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The Problem with Jon Stewart cancellation highlights a problem for Apple content

108 points by simon_acca 3y ago

chiefalchemist 3y ago
> The show's cancellation is indicative of the kinds of challenges owners of platforms (like Apple, Amazon, Google, and others) face when they are producing content, too. Apple TV+, the iPhone, and other Apple products are used by a wide range of people, and investing in content that may be contentious for key customers or partners could create big problems for the company's overall business Or better (my remix, so to speak)... The show's cancellation is indicative of the kinds of challenges consumers face not knowing how much the content producers and platforms control and influence what is - or more importantly is not - spotlighted. In order to mitigate the possibility of big problems for said company's overall business the incentive is to keep consumers as ignorant and distracted as possible. The less consumer know, the less consumer think, the better. --- It's important to point out that democracy can't exist in information darkness (i.e., lack of transparency and completeness). And yet it's these gate keepers who are so quick to promote "threat to democracy" narratives that somehow always seem to fail to mention their own willing and intentional efforts in to limit information.
excalibur 3y ago
Interesting that this never happened to John Oliver with all of the trash he famously talked about AT&T, and more recently Warner/Discovery. It looks like the bar Apple just knocked their teeth out on was set pretty low.
- lotsofpulp 3y ago
  Apple has a lot more to lose than ATT. I do not see why Apple shareholders would want any of that risk. Anyone can publish content critical of China or whatever online, it does not need to come from Apple.
  - mission_failed 3y ago
    Doubtless the censorship also extends to publishing apps that are critical of topics Apple relies on for profit. A walled garden of Apple approved thought
    - lotsofpulp 3y ago
      Then host the topics on websites.
  - Robotbeat 3y ago
    Most US smartphones are Apple, now. Content increasingly being withheld from the broader internet and confined to apps. Apps which Apple has discretion over.
    - lotsofpulp 3y ago
      Who is stopping content on the “broader” internet? Does iOS block certain videos from playing in the browser?
      - jabradoodle 3y ago
        Confined != Blocked Countless hours are spent consuming content on platforms controlled by a tiny number of people.
        lotsofpulp 3y ago
        And? The point is Jon Stewart can make his own website and sell his content, and people using Apple’s devices can consume it. And it is pretty frictionless, all people have to do is type or search for the website address.
        jabradoodle 3y ago
        It's really not complicated, lots of people's attention consuming content, and lots of people's time producing content is focused on major platforms that censor for political reasons, this is sub optimal. Yes, the internet still exits and you can use it, I am aware of that.
- TechRemarker 3y ago
  Trash talking AT&T / Warner I would consider a very low bar, vs trash talking China and the value of China for Apple would seem existentially larger. If Apple views AI as the cornerstone of their future offerings then that would also seem massive compared to poking fun at a content company.
  - excalibur 3y ago
    Well AT&T is ostensibly a telecom. ;) You're right that this content is potentially more damaging to Apple's interests than anything Oliver said. The low bar I was referring to was "be better than AT&T". Or than David Zaslav, who waltzed in the door and killed all the content people liked.
- klabb3 3y ago
  > It looks like the bar Apple just knocked their teeth out on was set pretty low. Indeed, Jon Stewart talking about China and AI is an incredibly low bar for censorship. Plus, it wouldn't be hard for him to build an audience with a different network or even on his own. I'm surprised that tech companies are entering media at all. The mysterious echelons in the board rooms are obsessed with PR and HR messaging, and Apple is even more notorious with secrecy, compartmentalization and an appearance of total external coherence. In fact, that's arguably their biggest strength when it comes to design and product. Now, when a company like Apple enters entertainment, you need a lot more diversity of thought. Nobody wants to watch the same thing over and over, not even "normies". I believe legacy media as well as HBO, Netflix etc, "get it" to a larger extent. Sure, they have conflicts of interest (e.g. The Dissident that few wanted to touch because of Saudi relations). But, they have a base-level awareness of the rules of engagement, and at least a moderately thicker skin.
- permo-w 3y ago
  it's a good point. there are two solutions to this problem. a) you do what they have done and cancel the show, thereby setting an unpleasant precedent of having to police content, or b) you say that we do not enforce a company line on our TV shows, and you save a lot of future hassle this dichotomy makes me strongly think that this decision has little relation to AI and has come straight from the CCP. realistically Jon Stewart criticising AI is going to negligibly affect their bottom line. at worst they get mocked in the press and a small segment of very principled opinionated people may not buy an iPhone. at best they come across as fair and unbiased by allowing seemingly antithetical viewpoints on their platform. if the CCP weren't involved, I think they take that risk. the CCP can hugely affect their bottom-line, not only in customer-base, but massively in the supply-chain too
- jameshart 3y ago
