smells like legally actionable monopolistic behavior. apple clearly needs to be broken up… when was the last time we did that?
That was literally the point of this ruling. The EU only has the power to enforce things in the EU and they can’t force Apple to act differently outside of it.
Yeah, I don’t think they read the article… Sovereignty only applies, well, in the bloc or nation.
Bit the EU could still go nuclear and just refuse to let apple trade I the EU. It’s not an EU company and it doesn’t make products in the EU.
Financially it doesn’t care about apple being able to sell there
Ugh… I mean, they could, but the fact is I guarentee you many members of the EU commission and parliament themselves use these products, and they are popular in the EU, just not as overwhelmingly so as in the US. Ultimately, that wouldn’t really fly in a democracy and, as much as I may hate apple, for good reasons.
Great point.
This is why Americans have no consumer protections; they’re the ones fucking everyone.
They’re fucking themselves. In the EU the EU, not the US, is sovereign. Apple has to follow EU rules, but again, only with the EU.
Serious dumb question, how is it considered a monopoly? What forms the monopoly?
The company? If so, what is the proposal? Apple HW team is separate company from SW team? Apple phones and Apple computers are separated?
The app store? There’s only one Xbox store on the Xbox, one Nintendo shop on the switch or Wii. It wouldn’t make sense to require supporting competition on your hardware. Did N64 games work on the Sega Genesis?
What is constitutes the monopoly and what’s the proposed fix?
It doesn’t, the poster just doesn’t like Apple (neither do I) and those are apparently magic words for “stop this company I don’t like.”
Did N64 games work on the Sega Genesis?
No, but Playstation games did https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bleem!#Bleemcast! And Sony sued them but failed
Here’s the section for the wikipedia article you mentioned in your comment:
Bleemcast! is an independently developed commercial emulator by Bleem! that allows one to load and play PlayStation discs on the Sega Dreamcast. It is compatible with most Dreamcast controllers and steering wheels, and leverages the Dreamcast’s superior processing power for enhanced graphics. It was created by using the MIL-CD security hole found in the Dreamcast BIOS.
see, apples a hard one… i usually agree with breaking companies up, but most of apples value comes from their extremely tight integration. would that be possible if they were separate? i don’t know - i wouldn’t want to lose the value that i get from apple products
like, how would that work?
you’d usually split like hardware and software, but we have m series chips and macos working so damn well because they collaborated really closely
or iphone, mac, homepod? airdrop between devices, airplay, etc is pretty seamless and i’m not sure how well that’d work if they were separated… and again the m series chips are there because they planned for scaling up an iphone to mac size quite a while ago
retail maybe - that could be a good option, but honestly probably a drop in the ocean and wouldn’t solve anything
perhaps if they separated app store from the rest of apple, or music - like a services division? they’re not so tightly integrated (yet)
or perhaps they should just be separated and be made to deal with it - then we would hope they don’t get a bunch of shit business majors in to run them who don’t understand apple and want to make their turf as profitable as possible… but that always ends up happening eventuallly
apple fanboys are horrible.
Because they have counter arguments or because they like stuff that you don’t?
no, its because they come up with all sorts of egregious and nonsensical arguments to defend apple no matter the shitty thing they do.
if an apple product was killing babies they would bend over backwards to justify how it cant be apples fault.
their marketing did a number on peoples head, in a scary fucking way.
no way i would ever justify the shitty things google does just because I use a fork of their os on my shitty phone.
they come up with all sorts of egregious and nonsensical arguments
In the first sentence, and then
if an apple product was killing babies
in the very next…
If Apple users are horrible, logic like this ensures that “fanboy” haters remain a tier worse.
you are bending over backwards to misinterpret what i said, and you prove my point somewhat.
They didn’t bend over at all. You literally made a ridiculous argument while complaining about other people doing that.
You really think if Apple killed babies people would be ok with that? Of course you don’t.
Well, not really, because you could use android, and it commands 70% of the global market share
Also, the way the law is, you have to have both a monopoly & also be causing substantial harm to the public. I.e. you can have a monopoly if it’s really nice and more like a public utility. So after the Microsoft antitrust case (for basically same thing), it’s been very hard to justify breaking up tech companies or banks
If a company acquires its monopoly by using business acumen, innovation and superior products, it is regarded to be legal; if a firm achieves monopoly through predatory or exclusionary acts, then it leads to anti-trust concern
For example, business can defense that its business conducts bring merits for consumers
(Wikipedia)
What happened with Microsoft browser tie ins antitrust?
