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As much as I dislike the effects of Facebook, Twitter, and Reddit on the world, it is equally alarming that the actions of platform providers like Apple and Goo

As much as I dislike the effects of Facebook, Twitter, and Reddit on the world, it is equally alarming that the actions of platform providers like Apple and Google can have such broad impact. Apple’s recent history in political manipulations includes swapping the gun emoji for a squirt gun emoji, banning Parler, and more. Now, I’m no less alarmed that they could “end” Facebook even if I’m not a fan of Facebook and even if privacy protections help me. This issue is that there simply isn’t much choice in the market here - between Google and Apple it’s two companies from the same area espousing the same political culture. Having them influence and control the entire world between them is dangerous. Unfortunately I don’t see viable competition for them on mobile devices. Who would we look to - Purism?

harry8 6y ago
Going from Apple+Google to Apple+Google+Facebook doesn't seem like a solution to any problem anyone would care about other than Facebook investors. Nokia n900 is still peak smartphone a decade after it was killed.
- Nasrudith 6y ago
  It wouldn't be something to get excited about but three major players is greater than two. I believe there are still some open source phones out there but they are currently a minority so tiny their existence is deniable.
  - harry8 6y ago
    Windows phone is a third major player. How did that work out for us? Anything improve at all? Facebook is not going to provide any meaningful competition to improve things. An additional player when that player is facebook is utterly meaningless to enhancing customer power at best. More likely speeds the race to the bottom of "we can get away with that" because "this is already being done by facebook and we're not doing it as much so it's fine." The odds of looking at it and rationally thinking "I'll buy a facebook phone for its enhanced privacy compared to apple and google" are so vanishingly small they are indistinguishable from zero. It's like choosing which crime syndicate you want to to pay protection to and thinking it's a positive thing there's a new crime syndicate with a different dress code now. Anyway these are the companies who are right this minute, spending up big in washington to put your interests well behind theirs because you pay tax and they don't, they pay lobbying and political donations and you can't compete with that even if you were that dishonest which you probably aren't.

harry8 6y ago

Going from Apple+Google to Apple+Google+Facebook doesn't seem like a solution to any problem anyone would care about other than Facebook investors. Nokia n900 is still peak smartphone a decade after it was killed.

Nasrudith 6y ago
It wouldn't be something to get excited about but three major players is greater than two. I believe there are still some open source phones out there but they are currently a minority so tiny their existence is deniable.
- harry8 6y ago
  Windows phone is a third major player. How did that work out for us? Anything improve at all? Facebook is not going to provide any meaningful competition to improve things. An additional player when that player is facebook is utterly meaningless to enhancing customer power at best. More likely speeds the race to the bottom of "we can get away with that" because "this is already being done by facebook and we're not doing it as much so it's fine." The odds of looking at it and rationally thinking "I'll buy a facebook phone for its enhanced privacy compared to apple and google" are so vanishingly small they are indistinguishable from zero. It's like choosing which crime syndicate you want to to pay protection to and thinking it's a positive thing there's a new crime syndicate with a different dress code now. Anyway these are the companies who are right this minute, spending up big in washington to put your interests well behind theirs because you pay tax and they don't, they pay lobbying and political donations and you can't compete with that even if you were that dishonest which you probably aren't.