  AT&T/Warner Discovery/HBO are comfortable participating in the occasional light comedy roast that John Oliver subjects them to, because it shows they’re a good sport and doesn’t do them any harm. There’s also more of an arms length brand relationship at play here. John Oliver doing a segment on FIFA corruption on HBO is hardly going to register as a concern when Eurosport, AT&T SportsNet and TNT Sports are negotiating soccer broadcast rights contracts… while a ‘Stream Now’ button on a Problem With Jon Stewart title card appearing on the front page of Apple.com is a lot less ambiguous when you’re revisiting the terms of your joint venture with the Chinese government.
- cableshaft 3y ago
  Well AT&T and Warner/Discovery own the show, so one significant difference is it's a joke about just their company that they can determine if they're okay with or not, and don't have to worry about losing anything due to external third party retaliation. Whereas with a topic about China, that's a whole government that has a history of not being able to take a joke, and will likely retaliate and cost Apple a significant amount of money. Not saying it's good or right, though. John Oliver also had a whole show about China and their treatment of Uighurs, though, so that seems to be a more direct comparison. That aired back in 2020 and his show hasn't been cancelled yet. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17oCQakzIl8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17oCQakzIl8
azangru 3y ago
> highlights a problem for Apple content Highlights a problem with reliance on a big centralized distributor with an editorial policy and a conflict of interests. Perhaps he should start a podcast, like so many others have done :-)
- mark_l_watson 3y ago
  Great idea. I like the model of people doing a generic podcasts that I can listen to on a choice of platforms, including Apple Podcasts, and if I want to watch people talking then watch on YouTube or Rumble. BTW, I am mildly put off by some of the conservative content on Rumble, but with YouTube sometimes seeming arbitrary in censoring material, I sometimes will watch Rumble just to support them as an option. I find the centralization and control by the mega tech companies to be very disturbing. +100 for Mastodon.
  - smellythief 3y ago
    > and if I want to watch people talking then watch on YouTube or Rumble. Or he could just make a video podcast. Video podcasts _are_ a thing, though most podcasters don't go that route. That would be better than going the youtube route imo, since podcasts are decentralized. Apple Podcasts isn't really a platform; it just an app that interfaces with the RSS feed of decentralized podcasts.
xivzgrev 3y ago
Could it be low ratings and this is face saving attempt by Jon? There was another thread on this where several people said the show was painful to watch / not enjoyable. Do a lot of people watch it?
- sheeshkebab 3y ago
  Jon should have stuck to comedy… there is a lot of angry news shows as it is.
- Krasnol 3y ago
  Sure there are "several" people who don't like it. Especially if they or their political representatives are being ridiculed by him. It's hardly a relevant group here, especially because the article points out the actual reasons. So what are you trying to do here?
- bnralt 3y ago
  Could be, there were massive ratings drops[1]. Hard to know how factually correct the anonymous sources blaming other reasons are. [1] https://www.thewrap.com/the-problem-with-jon-stewart-ratings-apple-plus/ https://www.thewrap.com/the-problem-with-jon-stewart-ratings...
nabla9 3y ago
> Stewart and Apple executives "had disagreements over some of the topics and guests," the sources said. Specifically, they claimed Stewart told staffers that Apple execs took issue with planned programming related to both China and artificial intelligence, and noted that with the 2024 US election coming up, there might have been additional opportunities for disagreement then. Apple's revenue from China is $74 billion, 19% of the total. They also have manufacturing there still, even when they try to separate. You can insult anyone in the free world except Xi from China and MSB from Saudi Arabia.
- lotsofpulp 3y ago
  > You can insult anyone in the free world except Xi from China and MSB from Saudi Arabia. You can even insult them. Maybe not with someone else’s money, but go ahead and put up a website.
  - smt88 3y ago
    Xi, Putin, MBS, Kim, and now Modi have assassinated critics in countries with free speech protections (UK, US, Canada).
    - gigatexal 3y ago
      > You can even insult them. Maybe not with someone else’s money, but go ahead and put up a website. We have video games like Fuck Putin (https://store.steampowered.com/app/1926680/FUCK_PUTIN/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/1926680/FUCK_PUTIN/) does that count? I’d sure put up a single page html site calling all the above listed as autocrats with blood on their hands but I too fear what might befall me physically or professionally. So much Chinese money flows into the west especially here in Berlin and Germany in general. Imagine I put up a site that said President Xi is a a despot and looks like a certain bear and word got to my would be employers at BMW and they thought my words would threaten their ability to sell cars in China I wouldn’t be offered the job, that’s for sure. So, even though I am nobody, I’m still too afraid to really speak out.
      - 3y ago
kzrdude 3y ago
It would be interesting if there was a podcast type model for video. I guess technically it's all there, and there is, but it's just not popular enough. The significant part about podcasts (compared with say youtube) is that distribution can be independent, listening (watching) to podcasts is not tied to any single platform.
- codetrotter 3y ago
  > It would be interesting if there was a podcast type model for video. That’s called a vodcast. It works the same way in principle as a podcast. You make an RSS feed and have it point to video files that you publish.
- seydor 3y ago
  BitTorrent it
- dartos 3y ago
  The issue with video is storage. YouTube gets 100s of hours of new video data every hour. How do you store that? AFAIK Literally they’re the only ones who deal with that kind of heavy data ingestion.
