[HN Gopher] Judge rules Apple executive lied under oath, makes c...
___________________________________________________________________
Judge rules Apple executive lied under oath, makes criminal
contempt referral
Author : connor11528
Score : 744 points
Date : 2025-05-01 12:27 UTC (10 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.thebignewsletter.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.thebignewsletter.com)
| perihelions wrote:
| Also
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43852145 ( _" Apple violated
| antitrust ruling, judge finds (wsj.com)"_ -- 336 comments)
| Eddy_Viscosity2 wrote:
| Will the executive actually face an criminal charges? No they
| will not.
| jordanb wrote:
| The upside is that executives are cowards (also there's no way
| in hell I'm going to prison for my employer and most people I
| know feel the same) so _even one_ high profile successful
| prosecution will have enormous deterrance effect.
|
| There is this despondent feeling among most people that the law
| no longer applies to the powerful and we watch the behave with
| ever more brazenness. The saving grace is the amount of
| pushback needed to put them back in line is very small. Once
| they see _any_ consequences for their actions they will fall in
| line.
| AlexandrB wrote:
| I think cowards is the wrong word - more like opportunists.
| Like you said, almost no one wants to go to jail for
| "shareholder value" or a 10% bonus.
| bluSCALE4 wrote:
| The coward part was to stress his later point that they'll
| all fall in line like a herd of animals.
| chrisjj wrote:
| > almost no one wants to go to jail for "shareholder value"
| or a 10% bonus.
|
| Almost no-one gets that choice.
|
| The choose a _risk_ of going to jail for a more likely
| bonus.
| californical wrote:
| But they don't, because there is no risk. If there was,
| many wouldn't take it
| chrisjj wrote:
| Many =/= all.
| notyourwork wrote:
| Generally I agree but I think the pushback needs to be a bit
| larger than you suggest.
|
| Over the last 25 years, we've become more tolerant to larger
| leeway for those of certain societal status. A relatively
| large whiplash must happen to course correct the general
| behavior, in my opinion.
| blooalien wrote:
| > "A relatively large whiplash must happen to course
| correct the general behavior, in my opinion."
|
| Indeed. Someone (or a couple few well-known someones) in
| positions of real "power" need to do some _real prison
| time_ in a _real prison_ for their massive lawbreaking and
| abuses of power before they 'll take the situation somewhat
| seriously.
| chipsrafferty wrote:
| A LOT imo.
|
| If you make it clear that even a little slip up of fraud
| will be at least 1 year in prison and huge fines, I think
| it would work wonders.
|
| Tough on crime policies don't really work for petty
| crime, because people are desperate. But rich people have
| so much to lose that they wouldn't risk it.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > But rich people have so much to lose that they wouldn't
| risk it.
|
| Ponzi schemes are still a regular thing despite Madoff
| being sentenced to 150 years behind bars. They're just
| relabeled as "cryptocurrencies" these days.
| heroprotagonist wrote:
| > we've become more tolerant
|
| We've become more powerless, you mean. The government has
| become more tolerant.
| voakbasda wrote:
| > Once they see any consequences for their actions they will
| fall in line.
|
| I would wager that idea crossed the mind of Luigi Mangione.
|
| It will take more than a slap on the hand from the court to
| change anything.
| dylan604 wrote:
| > most people that the law no longer applies to the powerful
|
| gee, I wonder why! you now have POTUS openly defying the
| direct orders from the highest court. That's so much further
| past some corp executive committing a crime that hasn't even
| gone to trial yet.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > Once they see any consequences for their actions they will
| fall in line.
|
| We're seeing this with just how fast and ruthless many
| executives were after Trump won the election, actually. The
| behavior of some of these people is best described as
| "swearing fealty": donations to Trump's circle, dismantling
| of anything remotely smelling as "DEI" instead of standing up
| for what was sold as "core values" over the last years,
| compliance instead of resistance (just recently Bezos in the
| Amazon tariff pricing issue, or the "resignation" of 60
| Minutes producer Bill Owens so that the Trump admin doesn't
| impede a corporate merger).
