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Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

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Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#321

Post by ftio »

amelius wrote: post #308
saagarjha wrote: post #172

An interesting offering from Amazon that is crippled by Apple and MacStadium, who deserve to be raked over the coals for their recent EULA changes. Just read the post on MacStadium's blog: https://blog.macstadium.com/blog/developers-big-sur-and-vind... Under the new agreement, you must: * Rent to only one organization * Rent for 24 hours at the minimum * Use it for some set of "approved" development work …among other…

> and shame on you Apple > (...) > either going to have to buy Macs Why not ditch the entire Apple ecosystem while you still can? Show them that we, developers, don't like feudal lords that like to tell us what we can and cannot do with our systems. So others won't dare to copy them.

Because there's money to be made by not "ditching the entire Apple ecosystem."

If you were able to run a business that was fun, that made you money, and that enabled you to help other people have fun and make money (i.e., your employees), would you not do that out of principle? I'm genuinely asking.

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#322

Post by Spooky23 »

saagarjha wrote: post #172

An interesting offering from Amazon that is crippled by Apple and MacStadium, who deserve to be raked over the coals for their recent EULA changes. Just read the post on MacStadium's blog: https://blog.macstadium.com/blog/developers-big-sur-and-vind... Under the new agreement, you must: * Rent to only one organization * Rent for 24 hours at the minimum * Use it for some set of "approved" development work …among other…

A little dramatic, eh?

Apple obviously doesn't want companies like AWS to be renting Mac Minis as some sort of VDI solution. That's consistent with the (shitty) practices of Microsoft with respect to Windows, which confines Windows 10 hosting to Azure services.

Given the nature of Mac, an AWS MacOS service is unique in that it's very clear who the manufacturer of the underlying hardware is. Apple, given it's control-freak nature wanted to have a model that accommodated both their needs and the provided a clear, multi-provider model to do what developers need.

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#323

Post by gumby »

addicted wrote: post #305
pbronez wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regulations benefit incumbents. That holds whether the regulations are national laws or corporate policies. When you make new rules, the established ecosystem adapts and doubles down while new players have a harder time getting started.

This is not true at all. Anti monopoly regulations, for example, exist for the sole purpose of privileging new entrants over incumbents. The actions against Microsoft, or the breaking up of AT&T certainly did not help the incumbents. An example closer to home is that entrepreneurial activity in Silicon Valley is often attributed to California law forbidding non competes in employment contracts. This is regulation, wi…

Regulations can benefit incumbents in two ways.

The best cases occur where they raise a floor uniformly. For example I would prefer to add anti pollution systems to my paint factory, because I live in town too, and I just don't want to pollute. It would raise the price of my paint $1/gal, and not enough customers will chose a product just because it polluted less. Many of my competitors feel the same. If we all do it everybody benefits and nobody suffers relative to their competition. This is even more important in cases where the customer can't signal through the market, e.g. electricity generation. These can benefit incumbents but not necessarily hurt new entrants, especially when they are cap ex rather than op ex (e.g. minimum wage rather than an additional piece of equipment).

There are many bad examples as well, some of which raise a floor asymmetrically. For example FB, or at least their CEO, is willing to have the CDA's section 230 abolished because they have such a dominant customer base and enough cash that they believe they would be able to afford to do the resulting government mandated controls and fight any lawsuits, while a new entrant would not.

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#324

Post by tootie »

nnx wrote: post #97
shp0ngle wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 24 hours is dictated by new Big Sur EULA. https://9to5mac.com/2020/11/11/macos-big-sur-adds-leasing-te... From the new EULA (not just for Amazon, paraphrased by 9to5mac): * Apple software and hardware must be leased “in its entirety to and individual or organization” * A lease period must be “for a minimum period of twenty-four (24) consecutive hours” * Customers must now accept software agreements for all instal…

Weird limitation. Hopefully Apple updates this.

They do this very intentionally. If they wanted to be available on AWS they'd allow OSX to run in a VM which they don't.

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#325

Post by tootie »

fomine3 wrote: post #105
shp0ngle wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 24 hours is dictated by new Big Sur EULA. https://9to5mac.com/2020/11/11/macos-big-sur-adds-leasing-te... From the new EULA (not just for Amazon, paraphrased by 9to5mac): * Apple software and hardware must be leased “in its entirety to and individual or organization” * A lease period must be “for a minimum period of twenty-four (24) consecutive hours” * Customers must now accept software agreements for all instal…

Does this EURA works to effectively kill handy macOS CI service like CircleCI and force users to use VM rental service like this?

