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> Apple is aware of how their systems ostracize children, in their own peer groups, who can't afford to carry around luxury phones. Tell me about it. Audi, BMW

> Apple is aware of how their systems ostracize children, in their own peer groups, who can't afford to carry around luxury phones. Tell me about it. Audi, BMW, Ferrari and Lamborghini have been ostracizing me, and so have all the gas stations around where I live! Not only that, but Microsoft, developers of pro software, movie theaters, restaurants, travel agents, lawyers and hookers! The nerve of them all to exclude me from their products and services simply because I can't afford them. It's very cruel and so arbitrary.

sho_hn 4y ago
I think people here take issue with the walled garden model of an intra-device comm protocol, not the price point or desirability of iPhones. The comparison to luxury cars is especially crude because it's an industry far more tightly regulated to the benefit of customers than any section of consumer electronics.
- Maursault 4y ago
  > I think people here take issue with the walled garden model of an intra-device comm protocol, not the price point GGP specified ostracizing by Apple of those "who can't afford to carry around luxury phones." Now you are suggesting that Apple excludes communication from non-Apple customers by using an "intra-device comm protocol," which I believe most refer to as iMessage. I'm pretty sure it was conceived to save the user from paying for SMS and MMS, or at least being a relief to use of those for-pay protocols, and the dreaded "green bubble" merely an indicator that the cell provider may be charging for it. The idea of competing for space here seems to be very popular, and there are many alternatives, such as WhatsApp, WeChat, Facebook Messenger, Kik, Signal, and many others. I just had the strongest sensation of deja vu, no, yes... something... do you at all remember IRC, IRQ, AIM, Yahoo Messenger, Jabber, MSN Messenger, Google Talk? I don't recall anyone complaining about iChat or any of the other services mentioned for being exclusive, which they all are. Are you sure the grievance is legitimate? Where were the complaints before with the legacy chat apps? What makes Apple deserving of special scrutiny while every other message service with similar exclusivity is doing nothing wrong? I also don't see how Apple is responsible for narcissistic parents raising bullies and shitheads. Innocent kids being ostracized really could be, and I think really is, the responsibility of bad parents.
  - sho_hn 4y ago
    Let's put it this way: I am largely on board with your line of reasoning, in so much that you're forcing people to make up their mind on what they're really upset about and what the root problems are. :-) For myself and my own grievances, I'm not a fan of comm protocols that don't allow an open market of clients and servers to exist and to interoperate. I much prefer using the ones that do, and so I do a lot of my group chatting on Matrix in the social spaces where I can. The "green bubble effect" and who gets to control it adds another to my list of reasons to want the more open systems to be well-made and prosper, although it's not a primary driver.
    - Maursault 4y ago
      I think you have a nice intentionally harmless approach to this, but I'm still not sure how iMessage is exclusive of other protocols rather than conveniently saving the users from cell providers' charges for SMS and MMS when possible. iMessage still supports SMS and MMS, and it only prioritizes its iMessage protocol when messaging other Apple device users. I don't use iMessage and never have, but my understanding is it communicates to Android users, other smartphones and even dumbphones though the cell providers' SMS and MMS services. Seems like the only ones that should have any complaint here are cell providers for being undermined and cut out of their instant messaging revenues.
      - sho_hn 4y ago
        My take here is that if iMessage is truly a Better Tool, I'd be great if it was available on any computer that fulfills the hardware requirements to participate. For example, Apple could release an iMessage app for Android (and if they priced it fairly, this would still be cheaper than an iPhone, yet still turn them a profit). Or release specs so others can do so. Do I think they should be or should feel obligated to do so? I'm not sure. I think society is having a debate about whether modern communication networks have "public infrastructure"-type characteristics and need to be regulated more in general, and this is probably also a question on that spectrum to a degree. Let's say I wouldn't be surprised if one day we come to the conclusion that the answer is yes and a larger functionality scope for what is considered basic interoperability is important to us, but there are also some good arguments against it. Another angle to approach it from is the spectrum of arguments pro and con of bundling/unbundling of hardware and software/services (i.e. need-iPhone-to-iMessage). Governments which run environmental certification/badging schemes for example are increasingly expanding them to apply to software and considering or enacting rules that are decidedly against bundling with HW. The reason is that it tends to cause more frequent hardware replacements to stay compatible with SW/services and therefore a larger energy/carbon footprint - unbundling allows legacy HW to keep going longer on average. A project along these lines I was tangentially involved with myself was the research to expand Germany's "Blauer Engel" label to software. What guides my thinking here is a bit overboard and flowery again, and also personal. As a software engineer and teenager myself I cut my teeth on making and maintaining one of the better-known IRC clients at the time; this was my first project that really had other users project part of their lives into it, hours at a time. For me it was quite powerful when I realized that I knew people who had met using my chat software and later gotten married and started families. It solidified my view of the engineer as a supportive toolmaker for others to better live their lives and build civilization. The modern day equivalent to the people who conceived of and made the flint tools others would use to start the fires to tell stories around. Comm tools being broadly available and interoperable and their social effects are stuff close to my heart, and stories of folks suffering from lack of access that isn't due to real technical barriers just aren't great, even knowing the complex economics driving the situation.

sho_hn 4y ago

I think people here take issue with the walled garden model of an intra-device comm protocol, not the price point or desirability of iPhones. The comparison to luxury cars is especially crude because it's an industry far more tightly regulated to the benefit of customers than any section of consumer electronics.

