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As someone who's been locked into the Apple ecosystem since 2010, I was extremely hopeful that this article would help me. Unfortunately, the writer does not u

As someone who's been locked into the Apple ecosystem since 2010, I was extremely hopeful that this article would help me. Unfortunately, the writer does not use iOS devices, iCloud, FaceTime, unlikely to be using iMessage (although not explicitly stated), so this is great if you're hooked in macOS only, and not with iDevices & iCloud services as well.

everdrive 5y ago
It's important not to start using a service which will be difficult to cease using. This is how lock in occurs. It's not truly convenient if you're stuck with it.
- jstx1 5y ago
  > It's not truly convenient if you're stuck with it. That's a bit extreme. I would say that it's only inconvenient if you need/want to switch - everyone can make a guess about the probability that they will want to switch in the future, what effort it would take and whether that's worth it for the value they will get in the meantime.
- pknomad 5y ago
  But that's a trade-off that most users are expected to have. I like how macOS can handle continuity of applications (iMessage, Apps, Fileshare) across multiple devices. I haven't seen any other OSs or ecosystem handle this as well as Apple's.
- dylan604 5y ago
  That works great if you're a nerd and only every communicate with other nerds. Once you try to talk to moms, your stuck using FB or messages. So, you can be definitely use the most secure stuff out there that gives you all the freedom to do exactly what you want, but you'll be on that island all by yourself. Enjoy
  - muyuu 5y ago
    my mum is too much of a normie to use computers regularly at all, which helps she either calls or messages, which from the lock-in standpoint is just better and perfectly adequate - it means much less spurious messaging
- tw600040 5y ago
  like the internet?
- newsclues 5y ago
  The service known as the Internet taught me this.
campground 5y ago
I use a Linux exclusively for my regular computing needs, development work, office stuff etc., and have an iPhone and iPad. The iPhone market is so much larger than the Mac market that Apple has designed the devices to work just fine without a Mac to plug in to. I do use Dropbox instead of iCloud for most files, but if I need to get a photo out of iCloud, the web interface works fine.
georgyo 5y ago
I don't understand entirely. Apple has locked you into their walled garden. But FaceTime and iMessage? There are plenty of alternatives. More importantly the alternatives have bigger user bases. What is making you feel locked into iMessage? Interoperability between apple devices and services is good, but any individual service is not actually great. They are only good if you commit everything to apple. So if you actually wanted to break free, switching from iMessage and FaceTime would be the easiest. Reduce your dependencies of stuff in the walled garden, then leaving that garden get easier. Apple knows that switching from MacOS/iOS is hard if you use their services that only work on their devices. The solution is don't use their services even if you use their devices.
- t-writescode 5y ago
  > What is making you feel locked into iMessage? When the not-tech savvy grandmother uses iMessage and FaceTime, it's hard to encourage her to switch to What'sApp or Discord.
  - azinman2 5y ago
    FaceTime will soon work with web links, tho I dunno if you can schedule that from the non-Apple side.
  - georgyo 5y ago
    How did your not-tech savvy grandparent deal with grandkids who use don't use apple products? If an entire family feels compelled to use apple products because the family users apple products things start feeling more like a religion then a technical choice for a product. The fact that the software choices of other people are forcing your hardware choices here is horrible.
    - miloignis 5y ago
      I agree, and in my opinion it's Apple's greatest sin. (Linux/Android/Pinephone/Matrix user here with family in the Apple ecosystem)
    - 5y ago
forrestthewoods 5y ago
Huh? I use iOS devices and do not own a single macOS device. iPhone + iPad + Windows desktop. It’s great. I haven’t connected my iPhone to a PC is 6 years. iTunes is the worst piece of software ever made. Thankfully it hasn’t been needed or even useful for half a decade.
wcchandler 5y ago
I’m in a similar situation. Once the core apps stop working as expected — iMessage, FaceTime, easy transfer of music to iPhone — I will be going back to Linux. I honestly can’t wait, but for now it’s not worth the time sink to get it installed on this 2010 MBP. Plus that would be an immediate loss of functionality for most of those applications without considerable research into FOSS alternatives.
2OEH8eoCRo0 5y ago
If you feel that trapped doesn't it piss you off?
derekp7 5y ago
I've been using Linux as my primary desktop since the early 90's. I used to dual boot as needed, then switched to Windows in a VM, but now I will RDP into a Windows server at work if I need to run a business app. But for the most part everything I do is either a web app or is in a terminal window. Of course that is a function of my particular career (Unix/Linux systems/network engineer/developer). At home I use VLC for videos, or Chrome/Firefox for Netflix (and other streaming services). I also picked up a Chromebook tablet for various media consumption needs. I can't really think of the last time I needed a non-Linux system for anything.
- pengaru 5y ago
  I needed a non-linux system recently to update the firmware on a Digidesign Mbox... had to borrow someone's mac.
trangus_1985 5y ago
> iOS devices, iCloud, FaceTime, unlikely to be using iMessage Attack it piece by piece. I have some experience de-siloing myself, and I have some insight on this. The first and most important thing is that you should (for the most part) not use anything that's a free hosted cloud service. Find a cross platform equivalent to those services and start switching to them. Standards based hosted services are much easier to set up than self-hosting, and makes it MUCH easier to switch out later. The first thing I'd recommend you do is get Signal installed. Figure out which of your friends are on there already, and just start sending them messages from that. Next, register a domain. Your name is a good start, since you'll need it for email (and for, if the privacy landscape in the US continues on its trajectory, self-hosting) Here are some good (non exhaustive) cross-platform alternatives that I use or have used: - icloud photos: Google Drive, Smugmug (my fav), Flickr - icloud mail/contacts/calendars: Fastmail (mail + card/caldav syncing) - imessage/facetime: signal (im aware there's other chat clients but signal is me and my friends' go to. Discord, whatsapp, telegram, etc also exist) - safari: Firefox with account set up I pay less than $150 a year, and I get phone or email support with a real person for all of the services I use. I use an iphone, apple watch, with windows 10 on a laptop, and desktop linux. It all works together pretty well, and it really wasn't that hard to establish.
- josephg 5y ago
  The hard one is continuity’s copy paste. I can copy & paste images and text seamlessly between my laptop and phone. I can’t think of a way to set that up myself any other way - maybe a custom app with a content box? It’s insanely useful, and such a drag when I don’t have it. (Eg when working from my Linux workstation)
  - commoner 5y ago
    KDE Connect provides clipboard continuity between desktop and mobile, among many other features: https://kdeconnect.kde.org/ https://kdeconnect.kde.org/ The GNOME client is GSConnect: https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/1319/gsconnect/ https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/1319/gsconnect/
ksec 5y ago
The biggest one for me isn't anything you mention, It is iCloud Keychain. Due to all the security concern I have finally made the effort to use random password for almost everything now ( macOS even has a hidden password generator in KeyChain App if one of those site happen to have stupid password combination requirement ) But I cant even use it in Firefox on my Mac.
- eric__cartman 5y ago
  Can't you migrate everything to a cross platform password manager like KeepassXC or Bitwarden? It seems quite clunky that the iCloud Keychain locks you to a particular browser and operating system platform.
m0zg 5y ago
Do what I did and switch to Signal wholesale. Or at least to Telegram. Both have really nice desktop clients on Linux. Move to Brave Search as well - it has its own index and it's easily on par with Google in my experience. I still have a few people on Messages, but they contact me through my iPhone, so I'm not losing anything. It baffles me why anyone on this site would use services that are not available across all major platofrms.
eddieh 5y ago
I think there's a huge amount of value in bringing more of the Linux and UNIX experience to the Mac. That way I can still use my iPhone and I can still us Logic and Pages, but I can run a window manager that I can modify and customize. That's just one aspect. It would be nice to have some other *nix features like procfs/sysfs, BSD jails (or at least better chroot support), tmpfs, etc.

