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Apple appears to be following a trajectory reminiscent of Microsoft's pre-Satya Nadella era. Apple’s myopic focus on safeguarding its only growing revenue stre

Apple appears to be following a trajectory reminiscent of Microsoft's pre-Satya Nadella era. Apple’s myopic focus on safeguarding its only growing revenue stream, the App Store, coupled with hubris in its dealings with developers and an abrasive approach toward regulators, suggests potential challenges ahead. The optimism surrounding Tim Cook as the savior of Apple may be subject to reconsideration, as his tenure may not be remembered favorably. Under his leadership, Apple has seemingly become a crack head, getting high on the App Store revenue.

factormeta 3y ago
If Steve is the revolutionary, then Tim is the professional business/bureaucratic guy, whom I'm sure has optimized Apple a bunch from an operational and business perspective. And when you have a business person running for too long, the company is going to focus on maintaining what is the growing revenue stream, market share, etc.
- lotsofpulp 3y ago
  Researching and developing M processors allowing laptops unparalleled power relative to power usage, R&D for AirPods which apparently had sufficient utility to become quite popular, and R&D for Apple Watch which also became quite popular. Apparently, this qualifies as > Under his leadership, Apple has seemingly become a crack head, getting high on the App Store revenue. To some people… And also developing a new business creating and selling movies and tv shows.
  - ksec 3y ago
    >Researching and developing M processors allowing laptops unparalleled power relative to power usage, R&D for AirPods which apparently had sufficient utility to become quite popular, and R&D for Apple Watch which also became quite popular. What has any of that got to do with Tim Cook, when Tim Cook is not the one who leads of any of these? Apart from Apple Watch, the other two has much of the foundation built during Steve Jobs era.
    - lotsofpulp 3y ago
      If Cook is held accountable for “getting high on App Store revenue”, I don’t see why he isn’t accountable (“under his leadership”) for the rest of the things under his long tenure. Jobs died in 2011, AirPods launched in 2016. M1 launched in 2020. Surely that is sufficient time to credit Cook’s leadership with some of the progress on those products.
      - ksec 3y ago
        You are mixing Strategic decision with Product Launches.
    - factormeta 3y ago
      In deed, I wouldn't say Tim is a crack head. He is just NOT Steve. And Steve had an influence on the culture of the company that Tim can replicate. e.g: what Steve expressed at the Stanford commencement speech, was one of things that had many talented people got inspired about Apple. Now days it is just another MS/IBM/Oracle type corp with better design and brand with everything driven by market share, TV/Ads streams, etc.
  - hu3 3y ago
    M processor and Airpods are evolutionary. iPhone was revolutionary.
jncfhnb 3y ago
It’s not myopic. The App Store tax is an absolutely enormous part of Apple’s net income. If Apple completely lost their software tax revenue (not on the table in the foreseeable future) I would expect their market cap to go down by like… a trillion dollars? Back of the envelope math usually leads me to conclude Apple makes about $30B net income per year off of the App Store tax, plus or minus a generous error bar. This ranges between a quarter to half of Apple’s total net income. App Store tax including the tax itself, plus App Store search/ad racketeering.
- kelnos 3y ago
  I don't think most people object to the App Store tax as a concept. They object to the idea that 30% is fair, and that there's no competitive market where different companies can set up different stores and compete on fees to determine what level of fees actually works in a competitive market. I think 30% (with all the restrictions on top of that) is extortion. But I don't think Apple should have to accept 0% either.
  - jncfhnb 3y ago
    Software distribution should be a perfect competition economic service. The fee should not be 0%, but it should be driven to effectively 0 profit. And a very large population of apps could very comfortably be direct downloads from the web. Or say, in a timely manner, a simple portable web app.
  - beeboobaa 3y ago
    That's because people have been brainwashed by apple to believe this is the only way to be secure. We need to go back to being able to just download installers from anywhere and running them, and giving people just a hint of personal responsibility. Application sandboxes are acceptable if they treat any and all applications the same. If there is a flaw in the sandbox they should fix it instead of charging everyone boatloads of money under the pretense of keeping bad actors out. Break up apple.
    - lotsofpulp 3y ago

factormeta 3y ago

If Steve is the revolutionary, then Tim is the professional business/bureaucratic guy, whom I'm sure has optimized Apple a bunch from an operational and business perspective. And when you have a business person running for too long, the company is going to focus on maintaining what is the growing revenue stream, market share, etc.

lotsofpulp 3y ago
Researching and developing M processors allowing laptops unparalleled power relative to power usage, R&D for AirPods which apparently had sufficient utility to become quite popular, and R&D for Apple Watch which also became quite popular. Apparently, this qualifies as > Under his leadership, Apple has seemingly become a crack head, getting high on the App Store revenue. To some people… And also developing a new business creating and selling movies and tv shows.
- ksec 3y ago
  >Researching and developing M processors allowing laptops unparalleled power relative to power usage, R&D for AirPods which apparently had sufficient utility to become quite popular, and R&D for Apple Watch which also became quite popular. What has any of that got to do with Tim Cook, when Tim Cook is not the one who leads of any of these? Apart from Apple Watch, the other two has much of the foundation built during Steve Jobs era.
  - lotsofpulp 3y ago
    If Cook is held accountable for “getting high on App Store revenue”, I don’t see why he isn’t accountable (“under his leadership”) for the rest of the things under his long tenure. Jobs died in 2011, AirPods launched in 2016. M1 launched in 2020. Surely that is sufficient time to credit Cook’s leadership with some of the progress on those products.
    - ksec 3y ago
      You are mixing Strategic decision with Product Launches.
  - factormeta 3y ago
    In deed, I wouldn't say Tim is a crack head. He is just NOT Steve. And Steve had an influence on the culture of the company that Tim can replicate. e.g: what Steve expressed at the Stanford commencement speech, was one of things that had many talented people got inspired about Apple. Now days it is just another MS/IBM/Oracle type corp with better design and brand with everything driven by market share, TV/Ads streams, etc.
- hu3 3y ago
  M processor and Airpods are evolutionary. iPhone was revolutionary.

jncfhnb 3y ago

It’s not myopic. The App Store tax is an absolutely enormous part of Apple’s net income. If Apple completely lost their software tax revenue (not on the table in the foreseeable future) I would expect their market cap to go down by like… a trillion dollars? Back of the envelope math usually leads me to conclude Apple makes about $30B net income per year off of the App Store tax, plus or minus a generous error bar. This ranges between a quarter to half of Apple’s total net income. App Store tax including the tax itself, plus App Store search/ad racketeering.

kelnos 3y ago
I don't think most people object to the App Store tax as a concept. They object to the idea that 30% is fair, and that there's no competitive market where different companies can set up different stores and compete on fees to determine what level of fees actually works in a competitive market. I think 30% (with all the restrictions on top of that) is extortion. But I don't think Apple should have to accept 0% either.
- jncfhnb 3y ago
  Software distribution should be a perfect competition economic service. The fee should not be 0%, but it should be driven to effectively 0 profit. And a very large population of apps could very comfortably be direct downloads from the web. Or say, in a timely manner, a simple portable web app.
- beeboobaa 3y ago
  That's because people have been brainwashed by apple to believe this is the only way to be secure. We need to go back to being able to just download installers from anywhere and running them, and giving people just a hint of personal responsibility. Application sandboxes are acceptable if they treat any and all applications the same. If there is a flaw in the sandbox they should fix it instead of charging everyone boatloads of money under the pretense of keeping bad actors out. Break up apple.
  - lotsofpulp 3y ago