  - kzrdude 3y ago
    Podcasting is a distributed medium, that's something the individual distributor has to solve for the podcasts they do - it could be just a single one for example. They know what they produce and can budget storage thereafter. Bandwidth is the unpredictable part in that equation.
    - dartos 3y ago
      Is podcasting distributed, really? Podcasting happens wherever a podcast publishing platform like anchor uploads the audio (YouTube, Apple Music, Spotify, etc.) Otherwise discoverability is difficult. Sure you can host your own audio and video files, but who will find it. The network effect is a tough nut to crack.
andybak 3y ago
> The show's cancellation is indicative of the kinds of challenges owners of platforms [...] face Yes. Such a challenge to choose between censorship and their own business interests. It's like the "challenge" to decide whether to do the right thing or not. Don't we have another word for that kind of "challenge"?
- gameoverhumans 3y ago
  I'm happy to stick with "challenge". It means I can lament how "morally challenged" Apple is :)
- Spivak 3y ago
  I mean if this exact story happened about Sean Hannity I think the reaction would be to break out the champagne and fireworks. They would be showered with praise for years for doing the right thing. I think in the real world "censorship" bad, where censorship means benign things like "yeah, I'm not paying you to turn public sentiment against a budding industry we're trying to enter" or facing any of the natural consequences of people generally being asses in public isn't so cut and dry. It's crazy how little people disrespect the freedom of non-association when it's people they like. Being published by Apple isn't some issue of public accommodation. And Apple isn't completely unfounded here, Jon's coverage of China walks the line of being anti-Chinese rather than criticizing Chinese leadership and unless it's changed very recently his coverage of "AI" is painfully ignorant to where it crosses over into not even wrong at times. And since has the gift of making literally anything he says sound reasonable it's hard to not be worried. I don't think it's enough to drop him but it's also not my call. I love Jon, I'd vote for him in 2024 but he's human and it's weird how much people mythologize him.
  - unethical_ban 3y ago
    Well, Hannity is a driveling liar with no critical thinking or humility or backbone. You can't compare the two with a straight face. If Jon Stewart were intentionally getting major stories entirely incorrect, fewer people would be defending him.
fredgrott 3y ago
I expect Jon Stewart would rise to the opportunity to complain about content partnerships with China among other things. The question long term is if someone takes money from big tech to fund a content studio will there be long term bad consequences or will the audience rebel to the content creators side.
kryptiskt 3y ago
I have no idea why Apple even is in the content business at all, it's a low-margin business at best that requires continuous investment or the viewers will go somewhere else. It doesn't even help retain people in their ecosystem as they make apps for other platforms.
- sircastor 3y ago
  It's a growth issue. Apple has done very well with Wall Street with devices in the last two decades, but Wall Street is an insatiable monsters always demanding more growth. Apple doesn't need to pivot, because they've got a tremendously successful device business. But they do need to expand to feed the monster. Services (Content, iCloud, Fitness+, etc) are just one approach. They're trying AR (Reality Pro), Cars maybe?
  - delish 3y ago
    >But they do need to expand to feed the monster. Take that as given, it still doesn't explain why, among all business opportunities, Apple picked 1 An area they had little experience in 2 That already serves its customers well 3 That is according to OP low margin. On (2): Cell phones in 2005 were way worse than Netflix, HBO, ESPN were when Apple would have been market-researching Apple TV+.
    - sircastor 3y ago
      At the very least, the entertainment industry was familiar. They were already into the music scene for ~20 years, and had been cutting television content deals for about 15. It's not unreasonable to say that they knew some people they trusted whom they could hire to make it happen.
  - nequo 3y ago
    Products also have lifecycles. What is profitable now won’t be as profitable in 10 years if at all. iPhones seem to have plateaued for example, there’s not much change from 13 to 15, so there’s less incentive to buy one. So Apple does well to try and stay ahead of the curve. Apple TV+ has never seemed like a core product to me though, just something they can bundle with iPhones and iPads to round out those products.
Invictus0 3y ago
Apple wants to be like Disney, totally unoffensive and unopinionated. Their only religion is money
ChrisArchitect 3y ago
Related: Most of this covered in previous discussions and stories this week https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37949512 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37949512 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37950194 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37950194
dmead 3y ago
The daily show is looking for a host.
- Wowfunhappy 3y ago
  I can promise Jon Stewart isn't interested. I saw one of the first tapings of The Problem. In a Q&A before the show, Jon talked about how draining it was to record The Daily Show every day. Furthermore, he felt frustrated by the short shelf-life of the episodes—for all the work they did, no one was interested after a few days. For The Problem, Jon Stewart only recorded a handful of episodes each year, and he chose topics which (he hoped) would remain relevant for longer.
  - dmead 3y ago
    I bet he could negotiate change of format.
gigatexal 3y ago
