd say that Apple doesn't just not understand the Internet, but at a higher level, it doesn't understand communication. Look at the iOS notification system: it is, and always has been, fundamentally broken. It assumes you'll only get a single notification, and that that notification is so important that it should interrupt your current app to get it.

Apple have been selling computers in phone formats. Android, Microsoft, and especially Palm, are selling you communicators, that pulls in data from all over your communication space and centralizes it. Apple doesn't seem to know how to do this (or assumes most people don't have an online persona in various locations, which I think most people really do).

Re: Google doesn't get 'social', but Apple doesn't understand the Internet

#22

Post by krakensden »

pohl wrote: post #15
larrik wrote: post #9

Exhibit A: iTunes (the service) is essentially blocked off from being accessed by people who don't have iTunes (the program) installed. This becomes VERY obvious if you run Linux. The App Store and the iTune music library are not easily searchable or browseable from your Linux PC. 3rd party websites that do this instead aren't really the point, either.

I don't think that makes a very compelling exhibit, given that "the internet" is not "all things you can get to via a web browser". The internet, rather, is IP, TCP, UDP, etc...and every protocol built on top of it. This includes HTTP & HTML (which iTunes leverages heavily) but also a many other things that are not browser-oriented. Regardless, I think your exhibit is more easily explained by Apple understanding exac…

We're not that tight fisted, and besides, what's the point of actively working to make it harder for us to give Apple money?

Re: Google doesn't get 'social', but Apple doesn't understand the Internet

#23

Post by Kylekramer »

usaar333 wrote: post #20
sfphotoarts wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nearly every geek I know has a MBP, and every startup I've worked at uses the same.

His statement definitely feels true the other way though; the most ani-Apple people are geeks.

Well, of course. That is how fandom works. I don't particularly care if Bella gets with Jacob or Edwards, but I don't like the Twilight books. In order to dislike a particular team/company/entity, you probably have to passionate about the field in general.

Re: Google doesn't get 'social', but Apple doesn't understand the Internet

#24

Post by semanticist »

epistasis wrote: post #19
kbutler wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Apple tolerates these [native] apps, but just barely, and offers the web as the way out of their walled garden. Geeks wanting native apps, and Apple reluctantly going along may have been the case when the iPhone & App Store first began, but Apple has long since realized that the app channel is very valuable to users and to the platform, and that control over that channel will be hugely profitable. If Apple really wa…

PhoneGap seems interesting, but I don't fully understand it yet. Which of its capabilities should be added to the browser? Should they be standardized in HTML5 or should they be part of a devices OS?

PhoneGap provides, if you include its JavaScript file in your PhoneGap-wrapped web app, JavaScript APIs to the camera, stored photos, the address book, and some other stuff.

Some of this stuff is in 'HTML5', like geolocation, but much of it isn't. Apple could have provided custom APIs to the camera and so on and allowed people to access it from their iOS-specific web apps.

The way that an API gets to be a standard is that someone implements it and people use it - if Apple had included a camera access API in Mobile Safari, it probably would have found its way into a spec and been implemented by other browsers.

Your last question seems confused: HTML/CSS rendering and JavaScript processing is part of the device's OS (in the form of its web browser). No browser does everything that's in the standard, and most browsers do things that aren't in the standard. Just adding it to the spec for HTML5 wouldn't be directly meaningful.

Re: Google doesn't get 'social', but Apple doesn't understand the Internet

#25

Post by justincormack »

epistasis wrote: post #19
kbutler wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Apple tolerates these [native] apps, but just barely, and offers the web as the way out of their walled garden. Geeks wanting native apps, and Apple reluctantly going along may have been the case when the iPhone & App Store first began, but Apple has long since realized that the app channel is very valuable to users and to the platform, and that control over that channel will be hugely profitable. If Apple really wa…

PhoneGap seems interesting, but I don't fully understand it yet. Which of its capabilities should be added to the browser? Should they be standardized in HTML5 or should they be part of a devices OS?

PhoneGap sees itself as a temporary measure and everything should be a browser capability. They bridge the OS capabilities that are not available now in the browser.