Maursault 4y ago
> I think people here take issue with the walled garden model of an intra-device comm protocol, not the price point GGP specified ostracizing by Apple of those "who can't afford to carry around luxury phones." Now you are suggesting that Apple excludes communication from non-Apple customers by using an "intra-device comm protocol," which I believe most refer to as iMessage. I'm pretty sure it was conceived to save the user from paying for SMS and MMS, or at least being a relief to use of those for-pay protocols, and the dreaded "green bubble" merely an indicator that the cell provider may be charging for it. The idea of competing for space here seems to be very popular, and there are many alternatives, such as WhatsApp, WeChat, Facebook Messenger, Kik, Signal, and many others. I just had the strongest sensation of deja vu, no, yes... something... do you at all remember IRC, IRQ, AIM, Yahoo Messenger, Jabber, MSN Messenger, Google Talk? I don't recall anyone complaining about iChat or any of the other services mentioned for being exclusive, which they all are. Are you sure the grievance is legitimate? Where were the complaints before with the legacy chat apps? What makes Apple deserving of special scrutiny while every other message service with similar exclusivity is doing nothing wrong? I also don't see how Apple is responsible for narcissistic parents raising bullies and shitheads. Innocent kids being ostracized really could be, and I think really is, the responsibility of bad parents.
- sho_hn 4y ago
  Let's put it this way: I am largely on board with your line of reasoning, in so much that you're forcing people to make up their mind on what they're really upset about and what the root problems are. :-) For myself and my own grievances, I'm not a fan of comm protocols that don't allow an open market of clients and servers to exist and to interoperate. I much prefer using the ones that do, and so I do a lot of my group chatting on Matrix in the social spaces where I can. The "green bubble effect" and who gets to control it adds another to my list of reasons to want the more open systems to be well-made and prosper, although it's not a primary driver.
  - Maursault 4y ago
    I think you have a nice intentionally harmless approach to this, but I'm still not sure how iMessage is exclusive of other protocols rather than conveniently saving the users from cell providers' charges for SMS and MMS when possible. iMessage still supports SMS and MMS, and it only prioritizes its iMessage protocol when messaging other Apple device users. I don't use iMessage and never have, but my understanding is it communicates to Android users, other smartphones and even dumbphones though the cell providers' SMS and MMS services. Seems like the only ones that should have any complaint here are cell providers for being undermined and cut out of their instant messaging revenues.
    - sho_hn 4y ago
      My take here is that if iMessage is truly a Better Tool, I'd be great if it was available on any computer that fulfills the hardware requirements to participate. For example, Apple could release an iMessage app for Android (and if they priced it fairly, this would still be cheaper than an iPhone, yet still turn them a profit). Or release specs so others can do so. Do I think they should be or should feel obligated to do so? I'm not sure. I think society is having a debate about whether modern communication networks have "public infrastructure"-type characteristics and need to be regulated more in general, and this is probably also a question on that spectrum to a degree. Let's say I wouldn't be surprised if one day we come to the conclusion that the answer is yes and a larger functionality scope for what is considered basic interoperability is important to us, but there are also some good arguments against it. Another angle to approach it from is the spectrum of arguments pro and con of bundling/unbundling of hardware and software/services (i.e. need-iPhone-to-iMessage). Governments which run environmental certification/badging schemes for example are increasingly expanding them to apply to software and considering or enacting rules that are decidedly against bundling with HW. The reason is that it tends to cause more frequent hardware replacements to stay compatible with SW/services and therefore a larger energy/carbon footprint - unbundling allows legacy HW to keep going longer on average. A project along these lines I was tangentially involved with myself was the research to expand Germany's "Blauer Engel" label to software. What guides my thinking here is a bit overboard and flowery again, and also personal. As a software engineer and teenager myself I cut my teeth on making and maintaining one of the better-known IRC clients at the time; this was my first project that really had other users project part of their lives into it, hours at a time. For me it was quite powerful when I realized that I knew people who had met using my chat software and later gotten married and started families. It solidified my view of the engineer as a supportive toolmaker for others to better live their lives and build civilization. The modern day equivalent to the people who conceived of and made the flint tools others would use to start the fires to tell stories around. Comm tools being broadly available and interoperable and their social effects are stuff close to my heart, and stories of folks suffering from lack of access that isn't due to real technical barriers just aren't great, even knowing the complex economics driving the situation.