Not sure who to laugh at or blame here really? Do I fault Apple for being a rational profit maximizing entity that thought that perhaps Jon’s show might hurt that goal or do I fault Jon who chose to put the show on Apple TV+ knowing full well they were a giant corp with lots of revenue from China? I mean, he should have known better, no? Maybe Apple said all the right things at the beginning and then changed their tune. Either way it sucks because I liked the show a lot.
- smoldesu 3y ago
  > Do I fault Apple for being a rational profit maximizing entity I mean, if that entity is rationalizing censorship to maximize profit, maybe you should? The alternative is blaming Jon Stewart, and eventually I'm going to get tired of accusing free speech and opinions of being the devil.
  - gigatexal 3y ago
    Yeah I get your point. I was hoping they’d make like Time Warner — or AT&T with John Oliver who often throws shade at the parent company but I guess all parties know it’s in good fun. AT&T is not Apple but I think it’s at least precedent.
    - smoldesu 3y ago
      It's platform politics, at the end of the day. It's Apple's platform, they choose what to stock it with. This whole situation stinks, though. If Jon's being honestly transparent, it's a sad confirmation of how deeply mired Apple is in the current political muck.
      - gigatexal 3y ago
        Exactly. This is well said and sums Up exactly what I was trying convey and failing to.
- humanrebar 3y ago
  I don't like blaming people for taking a chance on someone or something. Especially if the stakes are as low as a cancelled show. So I guess both Stewart and Apple get some credit there. But Apple isn't making it clear who is deciding Stewart crossed a line and how that happened. Maybe it's a government? Maybe it's an exec? I can fault them for that.
pipeline_peak 3y ago
How far can journalists stretch this? He got cancelled by a tv platform exclusively for Apple users. Not exactly the end of the world.
29athrowaway 3y ago
I am amazed that people feel amused over Jon Stewart insulting a guy over 2A rights. The guest was respectful, the host was vulgar.
- lotsofpulp 3y ago
  That type of content has been widespread for many years now, it helps people feel superior and better about their views.
  - 29athrowaway 3y ago
    If you disarm everyone, you effectively give every criminal a 30 min window to do everything they want and leave, including extortion. Or, have a police state with a 1 police station for every house. Extortion is the fertilizer of organized crime. When taking this into consideration, Jon's argument is equivalent to flatulence. If the police are the regulars, the citizens are the Minutemen. A scalable, ubiquituous force ready to act at a minute's notice.
    - catlover76 3y ago
      > If the police are the regulars, the citizens are the Minutemen. A scalable, ubiquituous force ready to act at a minute's notice. This is a weird fantasy that isn't really playing out with the Second Amendment rights we have. Meanwhile, there are other industrialized countries where people don't always have guns, and sometimes even the police do not have guns, and they are doing better than us in terms of crime and safety. Of course, if you think of countries like Japan, their cultures are simply superior. I am not against someone owning a gun to protect their household, but these kinds of grand arguments fall flat in front of the data we have.
      - 29athrowaway 3y ago
        Not a fantasy, a historical reality. And with a direct relation to 2A. Japan is formidable but they are effectively a vassal state, always remember that.
grecy 3y ago
The incredible part is this has been going on for many decades. The things we see and read in mainstream media are heavily censored to give only one side of any story, and not to tell stories that goes against the party line. (The party in this case being money) Years ago Discovery Channel were told NOT to allow Mythbusters to do an episode on credit card RFID security [1] Murdoch owns so many publications around the world who are not allowed to run stories about things he doesn't agree with, Bezos owns the Washington Post, etc. etc. It's manipulated all the way down. [1] https://www.networkworld.com/article/2275605/was-mythbuster-s-rfid-tale-only-a-myth-.html https://www.networkworld.com/article/2275605/was-mythbuster-...
efitz 3y ago
Apple should be pulling away from China as fast as possible; maybe invest in India or in Southeast Asia. China’s handling of COVID showed how vulnerable global supply chains were, and their censorship regime shows that they are not aligned with anyone with typical western values of freedom of expression. It seems to me that Tim Cook is chasing sunk costs.
- jsyang00 3y ago
  As fast as possible is still probably on the timescale of... at least a decade. Supply chains run deep
- reducesuffering 3y ago
  They have been. My airpods were made in Vietnam like 3 years ago.
lttlrck 3y ago
Maybe it is as bad as it appears. Something does feel off in their content, Disney-esque. Or maybe the show had terrible ratings and it wasn't worth the potential grief. Why needle a business partner (China) when there is no upside?
- smoldesu 3y ago
  > Why needle a business partner (China) Why make an adversarial superpower a critical "business partner" in the first place?
  - pySSK 3y ago
    Because it wasn’t always an adversarial superpower nor does our relationship with them have to stay adversarial.
    - smoldesu 3y ago
      Even disregarding the human rights violations and lack of labor protection, there are fundamental problems with Apple's relationship with China. This isn't a business decision we're talking about, this is a domestic supercorporation using China as a crutch. America turns the other eye because tax money spends well, but the PRC keeps our highest-valued public company on a leash. That's... fucked up, considering the politics of the situation. If you think the leash doesn't hurt and China is liable to be friendly towards America, that's your moral crusade. In my opinion, things have already gone too far.