Re: Google doesn't get 'social', but Apple doesn't understand the Internet

#26

Post by Travis »

jarin wrote: post #16

What this is basically saying is that the software these companies create doesn't understand the complexities and chaos of human interaction and thought. Pretty sure people have been working on this problem for a while, and it won't be solved anytime soon.

Agreed. How can you possibly expect a computer to make a non-optimal decision, such as humans regularly do (e.g., the lottery, short versus long-term output, etc.)? Until we can model these decisions, there will be areas that tech falls flat.

Re: Google doesn't get 'social', but Apple doesn't understand the Internet

#27

Post by Travis »

Synaesthesia wrote: post #4

Also I think Google get social, they appreciate it's potential but just haven't succeeded at it yet. They weren't focused on it.

What is your evidence to support that statement? All I see is many attempts that indicate Google gets that social is important. All those attempts seem to illustrate (to me), that they don't get how to do it, or what the core ideas in "social" are about.

Re: Google doesn't get 'social', but Apple doesn't understand the Internet

#28

Post by brd »

sfphotoarts wrote: post #5
apress wrote: post #2

Apps are a return to the walled garden -- the anti-Internet, if you will.

No they are not! apps mostly use the internet for their data, but provide a richer UX than what a web browser can do. The internet is the underpinning of most apps.

Apps may not be the antithesis of the Internet, but the concept of an App Store arguably is. Internet = decentralized freedom, App store = centralized control.

The data is not the problem, the communication medium is not the problem, the issue is the control over the distribution channel.

Re: Google doesn't get 'social', but Apple doesn't understand the Internet

#29

Post by Samuel_Michon »

Lewisham wrote: post #21
Samuel_Michon wrote: post #11

Apple understands the internet, it just doesn't like what it sees. There's a lot of smut, hate speech, pirated content, and malware out there. Just as Google has tried to do with its search engine, Apple is building a system that makes it easy to find quality content. Content that is legal, age rated and doesn't harm your devices. A lot of families value those qualities over 'absolute freedom'.

I would disagree. Apple fundamentally doesn't understand the Internet. MobileMe/.Mac has been a decent disaster for a long time, not even able to meet the quality levels of services that Google gives away for free. That's not because Apple chooses to not like bits about the net, that's because Apple doesn't seem to have any idea what its doing in that space. I'd say that Apple doesn't just not understand the Internet…

What you're saying is that Apple doesn't understand social networking and cloud services. I agree, but I suspect Apple is working on those; although it's anyone's guess what they're going to do with the massive data center they've just built in NC.

The article was about Apple trying to control how people interact with content on the internet. The author feels that that's against the nature of the internet, hence: "Apple doesn't understand the internet".

Re: Google doesn't get 'social', but Apple doesn't understand the Internet

#30

Post by Lewisham »

Samuel_Michon wrote: post #29
Lewisham wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would disagree. Apple fundamentally doesn't understand the Internet. MobileMe/.Mac has been a decent disaster for a long time, not even able to meet the quality levels of services that Google gives away for free. That's not because Apple chooses to not like bits about the net, that's because Apple doesn't seem to have any idea what its doing in that space. I'd say that Apple doesn't just not understand the Internet…

What you're saying is that Apple doesn't understand social networking and cloud services. I agree, but I suspect Apple is working on those; although it's anyone's guess what they're going to do with the massive data center they've just built in NC. The article was about Apple trying to control how people interact with content on the internet. The author feels that that's against the nature of the internet, hence: "Ap…

Well, to be fair, the author only has one paragraph about Apple and the Internet, and you could get multiple readings from it :) When I read control and centralization, I don't just think of iTunes, but I do think of Apple's dogged insistence that everything you do is essentially tied to one machine. Your iPhone, and (as I think Tim Bray described it "monsterously") your iPad, need to be sync'd to a computer when they start up, for no compelling reason. My Android phone lets me type in my Google ID and off I go.

Honestly, I think Apple's attitude towards the Internet is not because they don't like it. I think they just don't know what to do with it, certainly aren't willing to partner with companies that do, and they're letting their market get chipped away little by little. I've felt like Apple have been resting on their laurels for years, software-wise. Jonathan Ive is producing great hardware, but year on year competitors are catching up or surpassing Mac OS X and iOS, and Apple doesn't seem to notice/care.

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