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How would you split Apple? How would you split Meta (would you start charging for WhatsApp)?
by quonn 4y ago
How would you split Apple? How would you split Meta (would you start charging for WhatsApp)?
- soperj 4y agoWhatsApp used to charge, but really what they'd do is just charge facebook & whoever else for the data they're sharing.
- robopsychology 4y agoDid they actually charge though? I remember hearing about that but it's been my sole method of messaging for years and I never remember setting up payments with them
- quonn 4y agoI think they charged 1 Euro when you bought the app. I doubt that covers the costs to keep it running.
- bioemerl 4y agoApple into hardware and software. Microsoft into OS and other software and cloud. Amazon into cloud and web store(s). Google into ads and web software that serves ads.
- quonn 4y agoIt doesn't make sense to split Apple into hardware and software since the integration and simplicity that comes from it is the very thing that makes Apple unique.
- nindalf 4y agoYou asked for ideas. You never specified that they should be workable or logical.
- listenallyall 4y agoApple licensed it's MacOS back in the mid-90s to third-party hardware manufacturers. If it was forced to by the government, I imagine it could do so again.
- seanmcdirmid 4y agoIt wasn’t forced to by the government. The CEO at the time thought it was a good idea.
- listenallyall 4y agoYes, we know. Please read my comment, it doesn't claim or imply Apple was under any government pressure back then.
- bioemerl 4y agoUnfortunately this is also the source of all their monopolistic behavior. Apple hardware should be incentivized to make great hardware for any operating system. Apple software should be incentivized to sell to many manufacturers and also to not obey apple hardware's demands for locks to prevent things like the replacement of batteries. Their union could be a great thing, but apple decided to use it to be a bunch of monopolists, so your break them up like all the others.
- izacus 4y agoApple Hardware, Apple Licensed OSes, Apple Online Services, Apple Financial Services (apple card & apple pay & co), Apple News Services, Apple Mapping Services. Think of everything that Apple (Meta, Google) do, think on which components would benefit from having startups replace and distrupt them and then break them up on those seams while forcing them to allow competition between their fragments (e.g. iPhone with Android OS, iOS on Microsoft phone platform, MacBook M1 with ARM Windows, iOS iPhone with Google Pay, etc. etc.).
- bufferoverflow 4y agoWhich of them will own apple.com? Which of them will own Apple trademark? Which of them will own Apple logo?
- toyg 4y agoTrivialities that antitrust regulations already cover. It would not be the first time a company has been broken up.
- bufferoverflow 4y agoYou didn't answer the question.
- toyg 4y agoI don't have to: I'm not a judge specialized in antitrust law and I don't have access to Apple's books to determine what would be more appropriate. But a judge can, and will (if asked to), because - as I said - it's hardly an unprecedented situation. Just to mention one, AT&T still exists as a brand but was once broken up.
- izacus 4y agoWe can compromise and say "none" :P
- the_mitsuhiko 4y ago
- true_religion 4y agoWhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook, and Oculus all used to be separate companies. They can easily become so again.
- maxwell 4y agoI probably wouldn't break up Apple myself, but would require lifting the ban on other web browser engines and app stores on all operating systems. For Alphabet and Meta, I would likely pursue criminal charges for conspiracy to fix prices in online ad auctions: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jedi_Blue https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jedi_Blue
- georgeecollins 4y agoHow to split Meta: Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp. Easy! Hard part: Who gets Occulus?
- aembleton 4y agoOcculus can be its own company
- bilbo0s 4y agoThis is our problem as techies, we throw out this stuff with very little idea of the legal framework in place around antitrust. Even smaller ideas around precedent and the legal reasoning behind those precedents. I know everyone doesn't want to go to law school, but we have to at least understand that we can't go into a court and make stuff up. Who can reasonably be broken up? On what reasonable basis? Well, Perhaps Meta? Maybe Microsoft? Alphabet definitely. Apple? They'll laugh us out of court. If we want these changes, we're going to have to advocate for changes in the fundamental ideas behind antitrust itself. Technology has outstripped the current regulatory environment's ability to keep it in order. And we don't seem to want to admit that. We just keep crying that the law won't act. Well, that's because no laws are being broken. And the politicians and the tech bigs are desperate to ensure that no one figures that out. They'll keep feeding us crumbs so that we don't do the dangerous thing and ask for changes in law.