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What Happens When Apple Buys a Company You Depend On

wired.com

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Re: What Happens When Apple Buys a Company You Depend On

#31

Post by mc32 »

jasonlotito wrote: post #29
saganus wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We could all hope all was open source but short of that, we use the tools that are available --with the understanding they could disappear tomorrow. And even then, open source projects get abandoned all the time or get shut down as well. So in essence we as humans would probably be better off expecting things to disappear instead of the opposite maybe? Not sure I can do that, but still, seems like a more fitting st…

> And even then, open source projects get abandoned all the time or get shut down as well. I can continue improving an open source project that gets abandoned.

In theory anyone can, but only large projects tend to get picked up.

Re: What Happens When Apple Buys a Company You Depend On

#32

Post by mik3y »

grrowl wrote: post #19

"We have made the decision to evolve our company mission and, as of today, we will no longer offer downloads." is the least respectful and most opaque phrase I've ever heard. What would have been the risk of something more honest and direct?

Seriously. This is beyond crass. Not 2 months ago, I came this close to betting on and recommending FoundationDB. Today I would have been swimming in a world of shit (not to mention wasted time) had I recommended these guys.

I'm never one to begrudge exits, but they blew this. Even if financial circumstances meant they had to turn down the product, there are way better ways to do that before yanking everything and disappearing.

Dave Scherer, Dave Rosenthal: I hope you're stocking up for a long cozy retirement at Apple. I honestly don't know how you expect to be trusted by a faithful early adopter ever again.

Re: What Happens When Apple Buys a Company You Depend On

#33

Post by Frondo »

mc32 wrote: post #31
jasonlotito wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And even then, open source projects get abandoned all the time or get shut down as well. I can continue improving an open source project that gets abandoned.

In theory anyone can, but only large projects tend to get picked up.

But the magic of free software is, if your business depends on it and you can hire someone to work on it, you can keep using that source code for as long as it makes business sense to.

Re: What Happens When Apple Buys a Company You Depend On

#35

Post by sliverstorm »

mc32 wrote: post #10

The same thing that happens when a service or product you depend on shuts its doors or gets bought out. Why is this so exceptional? What would we do if twitter folded tomorrow? things like this happen all the time. There is nothing special about it, except Wired wants to make money taking this tack. I mean, it'd be nice if we could depend on things to be there forever and it'd be nice if companies shuttered gracefull…

At least you usually have runway. If your favorite OSS project closes its doors, you probably have a year or three until bitrot finally closes the doors. Same goes for many closed-source softwares, and physical products.

With a closed-source service on somebody else's servers, they can turn it off tomorrow and it's just gone.

Re: What Happens When Apple Buys a Company You Depend On

#36

Post by dlu »

nickysielicki wrote: post #28
mc32 wrote: post #10

The same thing that happens when a service or product you depend on shuts its doors or gets bought out. Why is this so exceptional? What would we do if twitter folded tomorrow? things like this happen all the time. There is nothing special about it, except Wired wants to make money taking this tack. I mean, it'd be nice if we could depend on things to be there forever and it'd be nice if companies shuttered gracefull…

> Why is this so exceptional? Because code isn't a good that spoils. When someone shuts their door to my favorite restaurant, the presumption is that they were losing money, and needed to close the doors. When my favorite SaaS service shuts down, it's the same deal. This is different. They're just being selfish because they got some money, giving the middle finger to everyone. That same code is still sitting in a git…

Angry much?

You lost me with the "code isn't a good that spoils" line. It is a great phrase, but perhaps you could re-explain?

Re: What Happens When Apple Buys a Company You Depend On

#37

Post by mb_72 »

grrowl wrote: post #19

"We have made the decision to evolve our company mission and, as of today, we will no longer offer downloads." is the least respectful and most opaque phrase I've ever heard. What would have been the risk of something more honest and direct?

Indeed - this reads as "we no longer need you, the customer, so screw you". Not a good look for anyone who is looking to move on from this company, especially if they are in management and presumably would have had something to say about how things wound down.

Re: What Happens When Apple Buys a Company You Depend On

#38

Post by jsprogrammer »

dlu wrote: post #36
nickysielicki wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why is this so exceptional? Because code isn't a good that spoils. When someone shuts their door to my favorite restaurant, the presumption is that they were losing money, and needed to close the doors. When my favorite SaaS service shuts down, it's the same deal. This is different. They're just being selfish because they got some money, giving the middle finger to everyone. That same code is still sitting in a git…

Angry much? You lost me with the "code isn't a good that spoils" line. It is a great phrase, but perhaps you could re-explain?

A restaurant requires continuous inputs: fresh food, labor, electricity.

Code is a purely digital good. What was in the repo a few days ago could be released at no ongoing cost to FoundationDB/Apple and it will stay exactly how it was, forever.

Re: What Happens When Apple Buys a Company You Depend On

#39

Post by mindcrash »

Maybe something more is at play here than just the founders and team cutting access to years of their work.

Could also be something to do with a certain company who doesn't like you to have access to (certain) assets of their acquisition after it went through. I mean, they did the same thing with TestFlight. janking Android support directly after the acquisition (and closing it altogether a while later) and Logic (yanking Windows support directly after the acquisition and making the product OSX exclusive).

You could say Apple really is quite ruthless and basically acts like a asshole when it comes to acquisitions, even though their CEO seems to be quite a nice and gentle person (at least after work hours)

Re: What Happens When Apple Buys a Company You Depend On

#40

Post by logicallee »

mc32 wrote: post #10

The same thing that happens when a service or product you depend on shuts its doors or gets bought out. Why is this so exceptional? What would we do if twitter folded tomorrow? things like this happen all the time. There is nothing special about it, except Wired wants to make money taking this tack. I mean, it'd be nice if we could depend on things to be there forever and it'd be nice if companies shuttered gracefull…

>Why is this so exceptional? What would we do if twitter folded tomorrow? things like this happen all the time.

obviously you're not an actuary but lay some odds that twitter folds tomorrow. (literally; overnight.)

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