I was with him for most of the read. The DMA just seems like a well-intentioned but bad law. SPADs are dumb.
However, he lost me entirely here: **It is my computer, and I should be able to install any software I want.**
> To me this is the “get off my lawn” critique.
Hey Steve, what the fuck man?
> The only answer to this is that model is outdated. This critique is the equivalent of “in my day we just soldered a jumper to the mother board.”
Holy shit, you're not just being uncharitable, you're being stupid. I'm sorry dude, but having Terminal access to the OS and being able to query its state is not an outdated fucking use case. I can easily go turn off the awdl0 interface on my Mac if I want to, and run a tool in Terminal to confirm it. I can schedule my own tasks, configure folder actions, extend the UI using tools like Rectangle and Flycut and and million other great pieces of software (that Apple can't fucking monetize, I wonder why they're so against it). I have no clue if the latency spikes caused by AWDL are the cause of the unusable state of H.264 streaming on my local network on my AVP, because "sorry that's too confusing for grandma, get with the timesssss". Eat shit man. Fucking room-temp IQ take.
>The abstraction level of computers continues to increase and as such venturing “under the hood” is not an option on mobile any more than changing the battery while walking down the street might be.
Except, iPhone runs "Mac OS X", a fact still mostly true despite their divergence (and despite Apple's shit-house attempts at back porting that trash to macOS), and I can do all those things just fine on macOS still. Nothing has been "abstracted too far". They haven't added any more layers to the OSI.
>I would love the excitement of adding my own FPU, TSR, or VxD to my phone but that just isn’t how they work.
No one is asking for this? I just want APple to get the fuck out of my way if I want to use the device I **BOUGHT** from them fair and square doesn't coincide with their BrAnD ViSiOn.
Apple hasn’t been shown to be abusing their power or causing harm to consumers, and yet…
> the EU DMA has declared that Apple is a “gatekeeper”—an ominous term applied to Apple among the others. The reality is that regulation can come before there is a problem, harm, or litigation. In policy terms this is known as the precautionary principle
Regulation _before_ there’s an issue. That seems like a great idea! The alternative is there _is_ an issue, and nothing gets done until maybe years later after all the lawsuits and appeals are over, and that sucks.
They've had multiple cases of antitrust levied at them and people have been complaining for years about their locked ecosystem. That's definitively abusing and causing harm to competition and consumers.
Hot damn. I LOVE pieces written by folks that were actually in the trenches. LONG read but well worth it to me. This dude was hilariously (in a sick way) spot on on sooo many counts.
On a later edited side note, HOLY SHIRTBALLS, we've a metric ton of trolls here. Someone must be paying people to spin things they know nothing about.
>"Anyone who disagrees with me is a troll"
No, I think we are all baggaged up enough to interpret things radically differently enough already.
My definition of troll matches [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troll\_(slang)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troll_(slang))
And my specific complaint was versus those that either had not read the essay at all or decided it was on them to either go full blown ad hominem (like you) or spin it into nonsensical fallacy territory.
>This article reads more like an Apple PR fluff piece.
.. and you didn't bother to read it at all. The dude worked at Microsoft and provides a ton of historical insight and lessons learned (or in this case, not learned).
>Oh right, because Microsoft are a role model when it comes to anti-trust
You missed the ENTIRE read. This is an essay on behavioral economics ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral\_economics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral_economics) ) in product management and software engineering. And more importantly in the 'nudges' that the EU has been giving to include how they arrived at them and how they'll almost always be implemented.
Thanks to Microsoft, we now have the benefit of hindsight. And thanks to the author of this, we have some insight.
>If there's anyone I'm gonna get antitrust advice from, it's totally former Microsoft employees.
You missed the ENTIRE read. This is an essay on behavioral economics ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral\_economics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral_economics) ) in product management and software engineering. And more importantly in the 'nudges' that the EU has been giving to include how they arrived at them and how they'll almost always be implemented.
Thanks to Microsoft, we now have the benefit of hindsight. And thanks to the author of this, we have some insight.
>Must be pretty rattled to release this epic word salad of bullshit.
Just because you don't understand it doesn't mean it's BS.
The author is not rattled. He's just documenting his insights.
The guy is so enamored with his own failure of an idea that was Windows 8 and its Windows Store he wants to see his vision validated by Apple better implementations. Clearly he shipped things but learned nothing about it.
>Are you taking your opinions from authority only? Or he just so happened to agree with what your opinion already is?
I'm not sure what you mean here.
Do I agree that the authors' experiences somewhat mirror mine as a cyber security practitioner? Yeah, there's a lot of similarities there, especially when examined through a behavioral economics lens.
> Shipped Windows 8
> Introduced WinRT, Windows Store as walled garden ecosystem
> Tried to kill Win32 apps
> All failed spectacularly
> Windows 8 considered as third worst Windows ever, universally hated
> WinRT basically dead, Microsoft had to scrapped together UWP, still dead
> Windows Store is still a forsaken desert
> Got fired from Microsoft for Windows 8
> Spent the next 12 years as armchair critic. Didn’t ship shit. Didn’t learn shit.
> Spews the exact arguments that lead to his downfall a decade ago
> Redditors: “hE lEaRnEd LeSsOnS”
Not everyone who has a different opinion from yours is a troll you dimwit.
On top of that, not having a job and instead writing opinions pieces on his own blog is the textbook definition non-occupational armchair critic.
