Quoting: slaapliedjeIs a lot of that due to store lockin, or just greed over what APIs they allow to be used? I mean nkt allowing alternative kwyboards and browsers is a garbage thing to do to your users, unless you can convince them that some engineers ALWAYS know what is best for EVERY user / circumstance...
Disgusting is the correct word for it.

By banning all other browsers under pretense that "they aren't secure", Apple can force developers who don't want to ignore their users (which is a significant user base), to use their proprietary APIs. That's the leverage they have over the whole industry and it's indeed disgusting and harmful to progress. Something anti-trust laws were explicitly designed to prevent but Apple managed to get away with it for years.

Finally someone is going after them about it (Epic), though in a different context, but it's really about the same issue. I.e. in more general terms, setting whatever bogus terms in their store and not allowing any other stores Apple have a lot of bad anti-competitive leverage over various industries (Web is just one major example) who don't want to ignore their user base.

Last edited by Shmerl on 30 September 2020 at 1:03 am UTC

Quoting: Kuduzkehpanyeah one of them is my Cousin which usually tries to convince me to install windows for blabla windows only game to play with and then if i do he just basicly stops playing that game and bullying that game after 1-2 weeks of gameplay.

It is so frustrating and I am close to somebody *exactly like that. He would get not just me, but an entire group, into some new game and then lose interest just as we begin picking up momentum (starting a cool project, or finally beginning to become ferocious on public lobbies, etc).

The last game I tried to play with them was ARK:SE and it quickly became apparent that this behavior will never change. It even affects them within a single game, constantly starting new bases instead of building on top of something established to reach further in the game world. Victim of a market which rewards short attention spans? Fear of commitment? I only wish I could at least know why.

Quoting: damarrinIt's just too bad for smartphones you only have the choice of locked-down chaperone Apple and spyware Google.

I run a softphone. 100% free software. It was a very easy choice to make.

Quoting: GustyGhost

Quoting: Kuduzkehpanyeah one of them is my Cousin which usually tries to convince me to install windows for blabla windows only game to play with and then if i do he just basicly stops playing that game and bullying that game after 1-2 weeks of gameplay.

It is so frustrating and I am close to somebody *exactly like that. He would get not just me, but an entire group, into some new game and then lose interest just as we begin picking up momentum (starting a cool project, or finally beginning to become ferocious on public lobbies, etc).

The last game I tried to play with them was ARK:SE and it quickly became apparent that this behavior will never change. It even affects them within a single game, constantly starting new bases instead of building on top of something established to reach further in the game world. Victim of a market which rewards short attention spans? Fear of commitment? I only wish I could at least know why.

Quoting: damarrinIt's just too bad for smartphones you only have the choice of locked-down chaperone Apple and spyware Google.

I run a softphone. 100% free software. It was a very easy choice to make.

Ha, yeah one of the reasons I stopped playing multiplayer games outside of occasionally doing so with my brother, is because either my friends couldn't agree on a game to play (they like RTSs, and I'm not a fan, as they all seem to play the same, and since I never spent the time to get good at any of them, they just annihilate me in minutes because I like to build up before sweeping in for attack... last RTS I really enjoyed was the Myth series...)

If it weren't for work, I'd probably just switch to using one of the Nokia feature phones.. I even bought one, then found out it was the wrong model and doesn't support T-mobile... always seems the phones I'd like are not compatible to the USA. Hopefully my Librem phone will show up some day!

Quoting: slaapliedje

Quoting: Shmerl

Quoting: damarrinExercising control over your own platform has nothing to do with monopoly.

Read about what's the point of competition laws. If Apple was some company with 5 users, no one would care what they exercise. However Apple have power over Web standards development due to having a huge market share (it doesn't have to be a monopoly to have such power). And not allowing competing browsers means they can dictate their garbage terms and everyone has to accept that. And they did it more than once, sabotaging touch events, DASH, WebGPU and other efforts that could go much better if not for Apple making a mess. For me it's clearly a case for anti-trust to handle.

The best solution is to fine Apple until they allow other stores which won't have any of their garbage restrictions, like ban on other browsers. Anti-trust frying them is very long overdue. So I hope Epic win and this disgusting thing will be explicitly prevented.

Is a lot of that due to store lockin, or just greed over what APIs they allow to be used? I mean nkt allowing alternative kwyboards and browsers is a garbage thing to do to your users, unless you can convince them that some engineers ALWAYS know what is best for EVERY user / circumstance...
Disgusting is the correct word for it.

By no means do I think Google is an angel in this, and I think they are only a tad better than Apple, but at least you basically know where Google stands. With Apple it is like that girl you thought was really hot, but then you started talking to her and she didn't have a lot going on upstairs...and had a limited imagination when it came to everything in life and was a spoiled brat to boot.

