15 ms·

Telegram, Apple, Belarus, and Conflating ‘Irrelevance’ with ‘Inconvenience’

254 points by jmsflknr 6y ago

jedimind 6y ago
Apple is basically saying: "Even if our rules are unethical, we still want you to take the blame for it. Don't even dare to explain to the consumer that you're merely following Apple's guidelines."
- zepto 6y ago
  No, they aren’t saying that. They are saying ‘when we ask you to stop doing something unethical, don’t try to make us look bad for making the request’. However, I agree with Gruber on this - it’s wrong for them to try to stifle discussion about their rules, whatever the context.
  - saagarjha 6y ago
    Actually, they’re saying “when we ask you to do something we consider unethical, you can’t say we told you to do it”.
    - zepto 6y ago
      Yes, that is another fair rewriting of what they are saying. Obviously they make their own ethical judgements when enforcing their own rules, as do we all. My guess is that they wouldn’t object to the discussion though, if it didn’t make them look bad.
      - jedimind 6y ago
        Can you elaborate on how that is substantially different from my statement?
        zepto 6y ago
        It should be obvious, but here are things from your comment that are very different from my or saagarjha’s version: “we still want you to take the blame” Neither I, nor saargarjha nor Apple are saying anything about blame. You are putting words into Apple’s mouth here. “Don't even dare” There is nothing in my, or Apple’s or Sagaarjha’s comment that has this connotation. You are adding in the idea that Apple wants developers to be afraid. “merely following Apple’s guidelines” Again, not something that is true, and not something reflected in either my or Sagaargarjha’s comment. If someone actually complies with a request from Apple, there is a lot more going on than ‘merely following guidelines’, an obvious one being that there may be a real problem with the content behind taken down. By saying this, you exclude the possibility that Apple is acting in good faith. To summarize, your comment was in no way a fair rewriting of Apple’s comment. You introduced a set of additional content that weren’t in anyone else’s version, and which give the appearance of Apple’s actions being the meritless bullying of a bad faith actor. That is the entire substance of your comment. It’s certainly possible that Apple’s actions are disagreeable to many people, but HN shows that they are not universally considered meritless. It’s also possible for Apple to act like a bully uninitentionally, or to actually bully developers. They are not above that and we should discuss it. But those facts don’t make your ‘rewrite’ a fair reflection.
        jedimind 6y ago
        You are all over this thread trying to protect Apple by hook or by crook, jumping into any statement and twisting and forcing your interpretations. Sagaarjha’s statement is still essentially saying the same as mine, so it's absolute nonsense to claim that it's not what Apple is saying, but then agreeing with Sagaarjha’s statement, which fundamentally says the same thing. Your zealousness in this thread exposes your unbearable bias.
        zepto 6y ago
        It seems like I struck a nerve. There is nothing twisted about my interpretations, and I’m not defending Apple. Here are is a summary of my position: 1. I agree with Gruber - Apple shouldn’t be policing discussion of their rules. 2. Your comment is not the same as Sagaarjha’s. I have clearly explained why, and you have chosen to ignore the points I made, and attack me personally. 3. I can understand why Apple is motivated to police certain comments, and I believe the motivations are based on real problems they want to avoid in good faith. 4. Despite believing #3 I also believe #1. Just because they are acting in good faith on real problems, doesn’t mean I think they are doing the right thing. 5. I believe we should choose open OS’s and there should be a possibly mandated requirement to be able to install alternate OS’s on Apple decides (and anything else in a wide similar class). Not one thing I have said in this thread defends Apple’s actions at all. I don’t find that it helps us to understand what is going on if we simply portray them as a nasty bully without considering their motivations. If this is representative of ‘unbearable bias’, then so be it.
    - 4926394057 6y ago
      Sounds like Telegram needs to implement a "message canary" where every message has a note attached saying something to the effect of; "Apple hasn't asked us to remove this message".
      - smnrchrds 6y ago
        Then they would probably get banned from Apple ecosystem. And Apple will defend itself saying they have a right to choose not to do business with anyone for any reason and they have deemed it best for user experience not to let Telegram in App Store. And Telegram developers would have no recourse.
