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How Apple Is Organized for Innovation

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Re: How Apple Is Organized for Innovation

#41
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Source? I've never see an Apple advertisement that would lead me to believe I can't use WhatsApp or Signal or any other messaging application.

Anecdotal sources: Every group of peers that wouldn't have excluded me from the group chat if it didn't "turn green"

The green means that it's technically inferior than WhatsApp, iMessage, Signal, etc. and/or you can end up with surprise international texting charges from your mobile network.

I don't have a problem with people discriminating against MMS, but everyone I know doesn't have a problem using any of the other decent alternatives that work on both Android and iOS.

Re: How Apple Is Organized for Innovation

#42
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What about the fact that they haven't announced a single new product category since the Apple Watch in 2014? AirPods (2016) are pretty popular. (edit: I listed some of Apple's recent new services here, but removed since the AirPods make the point by themselves. Apologies to user optimiz3 for leaving your comment dangling.)

A credit card is a bit of a stretch. Virtually every enterprise in existence has tried to get me to sign up for their in-house card since the mid 80s.

I would argue that Apple card is actually a significantly different and better experience purely by virtue of being able to cycle the number at will. I no longer have to worry about the safety of handing my card number out over the phone. I no longer have to wait for a new card if the old number gets compromised. I no longer have to deal with completely inept new card processing agents who fail to actually send the card to the right address while I'm traveling after half a dozen tries and they keep just sending the damned thing to my house which they know I'm not at.

Re: How Apple Is Organized for Innovation

#44
post #36
post #12

iMessage is a true marketing innovation in America, where the only "alternatives" are Facebook and (barely usable) SMS. It restricts communication and makes life more difficult for everyone who doesn't have an iPhone, which in turn increases iPhone sales. Meanwhile, while holding basically infinite money, they pretend some patent troll is holding them back from making it cross-platform. Pure genius.

Can you expand on the patent troll pretext? Never heard of that.

Apparently a company called VirnetX is seeking damages from Apple over iMessage and FaceTime, which some people (in my previous discussion among others) point out as their excuse not to develop cross-platform iMessage as they do cross-platform Apple Music. I don't have any evidence of Apple themselves claiming this as the excuse.

https://9to5mac.com/2016/05/26/patent-troll-facetime-imessag...

Re: How Apple Is Organized for Innovation

#45

Is the way "Apple is organized for innovation" the reason why XCode is so prone to crashing? Is it why so many of Apple's new APIs are lacking documentation? Is it the reason the iOS Simulator doesn't reliably export the accessibility tree needed to run XCUI tests without flaking half the time? What about the fact that they haven't announced a single new product category since the Apple Watch in 2014? To my mind, it…

> single new product category since the Apple Watch

They released the HomePod and AirPods as well as a range of new services e.g. Apple Arcade, Apple TV+, Apple News+, Apple Fitness.

And we are expecting two major changes to their product offerings over the coming year or so i.e. ARM Macs and Apple Glass.

Re: How Apple Is Organized for Innovation

#46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Source? I've never see an Apple advertisement that would lead me to believe I can't use WhatsApp or Signal or any other messaging application.

There’s a pretty common meme about people having green texts being “meh”. It’s weird. Does this count as a “source” in this instance? https://me.me/t/green-texts Edit: found something more traditional https://www.vogue.com/article/breathless-couples-who-are-not... pretty frustrating read though. Be warned.

Sounds like the green messages are doing people a favor by pointing out garbage people who discriminate against someone for not using iOS.

I'm just claiming that there is a valid use case for making it abundantly clear if a conversation is happening via MMS versus iMessage, so I didn't take it as a way for Apple to somehow "lock" people into iMessage...especially since plenty of other chat apps are a few taps away with no degradation in usability.

Re: How Apple Is Organized for Innovation

#47

Is the way "Apple is organized for innovation" the reason why XCode is so prone to crashing? Is it why so many of Apple's new APIs are lacking documentation? Is it the reason the iOS Simulator doesn't reliably export the accessibility tree needed to run XCUI tests without flaking half the time? What about the fact that they haven't announced a single new product category since the Apple Watch in 2014? To my mind, it…

> it certainly seems as if Apple is actually organized to simply refine the innovations of its past This takes innovation, too. Just because a product isn't a wholly new, virgin thing doesn't mean it isn't innovative. The A-series chips aren't products themselves, for example, but they're certainly innovations. Apple is now the best mobile processor house in the world, and it isn't particularly close - who saw that c…

> Apple is now the best mobile processor house in the world

Will likely be the best laptop processor in the world as well.

Re: How Apple Is Organized for Innovation

#48
post #37
post #12

iMessage is a true marketing innovation in America, where the only "alternatives" are Facebook and (barely usable) SMS. It restricts communication and makes life more difficult for everyone who doesn't have an iPhone, which in turn increases iPhone sales. Meanwhile, while holding basically infinite money, they pretend some patent troll is holding them back from making it cross-platform. Pure genius.

Before there was iMessage, there was BlackBerry Messenger. It had similar qualities of being a nicer user experience as compared to SMS. Must be nice to reimplement an old idea and qualify as innovation. :)

Google tries again, again, and again, to create a decent messaging app, and fails every time. Whether it's bad marketing or management, it's clearly not the simplest thing in the world to achieve what apple did with iMessage (unless now you want to posit that the billionaires in Google also have no idea what they're doing ever) and the discussion is relevant especially when we are reviewing their management style.

Re: How Apple Is Organized for Innovation

#49
post #27
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> only "alternatives" are Facebook and (barely usable) SMS. Why don't Americans use Telegram?

For me there are two basic reasons: 1) everyone I know is on iMessage, 2) iMessage does everything I require of a messaging app. Honest question and not trying to be hostile, why should I prefer telegram? What am I missing?

End to end encryption. If you’re using iCloud with iMessage Apple has access to your messages.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-apple-fbi-icloud-exclusiv...

Re: How Apple Is Organized for Innovation

#50

Is the way "Apple is organized for innovation" the reason why XCode is so prone to crashing? Is it why so many of Apple's new APIs are lacking documentation? Is it the reason the iOS Simulator doesn't reliably export the accessibility tree needed to run XCUI tests without flaking half the time? What about the fact that they haven't announced a single new product category since the Apple Watch in 2014? To my mind, it…

> To my mind, it certainly seems as if Apple is actually organized to simply refine the innovations of its past,

Apparently Apple can't even refine their own innovations without breaking their own kit and bilking their customers.

To wit, iOS 14 and watchOS 7 (most recent versions) break Activity and Health GPS data and Apple recommends using iCloud backup to resolve the issue. [0]

The problem is that not only is iCloud insecure (e.g. Messages) compared to local backup, it also costs money for over 5GB storage. [1] In other words, Apple has broken GPS with iOS 14 and watchOS 7 and their recommendation is to use an insecure service that will cost users more money.

Such affected customers should be represented in a class action lawsuit. (I'd love for this link to get traction, but I know it's a longshot. [2])

[0] https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT211865

[1] https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201238

[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24904349

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