Apple's anti-freedom stance really, really annoys me. It's one of the reasons I preferred to get an Android phone (and one of the reasons I'll be waiting for an Android tablet). The fact that I'd have to switch to AT&T doesn't help, but they so rigidly lock everything down and so strictly regulate content that it really turns me off as a consumer. Their industrial engineering is top-shelf, tho. Which just adds to the frustration. I haven't done it yet, but I love the fact that if I want to I can develop my own applications for my phone. Can't do that with the Apple products.
I guess it's no surprise but still seems interesting to me that the masses who don't have your expertise actually seem to prefer a closed system. There's something to be said for not having to deal with a lot of the chaff that come in an open system - not to say that there aren't thousands of crap apps. I think I read a comparison to a gated community.
I've never owned an iphone and just got my ipad a few days ago, so I'm very new to the apple world. I'm wondering if I need to download any kind of anti-virus or internet security software for my ipad....or is there something like that already built in to it?
It's like DK said - the iPad lives in a gated community. One that looks more like ADX Florence to me, but... they so strictly regulate things that anti-virus is unnecessary. There's almost no way to inject malicious code into the system.
I'm usually quite the open source, complete control of my self built system techie, but I'm enjoying the walled garden on the iPhone and iPad. It would be nice if were more open, but the benefits far outweigh the cons for me. I remember the dark days of getting apps for my Symbian phones, and the controlled App Store is a godsend compared to that.
Thats really what bugs me about Apple. I love their products, but the fact that some bloke in Cupertino is deciding which apps somebody on the other side of the world is allowed to use is just not acceptable. I mean I even understand that they want the App-store to be free of anything that could be controversial, but then they should allow other app stores as well and generally don't limit the apps the user is allowed to install.
It makes sense that Apple checks the apps to make sure there are no viruses, but what about looking at websites through Safari? If you go to a bad website will Safari automatically block any adware or viruses on the site?
yeah, apple's management seems to be on a bad power trip lately. but it's not about a closed system here anymore, it's about plain censorship. apparently they even banned an app by the Spiegel. I don't really know what kind of app that was, but I seriously doubt it was anything raunchy given that it had Spiegel's name on it. add to that the banning of political cartoons, and apple starts to increasingly look like China. the motivations might be completely different, but the end result is the same.
they could have simply separated the adult stuff from the rest, no big deal. but the adult stuff was seemingly just the start... as for not being controversial, I think their current approach is very controversial, and will cost them quite a few customers. at the end of the day, either you support freedom of choice, or you don't. apple apparently enjoy power more. as you say, fair enough if they want their own store to look like a kindergarten, but at least acknowledge that there are a lot of different people out there, and accept them, instead of looking down on them. (apologies for the rant, weekend has already started.. )
Apple has always run a tight ship, and their methods aren't anything new. People are only starting to complain because they have the most popular platform out there at the moment (for mobile devices, at least). In the end, as long as they have the apps people want, it's not going to make much of a difference. And it's not like the overall number of apps in the store is limited anyways. While I don't agree with everything they're doing, I also don't want the sort of "freedom" to install anything that makes most Windows computers so vulnerable. The last thing I want is to have to install an anti-virus or anti-spyware app.
you are completely missing the point. it has nothing to do with that, at all. a closed system and censorship are not in any way related.
Well, if you only use the app store then you wouldn't need anything like that anyway. But as laasan said, what Apple's doing is nothing short of censorship. The "Spiegel" example is as good as any. This was an online publication of Germany's biggest and most respected news magazine. I don't doubt that Apple found some nudity there, but it most definitely wasn't anything racy but something in context (e.g. to illustrate an article about some art photographer or something along those lines), everything else just wouldn't be their style. It's probably just that Germans aren't as prude as Americans. If Apple wants to keep its store clean of "filth" like Der Spiegel, then at least they should give them the opportunity to sell their product through some other channel. Apple likes to think about itself as the savior of Journalism with their new products, but by censoring them, they rather destroy it than save it. And they also run the risk of ultimately losing out because of this. European publishers are already working on an alternative channel to iTunes/iBooks as they don't want to be censored. And also, lets not forget how much power lies within pornography. VHS lost out to Betamax because of the porn industry and I'm sure that this alone might be enough for Android systems to eventually take over. Which gets me thinking...maybe I should circumvent the system and build a web-based, native looking, html5 iPornStore...I bet you could make a fortune...
End of the day, they own and operate the App Store, and they can set the terms of service and EULA as they want. It's a business decision on their end. Crying "censorship" doesn't make sense. Huss and Big Internet Group LLC set rules for what can and can't be posted on this very site. They have their reasons for wanting to keep this place BigSoccer rather than, say, 4chan. If it bothers you all that much, and you're insistent on using an iPhone, you can jailbreak your phone and get apps via Cydia.
The thing that kills me about the Apple haters is about how much crying you hear about how the App store/iPhone OS is a gated community. Apple is free to do what they want with their product. Nobody is forcing anyone to buy and use their products. If I buy an XBox 360 I'm not going to whine that I can't play PS3 games on it because big bad Microsoft has created a closed system. It's an Apple product, they have every right in deciding what goes on their gated system. I for one don't mind the fact that Apple controls what goes in the app store, I liked knowing that the app will work and is meant to do what it does. A buddy has a Droid and he's told me how he's downloaded a few apps that turned out to being broke or not doing what was describe. Sometimes open source isn't so good. Not to mention that I don't trust Google or like their practices. As for the pulitzer winning artist, Apple has asked him to send his app back in for review.