  - smnrchrds 6y ago
    What is unethical about letting the consumers know how much they are paying Apple for the privilege of using in-app purchase?
    - sunahe 6y ago
      Forbidding it
    - zepto 6y ago
      Nothing
  - FireBeyond 6y ago
    They're also saying "Don't say that your app overcame a bug in iOS, that's irrelevant".
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
saagarjha 6y ago
My own experience with this was that once I included a description of an OS bug I worked around in the changelog of my apps and the reviewers made me remove it with almost exactly the same verbiage–I can’t remember if they actually said “irrelevant” but the summary was “this information is not useful to your users” (edit: I tried to go look this up but App Store Connect is down at the moment :/). I claimed it was, they wouldn’t budge, I took it out. Apple claiming the inclusion of things that make them look bad being “irrelevant” is sadly a known practice for many years and one of the worst ways that the App Store can stifle people from even talking about highly relevant information Apple doesn’t particularly like.
- umvi 6y ago
  Wow, that story made me more angry than it should have. Why the heck should Apple be allowed to police your own app's changelog? "Because they can" is probably the reason.
  - zepto 6y ago
    Have you never heard an inexperienced developer incorrectly blame the platform or the tools for their own bugs?
    - umvi 6y ago
      Yes, so what? It comes back to the other article on HN about YouTube arbitrating truth. Apple should not be able to dictate what goes in my changelog. If I believe it's relevant info for my userbase that I'm working around some Clang compiler bug with some change, I should be able to say it. What kind of dystopian platform is Apple running where police have to look through everything you type about your own product to make sure you haven't written any thoughtcrimes?
      - zepto 6y ago
        Apple can’t dictate what goes in your changelog. What we are talking about here is the App Store release notes, on Apple’s site and storefront. They can indeed dictate what goes there. The fact that release notes are even displayed there is because they made a facility for that. You can publish your changelog on your own website.
waterhouse 6y ago
On a minor note: > it is prima facie wrong that one of the rules of the App Store is that an app is not allowed to explain the rules of the App Store. I’m hard pressed to think of an exception to this conviction, not just on Apple’s App Store, but in any sphere of life — whether a harmless game... There is a card game called "Mao" in which one of the rules is that you're not supposed to explain the rules. The base game is similar to Uno or Crazy 8s, and then, when you win a game, you get to define a new rule, which you name but don't otherwise explain, and then start enforcing that rule (giving penalty cards when others break it). Others are expected to guess the rule by observing its application. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_(card_game) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_(card_game)
- erichocean 6y ago
  That's a very fun game to play with friends. Many happy memories. :)
- mistermann 6y ago
  > There is a card game called "Mao" in which one of the rules is that you're not supposed to explain the rules. One could argue that politicians, corporations and journalists in the US (and many other countries) have a similar set of rules going on in their mutually beneficial game. It's nice to see someone in the mainstream pointing out the rhetorical word games that are played to hide the actual truth from the public.
  - mensetmanusman 6y ago
    Also in academia. A bunch of professors recently wrote an article about this because they don’t know what they can say anymore without offending someone.
    - chordalkeyboard 6y ago
      Can you link the article? Thanks.
s_dev 6y ago
>This has nothing to do with relevance and everything to do with convenience. I’ve said it before and will adamantly say it again: it is prima facie wrong that one of the rules of the App Store is that an app is not allowed to explain the rules of the App Store. Very damning when it's phrased like that.
vzaliva 6y ago
Apple makes excellent hardware and polished OS. However, if you care about your freedoms, you need to take a bullet and chose to replace it with a less restrictive operating system, perhaps sacrificing some convenience along the way. I personally decided that it is not OS vendor business to decide for me what programs to install and what information they are allowed to show me.
- zepto 6y ago
