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“My absolute dream would be for the DOJ to make Google and Apple collaborate on a cross-platform native app API and treat it as a first class citizen. Doubly so

by zepto 6y ago

“My absolute dream would be for the DOJ to make Google and Apple collaborate on a cross-platform native app API and treat it as a first class citizen. Doubly so if web/WASM can make those API calls.” You want a government mandated software platform? Regardless of whether any of your criticisms have merit, putting the government in charge of API design seems like a questionable suggestion to say the least. Also, all these breakups you are suggesting are anti-consumer. Your assumption is that somehow ‘competition’ would produce better products than we currently have, but history doesn’t support that idea. Without vertical integration you just end up with inefficient consortia attempting to solve problems by committee and political jockeying. That’s what enabled Apple to overtake WinTel in the first place. The way to unseat Apple isn’t to use the government to force us back in time. It’s to recognize the needs they aren’t satisfying and actually contribute to meeting them.

echelon 6y ago
> You want a government mandated software platform? Sure. I like that cars all have government mandated turn signals and brake lights too. Computing is an essential freedom and we can't let these companies turn it into "special sauce" that only they control. The fact that they're this close to doing it is both scary and a shame. We have a chance to get back on the right path, and we should do it. It's not like an industry and academia consortium wouldn't step in to help build the standard. The W3C got us pretty damn far. > The way to unseat Apple isn’t to use the government to force us back in time. It’s to recognize the needs they aren’t satisfying and actually contribute to meeting them. How do you compete with a $2T giant that can easily clone you or lock you out? They've created a "hardware + software + services" megalopoly that does nearly everything. Email, photos, video editing, movies, music, devices, health tracking. When businesses do compete (take SONOS, for instance), Apple comes along and builds their own. Owing to deep integration and ecosystem forces, the competitors aren't able to escape the growth/funding gravity well. Apple is Thanos, and they're snapping freedom and competition out of existence.
- zepto 6y ago
  The inability of industry and academia (and the w3c) to create standards is what created the opportunity that enabled Apple to succeed. If standards had been the solution, Apple wouldn’t have been able to differentiate themselves. Turn signals are a great example of why this idea is dead on arrival. They have been around for close to a century and the government mandated them 50 years ago. If you want the US computing industry to move at that speed, the government will make that happen for you. We just aren’t at the stage in computing where innovation is over and we can afford to force everyone to adhere to a government mandated design.
  - echelon 6y ago
    > The inability of industry and academia (and the w3c) to create standards is what created the opportunity that enabled Apple to succeed. Steve Jobs crippled the web browser, wouldn't allow non-Safari browsers, and didn't open the hardware APIs the way modern web APIs and WASM seek to do. Don't misrepresent history. It was always about control. > Turn signals are a great example of why this idea is dead on arrival. They have been around for close to a century and the government mandated them 50 years ago. Air bags, tire standards, headlight specifications. You're picking on the wrong part of my argument. > If you want the US computing industry to move at that speed, the government will make that happen for you. This sounds like a boogeyman. I hypothesize computing evolution happens slower because of how locked down everything is. Smartphones are stagnant already - no government help required.
    - zepto 6y ago
      Misrepresent history? How exactly did ‘Steve Jobs cripple the web browser’? I’m guessing you don’t know that Apple took the open source WebKit from KDE, and continued to develop it into a world class engine in the open. So open that Google was able to build Chrome with it. It’s still developed completely in the open now and is free to use in your platform, as most of Apple’s competitors actually do. That is about as far from ‘crippling the web’ as any company in history has ever been. As for saying that evolution in computing is slower because of how locked down things are, that seems like a view that is hard to understand. If you can’t see how fast things have moved in software over the past 5 years and then over the past 10, I think you just aren’t looking hard enough. Smartphone hardware design may have plateaued, but that’s just superficial. And in any case, a government standard isn’t going to make anything any less locked down. It will be just as locked down as it is now, more expensive to develop for, and the possibility of an open alternative emerging will be harder than ever, if not impossible.
- SilasX 6y ago
  >> You want a government mandated software platform? >I like that cars all have government mandated turn signals and brake lights too. Actually, you have an even better example to use here, which is the government mandated diagnostic computer in cars, which gives a uniform interface, across all brands, for querying what's going wrong with your car. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On-board_diagnostics#OBD-II_signal_protocols https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On-board_diagnostics#OBD-II_si...
  - zepto 6y ago
    OBD-II has remained unchanged for more than 20 years, save for a few vehicle specific codes. Take a look at WWDC (or any of Google or Amazon’s platform announcements) and see how many new APIs or API chances were announced this year alone. 20 years ago, Macs didn’t even run OSX. Luckily we don’t have to imagine the industry being fossilized like this: any country that hobbles itself in this way will simply be ignored by the rest of the world as a technology backwater.
    - SilasX 6y ago
      The ability to query your car via the uniform OBD-II interface is considered to be a good thing by everyone except those trying to frustrate users, not a "hobbling" of the industry. And backward-incompatible changes to an API should be considered a downside, not a benefit -- though which may (of course) be justified in the circumstance -- but which should never be trotted out, in and of itself, as evidence of superior engineering or progress, as you seem to be implying here. Edit: One more thing: Requiring that certain information be provided through a specific interface/standard does not mean they can't also use other standards as an option or support other other features, so I don't know why all the new APIs are a point in your favor either.
      - zepto 6y ago
        Who’s talking about backward incompatible changes? This is about the speed at which new capabilities are added. What good is a mandatory API if you have to use proprietary extensions a year after it is introduced, because new capabilities have been added to operating systems and hardware? Do you think gasoline engines have changed as much as computers in the last 20 years? Perhaps people like OBD-II because engines are a mature technology. I’d be surprised if you can make the case that operating systems and computers can be considered mature.

