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How about through business models that do not smell like rent-seeking extortion?

bzzzt 3y ago
Which business model would that be then? The Apple model where you buy expensive hardware and get exclusive software in the package? The Microsoft model where you buy software and are still treated like a freeloading advertisement consumer? Or the Google/Facebook model where you're not paying anything and the companies try to digest your entire life for the support of marketing departments?
- AnthonyMouse 3y ago
  You're describing the ones that smell like rent-seeking extortion. How about the Signal model, where you get a free messaging app with published source code that runs on multiple platforms without trying to lock you into any of them, and its modest operating expenses are paid from donations to a nonprofit? Or the Linux model, where a minority of users with the resources or technical capacity to make improvements are given the opportunity to do so, resulting in free software that anyone else can use too, and anyone could fork if the existing maintainers became abusive? Or the Substack model, where you pay money for a service with no ads on it? Huge dominant conglomerates being abusive is not unexpected. But why do we need huge dominant conglomerates? Let them cease to be.
- int_19h 3y ago
  There's nothing preventing Apple from requiring some kind of subscription for people to use its iMessage servers even if they were to open the protocol. All we're asking is for them to treat their service similar to premium email (which is also not free, but it's not all locked up either).
redserk 3y ago
How is this relevant? Apple doesn’t charge for iMessage. It is a service offered strictly to users of Apple devices.
- int_19h 3y ago
  A more accurate way to phrase it is that Apple does charge for iMessage, but the cost is bundled into the price of your Apple device, and there's no way unbundle.
- AnthonyMouse 3y ago
  That's the extortion. Create a service with a network effect, so you don't have a choice in what to use because it's what your group uses, then tie it to another product and thwart anyone who tries to make a compatible implementation for any other device.

Which business model would that be then? The Apple model where you buy expensive hardware and get exclusive software in the package? The Microsoft model where you buy software and are still treated like a freeloading advertisement consumer? Or the Google/Facebook model where you're not paying anything and the companies try to digest your entire life for the support of marketing departments?

AnthonyMouse 3y ago
You're describing the ones that smell like rent-seeking extortion. How about the Signal model, where you get a free messaging app with published source code that runs on multiple platforms without trying to lock you into any of them, and its modest operating expenses are paid from donations to a nonprofit? Or the Linux model, where a minority of users with the resources or technical capacity to make improvements are given the opportunity to do so, resulting in free software that anyone else can use too, and anyone could fork if the existing maintainers became abusive? Or the Substack model, where you pay money for a service with no ads on it? Huge dominant conglomerates being abusive is not unexpected. But why do we need huge dominant conglomerates? Let them cease to be.
int_19h 3y ago
There's nothing preventing Apple from requiring some kind of subscription for people to use its iMessage servers even if they were to open the protocol. All we're asking is for them to treat their service similar to premium email (which is also not free, but it's not all locked up either).

redserk 3y ago

How is this relevant? Apple doesn’t charge for iMessage. It is a service offered strictly to users of Apple devices.

int_19h 3y ago
A more accurate way to phrase it is that Apple does charge for iMessage, but the cost is bundled into the price of your Apple device, and there's no way unbundle.
AnthonyMouse 3y ago
That's the extortion. Create a service with a network effect, so you don't have a choice in what to use because it's what your group uses, then tie it to another product and thwart anyone who tries to make a compatible implementation for any other device.