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Once upon a time the idea of a computer was that it is a universal machine that can do any computation for you. As soon as the people producing the computer are

by cjfd 6y ago

Once upon a time the idea of a computer was that it is a universal machine that can do any computation for you. As soon as the people producing the computer are the same people controlling what software can run on it this idea is out of the window. An app store is an evil idea right from the start. Unless you actually don't want to own a computer but just want to buy a toy, of course. Which is the bigger part of the market. It is the task of us software developers who should be able to understand this to push hard against the whole idea of an app store.

Godel_unicode 6y ago
This line of thinking is as selfish as it is revisionist. Computers were not intended to be a playground for the high priesthood of initiates with Very Important Computations, they were intended to be tools to accomplish tasks. I think it's insane to throw out the incredible democratizing effect app stores have for the overwhelming majority of society in the name of you having perfect control. App Stores have done a huge good for society in bringing capability to the general public. If a few startups have to suffer for it, oh well, that's their job. It's not an accident the degree to which smartphone sales outstrip feature phone and traditional computer sales. This leaves out the discoverability argument, good luck getting people on the internet to find and install your random app. Then there's the security argument. Would you feel safer downloading a random script from the internet and piping it to bash, or a random ipa from the app store?
- Terretta 6y ago
  Precisely. iPhone’s black slate plus the magical app store = a shape-shifting appliance.
- rrrrrrrrrrrryan 6y ago
  I do wish Apple gave people the ability to install outside apps like Android does, though. Treat it like Android and Windows do: give people a bunch of warnings (e.g. "this generally isn't safe", "don't do this unless you're actually sure you know what you're doing", etc.), force them to dig through some deeper menus to disable a default a setting, and you'll prevent 95% of people who would otherwise ruin their devices with malware. I can't imagine an open source app store on iOS like F-Droid being anything but beneficial to end-users. The only reason it doesn't exist is because Apple doesn't want to let it exist.
- chacha2 6y ago
  How is one company operating a monopoly on software distribution a 'democratizing effect'? This is like saying an authoritarian government is increasing freedom by militarizing the police.
  - Godel_unicode 6y ago
    > "... the overwhelming majority of society..." Developers aren't the point. Everyone else is. App stores have given everyone the ability to do things that very few could otherwise. See also the infamous HN Dropbox comment. Also, as I say in another comment, other companies make phones. Switching cost is super low, ironically because the app stores on other OSes make it super easy to find all the apps you need.
- AtlasBarfed 6y ago
  Computers started as million dollar machines back when Coke was 10 cents, that only very smart people who could think in machine code were allowed to touch. Perhaps at the minicomputer level did they start to enter the realm of more basic tools rather than being massively expensive infrastructure. You could call the massive caterpillar that moved the Saturn V to the launchpad a "tool" technically, but not really.
  - Godel_unicode 6y ago
    I never said basic, you added that to change the meaning to what you want it to be. CNC routers are often described as "the right tool for the job" by machinists, and they can run into the millions. These magic boxes were always designed to solve specific problems. That's the generally used English meaning of tool. In my experience, people largely object to the word tool because they don't think it sounds important enough. Too bad for those people that it fits so well.
nexuist 6y ago
> Once upon a time the idea of a computer was that it is a universal machine that can do any computation for you. Right, and then more than 1000 people discovered what computers were.

by cjfd 6y ago

Godel_unicode 6y ago

This line of thinking is as selfish as it is revisionist. Computers were not intended to be a playground for the high priesthood of initiates with Very Important Computations, they were intended to be tools to accomplish tasks. I think it's insane to throw out the incredible democratizing effect app stores have for the overwhelming majority of society in the name of you having perfect control. App Stores have done a huge good for society in bringing capability to the general public. If a few startups have to suffer for it, oh well, that's their job. It's not an accident the degree to which smartphone sales outstrip feature phone and traditional computer sales. This leaves out the discoverability argument, good luck getting people on the internet to find and install your random app. Then there's the security argument. Would you feel safer downloading a random script from the internet and piping it to bash, or a random ipa from the app store?

Terretta 6y ago
Precisely. iPhone’s black slate plus the magical app store = a shape-shifting appliance.
rrrrrrrrrrrryan 6y ago
I do wish Apple gave people the ability to install outside apps like Android does, though. Treat it like Android and Windows do: give people a bunch of warnings (e.g. "this generally isn't safe", "don't do this unless you're actually sure you know what you're doing", etc.), force them to dig through some deeper menus to disable a default a setting, and you'll prevent 95% of people who would otherwise ruin their devices with malware. I can't imagine an open source app store on iOS like F-Droid being anything but beneficial to end-users. The only reason it doesn't exist is because Apple doesn't want to let it exist.
chacha2 6y ago
How is one company operating a monopoly on software distribution a 'democratizing effect'? This is like saying an authoritarian government is increasing freedom by militarizing the police.
- Godel_unicode 6y ago
  > "... the overwhelming majority of society..." Developers aren't the point. Everyone else is. App stores have given everyone the ability to do things that very few could otherwise. See also the infamous HN Dropbox comment. Also, as I say in another comment, other companies make phones. Switching cost is super low, ironically because the app stores on other OSes make it super easy to find all the apps you need.
AtlasBarfed 6y ago
Computers started as million dollar machines back when Coke was 10 cents, that only very smart people who could think in machine code were allowed to touch. Perhaps at the minicomputer level did they start to enter the realm of more basic tools rather than being massively expensive infrastructure. You could call the massive caterpillar that moved the Saturn V to the launchpad a "tool" technically, but not really.
- Godel_unicode 6y ago
  I never said basic, you added that to change the meaning to what you want it to be. CNC routers are often described as "the right tool for the job" by machinists, and they can run into the millions. These magic boxes were always designed to solve specific problems. That's the generally used English meaning of tool. In my experience, people largely object to the word tool because they don't think it sounds important enough. Too bad for those people that it fits so well.

nexuist 6y ago

> Once upon a time the idea of a computer was that it is a universal machine that can do any computation for you. Right, and then more than 1000 people discovered what computers were.