  100% this. Also we need a right to install our own OS. The right level for intervention is at the level of forcing Apple to provide a Bootcamp for iOS. This is far more important than a right to repair, since many many iOS devices continue to be useful for many years after Apple stops supporting them.
- crossroadsguy 6y ago
  I realised, more so in last few months, the difference between Android and iOS is literally letting your own whims and fancy randomly pick the lesser of evils. As a full time Android developer I was able to seemingly convince myself that moving back to Android (after 4+ years on iOS) indeed makes sense, especially since Android has come really a long way. Also, that I will accept Google will track every move and shake of mine and show me ads based on that data (assuming just Google gets to do it; I'd buy a stock Android phone). But when iPhone 12 was released and I saw the mini is perfectly sized for my palms. I was almost salivating. Even though I find iPhones horrendously expansive. Yes, I do. Except maybe for an SE. Just to make it sound fair, I find most of the expansive flagship Android phones expansive as well. So anyway, I almost did a full 180 and was about to think about buying the new iPhone. But then the enthusiasm started to wane. I saw that there's no touch id, jack was gone anyway, battery life has always been lacklustre, and that there's no way I can silence just one of the dual sims and keep another on separate notification settings (just something I want/need). But I was still deciding. What really hit me hard, in last few weeks, is that Apple has consistently been exploiting customers, more with every release - every move. Blatantly at that. Sometimes in the name of privacy on a completely closed OS and apps, in fact a completely closed ecosystem. Strips devices of useful and convenient hardware features and components. Then very sadistically and successfully patches the voids with "innovation" stickers. Even worse - marks the move as "environment friendly". Headphone jack, earphone and chargers - all gone. Strong arms developers (small and big alike), tries to run repair shops out of business, ensures its devices are less and less repairable - by making it physically difficult and lobbying as well, stifles free speech - literally and doesn't even try to be subtle about it, hands over keys of the kingdom to the authoritarian regimes with far reaches, CEO hobnobs with heads of states of questionable (or actually very obvious) records. We still buy their devices. Enthusiastically. In fact we become such apt apologists that it must be painful for anyone else to read the reactions to criticism. There were plenty of such comments, right here; just from the iPhone 12 release day, which read something like, "Oh, once I started using Bluetooth Headphones and never looked back". Innocuous looking, just a satisfied customer feeling grateful, apologetic comments like these are worst in such contexts. Anyway, then I spent few hours researching a ~5 inch phone with stock Android phone for the nth time yesterday and I didn't find one. The closest, Pixel 4a, has a plastic body. I really do not think I am buying any other Apple device ever (or for the foreseeable future) and I am glad I've not bought into their services. iMessage is useless here anyway. My whims and fancy kinda have stopped seeing Apple as the lesser of the two evils (wrt mobile platforms), or so it seems as of now.
rektide 6y ago
what a striking account of apple waging all out war on the infosphere. making rules, and then preventing people from explaining what is happening, that they have been subject to the rules. incredibly bold policy. incredibly bad acts. perpetrating ignorance upon the world.
eyesee 6y ago
In trying to understand Apple's position on App Store policies, it may help to think of them as a retail store. For example, substitute "Best Buy" for App Store. Can I tell my customers that 30% of the price of their widget goes to Best Buy at purchase? No, that's privileged information in the contract. When my widget is on a shelf at Best Buy, can I advertise a lower price at Amazon.com on the box? No, of course not. They'd never place it on their shelves. If I have to redesign my packaging so Best Buy can put a spider wrap around it, do I get to bitch about that to my customers? Nope, just a cost of doing business. It's "irrelevant" information to the customer. I'm not suggesting this justifies their behavior. It's just an analogy that happens to fit Apple's world view of their App Store.
- nexuist 6y ago