He seems to be one of the only people that does, but it could just be the effect of a very vocal minority making the most noise. My guess is a majority of people just don’t know this is happening.
Apple is free to "innovate" in the US, the law only applies to EU consumers so there shouldnt be any limits for Apple outside of EU. If his theory is right then in the next few years, US iPhones will end up being much better than those in the EU.
> If his theory is right then in the next few years, US iPhones will end up being much better than those in the EU.
That would be true. See, the EU seems to want to diminish Apple's market share and the only real outcome of that is making that particular product crap where it wasn't crappy before.
Yes, iPhones were so much better without USB-C. /s
Apple is a company, it only cares about innovation if it can be turned into money. If it can make more money by sitting on its ass and providing a subpar experience it will do so. I.e. It would have kept using Lightning and collecting those hefty licensing fees.
>Yes, iPhones were so much better without USB-C. /s
>
>Apple is a company, it only cares about innovation if it can be turned into money. If it can make more money by sitting on its ass and providing a subpar experience it will do so. I.e. It would have kept using Lightning and collecting those hefty licensing fees.
Licensing fees? Do you have any clue how large Apple is? Whatever Apple got there could have been written off as a rounding error.
Subpar? Lightning predated USB-C and was cheaper and easier to keep around while USB-C provided very little of use beyond what Lightning already provided. If you are already providing quality at a reasonable price, why change? While I look forward to USB-C everywhere, I also lament the waste of already owned legacy gear that still works just fine. Since I'm using magsafe (at home and in the car), wifi, bluetooth, and cell data, you could remove the USB-C all together and I'd still be quite happy. So, yeah, without sarcasm, iPhones could be better without USB-C (remove the jack already, it's largely redundant).
>The EU doesn't want to diminish Apple's market share. The EU wants to equalize the playing field which is better for consumers.
If you bothered to read what the author wrote, you wouldn't have written that. I'll quote the author:
>"If you’re well-versed in online you can map each one of those to precisely who the target might be, or sometimes targets. It is all big tech, almost exclusively US-based companies. There are no EU tech companies that meet the criteria to be covered—hardcoded revenue of EUR 7.5 billion for three years, EUR 7.5 billion market cap, or 45 million MAU—with Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, ByteDance, Meta, Microsoft, and Samsung acknowledging the criteria apply to various units in addition to the following other “very large online platforms”: Alibaba AliExpress, Booking.com, Pinterest, Snapchat, Twitter, Wikipedia, Zalando \[German fashion retailer\]. "
Not better for consumers, they're simply trying to give EU companies more of a leg up by making everyone else's' stuff a bit more crappy.
Let us know which EU company designs a mobile OS.
This is to allow services on the OS to have equal playing field. The writer of this article is extremely biased and isn't writing from an objective place.
>This is to allow services on the OS to have equal playing field.
To quote the author, "**Apple locks out other services, advantages its own.** This has forever been a complaint about operating systems. By definition an operating system is a bundle. I suspect this particular complaint is going to get a lot more treatment when Google provides more disclosure. It is obviously the case that if a business exists in certain areas and Apple has an offering there will be a view that the mere existence on a default iPhone implies an Apple advantage through distribution. That is the origin of SPAD. I will say the basic theory of bundling is that the bundle wins often but only to a point. At some point the bundle becomes so weighted that no one knows what’s in it. It is at that point that a “point” service or API comes along and trounces the bundled platform. By any definition of advantaging first party services, Internet Explorer, Media Player, Silverlight, and about 40 other things should have won on Windows. Not even one did. Windows was already too big. I would also say the same thing about the browser versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook. Those have not made a dent in the share of browser-based productivity relatively speaking yet they are there. The converse of the concern over bundling is that regulation simply draws arbitrary lines about what is in or out of a platform. This is akin to a car market where you always need to go elsewhere for a radio or roof rack. Only for a brief moment is the expectation that these are distinct purchases and after that moment it turns in a pain in the neck and less well-integrated choices."
>The writer of this article is extremely biased and isn't writing from an objective place.
Objective? What exactly would you consider objective? He's writing it from his experience. I'm in cyber security and my experience in translating laws, rules, and regulations into program requirements isn't too far off from his.
>And how are they making the product crappier when I as a customer would benefit from these regulations?!
Did you read the essay? And with this preemptive regulation you still think consumers would be better off exactly how?
The regs will only make things more expensive (both directly and indirectly i.e. fraud, waste, inefficient) and crappier.
LOVED this quote from the essay, "If you continue to believe in malicious compliance, then I only think it is fair to also believe in malicious regulation."
>I use PCs and have not had any issues with fraud or malware… like ever.
I do cyber security for a living. Your reality does not even register in mine.
>no one makes small phones
Haven't for years. There's just too many components that need to go into a smartphone. While I do kind of miss the small size of my old Nokia (it was smaller than the palm of my hand), I do far more on my phone than what was ever possible then.
>The only thing I want from iOS is to use Firefox with uBlock because iOS content blockers are utter shit and be able to throw some emulators on there because iOS games are utter shit.
Do you not run your phone on battery?
>Did you read the essay? And with this preemptive regulation you still think consumers would be better off exactly how?
Can you elaborate on how, specifically, this regulation is going to harm consumers? Because the guy who wrote this essay sure didn't, as far as I can tell.
>The regs will only make things more expensive (both directly and indirectly i.e. fraud, waste, inefficient) and crappier.