I've done iOS builds using Github actions. The build minutes cost 10x as much as Linux. Anyone out there offering MacOS in the cloud is doing the same thing. Just racking Mac Minis. It means you can't slice CPUs or memory like a VM so it's less efficient and more expensive.

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#326

Post by lultimouomo »

kgantchev wrote: post #299
lultimouomo wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get that you're happy because Apple has now explicitly permitted what you were doing. I'm less clear on why you're happy that they didn't allow more stuff, like renting by the minute or for arbitrary purposes. You seem to depict companies that were doing this as "below board", while you as "above board". This is certainly true now, but before the changes both would have been a grey area - I don't see much of a diff…

> Would I be correct saying that you're happy because in one stroke Apple has moved you from grey area to explicitly permitted, and part of your competition from grey area to explicitly forbidden? I don't know how any competition would be negatively impacted by Apple implementing these terms, unless the competition was already selling services that were on a short-term basis (below 24 hours). And to circle back aroun…

> I don't know how any competition would be negatively impacted by Apple implementing these terms, unless the competition was already selling services that were on a short-term basis (below 24 hours).

Almosto all of MacStadium post is about those competitors, did we read something different?

And Amazon would be much more of a competition were they allowed to rent by the minute, it's their selling point!

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#327

Post by kevincox »

I find it disgusting that Apple can force people to jump though these hoops while paying them a huge premium for sub-standard hardware[1] so that these people can develop for their platform.

Not only are they bleeding the developers at build, test and sale time. They are providing a shitty experience while doing it.

Of course from an economic point of view they are right! For businesses it still makes sense to do this most of the time (especially since webapps are crippled on iOS) due to the large user base. If they didn't have that user base I'd bet very few people would tolerate this crap.

This is one of the handful of reasons that I boycott Apple, I find their business practices morally unacceptable.

[1] Sub-standard for CI/server use cases.

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#328

Post by oxfordmale »

stephenr wrote: post #283
oxfordmale wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are a startup, you can have your MacBook Mini in the office. As a larger organisation, you will need a dedicated server room for it limiting access to authorised staff members. You are likely going to need more than one, as you don't want your developers sitting around doing nothing if your MacBook Mini fails. You also need to allocate IT budget to maintain your devices and to replace them on a regular instanc…

what the hell is a "MacBook Mini"? You keep repeating the same phrase over and over so it can't be a typo.

Mac Mini

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#329

Post by sokoloff »

kgantchev wrote: post #299
lultimouomo wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get that you're happy because Apple has now explicitly permitted what you were doing. I'm less clear on why you're happy that they didn't allow more stuff, like renting by the minute or for arbitrary purposes. You seem to depict companies that were doing this as "below board", while you as "above board". This is certainly true now, but before the changes both would have been a grey area - I don't see much of a diff…

> Would I be correct saying that you're happy because in one stroke Apple has moved you from grey area to explicitly permitted, and part of your competition from grey area to explicitly forbidden? I don't know how any competition would be negatively impacted by Apple implementing these terms, unless the competition was already selling services that were on a short-term basis (below 24 hours). And to circle back aroun…

> I don't know how any competition would be negatively impacted by Apple implementing these terms, unless the competition was already selling services that were on a short-term basis (below 24 hours).

Macstadium competes against other short-term rental companies but also against real Macs, Hackintoshes on physical machines, Hackintoshes on virtual machines (inc EC2), and non-consumption.

Hacks on VMs are a pretty direct competitor I’d think.

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#330

Post by PopeDotNinja »

BGStucki wrote: post #245
saagarjha wrote: post #172

An interesting offering from Amazon that is crippled by Apple and MacStadium, who deserve to be raked over the coals for their recent EULA changes. Just read the post on MacStadium's blog: https://blog.macstadium.com/blog/developers-big-sur-and-vind... Under the new agreement, you must: * Rent to only one organization * Rent for 24 hours at the minimum * Use it for some set of "approved" development work …among other…

Brian Stucki here. If I had the power over Apple that you think I do, I definitely would have pushed for iPhone Socks first. Joking aside, the software license agreement was certainly a cause for personal celebration. It might be helpful for you to compare macOS 11 to previous versions. (Linked in my post.) If I/MacStadium did anything, we showed that there was a need for this sort of service and that both Apple and…

Maybe a case can be made to eliminate the 24 hour minimum by focusing on reducing carbon emissions Why force someone to rent for a day when they need it for an hour?

“This 23 hours of global warming is proudly sponsored by the Appleverse.”

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