|
| We've been asking ourselves "wtf are the Russian oligarchs
| doing" after Putin invaded Ukraine, and now we're seeing just
| the same compliance from our own oligarchs.
| autoexec wrote:
| > There is this despondent feeling among most people that the
| law no longer applies to the powerful
|
| It's less of a feeling and more of a repeatedly demonstrated
| reality. It shouldn't be that way, but most of the time it
| is. I'd love for that to change, but I can't fault people for
| not expecting it to happen any time soon.
| Molitor5901 wrote:
| and the 9th Circuit is almost certain to overturn this. Apple
| is a major employer, donor, etc. that I can't see this going
| all the way. I hope, but I am so jaded on the courts doing
| anything to actually hold companies and their executives
| responsible that I can't help but be pessimistic.
| chrisjj wrote:
| > Will the executive actually face an criminal charges? No they
| will not.
|
| How so?
| thinkingtoilet wrote:
| Rich people in America rarely face consequences for anything,
| even flagrantly lying under oath. I would bet good money no
| one faces any jail time, but I would be happy to be wrong.
| chrisjj wrote:
| Rarely =/= never.
| leptons wrote:
| All they have to do is pony up $2 million and they can buy a
| pardon from a criminal president. Seems like a pretty easy
| problem to solve if you're rich like Apple execs.
| kace91 wrote:
| >Internally, Phillip Schiller had advocated that Apple comply
| with the Injunction, but Tim Cook ignored Schiller and instead
| allowed Chief Financial Officer Luca Maestri and his finance team
| to convince him otherwise. Cook chose poorly. The real evidence,
| detailed herein, more than meets the clear and convincing
| standard to find a violation.
|
| Judging by tech, apple is right now in deep water due to the
| failure of delivering apple intelligence and a major drop in
| software quality.
|
| Judging by political positioning, cook's donation to trump's
| inauguration didn't sit well with the fanbase.
|
| Now, it seems Cook is going for shady behavior against judges.
|
| Maybe it's time for a major change of leadership. Financially
| they might be ok, but one can't avoid the feeling they're burning
| the furniture to heat the house.
| Tadpole9181 wrote:
| A change of leadership? This is clear, obvious, undenied
| evidence of Tim Cook committing a criminal act. This is a
| _crime_. A coordinated, intentional, well-informed crime made
| in malice!
|
| He should go to jail!
| jobs_throwaway wrote:
| 100%. For any regular citizen this would obviously lead to
| jail time. Being Tim Cook shouldn't change that.
| benoau wrote:
| The funny thing is they have 2x consumer class actions (US
| + UK) alleging these 30% fees were always a ripoff, they
| just became a slam dunk so that'll be tens of billions they
| have to pay back!
| Reubachi wrote:
| Genuine question as I'm seeing this sentiment a lot in
| these threads, and I must be missing something.
|
| What you've just described would be the single greatest
| punishment to an entity in the (admittently recently
| established) history of case-law, would upend the tech
| sector (maybe justly), lay off 10s of thousands and
| effectively stop work at downstream supply chains.
|
| _I_ get that this is the point of the punishment.
| However, do you think politicians, investors, lawyers
| with controlling stake, The DOD with security
| integrations, would allow that to happen?
|
| Put another way, do you think the rule of law exists for
| the hyper rich when the current admin put.....Linda
| McMahon on the presidents cabinet?
| Molitor5901 wrote:
| I think Apple has needed a change of leadership since day one
| of the Cook era. He may have been brilliant at logistics and
| putting products on shelves, but I think Apple innovation has
| flatlined under Cooke and if anything, the holier than thou
| arrogance of Apple in general has grown exponentially. Maybe
| it's time to breakup Apple - separate the computer and phone
| divisions.