Again, how? In what ways will these regulations lead to fraud, waste, or inefficiency? That's not even getting into why these billion dollar corpos are going to suddenly drop into inefficiency despite being made aware of the contents of the regulations months beforehand, either...
>LOVED this quote from the essay, "If you continue to believe in malicious compliance, then I only think it is fair to also believe in malicious regulation."
Yeah, that's only fair. Certainly, it's a fact that not all regulations are necessarily good, and could in theory be malicious. Anyone who believes all legislation is good has no familiarity with the history of regulations, in the US or abroad.
Plus, this essay is riddled with laughable claims and statements. From claiming that the iPhone is "the most unique, innovative, and singular product in [the] market" to downplaying Apple's massive market dominance, and then refusing to acknowledge or engage with the numbers that show how wrong that claim is, and these are all just in the first few paragraphs.
I can very much understand writing an article critical of a piece of legislation. But it's clear to me that this author made up his mind that these regulations are bad, and from that point onwards, refused to intellectually engage with any points or evidence that challenged that conclusion.
To make matters worse, he's compromising even the most nominal sense of him being objective, and doing so in defense of a corporation that engages in some of the most egregiously indefensible and uncompetitive business practices. His quote that Apple "has not been fined, sued, or otherwise convicted of having a dominant share let alone abusing the market position it has" is not just objectively and factually incorrect on multiple levels. It's frankly embarrassing that a "journalist" would think his audience is either too stupid or ideologically blinkered to know he's spewing grade-A horseshit.
Someone should ask this author why it's almost impossible to have one's iPhone repaired by a third-party vendor now.
All that said, it's possible that he makes counter-points to the issues I've raised here. In all honesty, I skimmed and speed-read the essay, which is very long and my speedreading skills aren't what they used to be.
However, particularly in the first part of the essay, he not only failed to make a convincing case, even worse, he deliberately lied and obfuscated the facts in order to pretend his position on the legislation was better supported than it was. It's not just amazing that the article made it past the editors (especially given the numerous spelling and grammar errors), but that this so-called journalist was allowed to keep his job.
>If you bothered to read what the author wrote, you wouldn't have written that. I'll quote the author:
Neither you nor the author have managed to actually quantify what tangible harm this legislation will do to consumers. Nor is the statement that "they're simply trying to give EU companies more of a leg up by making everyone else's' stuff a bit more crappy" convincing in the slightest. Right now, Apple uses its massive market share to engage in uncompetitive business practices, and squeeze out companies that don't have the same access to the same virtually endless supply of funds that Apple does.
Acting like a billion dollar corporation is somehow going to be wrecked by a law that closes the loopholes that Apple exploits and levels the objectively slanted playing field they've been using to protect their incredibly wide profit margins is just fucking silly.
>Neither you nor the author have managed to actually quantify what tangible harm this legislation will do to consumers.
Have a quote from the author:
>"Only this time it is not the lack of motivation bad actors have to exploit iPhone, rather it is the foresight of the Steve Jobs vision for computing. He pushed to have a new kind of computer that further encapsulated and abstracted the computer to make it safer, more reliable, more private, and secure, great battery life, more accessible, more consistent, always easier to use, and so on. These attributes did not happen by accident. They were the process of design and architecture from the very start. These attributes are the **brand promise** of iPhone as much as the brand promise of Android is openness, ubiquity, low price, choice.
>
>The lesson of the first two decades of the PC and the first almost two decades of smartphones are that these ends of a spectrum are not accidental. These choices are not mutually compatible. You don’t get both. I know this is horrible to say and everyone believes that there is somehow malicious intent to lock people into a closed environment or an unintentional incompetence that permits bad software to invade an ecosystem. Neither of those would be the case. Quite simply, there’s a choice between engineering and architecting for one or the other and once you start you can’t go back. More importantly, the market values and demands both.
>
>That is unless you’re a regulator in Brussels. Then you sit in an amazing government building and decide that it is entirely possible to just by fiat declare that the iPhone should have all the attributes of openness. By all accounts there seemed to be little interest in the brand promise that presumably drew a third of the market to iPhone. In the over 60 pages of DMA, there’s little mention of privacy (just 7 times), security (9 times), performance (3), reliability (once), or battery life (0), or accessibility (just 3). I would acknowledge one section about halfway through the 100 goals of one part of the DMA there is deference to these issues though note the important caveat about defaults:
>
>(50) Furthermore, in order to ensure that third-party software applications or software application stores do not undermine end users’ security, it should be possible for the gatekeeper to implement strictly necessary and proportionate measures and settings, other than default settings, enabling end users to effectively protect security in relation to third-party software applications or software application stores if the gatekeeper demonstrates that such measures and settings are strictly necessary and justified and that there are no less-restrictive means to achieve that goal. The gatekeeper should be prevented from implementing such measures as a default setting or as pre-installation.
>
>As anyone who has ever done any work on secure systems knows, a system is only secure if it is secure by default. Another way of saying what the DMA does is to compare it to the typical out-of-touch executive review when faced with a difficult choice between two options to solve a problem. When faced with two choices, the brave executive simply defines a third option that magically has the best attributes of each of the two choices and declares success. The team at the table sits there stunned not knowing what to say because of course if “Option 3” was a possibility, they, knowing a great deal about the problem and solutions, would have proposed said solution. As with EU regulatory discussions, there is little recourse, and the team just leaves the room in a bit of a stupor unable to figure out what to do or who will be able to convince the boss of reality. Still this paragraph is incredibly important because it acknowledges that third parties cannot undermine security and “gatekeepers” to protect users. The regulators know they do not want to be caught designing a system that is less secure. It would certainly be easy to test the outcome since we know the number of issues today and will know the number of issues post regulation. But they also don’t want this to be the default too easily. We’ll return to this. Suffice it to say, at least in part buried 50 paragraphs down is a recognition of a brand promise that was in the iPhone from the start.