108 points by simon_acca 3y ago

> The show's cancellation is indicative of the kinds of challenges owners of platforms (like Apple, Amazon, Google, and others) face when they are producing content, too. Apple TV+, the iPhone, and other Apple products are used by a wide range of people, and investing in content that may be contentious for key customers or partners could create big problems for the company's overall business Or better (my remix, so to speak)... The show's cancellation is indicative of the kinds of challenges consumers face not knowing how much the content producers and platforms control and influence what is - or more importantly is not - spotlighted. In order to mitigate the possibility of big problems for said company's overall business the incentive is to keep consumers as ignorant and distracted as possible. The less consumer know, the less consumer think, the better. --- It's important to point out that democracy can't exist in information darkness (i.e., lack of transparency and completeness). And yet it's these gate keepers who are so quick to promote "threat to democracy" narratives that somehow always seem to fail to mention their own willing and intentional efforts in to limit information.

excalibur 3y ago

Interesting that this never happened to John Oliver with all of the trash he famously talked about AT&T, and more recently Warner/Discovery. It looks like the bar Apple just knocked their teeth out on was set pretty low.

lotsofpulp 3y ago
Apple has a lot more to lose than ATT. I do not see why Apple shareholders would want any of that risk. Anyone can publish content critical of China or whatever online, it does not need to come from Apple.
- mission_failed 3y ago
  Doubtless the censorship also extends to publishing apps that are critical of topics Apple relies on for profit. A walled garden of Apple approved thought
  - lotsofpulp 3y ago
    Then host the topics on websites.
- Robotbeat 3y ago
  Most US smartphones are Apple, now. Content increasingly being withheld from the broader internet and confined to apps. Apps which Apple has discretion over.
  - lotsofpulp 3y ago
    Who is stopping content on the “broader” internet? Does iOS block certain videos from playing in the browser?
    - jabradoodle 3y ago
      Confined != Blocked Countless hours are spent consuming content on platforms controlled by a tiny number of people.
      - lotsofpulp 3y ago
        And? The point is Jon Stewart can make his own website and sell his content, and people using Apple’s devices can consume it. And it is pretty frictionless, all people have to do is type or search for the website address.
        jabradoodle 3y ago
        It's really not complicated, lots of people's attention consuming content, and lots of people's time producing content is focused on major platforms that censor for political reasons, this is sub optimal. Yes, the internet still exits and you can use it, I am aware of that.
TechRemarker 3y ago
Trash talking AT&T / Warner I would consider a very low bar, vs trash talking China and the value of China for Apple would seem existentially larger. If Apple views AI as the cornerstone of their future offerings then that would also seem massive compared to poking fun at a content company.
- excalibur 3y ago
  Well AT&T is ostensibly a telecom. ;) You're right that this content is potentially more damaging to Apple's interests than anything Oliver said. The low bar I was referring to was "be better than AT&T". Or than David Zaslav, who waltzed in the door and killed all the content people liked.
klabb3 3y ago
> It looks like the bar Apple just knocked their teeth out on was set pretty low. Indeed, Jon Stewart talking about China and AI is an incredibly low bar for censorship. Plus, it wouldn't be hard for him to build an audience with a different network or even on his own. I'm surprised that tech companies are entering media at all. The mysterious echelons in the board rooms are obsessed with PR and HR messaging, and Apple is even more notorious with secrecy, compartmentalization and an appearance of total external coherence. In fact, that's arguably their biggest strength when it comes to design and product. Now, when a company like Apple enters entertainment, you need a lot more diversity of thought. Nobody wants to watch the same thing over and over, not even "normies". I believe legacy media as well as HBO, Netflix etc, "get it" to a larger extent. Sure, they have conflicts of interest (e.g. The Dissident that few wanted to touch because of Saudi relations). But, they have a base-level awareness of the rules of engagement, and at least a moderately thicker skin.
permo-w 3y ago
it's a good point. there are two solutions to this problem. a) you do what they have done and cancel the show, thereby setting an unpleasant precedent of having to police content, or b) you say that we do not enforce a company line on our TV shows, and you save a lot of future hassle this dichotomy makes me strongly think that this decision has little relation to AI and has come straight from the CCP. realistically Jon Stewart criticising AI is going to negligibly affect their bottom line. at worst they get mocked in the press and a small segment of very principled opinionated people may not buy an iPhone. at best they come across as fair and unbiased by allowing seemingly antithetical viewpoints on their platform. if the CCP weren't involved, I think they take that risk. the CCP can hugely affect their bottom-line, not only in customer-base, but massively in the supply-chain too
jameshart 3y ago
AT&T/Warner Discovery/HBO are comfortable participating in the occasional light comedy roast that John Oliver subjects them to, because it shows they’re a good sport and doesn’t do them any harm. There’s also more of an arms length brand relationship at play here. John Oliver doing a segment on FIFA corruption on HBO is hardly going to register as a concern when Eurosport, AT&T SportsNet and TNT Sports are negotiating soccer broadcast rights contracts… while a ‘Stream Now’ button on a Problem With Jon Stewart title card appearing on the front page of Apple.com is a lot less ambiguous when you’re revisiting the terms of your joint venture with the Chinese government.
cableshaft 3y ago
Well AT&T and Warner/Discovery own the show, so one significant difference is it's a joke about just their company that they can determine if they're okay with or not, and don't have to worry about losing anything due to external third party retaliation. Whereas with a topic about China, that's a whole government that has a history of not being able to take a joke, and will likely retaliate and cost Apple a significant amount of money. Not saying it's good or right, though. John Oliver also had a whole show about China and their treatment of Uighurs, though, so that seems to be a more direct comparison. That aired back in 2020 and his show hasn't been cancelled yet. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17oCQakzIl8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17oCQakzIl8