by zepto 6y ago

echelon 6y ago

> You want a government mandated software platform? Sure. I like that cars all have government mandated turn signals and brake lights too. Computing is an essential freedom and we can't let these companies turn it into "special sauce" that only they control. The fact that they're this close to doing it is both scary and a shame. We have a chance to get back on the right path, and we should do it. It's not like an industry and academia consortium wouldn't step in to help build the standard. The W3C got us pretty damn far. > The way to unseat Apple isn’t to use the government to force us back in time. It’s to recognize the needs they aren’t satisfying and actually contribute to meeting them. How do you compete with a $2T giant that can easily clone you or lock you out? They've created a "hardware + software + services" megalopoly that does nearly everything. Email, photos, video editing, movies, music, devices, health tracking. When businesses do compete (take SONOS, for instance), Apple comes along and builds their own. Owing to deep integration and ecosystem forces, the competitors aren't able to escape the growth/funding gravity well. Apple is Thanos, and they're snapping freedom and competition out of existence.

zepto 6y ago
The inability of industry and academia (and the w3c) to create standards is what created the opportunity that enabled Apple to succeed. If standards had been the solution, Apple wouldn’t have been able to differentiate themselves. Turn signals are a great example of why this idea is dead on arrival. They have been around for close to a century and the government mandated them 50 years ago. If you want the US computing industry to move at that speed, the government will make that happen for you. We just aren’t at the stage in computing where innovation is over and we can afford to force everyone to adhere to a government mandated design.
- echelon 6y ago
  > The inability of industry and academia (and the w3c) to create standards is what created the opportunity that enabled Apple to succeed. Steve Jobs crippled the web browser, wouldn't allow non-Safari browsers, and didn't open the hardware APIs the way modern web APIs and WASM seek to do. Don't misrepresent history. It was always about control. > Turn signals are a great example of why this idea is dead on arrival. They have been around for close to a century and the government mandated them 50 years ago. Air bags, tire standards, headlight specifications. You're picking on the wrong part of my argument. > If you want the US computing industry to move at that speed, the government will make that happen for you. This sounds like a boogeyman. I hypothesize computing evolution happens slower because of how locked down everything is. Smartphones are stagnant already - no government help required.
  - zepto 6y ago
    Misrepresent history? How exactly did ‘Steve Jobs cripple the web browser’? I’m guessing you don’t know that Apple took the open source WebKit from KDE, and continued to develop it into a world class engine in the open. So open that Google was able to build Chrome with it. It’s still developed completely in the open now and is free to use in your platform, as most of Apple’s competitors actually do. That is about as far from ‘crippling the web’ as any company in history has ever been. As for saying that evolution in computing is slower because of how locked down things are, that seems like a view that is hard to understand. If you can’t see how fast things have moved in software over the past 5 years and then over the past 10, I think you just aren’t looking hard enough. Smartphone hardware design may have plateaued, but that’s just superficial. And in any case, a government standard isn’t going to make anything any less locked down. It will be just as locked down as it is now, more expensive to develop for, and the possibility of an open alternative emerging will be harder than ever, if not impossible.
SilasX 6y ago
>> You want a government mandated software platform? >I like that cars all have government mandated turn signals and brake lights too. Actually, you have an even better example to use here, which is the government mandated diagnostic computer in cars, which gives a uniform interface, across all brands, for querying what's going wrong with your car. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On-board_diagnostics#OBD-II_signal_protocols https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On-board_diagnostics#OBD-II_si...
- zepto 6y ago
  OBD-II has remained unchanged for more than 20 years, save for a few vehicle specific codes. Take a look at WWDC (or any of Google or Amazon’s platform announcements) and see how many new APIs or API chances were announced this year alone. 20 years ago, Macs didn’t even run OSX. Luckily we don’t have to imagine the industry being fossilized like this: any country that hobbles itself in this way will simply be ignored by the rest of the world as a technology backwater.
  - SilasX 6y ago
    The ability to query your car via the uniform OBD-II interface is considered to be a good thing by everyone except those trying to frustrate users, not a "hobbling" of the industry. And backward-incompatible changes to an API should be considered a downside, not a benefit -- though which may (of course) be justified in the circumstance -- but which should never be trotted out, in and of itself, as evidence of superior engineering or progress, as you seem to be implying here. Edit: One more thing: Requiring that certain information be provided through a specific interface/standard does not mean they can't also use other standards as an option or support other other features, so I don't know why all the new APIs are a point in your favor either.
    - zepto 6y ago
      Who’s talking about backward incompatible changes? This is about the speed at which new capabilities are added. What good is a mandatory API if you have to use proprietary extensions a year after it is introduced, because new capabilities have been added to operating systems and hardware? Do you think gasoline engines have changed as much as computers in the last 20 years? Perhaps people like OBD-II because engines are a mature technology. I’d be surprised if you can make the case that operating systems and computers can be considered mature.