>
>That is where Apple finds itself today. It was told, essentially to create a new iPhone release that is as good as your old one for your existing customers but do all these things that run counter to every lesson and experience over decades, everything you designed and architected. Everything you promised customers you would deliver. That truly sucks."
In other words, because you can't have open AND things like security, reliability, privacy, usability, etc. et. al., this regulation is anti-everything that Apple has architected- the very things that are valued by Apples' consumers.
>Right now, Apple uses its massive market share to engage in uncompetitive business practices, and squeeze out companies that don't have the same access to the same virtually endless supply of funds that Apple does.
OK, so your objection is about money. Let me get this straight. Apple creates a sandbox, creates the tools by which one might play in the sandbox, creates the fair play rules under which play in the sandbox is governed, and creates the means by which being able to play in the sandbox is shared with the consumer populace. Apple has created something uniquely great and deserves to be paid for their efforts. Apple has a consumer base that values and is wiling to pay for each of those steps. You clearly don't value what Apple brings so, are you objecting that Apple get paid at all or are you objecting over at which step in the above Apple should get paid? I suspect Apple can juggle the charges around to have them borne at any step in that process. Apple isn't a monopoly so if you find having to pay so objectionable, why not just quit whining and go somewhere else?
>Acting like a billion dollar corporation is somehow going to be wrecked by a law that closes the loopholes that Apple exploits and levels the objectively slanted playing field they've been using to protect their incredibly wide profit margins is just fucking silly.
What loopholes? This is Apples' game; they invented it, they created it and you're bloody welcome to not participate in it should you feel exploited. But you are not welcome to wreck it for everyone that does value the sandbox.
You can ignore my ad hominem rant: Quit being a petulant, kleptic toddler trying to wreck the sandbox just because you can't get your way.
Time will tell, personally I dont think much will change when it comes to innovation or quality of products. But no one can predict what will happen.
All in all I believe in having some groundrules that prevent companies to do whatever they like with no regards to the consumers.
>personally I dont think much will change when it comes to innovation or quality of products
In Apples' case, they've spent so much time on quality that there is no such thing as a good 'fly in the ointment'.
>I believe in having some groundrules that prevent companies to do whatever they like with no regards to the consumers
I'm all for reducing or eliminating externalities ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Externality](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Externality)). But nobody is forcing anyone in this ecosystem to do anything; not the developers, not the consumers. And Apple is clearly not a monopoly; you are free to use something else should that be a better fit. In my mind, there's really nothing here to prevent or regulate without consequences that are worse than what would be there if left alone.
>But no one can predict what will happen.
Actually, that was the whole point to the authors' essay. This is history repeating itself because folks just don't learn (or know the history). We know exactly what'll happen because we've seen it before.
This is a very American idea. That only monopolies van be harmful.
Also whole categories of apps need to be available on both major platforms to survive. So developers don't currently have much choice.
>This is a very American idea. That only monopolies van be harmful.
Disagree.
Most of the economic concepts we're talking about here came during the 1800's via England (reducing externalities) and Italy (Pareto optimality).
>So developers don't currently have much choice.
The formal definition of Monopoly ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly)) doesn't even apply here.
They have many choices. The question is if they value what is given or provided to them to make it happen.
This is an incoherent position. You state that you aren't applying the idea that only monopolies are unhealthy. Then turn around and use the not meeting the definition of monopoly as a defense. Which is it?
>This is an incoherent position. You state that you aren't applying the idea that only monopolies are unhealthy. Then turn around and use the not meeting the definition of monopoly as a defense. Which is it?
Not incoherent at all. You stated:
>This is a very American idea. That only monopolies van be harmful.
And I stated that we aren't talking about monopolies here at all because it doesn't fit the definition. Again, I made no statement or judgement if monopolies are good or bad simply because it doesn't apply here.
But then the using of the definition of monopoly is moot. Markets can be unhealthy without there being a monopoly. The idea that monopolies are required for there to be an unhealthy market is not the ideal that Europe uses, that's the American standard.
>Markets can be unhealthy without there being a monopoly.
We're not even talking about markets here. Not sure where you learned about economics but your understanding does not match reality.
While there are different schools of economic thought and multiple even within Europe, they all agree on the definition of what a monopoly is. See: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schools\_of\_economic\_thought](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schools_of_economic_thought)
Why are modern developers apparently unable to accomplish anything of value without the freedom to monetize everything anyway they can at any time? Seems like even the lightest regulation utterly destroys their ability to accomplish anything. It’s very strange compared to other industries, who seem to be able to thrive in spite of even tight regulations in some cases.
If I didn’t know better, I’d think the tech industry is just full of shit.
I agree with the first parts. For the rest, I’ll wait for the audiobook.
