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I always assumed it was Oracle buying Sun and Steve Jobs NOPEing far away from the prospect of putting an Oracle filesystem at the heart of their then-largest p

I always assumed it was Oracle buying Sun and Steve Jobs NOPEing far away from the prospect of putting an Oracle filesystem at the heart of their then-largest product. Oracle is really good at using their products as beachheads to vampirize large companies. I hesitate to even imagine what would have happened to Apple had they gone forward with ZFS.

lern_too_spel 8y ago
Jobs and Ellison were friends. This is why their companies are so similar in terms of business strategy. https://mashable.com/2013/08/13/larry-ellison-remembers-steve-jobs/ https://mashable.com/2013/08/13/larry-ellison-remembers-stev...
- pvg 8y ago
  In what ways are their business strategies similar?
  - lern_too_spel 8y ago
    Heavy investment in sales, marketing, and litigation relative to R&D.
    - pvg 8y ago
      That sounds more like a just-so story than some fundamental similarity in overall business approach. And what would a 'heavy investment in litigation' even look like? There's a chart of (absolute) R&D numbers here. https://www.recode.net/2017/9/1/16236506/tech-amazon-apple-gdp-spending-productivity https://www.recode.net/2017/9/1/16236506/tech-amazon-apple-g...
      - lern_too_spel 8y ago
        > That sounds more like a just-so story than some fundamental similarity in overall business approach. And yet both companies' business strategies are primarily known for those things, and both companies spend more of their money on those things relative to R&D than their competitors. > what would a 'heavy investment in litigation' even look like Like this: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/jan/23/steve-jobs-apple-palm-tech-lawsuit https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/jan/23/steve-job... The fact that Jobs would even threaten such a thing shows how similar he is to Ellison. The only reason he backed down was that Palm would have taken Apple to the cleaners in the countersuits.
        pvg 8y ago
        And yet both companies' business strategies are primarily known for those things I don't think they are and really, it's the thing I'm asking you to defend which I don't think you can do very well by just repeating it. As to the other thing, ok, Apple was involved in a lawsuit? Lots of big companies are involved in lawsuits. What you are saying is that Apple and Oracle's business strategies are marketing and suing people and that they are known for this. That doesn't sound right at all.
        lern_too_spel 8y ago
        > What you are saying is that Apple and Oracle's business strategies are marketing and suing people and that they are known for this. That doesn't sound right at all. The reason I repeated what I said is that you keep repeating what I said incorrectly, even after I emphasized the part that you left out. The key phrase is relative to R&D. > As to the other thing, ok, Apple was involved in a lawsuit? Is that what you got out of it? The (maybe too subtle) point is that Apple is so quick to litigate that it even threatened to bring lawsuits against another company for not participating in its illegal wage suppression agreement. Jobs would rather spend money on lawyers than on poaching engineers away from competitors or paying his own engineers enough to stay.
        pvg 8y ago
