4 ms·

If you won’t say it, I will: Apple is wrong for what they’re doing. These are tools that should be serving their users, not their creators.

rTX5CMRXIfFG 4y ago
What is the basis of right/wrong in this value judgment and why is this basis correct and the others not?
- hutzlibu 4y ago
  It is wrong that they do not do, what the user who payed for it, asked it to do. A task it can do, but choose to do a different task, that is better in the intereet of the corporation. It is a quite harmles example, but it is zelling of the general state of things and where we are heading. If I buy a device I assume I own it. Thats how it should be. Not that I rent it and the rules to rent change all the time.
  - farias0 4y ago
    Is it not reasonable to expect that the keyword "share" functions the same as the share button? I don't know the standards you have for the things you buy, but I find unacceptable that a thing I paid (handsomely) for twists my orders to share adverting to my contacts under my name, and part of the reason things are so bad is because at every valid criticism there are people defending these stuff as normal
- rendall 4y ago
  One could ask this same question of any terrible, unethical thing. The reasonable expectation is that a digital assistant will work for its user and not the corporation that sold it. The corporation is trading on this expectation to exploit its users.
  - hnews_account_1 4y ago
    This is not a reasonable expectation for a digital assistant. At all. It is reasonable for a hacker to expect it. But the majority of the public doesn’t care that Apple tries to push Apple Music. If this was sold as a separate service however, maybe people would have other expectations.
  - obarthelemy 4y ago
    Except Apple clearly owns its users, not the other way around. They get money from you for everything you do with their devices (music, vids, books, ads, even purchases of anything now), AND get money from the sellers to let them just talk to you. "If you can't freely do anything on the device you own, you're the one owned."
snapplebobapple 4y ago
Why would you ever think Apple's tools should be doing anything other than serving the interests of their owners? The whole system has worked so well for us by driving massive innovation through the credible promise of being able to use what you created for your own benefit. The thing that stops companies from abusing their users like this is not any should statement attached to their product, it's the fear of losing all their customers to a competitor, which is not a credible threat to a company as large, entrenched and good at using the walled garden strategy as apple. The correct thought here is not a should statement that will never happen (and shouldn't happen because if we make it true it will fundamentally break the innovation machine). The correct thought here is "Apple is way too big and has way too much market power. We need to use the existing antitrust system and break this company up." This correct thought is not unique to apple either, it's equally applicable to many tech companies, apple just happens to be in the small cadre of the worst of the worst.
- snapplebobapple 4y ago
  wow, there are at least five people on here with more than 500 points that don't live in the real world and instead choose to believe this is a utopia where people don't work in their own interest and will instead sacrifice for everyone else to benefit over themselves. Please open your eyes and realize this is not the case and that pretty much any time it has been held up as the case it has turned out to be a cover for self interested (most recent example on here is the Patagonia founder hiding the true purpose of avoiding billions in taxes with the unicorn farts of a charitable donation to a charity controlled by his family) and sometimes illegal (most recent example on here is the SBF FTX debacle. Effective altruism apparently really means fraudulent client fund comingling and theft) behavior. The first step to a better world is acknowledging the prime driver of self interest in human action and designing systems that support that while protecting from too much power. This historically meant strong property rights, strong speech rights and strong antitrust regulation. Wishing that someone would exercise their property and speech rights differently isn't an effective system and regulating them into right think and right action robs us of innovation because there's no reason for anyone to put in the extra effort to make something better beyond trivial improvements since they won't get to keep that benefit while they pay the cost of development, it is far easier to just stay mediocre and not stick your head out.

rTX5CMRXIfFG 4y ago

What is the basis of right/wrong in this value judgment and why is this basis correct and the others not?

hutzlibu 4y ago
It is wrong that they do not do, what the user who payed for it, asked it to do. A task it can do, but choose to do a different task, that is better in the intereet of the corporation. It is a quite harmles example, but it is zelling of the general state of things and where we are heading. If I buy a device I assume I own it. Thats how it should be. Not that I rent it and the rules to rent change all the time.
- farias0 4y ago
  Is it not reasonable to expect that the keyword "share" functions the same as the share button? I don't know the standards you have for the things you buy, but I find unacceptable that a thing I paid (handsomely) for twists my orders to share adverting to my contacts under my name, and part of the reason things are so bad is because at every valid criticism there are people defending these stuff as normal
rendall 4y ago
One could ask this same question of any terrible, unethical thing. The reasonable expectation is that a digital assistant will work for its user and not the corporation that sold it. The corporation is trading on this expectation to exploit its users.
- hnews_account_1 4y ago
  This is not a reasonable expectation for a digital assistant. At all. It is reasonable for a hacker to expect it. But the majority of the public doesn’t care that Apple tries to push Apple Music. If this was sold as a separate service however, maybe people would have other expectations.
- obarthelemy 4y ago
  Except Apple clearly owns its users, not the other way around. They get money from you for everything you do with their devices (music, vids, books, ads, even purchases of anything now), AND get money from the sellers to let them just talk to you. "If you can't freely do anything on the device you own, you're the one owned."

snapplebobapple 4y ago

Why would you ever think Apple's tools should be doing anything other than serving the interests of their owners? The whole system has worked so well for us by driving massive innovation through the credible promise of being able to use what you created for your own benefit. The thing that stops companies from abusing their users like this is not any should statement attached to their product, it's the fear of losing all their customers to a competitor, which is not a credible threat to a company as large, entrenched and good at using the walled garden strategy as apple. The correct thought here is not a should statement that will never happen (and shouldn't happen because if we make it true it will fundamentally break the innovation machine). The correct thought here is "Apple is way too big and has way too much market power. We need to use the existing antitrust system and break this company up." This correct thought is not unique to apple either, it's equally applicable to many tech companies, apple just happens to be in the small cadre of the worst of the worst.

snapplebobapple 4y ago
wow, there are at least five people on here with more than 500 points that don't live in the real world and instead choose to believe this is a utopia where people don't work in their own interest and will instead sacrifice for everyone else to benefit over themselves. Please open your eyes and realize this is not the case and that pretty much any time it has been held up as the case it has turned out to be a cover for self interested (most recent example on here is the Patagonia founder hiding the true purpose of avoiding billions in taxes with the unicorn farts of a charitable donation to a charity controlled by his family) and sometimes illegal (most recent example on here is the SBF FTX debacle. Effective altruism apparently really means fraudulent client fund comingling and theft) behavior. The first step to a better world is acknowledging the prime driver of self interest in human action and designing systems that support that while protecting from too much power. This historically meant strong property rights, strong speech rights and strong antitrust regulation. Wishing that someone would exercise their property and speech rights differently isn't an effective system and regulating them into right think and right action robs us of innovation because there's no reason for anyone to put in the extra effort to make something better beyond trivial improvements since they won't get to keep that benefit while they pay the cost of development, it is far easier to just stay mediocre and not stick your head out.