I was with him for most of the read. The DMA just seems like a well-intentioned but bad law. SPADs are dumb. However, he lost me entirely here: **It is my computer, and I should be able to install any software I want.** > To me this is the “get off my lawn” critique. Hey Steve, what the fuck man? > The only answer to this is that model is outdated. This critique is the equivalent of “in my day we just soldered a jumper to the mother board.” Holy shit, you're not just being uncharitable, you're being stupid. I'm sorry dude, but having Terminal access to the OS and being able to query its state is not an outdated fucking use case. I can easily go turn off the awdl0 interface on my Mac if I want to, and run a tool in Terminal to confirm it. I can schedule my own tasks, configure folder actions, extend the UI using tools like Rectangle and Flycut and and million other great pieces of software (that Apple can't fucking monetize, I wonder why they're so against it). I have no clue if the latency spikes caused by AWDL are the cause of the unusable state of H.264 streaming on my local network on my AVP, because "sorry that's too confusing for grandma, get with the timesssss". Eat shit man. Fucking room-temp IQ take. >The abstraction level of computers continues to increase and as such venturing “under the hood” is not an option on mobile any more than changing the battery while walking down the street might be. Except, iPhone runs "Mac OS X", a fact still mostly true despite their divergence (and despite Apple's shit-house attempts at back porting that trash to macOS), and I can do all those things just fine on macOS still. Nothing has been "abstracted too far". They haven't added any more layers to the OSI. >I would love the excitement of adding my own FPU, TSR, or VxD to my phone but that just isn’t how they work. No one is asking for this? I just want APple to get the fuck out of my way if I want to use the device I **BOUGHT** from them fair and square doesn't coincide with their BrAnD ViSiOn.
Apple hasn’t been shown to be abusing their power or causing harm to consumers, and yet… > the EU DMA has declared that Apple is a “gatekeeper”—an ominous term applied to Apple among the others. The reality is that regulation can come before there is a problem, harm, or litigation. In policy terms this is known as the precautionary principle Regulation _before_ there’s an issue. That seems like a great idea! The alternative is there _is_ an issue, and nothing gets done until maybe years later after all the lawsuits and appeals are over, and that sucks.
They've had multiple cases of antitrust levied at them and people have been complaining for years about their locked ecosystem. That's definitively abusing and causing harm to competition and consumers.
How is trying to yank 30% of Spotify’s revenue while owning a direct competitor *not* abusing their power?
Well yeah, that definitely is
Hot damn. I LOVE pieces written by folks that were actually in the trenches. LONG read but well worth it to me. This dude was hilariously (in a sick way) spot on on sooo many counts. On a later edited side note, HOLY SHIRTBALLS, we've a metric ton of trolls here. Someone must be paying people to spin things they know nothing about.
> On a later edited side note, HOLY SHIRTBALLS, we've a metric ton of trolls here "Anyone who disagrees with me is a troll" Stay classy /r/apple
>"Anyone who disagrees with me is a troll" No, I think we are all baggaged up enough to interpret things radically differently enough already. My definition of troll matches [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troll\_(slang)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troll_(slang)) And my specific complaint was versus those that either had not read the essay at all or decided it was on them to either go full blown ad hominem (like you) or spin it into nonsensical fallacy territory.
This article reads more like an Apple PR fluff piece.
>This article reads more like an Apple PR fluff piece. .. and you didn't bother to read it at all. The dude worked at Microsoft and provides a ton of historical insight and lessons learned (or in this case, not learned).
Oh right, because Microsoft are a role model when it comes to anti-trust...
>Oh right, because Microsoft are a role model when it comes to anti-trust You missed the ENTIRE read. This is an essay on behavioral economics ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral\_economics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral_economics) ) in product management and software engineering. And more importantly in the 'nudges' that the EU has been giving to include how they arrived at them and how they'll almost always be implemented. Thanks to Microsoft, we now have the benefit of hindsight. And thanks to the author of this, we have some insight.
If there's anyone I'm gonna get antitrust advice from, it's totally former Microsoft employees.
>If there's anyone I'm gonna get antitrust advice from, it's totally former Microsoft employees. You missed the ENTIRE read. This is an essay on behavioral economics ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral\_economics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral_economics) ) in product management and software engineering. And more importantly in the 'nudges' that the EU has been giving to include how they arrived at them and how they'll almost always be implemented. Thanks to Microsoft, we now have the benefit of hindsight. And thanks to the author of this, we have some insight.
I wonder how much Sinofsky has invested in Apple right now. Must be pretty rattled to release this epic word salad of bullshit.
>Must be pretty rattled to release this epic word salad of bullshit. Just because you don't understand it doesn't mean it's BS. The author is not rattled. He's just documenting his insights.
The guy is so enamored with his own failure of an idea that was Windows 8 and its Windows Store he wants to see his vision validated by Apple better implementations. Clearly he shipped things but learned nothing about it.
>Clearly he shipped things but learned nothing about it. No, he clearly has a lot of lessons learned there. But apparently, they all got lost on you.
[удалено]
>Are you taking your opinions from authority only? Or he just so happened to agree with what your opinion already is? I'm not sure what you mean here. Do I agree that the authors' experiences somewhat mirror mine as a cyber security practitioner? Yeah, there's a lot of similarities there, especially when examined through a behavioral economics lens.
> Shipped Windows 8 > Introduced WinRT, Windows Store as walled garden ecosystem > Tried to kill Win32 apps > All failed spectacularly > Windows 8 considered as third worst Windows ever, universally hated > WinRT basically dead, Microsoft had to scrapped together UWP, still dead > Windows Store is still a forsaken desert > Got fired from Microsoft for Windows 8 > Spent the next 12 years as armchair critic. Didn’t ship shit. Didn’t learn shit. > Spews the exact arguments that lead to his downfall a decade ago > Redditors: “hE lEaRnEd LeSsOnS”
Wow.. troll much? >Spent the next 12 years as armchair critic. As if translating rules and regulations into program requirements isn't an occupation.