Ultimately, the Circuit Court overturned Jackson’s holding that Microsoft should be broken up as an illegal monopoly. However, the Circuit Court did not overturn Jackson’s findings of fact, and held that traditional antitrust analysis was not equipped to consider software-related practices like browser tie-ins
So in short, Apple’s legal / business strategy here is totally solid. Arguably helps users, defended by precedent, and doesn’t dominate market share. Of course they have to debate all this
if a firm achieves monopoly through predatory or exclusionary acts, then it leads to anti-trust concern
Hey, ChatGPT …?
Closed Ecosystem: Apple is known for its closed ecosystem, which can limit users’ choices. For instance, iOS users can only download apps from the App Store, and Apple tightly controls the app approval process.
Proprietary Connectors: Apple often uses proprietary connectors and cables, such as the Lightning port, which can be inconvenient for users who want more universal standards like USB-C.
Repairability Issues: Apple products are often criticized for being difficult to repair. For example, the company discourages third-party repairs and designs its products with components that are challenging to replace.
To be fair, USB-C didn’t exist when Lightning was introduced, and it was vastly superior to Micro-USB.
It doesn’t really have any reason to exist now…
Agreed with your other points though!
I have an old iPad that I try to reuse for another purpose and all the locks to stop me to keep using it make it such a pain in the butt, when the alternative is simply to enable developer mode on an Android tablet.
Thankfully I remembered when buying a laptop and skipped the very enticing M-series hardware, because in 5-7 years that thing is a brick destined for the landfill.
To be fair, USB-C didn’t exist when Lightning was introduced
Hmm, I wonder why that was?
Lightning is a proprietary computer bus and power connector, created and designed by Apple Inc. It was introduced on September 12, 2012
Design for the USB-C connector was initially developed in 2012 by Apple Inc. and Intel.
So Apple helped develop USB-C but failed to integrate it into their products for a decade. Now, why would they do that?
Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightning_(connector)
I absolutely love how Mozilla has been calling out Apple, Google, and Microsoft. So good.
Sad thing is they don’t have enough pull to make people listen.
Well they recently got people to get scared of what car manufacturers want to do with all sensitive data they get access to, who knows
They still gladly accept Google’s sweet money (while asking for donations). So brave of them! /s
Bluntly, where would Mozilla be without Google’s funding?
Gone, probably.
So while I agree that it is poisonous and there is something very wrong with Mozilla corporate structure, it is a necessary evil.
Who cares? Nobody needs Mozilla anyway.
You appear to be lost, corporate deepthroaters anonymous is down the hall on the left.
Get lost.
Tis you who seems lost
Get lost you too.
Isn’t it just for the default search engine which you change without any difficulty?
Just? You call someone out and still accept money from them? Highly hypocritical behavior, if you ask me.
Moreover, here it comes the cognitive dissonance of Mozilla’s fans: they say “the default search engine can be changed easily”, while a the same time they blame “Chrome/Edge being the default” for the low FF market share, when in reality installing a different app is easier for tech illiterates than changing the default search engine.
Doublethink can be amazing.
Your vitriol is pathetic and exhausting. Take all this energy you have and maybe advocate for what you think is a better browser rather than berating people. You may live in Spain and not be American, but your attitude and the way you present yourself, at least in comments, is glaringly American.
“I vehemently hate dancing, to the point I can get upset even if someone just suggests it to me.”
Holy shit, you lack the self control to keep composure at the fucking mention of dancing? I thoroughly pity your child.
Take your fuckin’ meds, dude. Get help.
Just block me, just as I’m going to do with you. Goodbye.
Of course, they want to make it as complicated as possible so that people don’t actually do it.
This is why I support Linux and open source stuff whenever I can. Always used Firefox. Linux on the server and desktop. Doesn’t work for everyone but it’s the last free open thing we’ve got. What’s been great about Linux is now that basically everything is a Web app Linux is the perfect OS. But now we are dealing with bullshit browser wars. Uhg. Firefox will be the Linux if browsers in no time.