Google is more like the college roomate who kept drawing a dick on your face when you passed out at the party.

Well, Apple is certainly no saint, but I trust Apple more than lots of shady stuff that would appear on people’s iPhones when they weren’t that strict. In that sense I agree with https://tirania.org/blog/archive/2020/Aug-28.html
Apple certainly has an interest in peoples wallets, but they also have to care that their ecosystem stays healthy and secure. I’m pretty sure that would no longer be the case when any shady app is allowed to run its own browser engine or payment system.

Please note that there are lots of people out there without any technical background or interest, you can’t expect everybody to know what lands on their devices, let alone really understand what may happen with their credit card numbers when being entered somewhere online.

I’m not saying that Apple cannot improve, there are certainly things that can better/more fair, though it is not that black and white imho.

Sorry for getting off-topic.

Last edited by jens on 30 September 2020 at 6:58 pm UTC

Apple used security excuse for anti-competitive harm for years. If anything, I'd trust real open source browsers to be more secure than anything Apple make.

Basically, they can't hide forest behind the trees - they are anti-competitive lock-in bullies. Security and the rest are just a pretense.

Last edited by Shmerl on 30 September 2020 at 6:14 pm UTC

Don't forget Apple collaborated with the NSA.

I think the answer is "tribalism". A simple human psychology. We want to be in packs, the bigger the pack of choice, the better. So, most see being in a large tribe to be "better" than being in a small one, even if ones role is the "slave" instead of "free citizen".

Plus, not coping with a society's rules is perceived as "deviation", a decease, and those exhibiting deviant behavior must be isolated or disposed of. And like it or not, using Windows is a norm (as 95% of people are doing so) and using everything else is a deviation. All "normal" people are thinking you are a "freak". The reason for not of them outright bashing you are that most of them can hold themselves, while the remaining "highly impulsive" ones can not restrain themselves from "doing the right thing" of correcting you and putting you on the right path.

"Stop alienating yourself in the society! Just be like everyone else! Just use Windows!" Most of these "trolls" are not "trolling" just to "have fun". They are thinking they are doing yourself a favor.

It is not all "doom and gloom" though. There is a thing called Overton's Window to slowly change the very definitions of "norm" and "deviation". The keyword is "slowly".

That's why I stopped preaching on every corn er about how "Linux is superior" and just started to use it on my work. Now, even die-hard Windows fans among my colleagues can see Linux is not just a "toy for freaks", but a stable and update-free system.

Quoting: Alm888I think the answer is "tribalism". A simple human psychology. We want to be in packs, the bigger the pack of choice, the better. So, most see being in a large tribe to be "better" than being in a small one, even if ones role is the "slave" instead of "free citizen".

Plus, not coping with a society's rules is perceived as "deviation", a decease, and those exhibiting deviant behavior must be isolated or disposed of. And like it or not, using Windows is a norm (as 95% of people are doing so) and using everything else is a deviation. All "normal" people are thinking you are a "freak". The reason for not of them outright bashing you are that most of them can hold themselves, while the remaining "highly impulsive" ones can not restrain themselves from "doing the right thing" of correcting you and putting you on the right path.

"Stop alienating yourself in the society! Just be like everyone else! Just use Windows!" Most of these "trolls" are not "trolling" just to "have fun". They are thinking they are doing yourself a favor.

It is not all "doom and gloom" though. There is a thing called Overton's Window to slowly change the very definitions of "norm" and "deviation". The keyword is "slowly".

That's why I stopped preaching on every corn er about how "Linux is superior" and just started to use it on my work. Now, even die-hard Windows fans among my colleagues can see Linux is not just a "toy for freaks", but a stable and update-free system.

Ah, if only Linux were update-free. Mind you I would rather update moat Linux installs with ease than the bromen mess that has always been Windows Update.

But yeah, I think you are 100% correct about the trolls. Granted I also have always been one to run with the underdog. Then again, I have also tended to think they are the better solutions than their competitor's, but because people tend toward cheap over quality, the better product tends to lose. (Take for example any early version of Windows against the Amiga, or beta vs VHS...) I mean going back in time, the Apple Machintosh didn't even have color displays for a bit after they were first introduced, but because they got into schools and their high price demanded that they clearly must be so much better than the Amiga or Atari ST... yet both of those platforms at times could run Mac software better than the Mac...

If cheaper always won then there wouldn't be Microsoft/Apple, since libre systems have been around forever. It's more like the one that does the lying (marketing) and law abuse better wins. It's as true in the computing industry as outside it.

Hmm, I think when MS DOS came about there was no Linux, only a bunch of very expensive Unixes. Then MS put windows out as the natural successor and people followed suit.

And yes, marketing is EVERYTHING.