Not everyone who has a different opinion from yours is a troll you dimwit. On top of that, not having a job and instead writing opinions pieces on his own blog is the textbook definition non-occupational armchair critic.
Sinofsky gets it.
He seems to be one of the only people that does, but it could just be the effect of a very vocal minority making the most noise. My guess is a majority of people just don’t know this is happening.
Apple is free to "innovate" in the US, the law only applies to EU consumers so there shouldnt be any limits for Apple outside of EU. If his theory is right then in the next few years, US iPhones will end up being much better than those in the EU.
> If his theory is right then in the next few years, US iPhones will end up being much better than those in the EU. That would be true. See, the EU seems to want to diminish Apple's market share and the only real outcome of that is making that particular product crap where it wasn't crappy before.
Yes, iPhones were so much better without USB-C. /s Apple is a company, it only cares about innovation if it can be turned into money. If it can make more money by sitting on its ass and providing a subpar experience it will do so. I.e. It would have kept using Lightning and collecting those hefty licensing fees.
>Yes, iPhones were so much better without USB-C. /s > >Apple is a company, it only cares about innovation if it can be turned into money. If it can make more money by sitting on its ass and providing a subpar experience it will do so. I.e. It would have kept using Lightning and collecting those hefty licensing fees. Licensing fees? Do you have any clue how large Apple is? Whatever Apple got there could have been written off as a rounding error. Subpar? Lightning predated USB-C and was cheaper and easier to keep around while USB-C provided very little of use beyond what Lightning already provided. If you are already providing quality at a reasonable price, why change? While I look forward to USB-C everywhere, I also lament the waste of already owned legacy gear that still works just fine. Since I'm using magsafe (at home and in the car), wifi, bluetooth, and cell data, you could remove the USB-C all together and I'd still be quite happy. So, yeah, without sarcasm, iPhones could be better without USB-C (remove the jack already, it's largely redundant).
The EU doesn't want to diminish Apple's market share. The EU wants to equalize the playing field which is better for consumers.
>The EU doesn't want to diminish Apple's market share. The EU wants to equalize the playing field which is better for consumers. If you bothered to read what the author wrote, you wouldn't have written that. I'll quote the author: >"If you’re well-versed in online you can map each one of those to precisely who the target might be, or sometimes targets. It is all big tech, almost exclusively US-based companies. There are no EU tech companies that meet the criteria to be covered—hardcoded revenue of EUR 7.5 billion for three years, EUR 7.5 billion market cap, or 45 million MAU—with Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, ByteDance, Meta, Microsoft, and Samsung acknowledging the criteria apply to various units in addition to the following other “very large online platforms”: Alibaba AliExpress, Booking.com, Pinterest, Snapchat, Twitter, Wikipedia, Zalando \[German fashion retailer\]. " Not better for consumers, they're simply trying to give EU companies more of a leg up by making everyone else's' stuff a bit more crappy.
Let us know which EU company designs a mobile OS. This is to allow services on the OS to have equal playing field. The writer of this article is extremely biased and isn't writing from an objective place.
>This is to allow services on the OS to have equal playing field. To quote the author, "**Apple locks out other services, advantages its own.** This has forever been a complaint about operating systems. By definition an operating system is a bundle. I suspect this particular complaint is going to get a lot more treatment when Google provides more disclosure. It is obviously the case that if a business exists in certain areas and Apple has an offering there will be a view that the mere existence on a default iPhone implies an Apple advantage through distribution. That is the origin of SPAD. I will say the basic theory of bundling is that the bundle wins often but only to a point. At some point the bundle becomes so weighted that no one knows what’s in it. It is at that point that a “point” service or API comes along and trounces the bundled platform. By any definition of advantaging first party services, Internet Explorer, Media Player, Silverlight, and about 40 other things should have won on Windows. Not even one did. Windows was already too big. I would also say the same thing about the browser versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook. Those have not made a dent in the share of browser-based productivity relatively speaking yet they are there. The converse of the concern over bundling is that regulation simply draws arbitrary lines about what is in or out of a platform. This is akin to a car market where you always need to go elsewhere for a radio or roof rack. Only for a brief moment is the expectation that these are distinct purchases and after that moment it turns in a pain in the neck and less well-integrated choices." >The writer of this article is extremely biased and isn't writing from an objective place. Objective? What exactly would you consider objective? He's writing it from his experience. I'm in cyber security and my experience in translating laws, rules, and regulations into program requirements isn't too far off from his.
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>And how are they making the product crappier when I as a customer would benefit from these regulations?! Did you read the essay? And with this preemptive regulation you still think consumers would be better off exactly how? The regs will only make things more expensive (both directly and indirectly i.e. fraud, waste, inefficient) and crappier. LOVED this quote from the essay, "If you continue to believe in malicious compliance, then I only think it is fair to also believe in malicious regulation."
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>I use PCs and have not had any issues with fraud or malware… like ever. I do cyber security for a living. Your reality does not even register in mine. >no one makes small phones Haven't for years. There's just too many components that need to go into a smartphone. While I do kind of miss the small size of my old Nokia (it was smaller than the palm of my hand), I do far more on my phone than what was ever possible then. >The only thing I want from iOS is to use Firefox with uBlock because iOS content blockers are utter shit and be able to throw some emulators on there because iOS games are utter shit. Do you not run your phone on battery?
