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It means Apple (or big tech) has adopted/cloned your product basically killing your products ability to succeed In reference to when Apple created a project ca

It means Apple (or big tech) has adopted/cloned your product basically killing your products ability to succeed In reference to when Apple created a project called Sherlock that was a direct copy of a popular Mac app Watson

jrmg 3mo ago
This makes it sound like Sherlock was named in response to Watson. It was the other way around. Earlier versions of Mac OS had an app called ‘Sherlock’[^1] that could search local files and the web in a fairly rigid manner. ‘Watson’[^2] was a third party shareware app very much inspired by Sherlock (and obviously, given the name, not trying to hide that!) that was much more flexible, more ‘OS X-like’, arguably much more user friendly, and was open to plugins (like, there was a movie time search plugin, an eBay plugin, an Amazon plugin etc). Sherlock 3[^3], in MacOS 10.2, was redesigned with a UI very like that of Watson, and also allowed similar plugins, making Watson obsolete. In the Apple developer world, “being Sherlocked” came to mean “your app being made obsolete by Apple including identical functionality with the OS”. 1: https://winworldpc.com/res/img/screenshots/f2d124c36d74f71c62852ba221db215b66a1d942682130dd2e70f3c0e1ec1cc1.png https://winworldpc.com/res/img/screenshots/f2d124c36d74f71c6... 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karelia_Watson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karelia_Watson 3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherlock_(software) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherlock_(software)
embedding-shape 3mo ago
But here Apple seems like they avoided that by buying the project instead of creating their own clone. Doesn't that make it nothing lime the Sherlock/Watson situation?
- MoonWalk 3mo ago
  Indeed, it seems like the honorable approach.
  - sneak 3mo ago
    Cloning features and UI in your own product is not dishonorable. Outcompeting someone who didn’t bake in a moat isn’t doing anything wrong, or Burger King and Wendy’s shouldn’t exist.
    - Onavo 3mo ago
      Well at least they didn't have their product managers reach out to "start a conversation" like Google and Microsoft's who then blatantly rip off the product later.
- julianozen 3mo ago
  Parent comment said "Well I was thinking about making a competitor...." Response said "Working on an idea after it has been Sherlocked is a bold choice" Child comment asked what Sherlocked meant. I explained. Apple purchasing Swift Package Index is great. The Sherlocking above comment was in response to the suggesting that theyd create a project apple has already made first party

jrmg 3mo ago

This makes it sound like Sherlock was named in response to Watson. It was the other way around. Earlier versions of Mac OS had an app called ‘Sherlock’[^1] that could search local files and the web in a fairly rigid manner. ‘Watson’[^2] was a third party shareware app very much inspired by Sherlock (and obviously, given the name, not trying to hide that!) that was much more flexible, more ‘OS X-like’, arguably much more user friendly, and was open to plugins (like, there was a movie time search plugin, an eBay plugin, an Amazon plugin etc). Sherlock 3[^3], in MacOS 10.2, was redesigned with a UI very like that of Watson, and also allowed similar plugins, making Watson obsolete. In the Apple developer world, “being Sherlocked” came to mean “your app being made obsolete by Apple including identical functionality with the OS”. 1: https://winworldpc.com/res/img/screenshots/f2d124c36d74f71c62852ba221db215b66a1d942682130dd2e70f3c0e1ec1cc1.png https://winworldpc.com/res/img/screenshots/f2d124c36d74f71c6... 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karelia_Watson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karelia_Watson 3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherlock_(software) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherlock_(software)

embedding-shape 3mo ago

But here Apple seems like they avoided that by buying the project instead of creating their own clone. Doesn't that make it nothing lime the Sherlock/Watson situation?

MoonWalk 3mo ago
Indeed, it seems like the honorable approach.
- sneak 3mo ago
  Cloning features and UI in your own product is not dishonorable. Outcompeting someone who didn’t bake in a moat isn’t doing anything wrong, or Burger King and Wendy’s shouldn’t exist.
  - Onavo 3mo ago
    Well at least they didn't have their product managers reach out to "start a conversation" like Google and Microsoft's who then blatantly rip off the product later.
julianozen 3mo ago
Parent comment said "Well I was thinking about making a competitor...." Response said "Working on an idea after it has been Sherlocked is a bold choice" Child comment asked what Sherlocked meant. I explained. Apple purchasing Swift Package Index is great. The Sherlocking above comment was in response to the suggesting that theyd create a project apple has already made first party