| mepian wrote:
| >Maybe it's time to breakup Apple - separate the computer and
| phone divisions.
|
| Who gets the Apple brand?
| Reubachi wrote:
| easily no question, ios would get apple naming convention.
| 85 percent of their revenue is from ios and connected
| services.
|
| Which also means, "it's time to breakup apple" means
| nothing, not sure why OP suggested that as a method to
| punish a legally problematic CEO/board. they don't have a
| multisegment monopoly allowing them complete control over
| supply chains, or multi region monopoly on smartphones that
| would be effected by a breakup.
| mike-the-mikado wrote:
| A more user friendly option would be to separate them into a
| hardware and a software company.
|
| The hardware company would have to publish specs allowing
| anyone to offer operating systems running on Apple hardware.
| udev4096 wrote:
| Cook is getting cooked
| crims0n wrote:
| > Judging by political positioning, cook's donation to trump's
| inauguration didn't sit well with the fanbase.
|
| On the other hand, it may have saved his company billions on
| tariffs.
| leptons wrote:
| Oh you mean that guy "Tim Apple"? Trump doesn't even know his
| name, and I doubt Apple will get much for their tithing.
| rad_gruchalski wrote:
| Tim Apple. Sounds like a compliment to a CEO.
| intothemild wrote:
| Lately he's been rather sour... Like a Granny Smith.
| test6554 wrote:
| Apple might still appeal to a higher court and lean heavily on
| that donation to Trump for legal support. They as much as said
| they would appeal the decision.
| nova22033 wrote:
| Tim Cook is an operation guy. With Trump's trade war,
| operations is going to be even more important.
| Osiris wrote:
| Given that the CFO encouraged Cook to violate the court order
| tells me that they calculated that
|
| 1. Any fines for not complying would be less than what they
| would lose by complying
|
| 2. That no individual would suffer any consequences for
| blatantly disobeying a court order.
|
| In my opinion, the whole concept that a company can break the
| law but no human can be held responsible is insane.
|
| I really hope that criminal charges are brought against those
| involved in making a conscious choice to both lie to the court
| and ignore the court order. Hopefully that will make other
| executives think twice when put in the same situation.
| cogman10 wrote:
| > I really hope that criminal charges are brought against
| those involved in making a conscious choice to both lie to
| the court and ignore the court order.
|
| I do as well, but I have little hope that it will.
|
| Prosecutors don't like prosecuting perjury. It's tricky to
| prosecute (particularly because of how close it is to the
| first amendment), takes a lot of time, and often it just ends
| up with a minor slap on the wrist. I've seen other cases with
| outrageous perjury that resulted in no criminal prosecution.
|
| This is a broken part of the justice system. Particularly
| because these apple execs have the money and lawyers to drag
| out any prosecution until everyone involved is dead. But also
| because it relies on government prosecutors caring in the
| first place.
| wiktor-k wrote:
| > In my opinion, the whole concept that a company can break
| the law but no human can be held responsible is insane.
|
| Wait, isn't the board personally liable for their decisions?
| I'm not a lawyer, obviously.
| bix6 wrote:
| Corps are separate legal entities so individuals are
| generally protected from personal liability. There can be
| exceptions in criminal and civil liability instances but
| even then there things like D&O. Until we stop giving
| corporations so much legal cover we're hosed.
| manquer wrote:
| Not even when their product kills thousands or more and
| they knowingly took action that resulted in those deaths.
|
| Perdue pharma is a high profile recent example of this ,
| but there dozens of such events from big tobacco to baby
| formula
| jmward01 wrote:
| We have a lot of messed up rulings in the past that allow
| corporations to act like people but skate by when they do
| things as if they weren't people. I say if a corporation can
| have free speech like a person then they can get thrown in
| jail like a person too. When illegal stuff happens it should
| have real, meaningful, consequences like the board being
| fired and massive fines or outright closing the company. I am
| not a fan of the industry right now. Apple is a symptom of a
| broader problem and we need bigger changes to start
| correcting the direction corporate america has been heading
| for the last 50 years.