azangru 3y ago

> highlights a problem for Apple content Highlights a problem with reliance on a big centralized distributor with an editorial policy and a conflict of interests. Perhaps he should start a podcast, like so many others have done :-)

mark_l_watson 3y ago
Great idea. I like the model of people doing a generic podcasts that I can listen to on a choice of platforms, including Apple Podcasts, and if I want to watch people talking then watch on YouTube or Rumble. BTW, I am mildly put off by some of the conservative content on Rumble, but with YouTube sometimes seeming arbitrary in censoring material, I sometimes will watch Rumble just to support them as an option. I find the centralization and control by the mega tech companies to be very disturbing. +100 for Mastodon.
- smellythief 3y ago
  > and if I want to watch people talking then watch on YouTube or Rumble. Or he could just make a video podcast. Video podcasts _are_ a thing, though most podcasters don't go that route. That would be better than going the youtube route imo, since podcasts are decentralized. Apple Podcasts isn't really a platform; it just an app that interfaces with the RSS feed of decentralized podcasts.

xivzgrev 3y ago

Could it be low ratings and this is face saving attempt by Jon? There was another thread on this where several people said the show was painful to watch / not enjoyable. Do a lot of people watch it?

sheeshkebab 3y ago
Jon should have stuck to comedy… there is a lot of angry news shows as it is.
Krasnol 3y ago
Sure there are "several" people who don't like it. Especially if they or their political representatives are being ridiculed by him. It's hardly a relevant group here, especially because the article points out the actual reasons. So what are you trying to do here?
bnralt 3y ago
Could be, there were massive ratings drops[1]. Hard to know how factually correct the anonymous sources blaming other reasons are. [1] https://www.thewrap.com/the-problem-with-jon-stewart-ratings-apple-plus/ https://www.thewrap.com/the-problem-with-jon-stewart-ratings...

nabla9 3y ago

> Stewart and Apple executives "had disagreements over some of the topics and guests," the sources said. Specifically, they claimed Stewart told staffers that Apple execs took issue with planned programming related to both China and artificial intelligence, and noted that with the 2024 US election coming up, there might have been additional opportunities for disagreement then. Apple's revenue from China is $74 billion, 19% of the total. They also have manufacturing there still, even when they try to separate. You can insult anyone in the free world except Xi from China and MSB from Saudi Arabia.

lotsofpulp 3y ago
> You can insult anyone in the free world except Xi from China and MSB from Saudi Arabia. You can even insult them. Maybe not with someone else’s money, but go ahead and put up a website.
- smt88 3y ago
  Xi, Putin, MBS, Kim, and now Modi have assassinated critics in countries with free speech protections (UK, US, Canada).
  - gigatexal 3y ago
    > You can even insult them. Maybe not with someone else’s money, but go ahead and put up a website. We have video games like Fuck Putin (https://store.steampowered.com/app/1926680/FUCK_PUTIN/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/1926680/FUCK_PUTIN/) does that count? I’d sure put up a single page html site calling all the above listed as autocrats with blood on their hands but I too fear what might befall me physically or professionally. So much Chinese money flows into the west especially here in Berlin and Germany in general. Imagine I put up a site that said President Xi is a a despot and looks like a certain bear and word got to my would be employers at BMW and they thought my words would threaten their ability to sell cars in China I wouldn’t be offered the job, that’s for sure. So, even though I am nobody, I’m still too afraid to really speak out.
    - 3y ago

kzrdude 3y ago

It would be interesting if there was a podcast type model for video. I guess technically it's all there, and there is, but it's just not popular enough. The significant part about podcasts (compared with say youtube) is that distribution can be independent, listening (watching) to podcasts is not tied to any single platform.