  > It's just an analogy that happens to fit Apple's world view of their App Store. The problem with the world view, of course, is that there's more to the world than Best Buy. If I don't like a widget at Best Buy I can go look it up and buy it from Amazon. Or Target. Or Walmart. Or Alibaba. If I use an iPhone I am limited to what Apple allows on their shelves, full stop. If Best Buy dictated everything you were allowed to buy, that would seem rather problematic, right? I can't see any way that a corporate executive would justify not only not placing a certain brand on their shelves, but also physically blocking their customers from walking into any other store. Imagine the PR field day if an Apple store manager paid his or her employees to stand in front of the Microsoft store and physically assault any of their customers if they tried to walk inside! And yet that's exactly what they're doing virtually. We can't use a Microsoft app store, or an Amazon app store, or Google Play. We are beholden to the manager's personal preferences of what we can and can't buy.
  - barkingcat 6y ago
    the other side of the equation is that you are free not to buy an apple device (for now) the collective amount of people buying apple devices is what gives them the power to implement these rules on their own. I forsee a time in the future when you are forced to buy an Apple product from birth, no options allowed.
lsen001 6y ago
“The first rule about fight club is you don't talk about fight club.” Apple doesn't want negative information spread about it, and if they can control it, they'll definitely try. Very shady of Apple.
dang 6y ago
The big previous thread about this is https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24737171 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24737171.
varispeed 6y ago
Apple entire business model should be illegal. They amassed so much wealth by using various loopholes and tricks, that any normal business wouldn't be able to achieve. Lawmakers should carefully go through it and make every bit impossible to do by any other company in the future and the wealth that Apple amassed should be sold and distributed among Apple customers.
robertlagrant 6y ago
Hi I'm Apple and I'd really like daringfireball to not render in any iOS browsers as it's irrelevant.
mensetmanusman 6y ago
Reminds me of Wizard of Oz. “Don’t mention the man behind the curtain” Retailers went through this with Credit cards. It used to be trouble to charge more for CC usage (in essence, blaming the CC companies for higher charges).
bambax 6y ago
Big app makers should band together and boycott the Apple platform until they get what they want -- and provided "what they want" is not unreasonable; being able to tell the truth in a changelog is reasonable. People will eventually notice if many important apps are no longer available on iPhones.
- grishka 6y ago
  And before they notice, you'll be hurting yourself, not Apple, for god knows how long. IMO, legislation is our best bet. I'm really looking forward to that EU antimonopoly investigation.
luord 6y ago
Somehow, what surprised me the most here—given Apple's recent news—is the fact that they were able to strong-arm Facebook into complying. One would think that, if there are companies with enough leverage to ignore Apple's odd whims, Facebook would be one of them.
- zepto 6y ago
  What did Facebook comply with?
  - luord 6y ago
    > Similarly, when Facebook wanted to inform its users that 30% of the fees users were paying for online events went to Apple, Apple didn’t let Facebook do it saying this information was (once more) “irrelevant”. That's the passage I meant. I wouldn't have imagined that Apple would be in the capacity of letting or not letting Facebook do something. On a separate note, you seem to have replied to pretty much everyone in this thread, may I ask why?
    - zepto 6y ago
      I got into a dialog with ‘Jedimind’. That has brought me back to the thread more often than I would usually bother with, and I’ve commented on things that seem to have more complexity to them than is apparent.
ofou 6y ago
Apple content firewall is getting at least worrisome. For sure some autocracy would call 'alt information' as irrelevant and banish them all from their platform. Impossible to get consensus from a wildly diverse world. Internet was open, free, and young. Who's going to be the arbiter of truth now? I bet the one with widest arms to grab them all.
m0zg 6y ago
Someone should tell Gruber to what extent his beloved Apple censors things in China to pacify the Chinese Communist Party. Funny how pundits routinely latch on to a tiny gnat on a proverbial elephant's ass.
srtjstjsj 6y ago
Does Apple censor email going through Mail app? Why not? Apple is acting like Communist China or East Germany here. This is unconscionable.
harry8 6y ago
Not conflating. Just straight up lying. Apple are falsely claiming something obviously relevant is irrelevant in an abuse of market power to maximise profit. There we go. It's not a calling a spade a digging implement and then conflating it with all garden tools in general (eg chainsaws are not for children). It is calling the spade a piece of cheese to further and protect their abuse of market power con.

