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I'd prefer Nvidia, were I forced to pick a torture to endure. See: "Qualcomm shook down the cell phone industry for almost 20 years"[1] (and then the 9th Distr

I'd prefer Nvidia, were I forced to pick a torture to endure. See: "Qualcomm shook down the cell phone industry for almost 20 years"[1] (and then the 9th District let em them away with it, the dogs!). [1] https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/05/how-qualcomm-shook-down-the-cell-phone-industry-for-almost-20-years/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/05/how-qualcomm-sho... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31557324 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31557324 (251 points, 3 days ago, 125 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20055517 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20055517 (528points, 3 years ago, 300 comments).

amelius 4y ago
Does it matter which company, though, given that they are run by humans who might change jobs or retire? And isn't greed what drives most non-technical upper-management folks, because "greed" is what they are hired for?
- smoldesu 4y ago
  FWIW, greed is what drives ARM right now anyways. People seem to forget that ARM is not a community-owned endeavor.
  - mlyle 4y ago
    There's different business models behind greed, though. You can be an innovator running a license business, with a "friendly" stance towards licensees as you work to grow a massive market. ARM's mostly played this game. Or, you can be a rent-seeking, litigation-happy shop that seeks to acquire many types of IP to force all market participants to license from you; unilaterally determine payments based on ability to pay; and threaten to tie up indefinitely in litigation anyone who doesn't pay the extortion. This has been Qualcomm's bread and butter. Or, anywhere inbetween.
    - smoldesu 4y ago
      I don't really think there's much of a difference, contextually. ARM still collects rent, and most of their "innovation" is contributed by their licencees. Pretty much the only thing ARM can peddle at this point is their core designs and ISA, and both of those things are starting to show their age now. Maybe 10 years ago ARM had a "friendly" stance towards their customer base, but nowadays they're frankly no better than Qualcomm. If you want to make a usable ARM computer today, you need to have ISA extensions out-of-the-box and probably design your own cores unless you want to saddle your customers with 8x M53's. I agree that not all of these companies are equal, but ARM right now reminds me of Intel in 2016. You can only rest on your laurels for so long, sufficiently motivated competitors will be sure to remind you again and again.
      - mlyle 4y ago
        > Maybe 10 years ago ARM had a "friendly" stance towards their customer base, but nowadays they're frankly no better than Qualcomm. I'm sick of this kind of comparison, like I detail here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31578523 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31578523 Qualcomm systematically shook down everyone in entire industries with a web of technologies, threatening "well, even if you didn't use ____, you'll also violate ____ and ____. And, we'll cut off your access to important chips in ___, ___ ,and ___." Between the two, ARM is an absolute pleasure to work with. > If you want to make a usable ARM computer today, you need to have ISA extensions out-of-the-box and probably design your own cores Samsung just moved from proprietary cores in flagships to Cortex-X + A710 + A510. Ditto for Snapdragon 8. Graviton is using ARM Neoverse-N1/N2. Actual cores from ARM proper are a bigger share of usage than almost anytime before, with Apple being the main remaining exception.
        smoldesu 4y ago
        I think we'll have to agree to disagree, then. I don't think your other comment was right either: people typically give Apple more scrutiny because A. they are the larger company and B. they have much more of our personal data than Meta does In this case, I think the comparison is apt because the only thing that matters is if the current IP owners are abusing their power. In this case, I think ARM and Qualcomm would wind up to be about equally as tyrannical. If you think ARM's slate is clean, you should read into the neverending drama that is ARM China. Nobody is necessarily good here.
- mlyle 4y ago
  > Does it matter which company, though, given that they are run by humans who might change jobs or retire? Eh, if you have an existing big organizational apparatus built around IP extortion... you may be more of a danger than someone else who'd need to tool up.
- stormbrew 4y ago
  "All companies are greedy so all choices are pointless" is a pretty nihilistic perspective. Do you really think every company engages in all the same practices that are identically detrimental to the commons? I'm almost as far from a fan of capitalism as you can get and even I don't think that.
  - sfe22 4y ago
    You somehow believe that having only one corporation will yield better results for the society, instead of many companies competing in a free market? (Where you can also compete if you think your better)
    - stormbrew 4y ago
      I'm having trouble seeing how you got from my post to this question, so I'm really not sure how to answer it.
      - sfe22 4y ago
        You said you are far from being fan of capitalism. Free market means as many companies as needed. The opposite is one company only controlling everything, most commonly irl in form of communism.
        stormbrew 4y ago
        The opposite of a vacuum is the center of a black hole, and yet we manage to live in neither. At any rate a deeper conversation about this would go pretty far off topic, so I'm going to leave your strawmen and conflation of several different ideas and axes into one binary choice alone.
        sfe22 4y ago
        Yeah that’s why i said believe in. Whether you tend to believe if fewer is better, or more is better. To me it seemed like you belong to the former, and thats why i made a specific question which you are actively avoiding answering.
- akira2501 4y ago
  Yes, because companies can "own" property. The fact that humans change jobs or retire inside one has no impact on this. Greed may be what they are selected for, but I don't think it's necessarily obvious that's what drives them. It's also not necessarily obvious that this is the most robust mechanism to achieving sustained success.