everdrive 5y ago

It's important not to start using a service which will be difficult to cease using. This is how lock in occurs. It's not truly convenient if you're stuck with it.

jstx1 5y ago
> It's not truly convenient if you're stuck with it. That's a bit extreme. I would say that it's only inconvenient if you need/want to switch - everyone can make a guess about the probability that they will want to switch in the future, what effort it would take and whether that's worth it for the value they will get in the meantime.
pknomad 5y ago
But that's a trade-off that most users are expected to have. I like how macOS can handle continuity of applications (iMessage, Apps, Fileshare) across multiple devices. I haven't seen any other OSs or ecosystem handle this as well as Apple's.
dylan604 5y ago
That works great if you're a nerd and only every communicate with other nerds. Once you try to talk to moms, your stuck using FB or messages. So, you can be definitely use the most secure stuff out there that gives you all the freedom to do exactly what you want, but you'll be on that island all by yourself. Enjoy
- muyuu 5y ago
  my mum is too much of a normie to use computers regularly at all, which helps she either calls or messages, which from the lock-in standpoint is just better and perfectly adequate - it means much less spurious messaging
tw600040 5y ago
like the internet?
newsclues 5y ago
The service known as the Internet taught me this.

campground 5y ago

I use a Linux exclusively for my regular computing needs, development work, office stuff etc., and have an iPhone and iPad. The iPhone market is so much larger than the Mac market that Apple has designed the devices to work just fine without a Mac to plug in to. I do use Dropbox instead of iCloud for most files, but if I need to get a photo out of iCloud, the web interface works fine.

georgyo 5y ago

I don't understand entirely. Apple has locked you into their walled garden. But FaceTime and iMessage? There are plenty of alternatives. More importantly the alternatives have bigger user bases. What is making you feel locked into iMessage? Interoperability between apple devices and services is good, but any individual service is not actually great. They are only good if you commit everything to apple. So if you actually wanted to break free, switching from iMessage and FaceTime would be the easiest. Reduce your dependencies of stuff in the walled garden, then leaving that garden get easier. Apple knows that switching from MacOS/iOS is hard if you use their services that only work on their devices. The solution is don't use their services even if you use their devices.