254 points by jmsflknr 6y ago

Apple is basically saying: "Even if our rules are unethical, we still want you to take the blame for it. Don't even dare to explain to the consumer that you're merely following Apple's guidelines."

zepto 6y ago
No, they aren’t saying that. They are saying ‘when we ask you to stop doing something unethical, don’t try to make us look bad for making the request’. However, I agree with Gruber on this - it’s wrong for them to try to stifle discussion about their rules, whatever the context.
- saagarjha 6y ago
  Actually, they’re saying “when we ask you to do something we consider unethical, you can’t say we told you to do it”.
  - zepto 6y ago
    Yes, that is another fair rewriting of what they are saying. Obviously they make their own ethical judgements when enforcing their own rules, as do we all. My guess is that they wouldn’t object to the discussion though, if it didn’t make them look bad.
    - jedimind 6y ago
      Can you elaborate on how that is substantially different from my statement?
      - zepto 6y ago
        It should be obvious, but here are things from your comment that are very different from my or saagarjha’s version: “we still want you to take the blame” Neither I, nor saargarjha nor Apple are saying anything about blame. You are putting words into Apple’s mouth here. “Don't even dare” There is nothing in my, or Apple’s or Sagaarjha’s comment that has this connotation. You are adding in the idea that Apple wants developers to be afraid. “merely following Apple’s guidelines” Again, not something that is true, and not something reflected in either my or Sagaargarjha’s comment. If someone actually complies with a request from Apple, there is a lot more going on than ‘merely following guidelines’, an obvious one being that there may be a real problem with the content behind taken down. By saying this, you exclude the possibility that Apple is acting in good faith. To summarize, your comment was in no way a fair rewriting of Apple’s comment. You introduced a set of additional content that weren’t in anyone else’s version, and which give the appearance of Apple’s actions being the meritless bullying of a bad faith actor. That is the entire substance of your comment. It’s certainly possible that Apple’s actions are disagreeable to many people, but HN shows that they are not universally considered meritless. It’s also possible for Apple to act like a bully uninitentionally, or to actually bully developers. They are not above that and we should discuss it. But those facts don’t make your ‘rewrite’ a fair reflection.
        jedimind 6y ago
        You are all over this thread trying to protect Apple by hook or by crook, jumping into any statement and twisting and forcing your interpretations. Sagaarjha’s statement is still essentially saying the same as mine, so it's absolute nonsense to claim that it's not what Apple is saying, but then agreeing with Sagaarjha’s statement, which fundamentally says the same thing. Your zealousness in this thread exposes your unbearable bias.
        zepto 6y ago
        It seems like I struck a nerve. There is nothing twisted about my interpretations, and I’m not defending Apple. Here are is a summary of my position: 1. I agree with Gruber - Apple shouldn’t be policing discussion of their rules. 2. Your comment is not the same as Sagaarjha’s. I have clearly explained why, and you have chosen to ignore the points I made, and attack me personally. 3. I can understand why Apple is motivated to police certain comments, and I believe the motivations are based on real problems they want to avoid in good faith. 4. Despite believing #3 I also believe #1. Just because they are acting in good faith on real problems, doesn’t mean I think they are doing the right thing. 5. I believe we should choose open OS’s and there should be a possibly mandated requirement to be able to install alternate OS’s on Apple decides (and anything else in a wide similar class). Not one thing I have said in this thread defends Apple’s actions at all. I don’t find that it helps us to understand what is going on if we simply portray them as a nasty bully without considering their motivations. If this is representative of ‘unbearable bias’, then so be it.
  - 4926394057 6y ago
    Sounds like Telegram needs to implement a "message canary" where every message has a note attached saying something to the effect of; "Apple hasn't asked us to remove this message".
    - smnrchrds 6y ago
      Then they would probably get banned from Apple ecosystem. And Apple will defend itself saying they have a right to choose not to do business with anyone for any reason and they have deemed it best for user experience not to let Telegram in App Store. And Telegram developers would have no recourse.
- smnrchrds 6y ago
  What is unethical about letting the consumers know how much they are paying Apple for the privilege of using in-app purchase?
  - sunahe 6y ago
    Forbidding it
  - zepto 6y ago
    Nothing
- FireBeyond 6y ago
  They're also saying "Don't say that your app overcame a bug in iOS, that's irrelevant".