| pton_xd wrote:
| > 2. That no individual would suffer any consequences for
| blatantly disobeying a court order.
|
| This is the real issue. Even if they're wrong about 1), they
| concluded there is no personal risk for at least trying.
|
| And they are probably correct. As it stands, there is likely
| a greater threat to their personal "brand" and future
| employment by directly damaging Apple's finances through
| overt compliance. That is a huge problem and conflict of
| interest.
| vkou wrote:
| > Judging by political positioning, cook's donation to trump's
| inauguration didn't sit well with the fanbase.
|
| Objectively and ethically, it's reprehensible, but
| subjectively, we're now living in a _blatantly_ pay-to-play
| world and _everyone else is doing it_ , and there are clear,
| easily quantifiable gains of billions to be made from that
| bribe.
|
| (The best part of all this was learning that inauguration
| bribes have been happening for _decades_ , generally to little
| fanfare.)
| floxy wrote:
| >The best part of all this was learning that inauguration
| bribes have been happening for decades, generally to little
| fanfare.
|
| Where can I read more about this?
| janalsncm wrote:
| I generally like Apple but this is not ok. It wouldn't bother
| me at all if they put Tim Cook in prison for this.
|
| If corporations are not bound by laws they don't like, then why
| should they be protected by laws they do like? Should the US
| turn a blind eye to IP infringement against Apple?
| ujkhsjkdhf234 wrote:
| I hope he gets criminal charges. The amount of people who lie
| under oath and get away with it is unacceptable. Lets get all the
| politicians who lied under oath next as well.
| intrasight wrote:
| It's not gonna happen. And for the reason that you just gave.
| ujkhsjkdhf234 wrote:
| The only reason I have the smallest bit of hope is that this
| is a state case in California and not a federal one.
| TechDebtDevin wrote:
| California is not going to punish Apple Execs lmao.
| teraflop wrote:
| No, it's a federal court case. The original claim that Epic
| won against Apple was based on California state law, but it
| was decided in a federal US District Court (N.D. Cal)
| because there were also claims under federal law (the
| Sherman Antitrust Act) and because Epic and Apple are
| headquartered in different states.
| chrisjj wrote:
| They didn't give a reason.
| aeurielesn wrote:
| It's baffling putting together a C-suite of anti-competitive
| executives doesn't get anyone criminal charges.
| hobs wrote:
| Its only baffling if you think consumers control the courts,
| which they self evidently do not.
| mykowebhn wrote:
| And other execs, like Zuckerberg
| Molitor5901 wrote:
| Al Gore is still on the board.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| John Gruber has a good summary of the ruling:
| https://daringfireball.net/2025/04/gonzales_rogers_apple_app....
|
| My favourite part: "Unlike Mr. Maestri and Mr. Roman, Mr.
| Schiller sat through the entire underlying trial and actually
| read the entire 180-page decision. That Messrs. Maestri and Roman
| did neither, does not shield Apple of its knowledge (actual and
| constructive) of the Court's findings."
| onionisafruit wrote:
| Thanks for posting that. I came away from tfa wondering what
| the actual lie was. Gruber made that clear and was a good read
| otherwise.
| cyral wrote:
| Great summary. I will add to this:
|
| > Apple's response: charge a 27 percent commission (again tied
| to nothing) on off-app purchases, where it had previously
| charged nothing, and extend the commission for a period of
| seven days after the consumer linked-out of the app.
|
| Not only have they been asking for this, but the link to your
| external checkout could only be in once place in your app, and
| could not be part of the payment flow (where else would you put
| it??)
|
| They also want rights to audit your financials to determine
| compliance
|
| And this scary popup before going to the external payment page:
| https://d7ych6cwyfyiba.archive.is/AZrEz/0c8d40ed4a6886240370...