t-writescode 5y ago
> What is making you feel locked into iMessage? When the not-tech savvy grandmother uses iMessage and FaceTime, it's hard to encourage her to switch to What'sApp or Discord.
- azinman2 5y ago
  FaceTime will soon work with web links, tho I dunno if you can schedule that from the non-Apple side.
- georgyo 5y ago
  How did your not-tech savvy grandparent deal with grandkids who use don't use apple products? If an entire family feels compelled to use apple products because the family users apple products things start feeling more like a religion then a technical choice for a product. The fact that the software choices of other people are forcing your hardware choices here is horrible.
  - miloignis 5y ago
    I agree, and in my opinion it's Apple's greatest sin. (Linux/Android/Pinephone/Matrix user here with family in the Apple ecosystem)
  - 5y ago

forrestthewoods 5y ago

Huh? I use iOS devices and do not own a single macOS device. iPhone + iPad + Windows desktop. It’s great. I haven’t connected my iPhone to a PC is 6 years. iTunes is the worst piece of software ever made. Thankfully it hasn’t been needed or even useful for half a decade.

wcchandler 5y ago

I’m in a similar situation. Once the core apps stop working as expected — iMessage, FaceTime, easy transfer of music to iPhone — I will be going back to Linux. I honestly can’t wait, but for now it’s not worth the time sink to get it installed on this 2010 MBP. Plus that would be an immediate loss of functionality for most of those applications without considerable research into FOSS alternatives.

2OEH8eoCRo0 5y ago

If you feel that trapped doesn't it piss you off?

derekp7 5y ago

I've been using Linux as my primary desktop since the early 90's. I used to dual boot as needed, then switched to Windows in a VM, but now I will RDP into a Windows server at work if I need to run a business app. But for the most part everything I do is either a web app or is in a terminal window. Of course that is a function of my particular career (Unix/Linux systems/network engineer/developer). At home I use VLC for videos, or Chrome/Firefox for Netflix (and other streaming services). I also picked up a Chromebook tablet for various media consumption needs. I can't really think of the last time I needed a non-Linux system for anything.

pengaru 5y ago
I needed a non-linux system recently to update the firmware on a Digidesign Mbox... had to borrow someone's mac.

trangus_1985 5y ago

> iOS devices, iCloud, FaceTime, unlikely to be using iMessage Attack it piece by piece. I have some experience de-siloing myself, and I have some insight on this. The first and most important thing is that you should (for the most part) not use anything that's a free hosted cloud service. Find a cross platform equivalent to those services and start switching to them. Standards based hosted services are much easier to set up than self-hosting, and makes it MUCH easier to switch out later. The first thing I'd recommend you do is get Signal installed. Figure out which of your friends are on there already, and just start sending them messages from that. Next, register a domain. Your name is a good start, since you'll need it for email (and for, if the privacy landscape in the US continues on its trajectory, self-hosting) Here are some good (non exhaustive) cross-platform alternatives that I use or have used: - icloud photos: Google Drive, Smugmug (my fav), Flickr - icloud mail/contacts/calendars: Fastmail (mail + card/caldav syncing) - imessage/facetime: signal (im aware there's other chat clients but signal is me and my friends' go to. Discord, whatsapp, telegram, etc also exist) - safari: Firefox with account set up I pay less than $150 a year, and I get phone or email support with a real person for all of the services I use. I use an iphone, apple watch, with windows 10 on a laptop, and desktop linux. It all works together pretty well, and it really wasn't that hard to establish.

josephg 5y ago
The hard one is continuity’s copy paste. I can copy & paste images and text seamlessly between my laptop and phone. I can’t think of a way to set that up myself any other way - maybe a custom app with a content box? It’s insanely useful, and such a drag when I don’t have it. (Eg when working from my Linux workstation)
- commoner 5y ago
  KDE Connect provides clipboard continuity between desktop and mobile, among many other features: https://kdeconnect.kde.org/ https://kdeconnect.kde.org/ The GNOME client is GSConnect: https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/1319/gsconnect/ https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/1319/gsconnect/

ksec 5y ago

The biggest one for me isn't anything you mention, It is iCloud Keychain. Due to all the security concern I have finally made the effort to use random password for almost everything now ( macOS even has a hidden password generator in KeyChain App if one of those site happen to have stupid password combination requirement ) But I cant even use it in Firefox on my Mac.

eric__cartman 5y ago
Can't you migrate everything to a cross platform password manager like KeepassXC or Bitwarden? It seems quite clunky that the iCloud Keychain locks you to a particular browser and operating system platform.

m0zg 5y ago

Do what I did and switch to Signal wholesale. Or at least to Telegram. Both have really nice desktop clients on Linux. Move to Brave Search as well - it has its own index and it's easily on par with Google in my experience. I still have a few people on Messages, but they contact me through my iPhone, so I'm not losing anything. It baffles me why anyone on this site would use services that are not available across all major platofrms.

eddieh 5y ago

I think there's a huge amount of value in bringing more of the Linux and UNIX experience to the Mac. That way I can still use my iPhone and I can still us Logic and Pages, but I can run a window manager that I can modify and customize. That's just one aspect. It would be nice to have some other *nix features like procfs/sysfs, BSD jails (or at least better chroot support), tmpfs, etc.