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Biden Administration Report Recommends Sweeping Changes to Apple's Ecosystem
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#FJB
Brandon has all his notes on Apple's ecosystem locked up next to his Corvette so I'm sure we have nothing to fear
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Brandon has all his notes on Apple's ecosystem locked up next to his Corvette so I'm sure we have nothing to fear
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Exactly.
I didn't like the lockdown on the iPhone ecosystem - so I didn't buy an iPhone.
If Apple extends the lockdown too far into MacOS I'll stop using Macs.
I'm a grown up and can make my choice.
I'm almost on the point of re-considering - since starting to use a phone for e-banking and payments is becoming harder to avoid and I trust Apple slightly further than I trust Google/Samsung/Huawai etc. and I certainly don't want to install questionable third-party software on a phone I use for banking and ID.
I remember the "dark days" of the 1990s when it was a massive uphill struggle to use anything other than Wintel PCs and Internet Explorer. The current phone situation is nothing like that - there's a decent choice between iPhone, "Google experience" Android, "generic" Android and even a few Linux/Ubuntu phones, and most of the major Apps & services support at least iOS and Android.
...and, as for third-party payments, if Apple allow third-party payments in the App store then they won't get a nickel for any "freemium" apps they distribute which pretty much breaks the financial model.
Imagine you could walk into a store, pick up an Acme Widgetmaster, then phone Acme directly with your credit card number - how would the store finance itself without getting a slice of purchases? ANS: by monitoring your every move and selling your personal data to marketers. Remind you of anybody else with a large share of the smartphone market?
Of course, back in the good old days you could hack around with your PC and if you broke it you got to keep both parts, and if you installed malware you mostly just lost your own data (as being connected 24/7 to the internet was the exception rather than the rule). Today, smartphones have become security critical devices used for banking, ID verification etc. and installing malware has consequences. They probably need locking down even harder, not liberalising. If you want to hack around, choose the tool for the job - a linux PC or "maker-board", not a consumer appliance - and don't do your e-Banking on it.
Not America….. China.
Report will end up moot considering the Biden administration lost control of the House.
The government is not forcing Apple to allow alternative app stores inside their App Store. Besides, when you consider all of the national/regional retail chains and independent local stores out there, Walmart’s market share is fairly small compared to Apple's share of mobile OS. Apple (iOS) and Google (Android) are potentially impacted by this legislation because of their dominance in mobile OS.
Pretty darn easy to argue with what they're saying. In fact, you've made a good argument against it right here.
Apple customers aren't lobbying government to make these changes. They are, for the most part, happy, which is why they are Apple customers instead of Android users.
It's companies like Epic Games (Fornite) that want to profit from iPhone's marketplace but not play by Apple's rules that are driving these supposedly consumer-focused plans. They accuse Apple of being "greedy". Fine, Apple is greedy, whatever. But so are Epic and the others, who want all the benefits of being on Apple platforms but don't want to play by the rules, so they whine to and lobby Congress and administrations to change the rules, while pretending their just sticking up for the little guy. This is baptists and bootleggers in action.
You're right; they should keep their hands off, butt out, and let consumers make their own decisions. The last thing we need is government stepping in to "help". Their dream phone would be one with no first party apps installed, and a long list of questions: Which browser would you like to install? Which email client do you want to use? Which of 50 apps stores would you like to shop? Congratulations, your phone is now ready to use, 10 hours later!
Grr, it's hard not to argue with what they're saying. It's such utter BS from clueless people who think that they can run large, successful, and popular technology firms when they can't come even remotely close to balancing a budget. Apple (and Google) is immensely popular; the same cannot be said of politicians and bureaucrats.
(My complaints, by the way, are not in anyway limited to the Biden administration. They apply to both parties, and both the executive and legislative branches).
I realize I'm ranting at this point, but this crap ticks me off. Apple et al are successful because people, for the most part, like them. Stop trying to screw this up!
Good. If security was the number one concern then why not wall off macOS?
Totally don’t agree with any of these recommendations as they will make my experience worse and less safe.
only after they break up google
It’s not anticompetitive in fact in a way it’s pro consumer. I have a choice between a closed system Apple and open system Android. Now this takes my choice away. Only a handful of users on this site are asking for this that just want to run emulators (most common request I have seen in this topic over the years). Other than that it’s just big companies wanting more money. It won’t help us.
Well how will stores work? Epic wants to implement their own store. If an app (store) can’t maintain/edit/manipulate another app due to the sandbox model, how can a store work?
You get what you vote for: A government that is crumbling but can't keep it's nose out of anybody's business.
so I see google payments to the government did not see any disruption. They were like we know how to kill apple make them look just like our crappy platform then people will have to choose us and we shall get all there data perfect..... said in a megalomaniac voice....
But at least there are no more mean tweets, right?
I don't know, that's why I asked the general question. 😂
I'm sure there's someone in the forum with a lot more technical knowhow who could explain the intricacies of iOS. All the same, any change brought about from the results of this investigation won't affect us for years to come anyway.
And the extent to which it affects us is still unknown, if at all. So I really don't feel too bothered by any of the doom-posting.
If you don't like how it is, buy an Android. I think the government has better things to do.
I remember my MotoRazer V3 Elite was app locked and I couldn’t install apps outside those available on my carrier.
I remember BlackBerry didn’t allowed me to sideload apps outside the ones on their app portal.
I don’t remember the government going such lengths to allow me to do so.
Maybe there were less companies dictating the world’s politics back in the day.
I remember BlackBerry didn’t allowed me to sideload apps outside the ones on their app portal.
I don’t remember the government going such lengths to allow me to do so.
Maybe there were less companies dictating the world’s politics back in the day.
Glad your mom has offspring that understands the implications and is willing to provide her with helpful guidance.
Thanks for pointing this out. People forget this fact because “yay let’s HATE APPLE!!!!” Epic sued Google because it’s “too difficult to side load on Android devices”.
All very sensible and honestly pretty obvious suggestions.
Never let a bureaucrat tell an engineer how to do their job. They will always screw it up hard. This is why The Order of the Engineer was created. https://order-of-the-engineer.org/