|
| Not sure if such a large font is used anywhere else in iOS
|
| The whole thing was so obviously designed to prevent any
| developer from seriously considering it, maintaining their
| anti-competitive advantage. Glad the judge finally had enough.
| chrisjj wrote:
| > And this scary popup before going to the external payment
| page: https://d7ych6cwyfyiba.archive.is/AZrEz/0c8d40ed4a68862
| 40370...
|
| My. They forgot "Apple cannot guarantee making payment
| elsewhere won't give you cancer."
| dataflow wrote:
| Is there any reason to believe anyone will even get charged, let
| alone face trial, let alone convicted? And if so is there any
| reason to believe they won't be pardoned upon a conviction?
| DaiPlusPlus wrote:
| > And if so is there any reason to believe they won't be
| pardoned upon a conviction?
|
| Given Apple's direct pushback against Trump's anti-"DEI"
| campaign, it's less likely than I might have thought - or maybe
| that's leverage? e.g. what if Trump promises to pardon Apple's
| executives if they remove the giant rainbow thingie from Apple
| Park and stop selling pride-related Apple watch straps?
| coldpie wrote:
| You are being distracted by the culture war sideshow. No war
| but the class war, and Apple's execs are definitely powerful
| enough players in that war to protect themselves from
| consequences.
| afavour wrote:
| It's not really a culture war sideshow it's a "buying favor
| with the administration" sideshow. And it does matter,
| Trump is not exactly a man with a strong loyalty streak.
| Demonstrating fealty to him on a regular basis could
| absolutely result in preferable outcomes for Apple.
| ujkhsjkdhf234 wrote:
| This is a state case. Referral for criminal charges goes
| to a district attorney in Northern California. Trump's
| DOJ could try to lean on California but no one in
| California has any taste for Trump and his people.
| grogenaut wrote:
| Have you been to the county of orange? San Francisco does
| not California make.
| ujkhsjkdhf234 wrote:
| I live in California. I know how red parts of the state
| are.
| DaiPlusPlus wrote:
| Bakersfield, amirite?
| weaksauce wrote:
| orange county is still pretty liberal just not quite as
| liberal as the other parts. huntington beach and newport
| beach is not all of orange.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| Orange often gets cited as the example of a Republican
| county in California because it is the highest population
| county that is pretty reliably Republican (it has a
| slight Republican registration edge, but more solidly
| votes Republican because it also has a Republican-
| favoring balance of independent-by-registratiom voters.)
|
| But most of the Central Valley and the inland Northern
| California counties are much more Republican than Orange.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| Have you been to the county of Modoc? The urban coastal
| enclaves do not California make.
|
| (I mean, sure, by population they mostly do, and are
| overwhelmingly Democratic, but if you are going to look
| for a county that goes against the partisan trend of the
| state, staying in the urban coastal enclaves and picking
| Orange is actually a fairly weak example.)
| dragonwriter wrote:
| No, it is a federal case in the US District Court for the
| District of Northern California, and the referrals go to
| Pam Bondi's DOJ.
|
| You seem to have made the mistake of thinking that a news
| article saying "a judge in northern California" means "a
| State of California judge in the northern part of that
| state" rather than "a federal judge in the Northern
| California District Court".
| hedora wrote:
| An Apple attorney is now head of the NLRB. The day they were
| appointed, they stopped three ongoing lawsuits against Apple
| (including the #appleToo anti-harassment class action suit):
|
| https://appleinsider.com/articles/25/04/02/trump-admin-
| poach...
|
| Tim Cook is better at PR than Musk, but he's also a member of
| Trump's inner circle (why else would there be tariff
| carveouts that directly benefit Apple?):
|
| https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/apple-ceo-
| tim-...
|
| Unlike Musk, the two were also close during Trump 1.0.