        The key phrase is relative to R&D Great. And what's the evidence for this? Apple is so quick to litigate Again, lots of big companies are litigious. The salary-fixing thing involved a veritable who-is-who of big SV companies. Good thing? No. But Apple doesn't stand out more or less than the rest with its badness. Your claim isn't that Apple did some lame thing but that Apple and Oracle make that bad thing a central part of their business strategy.
        lern_too_spel 8y ago
        > The salary-fixing thing involved a veritable who-is-who of big SV companies. Yet not a single one of them threatened to sue other companies to enforce the agreement except Apple. As far as marketing, find another tech company that does https://www.cultofmac.com/255618/how-apples-blacklist-manipulates-the-press/ https://www.cultofmac.com/255618/how-apples-blacklist-manipu... and https://www.zdnet.com/article/apple-prs-dirty-little-secret/ https://www.zdnet.com/article/apple-prs-dirty-little-secret/. It brings to mind Ellison's retaliation against the University of Wisconsin for publishing database benchmarks (https://danluu.com/anon-benchmark/ https://danluu.com/anon-benchmark/). In Jobs's and Ellison's eyes, it's better to force the press not say anything bad about your product than to actually produce a good product. It's interesting that you're only asking for evidence about Apple and not about Oracle. My hypothesis as to why is that their press policy works.
- jacobush 8y ago
  Nah: http://usingapple.com/2011/06/funny-organizational-chart-for-apple-facebook-google-amazon-microsoft-oracle/ http://usingapple.com/2011/06/funny-organizational-chart-for...
toyg 8y ago
Actually the opposite is true, Jobs and Ellison were notoriously great friends - they were from the same generation, the "pirates" usurped by Gates. They just made sure to swim in different seas, as big sharks do. Apple simply gave up on Sun, seen as a losing bet, and abandoned Java too.
- protomyth 8y ago
  They were friends, but there was a lot of rumors going around that Jobs didn't want a business relationship with his friend. The strange part is that Ellison was put on the new Apple board when Steve took over[1], and the multiple stories of Ellison wanting to lead a takeover bid of Apple and Jobs stopping that cold. 1) Check the crowd reaction when Ellison is announced as part of the new board https://youtu.be/PEHNrqPkefI?t=11m40s https://youtu.be/PEHNrqPkefI?t=11m40s
- tannhaeuser 8y ago
  The Apple/Java story is still interesting. I now personally don't care much about Mac OS and Java anymore, but I remember me being pissed when Apple abandoned shipping Java, Cocoa bindings, native LaF for Swing and other integrations around 10.7 and leave the field for Oracle, after SJ had promised to deliver "first-party, best-of" Java dev experience years earlier. Oracle had also published a dev build for the Oracle RDMS on Power-based Macs, but then denounced the Mac as a serious platform. Maybe a back-deal or bet was in effect here, or Apple figured they'll never get into datacenter and enterprise anyway?
  - pfschell 8y ago
    Steve was once asked about Apple's commitment to Java by one of the engineers working on it. SJ called Java "a big, fat pig." It was on its way out of the OS within the year.
  - tonyedgecombe 8y ago
    Yes, I was a bit annoyed about that, it came just as I was finishing off a commercial Java application.
  - 8y ago
cryptonector 8y ago
Apple wanting to use ZFS, and then abandoning the idea, predated the Oracle acquisition.
- jjoonathan 8y ago
  By a couple of months, easily a narrow enough margin to be accounted for by insider foreknowledge.
  - cryptonector 8y ago
    Apple could have negotiated what it needed, if that's what it was. From what I can recall the issue was indemnification.