codetrotter 3y ago
> It would be interesting if there was a podcast type model for video. That’s called a vodcast. It works the same way in principle as a podcast. You make an RSS feed and have it point to video files that you publish.
seydor 3y ago
BitTorrent it
dartos 3y ago
The issue with video is storage. YouTube gets 100s of hours of new video data every hour. How do you store that? AFAIK Literally they’re the only ones who deal with that kind of heavy data ingestion.
- kzrdude 3y ago
  Podcasting is a distributed medium, that's something the individual distributor has to solve for the podcasts they do - it could be just a single one for example. They know what they produce and can budget storage thereafter. Bandwidth is the unpredictable part in that equation.
  - dartos 3y ago
    Is podcasting distributed, really? Podcasting happens wherever a podcast publishing platform like anchor uploads the audio (YouTube, Apple Music, Spotify, etc.) Otherwise discoverability is difficult. Sure you can host your own audio and video files, but who will find it. The network effect is a tough nut to crack.

andybak 3y ago

> The show's cancellation is indicative of the kinds of challenges owners of platforms [...] face Yes. Such a challenge to choose between censorship and their own business interests. It's like the "challenge" to decide whether to do the right thing or not. Don't we have another word for that kind of "challenge"?

gameoverhumans 3y ago
I'm happy to stick with "challenge". It means I can lament how "morally challenged" Apple is :)
Spivak 3y ago
I mean if this exact story happened about Sean Hannity I think the reaction would be to break out the champagne and fireworks. They would be showered with praise for years for doing the right thing. I think in the real world "censorship" bad, where censorship means benign things like "yeah, I'm not paying you to turn public sentiment against a budding industry we're trying to enter" or facing any of the natural consequences of people generally being asses in public isn't so cut and dry. It's crazy how little people disrespect the freedom of non-association when it's people they like. Being published by Apple isn't some issue of public accommodation. And Apple isn't completely unfounded here, Jon's coverage of China walks the line of being anti-Chinese rather than criticizing Chinese leadership and unless it's changed very recently his coverage of "AI" is painfully ignorant to where it crosses over into not even wrong at times. And since has the gift of making literally anything he says sound reasonable it's hard to not be worried. I don't think it's enough to drop him but it's also not my call. I love Jon, I'd vote for him in 2024 but he's human and it's weird how much people mythologize him.
- unethical_ban 3y ago
  Well, Hannity is a driveling liar with no critical thinking or humility or backbone. You can't compare the two with a straight face. If Jon Stewart were intentionally getting major stories entirely incorrect, fewer people would be defending him.

fredgrott 3y ago

I expect Jon Stewart would rise to the opportunity to complain about content partnerships with China among other things. The question long term is if someone takes money from big tech to fund a content studio will there be long term bad consequences or will the audience rebel to the content creators side.

kryptiskt 3y ago

I have no idea why Apple even is in the content business at all, it's a low-margin business at best that requires continuous investment or the viewers will go somewhere else. It doesn't even help retain people in their ecosystem as they make apps for other platforms.

sircastor 3y ago
It's a growth issue. Apple has done very well with Wall Street with devices in the last two decades, but Wall Street is an insatiable monsters always demanding more growth. Apple doesn't need to pivot, because they've got a tremendously successful device business. But they do need to expand to feed the monster. Services (Content, iCloud, Fitness+, etc) are just one approach. They're trying AR (Reality Pro), Cars maybe?
- delish 3y ago
  >But they do need to expand to feed the monster. Take that as given, it still doesn't explain why, among all business opportunities, Apple picked 1 An area they had little experience in 2 That already serves its customers well 3 That is according to OP low margin. On (2): Cell phones in 2005 were way worse than Netflix, HBO, ESPN were when Apple would have been market-researching Apple TV+.
  - sircastor 3y ago
    At the very least, the entertainment industry was familiar. They were already into the music scene for ~20 years, and had been cutting television content deals for about 15. It's not unreasonable to say that they knew some people they trusted whom they could hire to make it happen.
- nequo 3y ago
  Products also have lifecycles. What is profitable now won’t be as profitable in 10 years if at all. iPhones seem to have plateaued for example, there’s not much change from 13 to 15, so there’s less incentive to buy one. So Apple does well to try and stay ahead of the curve. Apple TV+ has never seemed like a core product to me though, just something they can bundle with iPhones and iPads to round out those products.

Invictus0 3y ago

Apple wants to be like Disney, totally unoffensive and unopinionated. Their only religion is money

ChrisArchitect 3y ago

Related: Most of this covered in previous discussions and stories this week https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37949512 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37949512 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37950194 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37950194

dmead 3y ago

The daily show is looking for a host.