amelius 4y ago

Does it matter which company, though, given that they are run by humans who might change jobs or retire? And isn't greed what drives most non-technical upper-management folks, because "greed" is what they are hired for?

smoldesu 4y ago
FWIW, greed is what drives ARM right now anyways. People seem to forget that ARM is not a community-owned endeavor.
- mlyle 4y ago
  There's different business models behind greed, though. You can be an innovator running a license business, with a "friendly" stance towards licensees as you work to grow a massive market. ARM's mostly played this game. Or, you can be a rent-seeking, litigation-happy shop that seeks to acquire many types of IP to force all market participants to license from you; unilaterally determine payments based on ability to pay; and threaten to tie up indefinitely in litigation anyone who doesn't pay the extortion. This has been Qualcomm's bread and butter. Or, anywhere inbetween.
  - smoldesu 4y ago
    I don't really think there's much of a difference, contextually. ARM still collects rent, and most of their "innovation" is contributed by their licencees. Pretty much the only thing ARM can peddle at this point is their core designs and ISA, and both of those things are starting to show their age now. Maybe 10 years ago ARM had a "friendly" stance towards their customer base, but nowadays they're frankly no better than Qualcomm. If you want to make a usable ARM computer today, you need to have ISA extensions out-of-the-box and probably design your own cores unless you want to saddle your customers with 8x M53's. I agree that not all of these companies are equal, but ARM right now reminds me of Intel in 2016. You can only rest on your laurels for so long, sufficiently motivated competitors will be sure to remind you again and again.
    - mlyle 4y ago
      > Maybe 10 years ago ARM had a "friendly" stance towards their customer base, but nowadays they're frankly no better than Qualcomm. I'm sick of this kind of comparison, like I detail here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31578523 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31578523 Qualcomm systematically shook down everyone in entire industries with a web of technologies, threatening "well, even if you didn't use ____, you'll also violate ____ and ____. And, we'll cut off your access to important chips in ___, ___ ,and ___." Between the two, ARM is an absolute pleasure to work with. > If you want to make a usable ARM computer today, you need to have ISA extensions out-of-the-box and probably design your own cores Samsung just moved from proprietary cores in flagships to Cortex-X + A710 + A510. Ditto for Snapdragon 8. Graviton is using ARM Neoverse-N1/N2. Actual cores from ARM proper are a bigger share of usage than almost anytime before, with Apple being the main remaining exception.
      - smoldesu 4y ago
        I think we'll have to agree to disagree, then. I don't think your other comment was right either: people typically give Apple more scrutiny because A. they are the larger company and B. they have much more of our personal data than Meta does In this case, I think the comparison is apt because the only thing that matters is if the current IP owners are abusing their power. In this case, I think ARM and Qualcomm would wind up to be about equally as tyrannical. If you think ARM's slate is clean, you should read into the neverending drama that is ARM China. Nobody is necessarily good here.
mlyle 4y ago
> Does it matter which company, though, given that they are run by humans who might change jobs or retire? Eh, if you have an existing big organizational apparatus built around IP extortion... you may be more of a danger than someone else who'd need to tool up.
stormbrew 4y ago
"All companies are greedy so all choices are pointless" is a pretty nihilistic perspective. Do you really think every company engages in all the same practices that are identically detrimental to the commons? I'm almost as far from a fan of capitalism as you can get and even I don't think that.
- sfe22 4y ago
  You somehow believe that having only one corporation will yield better results for the society, instead of many companies competing in a free market? (Where you can also compete if you think your better)
  - stormbrew 4y ago
    I'm having trouble seeing how you got from my post to this question, so I'm really not sure how to answer it.
    - sfe22 4y ago
      You said you are far from being fan of capitalism. Free market means as many companies as needed. The opposite is one company only controlling everything, most commonly irl in form of communism.
      - stormbrew 4y ago
        The opposite of a vacuum is the center of a black hole, and yet we manage to live in neither. At any rate a deeper conversation about this would go pretty far off topic, so I'm going to leave your strawmen and conflation of several different ideas and axes into one binary choice alone.
        sfe22 4y ago
        Yeah that’s why i said believe in. Whether you tend to believe if fewer is better, or more is better. To me it seemed like you belong to the former, and thats why i made a specific question which you are actively avoiding answering.
akira2501 4y ago
Yes, because companies can "own" property. The fact that humans change jobs or retire inside one has no impact on this. Greed may be what they are selected for, but I don't think it's necessarily obvious that's what drives them. It's also not necessarily obvious that this is the most robust mechanism to achieving sustained success.