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> That’s the world WE ALL are living in now. No Nikita, this is the world you live in. I saw this happening five years ago and ripped Apple out of my life like

> That’s the world WE ALL are living in now. No Nikita, this is the world you live in. I saw this happening five years ago and ripped Apple out of my life like a band-aid that's been there so long the skin's closing up around it. It sucked, but now it's a million times better. There simply isn't enough manpower, capital, or willpower to create decent software when you also have to contend with the profit motive. The author of the article went down a massive list of annoyances that just shouldn't happen, and they all stem from the need to keep Apple's technology proprietary. This need goes all the way back to the Apple II, when Jobs made the prescient observation that people want to buy full packages of hardware and software, not bits and pieces that they have to assemble themselves. To do that, you need to make a company to do it, then control the platform, hardware and software, to ensure a good user experience. This is the DNA of Apple and it's served them well and we got a lot of great tech out of it. He was right, until he was wrong, and he didn't really start being wrong until technology complicated to the point where a profit-seeking enterprise stopped being able to keep up with market demand. I'll tell the author or anyone else what they should do if they want to stop being constantly annoyed by technology. Use tech that is modifiable by the people that use them and not tech that is only modifiable by people you buy it from. If you do that, then you can lean on a community of people for support instead of a faceless corporation. Apple is slowly morphing into 90s-era Microsoft as they keep holding on to the need for dominance over their platform.

Finnucane 6y ago
But it's not just Apple. Apple has its own set of issues, but they are not really worse than others at this point, just not much better any more. I have mostly old, 'dumb' appliances in my house. My car is more than 20 years old. I have become a total luddite with respect to things. As far as I'm concerned a lot of 'smart' technology is still in the unproven, experimental stage and I am too old now to deal with that shit.
- vinceguidry 6y ago
  Of course it isn't just Apple. But when you build the foundation of your computing life on Apple, you're asking for pain. I applaud your dumb appliances and car.
TeMPOraL 6y ago
Well, you're either an alien or you have grown a case of Stockholm syndrome for computing :). Absolutely everything is like this. Apple sucks. So do Windows PCs and laptops. Open source software stacks. And don't get me started on modern appliances with microcontrollers in them. Personally, I can produce a daily list 3x as long as TFA on my Linux desktop, and probably 1-1.5x as long on my Windows sidearm. The only reason I don't run my desktop on Windows these days is because Emacs isn't a proper first-class citizen there. Otherwise, my life would be much better. As much as I love Open Source, the audio, video and GUI experiences on Linux are still pretty brittle.
- vinceguidry 6y ago
  Free software, not open source. The difference matters. Copyleft is important. What OS are you running on that Linux desktop? I switched from Ubuntu to an Arch variant, Ubuntu was getting too corporatized for me what with snap and everything. Eventually I'm going to rip out the desktop environment and go window manager only. When I said, "only use tech that the people that use them can modify" I'm not messing around. Any time I have an issue with tech, I go looking for where proprietary software invaded my life, rip it out, and go on with my day.
  - TeMPOraL 6y ago
    > Free software, not open source. The difference matters. Copyleft is important. I very much agree! I've learned to strongly appreciate the FSF philosophy. And I too appreciate (and use, and advocate for) end-user-modifiable software. However, when talking about software brittleness, user-facing Free (as in Libre) software is usually even worse than non-Free Open Source software. I'm currently running nth version of Ubuntu, but in the past I've been running Debian, Red Hat, (briefly) Gentoo, Slackware, and further in the past some others which I don't recall now. In my experience, things are systematically getting better over time, but are still fragile compared to Windows (and Windows isn't exactly a paragon of stability either). (Of course there are many places where proprietary = worse, UX-wise. In particular, just about any crapware preloaded by seller/manufacturer on your computer or phone, or stuff that gets bundled with printers, scanners and other peripherals.) My point isn't that Free Software and Open Source software are bad things. Just that they suck too, and when talking OSes and popular tools, they suck on average a bit more than proprietary software.

Finnucane 6y ago

But it's not just Apple. Apple has its own set of issues, but they are not really worse than others at this point, just not much better any more. I have mostly old, 'dumb' appliances in my house. My car is more than 20 years old. I have become a total luddite with respect to things. As far as I'm concerned a lot of 'smart' technology is still in the unproven, experimental stage and I am too old now to deal with that shit.

vinceguidry 6y ago
Of course it isn't just Apple. But when you build the foundation of your computing life on Apple, you're asking for pain. I applaud your dumb appliances and car.

TeMPOraL 6y ago

Well, you're either an alien or you have grown a case of Stockholm syndrome for computing :). Absolutely everything is like this. Apple sucks. So do Windows PCs and laptops. Open source software stacks. And don't get me started on modern appliances with microcontrollers in them. Personally, I can produce a daily list 3x as long as TFA on my Linux desktop, and probably 1-1.5x as long on my Windows sidearm. The only reason I don't run my desktop on Windows these days is because Emacs isn't a proper first-class citizen there. Otherwise, my life would be much better. As much as I love Open Source, the audio, video and GUI experiences on Linux are still pretty brittle.

vinceguidry 6y ago
Free software, not open source. The difference matters. Copyleft is important. What OS are you running on that Linux desktop? I switched from Ubuntu to an Arch variant, Ubuntu was getting too corporatized for me what with snap and everything. Eventually I'm going to rip out the desktop environment and go window manager only. When I said, "only use tech that the people that use them can modify" I'm not messing around. Any time I have an issue with tech, I go looking for where proprietary software invaded my life, rip it out, and go on with my day.
- TeMPOraL 6y ago
  > Free software, not open source. The difference matters. Copyleft is important. I very much agree! I've learned to strongly appreciate the FSF philosophy. And I too appreciate (and use, and advocate for) end-user-modifiable software. However, when talking about software brittleness, user-facing Free (as in Libre) software is usually even worse than non-Free Open Source software. I'm currently running nth version of Ubuntu, but in the past I've been running Debian, Red Hat, (briefly) Gentoo, Slackware, and further in the past some others which I don't recall now. In my experience, things are systematically getting better over time, but are still fragile compared to Windows (and Windows isn't exactly a paragon of stability either). (Of course there are many places where proprietary = worse, UX-wise. In particular, just about any crapware preloaded by seller/manufacturer on your computer or phone, or stuff that gets bundled with printers, scanners and other peripherals.) My point isn't that Free Software and Open Source software are bad things. Just that they suck too, and when talking OSes and popular tools, they suck on average a bit more than proprietary software.