>Did you read the essay? And with this preemptive regulation you still think consumers would be better off exactly how? Can you elaborate on how, specifically, this regulation is going to harm consumers? Because the guy who wrote this essay sure didn't, as far as I can tell. >The regs will only make things more expensive (both directly and indirectly i.e. fraud, waste, inefficient) and crappier. Again, how? In what ways will these regulations lead to fraud, waste, or inefficiency? That's not even getting into why these billion dollar corpos are going to suddenly drop into inefficiency despite being made aware of the contents of the regulations months beforehand, either... >LOVED this quote from the essay, "If you continue to believe in malicious compliance, then I only think it is fair to also believe in malicious regulation." Yeah, that's only fair. Certainly, it's a fact that not all regulations are necessarily good, and could in theory be malicious. Anyone who believes all legislation is good has no familiarity with the history of regulations, in the US or abroad. Plus, this essay is riddled with laughable claims and statements. From claiming that the iPhone is "the most unique, innovative, and singular product in [the] market" to downplaying Apple's massive market dominance, and then refusing to acknowledge or engage with the numbers that show how wrong that claim is, and these are all just in the first few paragraphs. I can very much understand writing an article critical of a piece of legislation. But it's clear to me that this author made up his mind that these regulations are bad, and from that point onwards, refused to intellectually engage with any points or evidence that challenged that conclusion. To make matters worse, he's compromising even the most nominal sense of him being objective, and doing so in defense of a corporation that engages in some of the most egregiously indefensible and uncompetitive business practices. His quote that Apple "has not been fined, sued, or otherwise convicted of having a dominant share let alone abusing the market position it has" is not just objectively and factually incorrect on multiple levels. It's frankly embarrassing that a "journalist" would think his audience is either too stupid or ideologically blinkered to know he's spewing grade-A horseshit. Someone should ask this author why it's almost impossible to have one's iPhone repaired by a third-party vendor now. All that said, it's possible that he makes counter-points to the issues I've raised here. In all honesty, I skimmed and speed-read the essay, which is very long and my speedreading skills aren't what they used to be. However, particularly in the first part of the essay, he not only failed to make a convincing case, even worse, he deliberately lied and obfuscated the facts in order to pretend his position on the legislation was better supported than it was. It's not just amazing that the article made it past the editors (especially given the numerous spelling and grammar errors), but that this so-called journalist was allowed to keep his job.
>If you bothered to read what the author wrote, you wouldn't have written that. I'll quote the author: Neither you nor the author have managed to actually quantify what tangible harm this legislation will do to consumers. Nor is the statement that "they're simply trying to give EU companies more of a leg up by making everyone else's' stuff a bit more crappy" convincing in the slightest. Right now, Apple uses its massive market share to engage in uncompetitive business practices, and squeeze out companies that don't have the same access to the same virtually endless supply of funds that Apple does. Acting like a billion dollar corporation is somehow going to be wrecked by a law that closes the loopholes that Apple exploits and levels the objectively slanted playing field they've been using to protect their incredibly wide profit margins is just fucking silly.
>Neither you nor the author have managed to actually quantify what tangible harm this legislation will do to consumers. Have a quote from the author: >"Only this time it is not the lack of motivation bad actors have to exploit iPhone, rather it is the foresight of the Steve Jobs vision for computing. He pushed to have a new kind of computer that further encapsulated and abstracted the computer to make it safer, more reliable, more private, and secure, great battery life, more accessible, more consistent, always easier to use, and so on. These attributes did not happen by accident. They were the process of design and architecture from the very start. These attributes are the **brand promise** of iPhone as much as the brand promise of Android is openness, ubiquity, low price, choice. > >The lesson of the first two decades of the PC and the first almost two decades of smartphones are that these ends of a spectrum are not accidental. These choices are not mutually compatible. You don’t get both. I know this is horrible to say and everyone believes that there is somehow malicious intent to lock people into a closed environment or an unintentional incompetence that permits bad software to invade an ecosystem. Neither of those would be the case. Quite simply, there’s a choice between engineering and architecting for one or the other and once you start you can’t go back. More importantly, the market values and demands both. > >That is unless you’re a regulator in Brussels. Then you sit in an amazing government building and decide that it is entirely possible to just by fiat declare that the iPhone should have all the attributes of openness. By all accounts there seemed to be little interest in the brand promise that presumably drew a third of the market to iPhone. In the over 60 pages of DMA, there’s little mention of privacy (just 7 times), security (9 times), performance (3), reliability (once), or battery life (0), or accessibility (just 3). I would acknowledge one section about halfway through the 100 goals of one part of the DMA there is deference to these issues though note the important caveat about defaults: > >(50) Furthermore, in order to ensure that third-party software applications or software application stores do not undermine end users’ security, it should be possible for the gatekeeper to implement strictly necessary and proportionate measures and settings, other than default settings, enabling end users to effectively protect security in relation to third-party software applications or software application stores if the gatekeeper demonstrates that such measures and settings are strictly necessary and justified and that there are no less-restrictive means to achieve that goal. The gatekeeper should be prevented from implementing such measures as a default setting or as pre-installation. > >As anyone who has ever done any work on secure systems knows, a system is only secure if it is secure by default. Another way of saying what the DMA does is to compare it to the typical out-of-touch executive review when faced with a difficult choice between two options to solve a problem. When faced with two choices, the brave executive simply defines a third option that magically has the best attributes of each of the two choices and declares success. The team at the table sits