lern_too_spel 8y ago

Jobs and Ellison were friends. This is why their companies are so similar in terms of business strategy. https://mashable.com/2013/08/13/larry-ellison-remembers-steve-jobs/ https://mashable.com/2013/08/13/larry-ellison-remembers-stev...

pvg 8y ago
In what ways are their business strategies similar?
- lern_too_spel 8y ago
  Heavy investment in sales, marketing, and litigation relative to R&D.
  - pvg 8y ago
    That sounds more like a just-so story than some fundamental similarity in overall business approach. And what would a 'heavy investment in litigation' even look like? There's a chart of (absolute) R&D numbers here. https://www.recode.net/2017/9/1/16236506/tech-amazon-apple-gdp-spending-productivity https://www.recode.net/2017/9/1/16236506/tech-amazon-apple-g...
    - lern_too_spel 8y ago
      > That sounds more like a just-so story than some fundamental similarity in overall business approach. And yet both companies' business strategies are primarily known for those things, and both companies spend more of their money on those things relative to R&D than their competitors. > what would a 'heavy investment in litigation' even look like Like this: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/jan/23/steve-jobs-apple-palm-tech-lawsuit https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/jan/23/steve-job... The fact that Jobs would even threaten such a thing shows how similar he is to Ellison. The only reason he backed down was that Palm would have taken Apple to the cleaners in the countersuits.
      - pvg 8y ago
        And yet both companies' business strategies are primarily known for those things I don't think they are and really, it's the thing I'm asking you to defend which I don't think you can do very well by just repeating it. As to the other thing, ok, Apple was involved in a lawsuit? Lots of big companies are involved in lawsuits. What you are saying is that Apple and Oracle's business strategies are marketing and suing people and that they are known for this. That doesn't sound right at all.
        lern_too_spel 8y ago
        > What you are saying is that Apple and Oracle's business strategies are marketing and suing people and that they are known for this. That doesn't sound right at all. The reason I repeated what I said is that you keep repeating what I said incorrectly, even after I emphasized the part that you left out. The key phrase is relative to R&D. > As to the other thing, ok, Apple was involved in a lawsuit? Is that what you got out of it? The (maybe too subtle) point is that Apple is so quick to litigate that it even threatened to bring lawsuits against another company for not participating in its illegal wage suppression agreement. Jobs would rather spend money on lawyers than on poaching engineers away from competitors or paying his own engineers enough to stay.
        pvg 8y ago
        The key phrase is relative to R&D Great. And what's the evidence for this? Apple is so quick to litigate Again, lots of big companies are litigious. The salary-fixing thing involved a veritable who-is-who of big SV companies. Good thing? No. But Apple doesn't stand out more or less than the rest with its badness. Your claim isn't that Apple did some lame thing but that Apple and Oracle make that bad thing a central part of their business strategy.
        lern_too_spel 8y ago
        > The salary-fixing thing involved a veritable who-is-who of big SV companies. Yet not a single one of them threatened to sue other companies to enforce the agreement except Apple. As far as marketing, find another tech company that does https://www.cultofmac.com/255618/how-apples-blacklist-manipulates-the-press/ https://www.cultofmac.com/255618/how-apples-blacklist-manipu... and https://www.zdnet.com/article/apple-prs-dirty-little-secret/ https://www.zdnet.com/article/apple-prs-dirty-little-secret/. It brings to mind Ellison's retaliation against the University of Wisconsin for publishing database benchmarks (https://danluu.com/anon-benchmark/ https://danluu.com/anon-benchmark/). In Jobs's and Ellison's eyes, it's better to force the press not say anything bad about your product than to actually produce a good product. It's interesting that you're only asking for evidence about Apple and not about Oracle. My hypothesis as to why is that their press policy works.
jacobush 8y ago
Nah: http://usingapple.com/2011/06/funny-organizational-chart-for-apple-facebook-google-amazon-microsoft-oracle/ http://usingapple.com/2011/06/funny-organizational-chart-for...

toyg 8y ago

Actually the opposite is true, Jobs and Ellison were notoriously great friends - they were from the same generation, the "pirates" usurped by Gates. They just made sure to swim in different seas, as big sharks do. Apple simply gave up on Sun, seen as a losing bet, and abandoned Java too.

protomyth 8y ago
They were friends, but there was a lot of rumors going around that Jobs didn't want a business relationship with his friend. The strange part is that Ellison was put on the new Apple board when Steve took over[1], and the multiple stories of Ellison wanting to lead a takeover bid of Apple and Jobs stopping that cold. 1) Check the crowd reaction when Ellison is announced as part of the new board https://youtu.be/PEHNrqPkefI?t=11m40s https://youtu.be/PEHNrqPkefI?t=11m40s
tannhaeuser 8y ago
The Apple/Java story is still interesting. I now personally don't care much about Mac OS and Java anymore, but I remember me being pissed when Apple abandoned shipping Java, Cocoa bindings, native LaF for Swing and other integrations around 10.7 and leave the field for Oracle, after SJ had promised to deliver "first-party, best-of" Java dev experience years earlier. Oracle had also published a dev build for the Oracle RDMS on Power-based Macs, but then denounced the Mac as a serious platform. Maybe a back-deal or bet was in effect here, or Apple figured they'll never get into datacenter and enterprise anyway?
- pfschell 8y ago
  Steve was once asked about Apple's commitment to Java by one of the engineers working on it. SJ called Java "a big, fat pig." It was on its way out of the OS within the year.
- tonyedgecombe 8y ago
  Yes, I was a bit annoyed about that, it came just as I was finishing off a commercial Java application.
- 8y ago

cryptonector 8y ago

Apple wanting to use ZFS, and then abandoning the idea, predated the Oracle acquisition.

jjoonathan 8y ago
By a couple of months, easily a narrow enough margin to be accounted for by insider foreknowledge.
- cryptonector 8y ago
  Apple could have negotiated what it needed, if that's what it was. From what I can recall the issue was indemnification.