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

saagarjha 6y ago

My own experience with this was that once I included a description of an OS bug I worked around in the changelog of my apps and the reviewers made me remove it with almost exactly the same verbiage–I can’t remember if they actually said “irrelevant” but the summary was “this information is not useful to your users” (edit: I tried to go look this up but App Store Connect is down at the moment :/). I claimed it was, they wouldn’t budge, I took it out. Apple claiming the inclusion of things that make them look bad being “irrelevant” is sadly a known practice for many years and one of the worst ways that the App Store can stifle people from even talking about highly relevant information Apple doesn’t particularly like.

umvi 6y ago
Wow, that story made me more angry than it should have. Why the heck should Apple be allowed to police your own app's changelog? "Because they can" is probably the reason.
- zepto 6y ago
  Have you never heard an inexperienced developer incorrectly blame the platform or the tools for their own bugs?
  - umvi 6y ago
    Yes, so what? It comes back to the other article on HN about YouTube arbitrating truth. Apple should not be able to dictate what goes in my changelog. If I believe it's relevant info for my userbase that I'm working around some Clang compiler bug with some change, I should be able to say it. What kind of dystopian platform is Apple running where police have to look through everything you type about your own product to make sure you haven't written any thoughtcrimes?
    - zepto 6y ago
      Apple can’t dictate what goes in your changelog. What we are talking about here is the App Store release notes, on Apple’s site and storefront. They can indeed dictate what goes there. The fact that release notes are even displayed there is because they made a facility for that. You can publish your changelog on your own website.

waterhouse 6y ago

On a minor note: > it is prima facie wrong that one of the rules of the App Store is that an app is not allowed to explain the rules of the App Store. I’m hard pressed to think of an exception to this conviction, not just on Apple’s App Store, but in any sphere of life — whether a harmless game... There is a card game called "Mao" in which one of the rules is that you're not supposed to explain the rules. The base game is similar to Uno or Crazy 8s, and then, when you win a game, you get to define a new rule, which you name but don't otherwise explain, and then start enforcing that rule (giving penalty cards when others break it). Others are expected to guess the rule by observing its application. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_(card_game) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_(card_game)

erichocean 6y ago
That's a very fun game to play with friends. Many happy memories. :)
mistermann 6y ago
> There is a card game called "Mao" in which one of the rules is that you're not supposed to explain the rules. One could argue that politicians, corporations and journalists in the US (and many other countries) have a similar set of rules going on in their mutually beneficial game. It's nice to see someone in the mainstream pointing out the rhetorical word games that are played to hide the actual truth from the public.
- mensetmanusman 6y ago
  Also in academia. A bunch of professors recently wrote an article about this because they don’t know what they can say anymore without offending someone.
  - chordalkeyboard 6y ago
    Can you link the article? Thanks.

s_dev 6y ago

>This has nothing to do with relevance and everything to do with convenience. I’ve said it before and will adamantly say it again: it is prima facie wrong that one of the rules of the App Store is that an app is not allowed to explain the rules of the App Store. Very damning when it's phrased like that.

vzaliva 6y ago

Apple makes excellent hardware and polished OS. However, if you care about your freedoms, you need to take a bullet and chose to replace it with a less restrictive operating system, perhaps sacrificing some convenience along the way. I personally decided that it is not OS vendor business to decide for me what programs to install and what information they are allowed to show me.