Apple will not censor books sold on the iBookstore. Porn isn't as powerful as it once was. HD DVD had a lot of porn available while Blu-ray didn't, look how that turned out. With the invention of the internet, porn no longer has the impact. Besides, who wants to watch porn such a small screen.
First of all, I'm certainly not an Apple hater and the criticism here was generally not just hating. I love their products, but I don't like their conduct. Because it was embarrassing for Apple. But hadn't he won, do you think they had changed their mind? Of course not. I believe it when I see it... http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/05/apples-new-low-censoring-a-dictionary/ Granted, this is an app, not a "book". But I'd really be surprised if Apple wouldn't refuse to sell content they don't like. Here's a great post on a mac forum regarding this: http://forums.macrumors.com/showpost.php?p=9319396&postcount=20 Yeah, I wasn't really serious about that. A better example would probably be Apple's app business itself. At first they didn't allow any of it and only when they opened the app store did the iPhone really take off. Similarly, allowing "uncensored" sales channels will most likely be a deciding factor in the long term. Personally, I don't like Google's conduct either, but if Apple doesn't change its policy, it'll lose out in the long term, just like they did against Microsoft in the 1990s. And personally, I'd hate that. I'd like Apple to succeed this time.
Even if they did decide to not carry certain books, which is certainly in their right because they operate a store and can decide the content of said store. What's to stop you from using the Kindle app or an HTML5 web alternative?
I'm not surprised, but also not bothered. People have already said that it's not important how open an OS is. As a consumer, I don't care how easy it is to branch off your own OS from Android. I care about what the OS can do and which additional apps/content I can get. Right now, Apple is still ahead in both respects, but Android is gaining ground fast and by not shutting out certain content, it'll take over eventually.
If you're a parent and you have the option to get your kid a phone or ipod with accessibility to all sorts of porn apps, etc. and one that doesn't, which are you going to buy? If you're an advertiser, which platform will be more appealing? http://macdailynews.com/index.php/weblog/comments/24850/ If you're a programmer who wants to make money are you going to be more likely to write for a consumer base with discretionary income who are willing to pay for apps, music, etc. or for an open platform where folks think everything on the internet should be free? People predicted the failure of the ipod, the iphone, and now you're worried that it's going to wither because of "censorship"? Apple has been winning in large part because it delivers a superior user experience - for example the iphone's touch calibration/sensitivity was rated the best - not because of the occasional mis-steps by the app reviewers. I don't see how this is analogous to Windows vs. Macs way back when.
Well, if you can browse the web, you better teach your kid some media skills, as you can always easily find porn. But for the app-store, as I said, Apple wouldn't need to open it up, or if it did, it could easily introduce something like an R-Rating which could be filtered out. I don't think it makes much of a difference, because I don't think that ads within apps will become an important factor anytime soon and web-ads are OS independent. Should ads within apps take off though, it would be a clear advantage for Apple at this point, but since Android is gaining ground, the situation could be quite different 2 years from now. I don't see why an Android user should be any different from an iPhoneOS user. It's not like Linux where users are enthusiasts. But at this point, Apple is of course still clearly ahead when it comes to developers. However, at the end of the day, it'll not be advertisers or developers who decide which OS will win, but consumers. The others will follow automatically. I mean Apple has angered many devs with their latest change in license agreement. Yet the devs won't go away because the iPhone is where the most money is at. http://arstechnica.com/staff/fatbit...tm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=rss And BTW, I have no problem with this decision by Apple. They want to use their superior market share to hit Android and Adobe and that's fine. I don't have a problem with a closed system as such. It depends on what you want. I agree with you regarding the iPhone. It has the best user experience, the best app store and the best integration into an entire eco-system with iTunes. And while I don't like their censoring policy at all, I'm planning on getting my first iPhone this summer, when the 4th generation will be available. The iPad is different though. It's supposed to be an alternative to NetBooks and the future distribution channel for print media. Here, censorship is a much bigger problem. When Apple tells the biggest and most respected German news magazine that their content is not acceptable, then where will it end? Content providers don't want to be told what they can publish while users are used to the print content as well as to an open web experience. For smartphone users, this is not as much on an issue (although it still is one). Now the iPad is still a nice toy and I'd love to have one. And of course it profits from the common iPhone eco-system which provides it with a massive head start. But it will ultimately fail as both, an outlet for newspapers and magazines as well as a NetBook replacement if it won't be opened up. That doesn't mean that it can't be profitable, or that there won't be any reason to buy one. But it's a dangerous gamble on Apple's part and I'm sure that it'll be a niche product should Apple stick to its policy. As soon as somebody can offer a similar package without the restrictions, it'll be an uphill battle for Apple, because if users want to read their favorite newspapers/magazines with such a device, it won't be the iPad. And I think that this is a shame as I love Apple products.
Apple has always been a US-centric company, and there hasn't really been a great deal in the way of censorship of major US media outlets (even get more "edgy" publications like Maxim, and Playboy). It's too early to tell whether it will fail as a media distribution platform as most magazines/papers are still developing their iPad content. The few that have already hit the app store have been largely underwhelming as they were either just magazine scans (GQ), or charging too much (WSJ is charging more for the iPad only subscription, than they do for the paper+web subscription).
Maybe it is that Apple is too US-centric... We could end up with different systems around the world then. Apple's iPad in North America, Android everywhere else. Other than that, it's of course up to the content providers to offer an attractive product, regardless of the system it's supposed to run on.