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I might be on board with this if the author even began to discuss why what Google and Amazon are doing is less than ideal for the consumer, but the main point h
by jenius 14y ago
I might be on board with this if the author even began to discuss why what Google and Amazon are doing is less than ideal for the consumer, but the main point he's trying to make remains totally unexplained, and in addition I don't agree with his argument about Apple at all.
Why is a kindle fire less than ideal - because they sell books on it? You could make the same argument about every video game system - it's less than ideal because you have to buy video games for it. This isn't because nintendo is evil or lazy, it's just how the system works. A video game system is a device for consuming other peoples' video games (and nintendo's too, if they want), and the kindle fire is a device for consuming other peoples' books.
Why is android less than ideal, because it's ad supported? You could say the same thing about facebook, twitter, and every other company out there that provides a free service supported by ads. Some people don't like this, and this leads to developments like app.net - we'll see how paid services like this do over the next couple of years. But the fact remains that if you don't realize when you sign up for a free service that people are being paid to make that they need to make money somehow, you aren't even thinking.
Then let's move on to all of apple's major devices. You get a iphone, but this relies on a contract with a service provider, which is in fact how apple makes most of their money off iphones. Oh no - immoral!
Or you may buy an ipod, apple's other big product. But what's an ipod without music on it from a third party. Hold up - third party pollution, the ipod is no good as a product.
Or perhaps you buy the only other thing they sell, a computer. But you'd better not put any software on it from a third party, because then it's just a means to an end, not an end in itself.
Overall, I understand the general idea, but this was very poorly thought out and needs more thinking and explanation, not to mention that at least to me, the statement about Apple's products all being an "end" is definitely false.
- shawndumas 14y agoI buy a video game console to play games. Most of the people I know bought a Fire to get a tablet. Look, everyone, naturally, caters to the one who's paying the bills. Advertisers are paying the bill. They make money on the ads/books/goods not the device. Therefore the device is secondary.
- jenius 14y agoSo you just look at the tablet and don't consume any content on it? I buy a tablet not to get a tablet, but to do things with it, just like you buy a console to play video games. Of course everyone caters to who's paying the bills, if not you're out of business. I figure this is more or less common knowledge. But you have to realize that deciding who pays the bills is hardly ever only your company. In Apple's case especially, there are often 3rd parties paying their bills. Like I mentioned, cell providers pay a huge chunk of their revenue to get the iphone, app developers pay them to create apps on their devices, etc. They do not pay all the bills without third parties. And even though this is the case, I don't think there's anything wrong with 3rd parties being involved. And if you did (which it seems you do), you should have mentioned this in your post - not just that you generically think there's something wrong with it, but what exactly is wrong with it. Then talk about how consumers would be totally ok with massive price increases on these products and what benefits that would be traded for.