zepto 6y ago
100% this. Also we need a right to install our own OS. The right level for intervention is at the level of forcing Apple to provide a Bootcamp for iOS. This is far more important than a right to repair, since many many iOS devices continue to be useful for many years after Apple stops supporting them.
crossroadsguy 6y ago
I realised, more so in last few months, the difference between Android and iOS is literally letting your own whims and fancy randomly pick the lesser of evils. As a full time Android developer I was able to seemingly convince myself that moving back to Android (after 4+ years on iOS) indeed makes sense, especially since Android has come really a long way. Also, that I will accept Google will track every move and shake of mine and show me ads based on that data (assuming just Google gets to do it; I'd buy a stock Android phone). But when iPhone 12 was released and I saw the mini is perfectly sized for my palms. I was almost salivating. Even though I find iPhones horrendously expansive. Yes, I do. Except maybe for an SE. Just to make it sound fair, I find most of the expansive flagship Android phones expansive as well. So anyway, I almost did a full 180 and was about to think about buying the new iPhone. But then the enthusiasm started to wane. I saw that there's no touch id, jack was gone anyway, battery life has always been lacklustre, and that there's no way I can silence just one of the dual sims and keep another on separate notification settings (just something I want/need). But I was still deciding. What really hit me hard, in last few weeks, is that Apple has consistently been exploiting customers, more with every release - every move. Blatantly at that. Sometimes in the name of privacy on a completely closed OS and apps, in fact a completely closed ecosystem. Strips devices of useful and convenient hardware features and components. Then very sadistically and successfully patches the voids with "innovation" stickers. Even worse - marks the move as "environment friendly". Headphone jack, earphone and chargers - all gone. Strong arms developers (small and big alike), tries to run repair shops out of business, ensures its devices are less and less repairable - by making it physically difficult and lobbying as well, stifles free speech - literally and doesn't even try to be subtle about it, hands over keys of the kingdom to the authoritarian regimes with far reaches, CEO hobnobs with heads of states of questionable (or actually very obvious) records. We still buy their devices. Enthusiastically. In fact we become such apt apologists that it must be painful for anyone else to read the reactions to criticism. There were plenty of such comments, right here; just from the iPhone 12 release day, which read something like, "Oh, once I started using Bluetooth Headphones and never looked back". Innocuous looking, just a satisfied customer feeling grateful, apologetic comments like these are worst in such contexts. Anyway, then I spent few hours researching a ~5 inch phone with stock Android phone for the nth time yesterday and I didn't find one. The closest, Pixel 4a, has a plastic body. I really do not think I am buying any other Apple device ever (or for the foreseeable future) and I am glad I've not bought into their services. iMessage is useless here anyway. My whims and fancy kinda have stopped seeing Apple as the lesser of the two evils (wrt mobile platforms), or so it seems as of now.

rektide 6y ago

what a striking account of apple waging all out war on the infosphere. making rules, and then preventing people from explaining what is happening, that they have been subject to the rules. incredibly bold policy. incredibly bad acts. perpetrating ignorance upon the world.

eyesee 6y ago

In trying to understand Apple's position on App Store policies, it may help to think of them as a retail store. For example, substitute "Best Buy" for App Store. Can I tell my customers that 30% of the price of their widget goes to Best Buy at purchase? No, that's privileged information in the contract. When my widget is on a shelf at Best Buy, can I advertise a lower price at Amazon.com on the box? No, of course not. They'd never place it on their shelves. If I have to redesign my packaging so Best Buy can put a spider wrap around it, do I get to bitch about that to my customers? Nope, just a cost of doing business. It's "irrelevant" information to the customer. I'm not suggesting this justifies their behavior. It's just an analogy that happens to fit Apple's world view of their App Store.