Wowfunhappy 3y ago
I can promise Jon Stewart isn't interested. I saw one of the first tapings of The Problem. In a Q&A before the show, Jon talked about how draining it was to record The Daily Show every day. Furthermore, he felt frustrated by the short shelf-life of the episodes—for all the work they did, no one was interested after a few days. For The Problem, Jon Stewart only recorded a handful of episodes each year, and he chose topics which (he hoped) would remain relevant for longer.
- dmead 3y ago
  I bet he could negotiate change of format.

gigatexal 3y ago

Not sure who to laugh at or blame here really? Do I fault Apple for being a rational profit maximizing entity that thought that perhaps Jon’s show might hurt that goal or do I fault Jon who chose to put the show on Apple TV+ knowing full well they were a giant corp with lots of revenue from China? I mean, he should have known better, no? Maybe Apple said all the right things at the beginning and then changed their tune. Either way it sucks because I liked the show a lot.

smoldesu 3y ago
> Do I fault Apple for being a rational profit maximizing entity I mean, if that entity is rationalizing censorship to maximize profit, maybe you should? The alternative is blaming Jon Stewart, and eventually I'm going to get tired of accusing free speech and opinions of being the devil.
- gigatexal 3y ago
  Yeah I get your point. I was hoping they’d make like Time Warner — or AT&T with John Oliver who often throws shade at the parent company but I guess all parties know it’s in good fun. AT&T is not Apple but I think it’s at least precedent.
  - smoldesu 3y ago
    It's platform politics, at the end of the day. It's Apple's platform, they choose what to stock it with. This whole situation stinks, though. If Jon's being honestly transparent, it's a sad confirmation of how deeply mired Apple is in the current political muck.
    - gigatexal 3y ago
      Exactly. This is well said and sums Up exactly what I was trying convey and failing to.
humanrebar 3y ago
I don't like blaming people for taking a chance on someone or something. Especially if the stakes are as low as a cancelled show. So I guess both Stewart and Apple get some credit there. But Apple isn't making it clear who is deciding Stewart crossed a line and how that happened. Maybe it's a government? Maybe it's an exec? I can fault them for that.

pipeline_peak 3y ago

How far can journalists stretch this? He got cancelled by a tv platform exclusively for Apple users. Not exactly the end of the world.

29athrowaway 3y ago

I am amazed that people feel amused over Jon Stewart insulting a guy over 2A rights. The guest was respectful, the host was vulgar.

lotsofpulp 3y ago
That type of content has been widespread for many years now, it helps people feel superior and better about their views.
- 29athrowaway 3y ago
  If you disarm everyone, you effectively give every criminal a 30 min window to do everything they want and leave, including extortion. Or, have a police state with a 1 police station for every house. Extortion is the fertilizer of organized crime. When taking this into consideration, Jon's argument is equivalent to flatulence. If the police are the regulars, the citizens are the Minutemen. A scalable, ubiquituous force ready to act at a minute's notice.
  - catlover76 3y ago
    > If the police are the regulars, the citizens are the Minutemen. A scalable, ubiquituous force ready to act at a minute's notice. This is a weird fantasy that isn't really playing out with the Second Amendment rights we have. Meanwhile, there are other industrialized countries where people don't always have guns, and sometimes even the police do not have guns, and they are doing better than us in terms of crime and safety. Of course, if you think of countries like Japan, their cultures are simply superior. I am not against someone owning a gun to protect their household, but these kinds of grand arguments fall flat in front of the data we have.
    - 29athrowaway 3y ago
      Not a fantasy, a historical reality. And with a direct relation to 2A. Japan is formidable but they are effectively a vassal state, always remember that.

grecy 3y ago

The incredible part is this has been going on for many decades. The things we see and read in mainstream media are heavily censored to give only one side of any story, and not to tell stories that goes against the party line. (The party in this case being money) Years ago Discovery Channel were told NOT to allow Mythbusters to do an episode on credit card RFID security [1] Murdoch owns so many publications around the world who are not allowed to run stories about things he doesn't agree with, Bezos owns the Washington Post, etc. etc. It's manipulated all the way down. [1] https://www.networkworld.com/article/2275605/was-mythbuster-s-rfid-tale-only-a-myth-.html https://www.networkworld.com/article/2275605/was-mythbuster-...

efitz 3y ago

Apple should be pulling away from China as fast as possible; maybe invest in India or in Southeast Asia. China’s handling of COVID showed how vulnerable global supply chains were, and their censorship regime shows that they are not aligned with anyone with typical western values of freedom of expression. It seems to me that Tim Cook is chasing sunk costs.

jsyang00 3y ago
As fast as possible is still probably on the timescale of... at least a decade. Supply chains run deep
reducesuffering 3y ago
They have been. My airpods were made in Vietnam like 3 years ago.

lttlrck 3y ago

Maybe it is as bad as it appears. Something does feel off in their content, Disney-esque. Or maybe the show had terrible ratings and it wasn't worth the potential grief. Why needle a business partner (China) when there is no upside?

smoldesu 3y ago
> Why needle a business partner (China) Why make an adversarial superpower a critical "business partner" in the first place?
- pySSK 3y ago
  Because it wasn’t always an adversarial superpower nor does our relationship with them have to stay adversarial.
  - smoldesu 3y ago
    Even disregarding the human rights violations and lack of labor protection, there are fundamental problems with Apple's relationship with China. This isn't a business decision we're talking about, this is a domestic supercorporation using China as a crutch. America turns the other eye because tax money spends well, but the PRC keeps our highest-valued public company on a leash. That's... fucked up, considering the politics of the situation. If you think the leash doesn't hurt and China is liable to be friendly towards America, that's your moral crusade. In my opinion, things have already gone too far.