When a company’ website doesn’t work on Firefox I don’t get angry at Firefox, I just don’t use the site. When a company makes their cookie popups are a pain in the ass I don’t get angry at the EU, I get angry at the company that made the popup. I use Firefox as a Canary that dies when a website is a piece of shit.
Maybe it’s a win-win, I don’t have to deal with Apple’s bullshit and Apple doesn’t have to waste resources on me, for me to block all their shady shit.
I feel the same but I also cannot avoid some sites. Ohio’s unemployment and job board only works with Chrome based sites and I have to use those when I’m in between jobs.
This brings up an interesting thought though. Should governments and states be able to prefer you to use a certain browser or should they be required to make the website function on all…
If the government cared at all about accessibility, then you’d be able to do your taxes in an HTML form.
Got to buy material for house renovation, several hundreds € of saving if I bought on one website that didn’t work with Firefox. Guess what I did.
Almost everyone choose money and commodity over everything else. Firefox is doomed to fail, and I say that as Firefox user.
But you’re forgetting something important: Firefox is open-source, meaning that it is literally impossible for it to fail. Even if the Mozilla org goes down in flames tomorrow.
If Mozilla dies, someone else will become a maintainer for the Firefox open-source project. If they are compromised or bought out, someone will fork the project (again). If 100% of websites make some code change that forces them to only work on a Chromium rendering engine, the developers of one of the Firefox forks (or, more likely, all of them) will implement a fix within days that spoofs whatever signal the lock-in code requires. If some form of online DRM is implemented, it will be cracked and the solution will be made available online. Or the relevant chunk of Chromium will be copied and modified to generate that verification key on Firefox without telemetry.
The browser may never achieve market dominance, but it doesn’t have to. It’s on the Internet, and on the Internet nothing ever truly goes away.
Sure nothing goes away on the internet but things get deprecated. Keeping up with a browser development must require highly technical engineer, who often don’t work for free. If Mozilla were to disappear or get 80% of its budget removed (Google) one can doubt they would be able to keep up with the evolution of internet.
I mean just look at Linux desktop, people working on it for free is great but it’s slow, innefective and it goes to all direction at the same time. Without million of $ behind it, Firefox would be gone in a year or two whatever the amount of fork happening.
That’s just…not true on any level at all. Of course things get deprecated, but engineers work for free on open source projects all the time.
And you understand nothing about Linux development if you think its development is slow; the kernel already has stable support for Intel’s Meteor Lake graphics, which were released only 43 days ago at the time of this comment.
The idea that Firefox would be “gone in a year or two” without Google’s money ignores the reality that there are thousands of large, successful open-source projects without massive financial endowments, projects that are still continuously updated over years and even decades for no other reason than that the maintainers want to use them.
Misunderstanding, I was speaking of Linux desktop environment. You think I speak of Linux. Linux is backed by dozen of companies like Google, Microsoft, Meta. It sure doesn’t lack any fund. Now compare it to the Linux desktop environment where this is mostly people working for free, shit doesn’t get done in 43 days. For instance, Wayland has been out for several years and many environment still doesn’t work with it or have not even started working on it.
The closest open source project I can think of is libreoffice. Just check it, it lacks tons of functions compared to ms but most important is that it barely improved at all in years. Now doc document aren’t going to change drastically , file from the 90’s are still compatible but the web foundation it improves very fast. When I say 2 years I’m generous, its already half dead (3.14% user !), breaking compatibility would be the nail in the coffin.
Actually, LibreOffice is the perfect example, thank you. After OOo development went in a direction the community didn’t agree with, the Document Foundation was formed and the project was immediately forked. 13½ years later, the project is still updated every six months. It has every necessary feature and supports all formats. A browser would be similar; web standards don’t change that much. Wayland, by comparison, is currently a niche product for a niche product; it doesn’t need the same support, and so it doesn’t get it.
Well I admire your optimism, personally I don’t have much faith into open source project because their is often very little or no money for the developer.
You could have said the same for Internet Explorer some years ago, and they got their lunch eaten despite being free AND the default owned by a monopoly
The difference is that Google had the capital and a monopoly itself. Mozilla doesn’t have shit.
Mozilla has a regular income from Google.
Yeah, they’re pretty much owned by Google, thus not a competitor.
Except and arguably better product in the browser space?
Both Mozilla and Opera had better browsers.
Firefox has add-ons that automatically reject all on cookie pop ups. It works great and sometimes you see it working which is really satisfying.