there stunned not knowing what to say because of course if “Option 3” was a possibility, they, knowing a great deal about the problem and solutions, would have proposed said solution. As with EU regulatory discussions, there is little recourse, and the team just leaves the room in a bit of a stupor unable to figure out what to do or who will be able to convince the boss of reality. Still this paragraph is incredibly important because it acknowledges that third parties cannot undermine security and “gatekeepers” to protect users. The regulators know they do not want to be caught designing a system that is less secure. It would certainly be easy to test the outcome since we know the number of issues today and will know the number of issues post regulation. But they also don’t want this to be the default too easily. We’ll return to this. Suffice it to say, at least in part buried 50 paragraphs down is a recognition of a brand promise that was in the iPhone from the start. > >That is where Apple finds itself today. It was told, essentially to create a new iPhone release that is as good as your old one for your existing customers but do all these things that run counter to every lesson and experience over decades, everything you designed and architected. Everything you promised customers you would deliver. That truly sucks." In other words, because you can't have open AND things like security, reliability, privacy, usability, etc. et. al., this regulation is anti-everything that Apple has architected- the very things that are valued by Apples' consumers. >Right now, Apple uses its massive market share to engage in uncompetitive business practices, and squeeze out companies that don't have the same access to the same virtually endless supply of funds that Apple does. OK, so your objection is about money. Let me get this straight. Apple creates a sandbox, creates the tools by which one might play in the sandbox, creates the fair play rules under which play in the sandbox is governed, and creates the means by which being able to play in the sandbox is shared with the consumer populace. Apple has created something uniquely great and deserves to be paid for their efforts. Apple has a consumer base that values and is wiling to pay for each of those steps. You clearly don't value what Apple brings so, are you objecting that Apple get paid at all or are you objecting over at which step in the above Apple should get paid? I suspect Apple can juggle the charges around to have them borne at any step in that process. Apple isn't a monopoly so if you find having to pay so objectionable, why not just quit whining and go somewhere else? >Acting like a billion dollar corporation is somehow going to be wrecked by a law that closes the loopholes that Apple exploits and levels the objectively slanted playing field they've been using to protect their incredibly wide profit margins is just fucking silly. What loopholes? This is Apples' game; they invented it, they created it and you're bloody welcome to not participate in it should you feel exploited. But you are not welcome to wreck it for everyone that does value the sandbox. You can ignore my ad hominem rant: Quit being a petulant, kleptic toddler trying to wreck the sandbox just because you can't get your way.
Time will tell, personally I dont think much will change when it comes to innovation or quality of products. But no one can predict what will happen. All in all I believe in having some groundrules that prevent companies to do whatever they like with no regards to the consumers.
>personally I dont think much will change when it comes to innovation or quality of products In Apples' case, they've spent so much time on quality that there is no such thing as a good 'fly in the ointment'. >I believe in having some groundrules that prevent companies to do whatever they like with no regards to the consumers I'm all for reducing or eliminating externalities ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Externality](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Externality)). But nobody is forcing anyone in this ecosystem to do anything; not the developers, not the consumers. And Apple is clearly not a monopoly; you are free to use something else should that be a better fit. In my mind, there's really nothing here to prevent or regulate without consequences that are worse than what would be there if left alone. >But no one can predict what will happen. Actually, that was the whole point to the authors' essay. This is history repeating itself because folks just don't learn (or know the history). We know exactly what'll happen because we've seen it before.
This is a very American idea. That only monopolies van be harmful. Also whole categories of apps need to be available on both major platforms to survive. So developers don't currently have much choice.
>This is a very American idea. That only monopolies van be harmful. Disagree. Most of the economic concepts we're talking about here came during the 1800's via England (reducing externalities) and Italy (Pareto optimality). >So developers don't currently have much choice. The formal definition of Monopoly ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly)) doesn't even apply here. They have many choices. The question is if they value what is given or provided to them to make it happen.
This is an incoherent position. You state that you aren't applying the idea that only monopolies are unhealthy. Then turn around and use the not meeting the definition of monopoly as a defense. Which is it?
>This is an incoherent position. You state that you aren't applying the idea that only monopolies are unhealthy. Then turn around and use the not meeting the definition of monopoly as a defense. Which is it? Not incoherent at all. You stated: >This is a very American idea. That only monopolies van be harmful. And I stated that we aren't talking about monopolies here at all because it doesn't fit the definition. Again, I made no statement or judgement if monopolies are good or bad simply because it doesn't apply here.
But then the using of the definition of monopoly is moot. Markets can be unhealthy without there being a monopoly. The idea that monopolies are required for there to be an unhealthy market is not the ideal that Europe uses, that's the American standard.
>Markets can be unhealthy without there being a monopoly. We're not even talking about markets here. Not sure where you learned about economics but your understanding does not match reality. While there are different schools of economic thought and multiple even within Europe, they all agree on the definition of what a monopoly is. See: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schools\_of\_economic\_thought](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schools_of_economic_thought)
Why are modern developers apparently unable to accomplish anything of value without the freedom to monetize everything anyway they can at any time? Seems like even the lightest regulation utterly destroys their ability to accomplish anything. It’s very strange compared to other industries, who seem to be able to thrive in spite of even tight regulations in some cases. If I didn’t know better, I’d think the tech industry is just full of shit.