nexuist 6y ago
> It's just an analogy that happens to fit Apple's world view of their App Store. The problem with the world view, of course, is that there's more to the world than Best Buy. If I don't like a widget at Best Buy I can go look it up and buy it from Amazon. Or Target. Or Walmart. Or Alibaba. If I use an iPhone I am limited to what Apple allows on their shelves, full stop. If Best Buy dictated everything you were allowed to buy, that would seem rather problematic, right? I can't see any way that a corporate executive would justify not only not placing a certain brand on their shelves, but also physically blocking their customers from walking into any other store. Imagine the PR field day if an Apple store manager paid his or her employees to stand in front of the Microsoft store and physically assault any of their customers if they tried to walk inside! And yet that's exactly what they're doing virtually. We can't use a Microsoft app store, or an Amazon app store, or Google Play. We are beholden to the manager's personal preferences of what we can and can't buy.
- barkingcat 6y ago
  the other side of the equation is that you are free not to buy an apple device (for now) the collective amount of people buying apple devices is what gives them the power to implement these rules on their own. I forsee a time in the future when you are forced to buy an Apple product from birth, no options allowed.

lsen001 6y ago

“The first rule about fight club is you don't talk about fight club.” Apple doesn't want negative information spread about it, and if they can control it, they'll definitely try. Very shady of Apple.

dang 6y ago

The big previous thread about this is https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24737171 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24737171.

varispeed 6y ago

Apple entire business model should be illegal. They amassed so much wealth by using various loopholes and tricks, that any normal business wouldn't be able to achieve. Lawmakers should carefully go through it and make every bit impossible to do by any other company in the future and the wealth that Apple amassed should be sold and distributed among Apple customers.

robertlagrant 6y ago

Hi I'm Apple and I'd really like daringfireball to not render in any iOS browsers as it's irrelevant.

mensetmanusman 6y ago

Reminds me of Wizard of Oz. “Don’t mention the man behind the curtain” Retailers went through this with Credit cards. It used to be trouble to charge more for CC usage (in essence, blaming the CC companies for higher charges).

bambax 6y ago

Big app makers should band together and boycott the Apple platform until they get what they want -- and provided "what they want" is not unreasonable; being able to tell the truth in a changelog is reasonable. People will eventually notice if many important apps are no longer available on iPhones.

grishka 6y ago
And before they notice, you'll be hurting yourself, not Apple, for god knows how long. IMO, legislation is our best bet. I'm really looking forward to that EU antimonopoly investigation.

luord 6y ago

Somehow, what surprised me the most here—given Apple's recent news—is the fact that they were able to strong-arm Facebook into complying. One would think that, if there are companies with enough leverage to ignore Apple's odd whims, Facebook would be one of them.

zepto 6y ago
What did Facebook comply with?
- luord 6y ago
  > Similarly, when Facebook wanted to inform its users that 30% of the fees users were paying for online events went to Apple, Apple didn’t let Facebook do it saying this information was (once more) “irrelevant”. That's the passage I meant. I wouldn't have imagined that Apple would be in the capacity of letting or not letting Facebook do something. On a separate note, you seem to have replied to pretty much everyone in this thread, may I ask why?
  - zepto 6y ago
    I got into a dialog with ‘Jedimind’. That has brought me back to the thread more often than I would usually bother with, and I’ve commented on things that seem to have more complexity to them than is apparent.

ofou 6y ago

Apple content firewall is getting at least worrisome. For sure some autocracy would call 'alt information' as irrelevant and banish them all from their platform. Impossible to get consensus from a wildly diverse world. Internet was open, free, and young. Who's going to be the arbiter of truth now? I bet the one with widest arms to grab them all.

m0zg 6y ago

Someone should tell Gruber to what extent his beloved Apple censors things in China to pacify the Chinese Communist Party. Funny how pundits routinely latch on to a tiny gnat on a proverbial elephant's ass.

srtjstjsj 6y ago

Does Apple censor email going through Mail app? Why not? Apple is acting like Communist China or East Germany here. This is unconscionable.

harry8 6y ago

Not conflating. Just straight up lying. Apple are falsely claiming something obviously relevant is irrelevant in an abuse of market power to maximise profit. There we go. It's not a calling a spade a digging implement and then conflating it with all garden tools in general (eg chainsaws are not for children). It is calling the spade a piece of cheese to further and protect their abuse of market power con.