|
| The rainbow thingy isn't a gay pride thing. The rainbow
| colors are out of order, just like in the original Apple
| logo.
| thrill wrote:
| "is there any reason to believe they won't be pardoned"
|
| Shortly after the next unexplained bull market in $TRUMP a
| pardon will appear along with direct links to their upcoming
| subscription service conveniently preloaded and un-delete-able
| from the iPhone Home Screen.
| post_break wrote:
| The top brass at Apple just think they are above everyone else.
| Remember when Tim Cook lied about Apple not giving anyone special
| terms in the app store and that everyone gets the same deal. And
| then it came out Netflix was one that got special terms?
|
| The sheer arrogance of Apple leaders is astounding. They think
| they are outright owed rent on anything that runs on an iPhone,
| iPad, etc. Apple thinks developers are nothing without Apple.
| Look at how snubbing developers has worked out for the Apple
| Vision Pro. It was already a niche device, but it's a ghost town.
| pyronik19 wrote:
| Unfortunately their arrogance isn't false bravado. iPhones
| brand is extremely strong. Funny aside I know many women who
| won't date men who's text come up in green bubbles... thats
| branding.
| xp84 wrote:
| I believe you -- though it's not surprising in the USA. Apple
| absolutely dominates the US market. I'd estimate of the top
| 75% of incomes Apple has at least an 80% market share. I live
| in a high-income area and the only Androids I ever see are
| carried by my house cleaners. And among young people it's
| only more intense because teens are so obsessed with brand
| cachet (as they always have been).
|
| Now, on HN we know some people, though plenty wealthy enough
| to afford Apple, are choosing Android for function. But I
| doubt most of the public even thinks about that choice
| through that lens. Green bubble is the same as arriving to
| pick up your date in a 2002 Civic. It projects "I'm probably
| broke." Statistically. In the US only.
| philistine wrote:
| The Playdate, made by Panic, has a more active store than
| Vision Pro.
| CharlesW wrote:
| The Playdate store has ~300 games.
|
| Apple Vision Pro has ~3,000 native apps, plus millions more
| compatible iPhone/iPad apps.
| jerjerjer wrote:
| > Look at how snubbing developers has worked out for the Apple
| Vision Pro.
|
| I think it's mostly the lack of users. Apple snubs mobile
| developers all the time, but since they gate access to a large
| chunk of well-paying customers, developers are ready to jump
| through any hoops.
|
| If there were millions of Apple Vision Pro users I'm sure the
| developers would have followed, but it's of course a chicken
| and egg situation considering Vision Pro lack of content.
| chmod775 wrote:
| What killed the Vision Pro is the complete lack of support
| for the two main things people use VR for. Productivity is a
| distant third behind the likes of VR Chat and pornography. If
| Apple managed to capture only 1% of VR Chat's monthly
| userbase, they would've tripled their pathetic sales numbers.
|
| Apple tried to focus on productivity and some light
| entertainment and didn't even throw the other two a bone by
| supporting a PC link feature. Particularly they didn't make a
| physical link possible - Wifi is not reliable/high bandwidth
| enough for most people, so those third party solutions aren't
| cutting it.
|
| Apple users are mostly locked out of the existing PC VR
| ecosystem - Apple didn't _have_ to rely on developers writing
| dedicated apps.
| spacedcowboy wrote:
| I bought the AVP for one thing only - long haul flights. It
| makes the experience completely and utterly different, and
| it's less than the cost of a business seat.
|
| It "works for me".
| nemomarx wrote:
| what kind of flights are you buying that cost 3500 for a
| business seat? do you get them very last minute?
| chmod775 wrote:
| Pretty standard for a ~10-12 hour flight.
|
| It's not like there's much reason to care about comforts
| on short flights. Anyone can tolerate economy for an hour
| and you'd probably not get out your VR headset for a
| short hop either.
| kridsdale3 wrote:
| Trust me, porn on the Vision Pro is plentiful and industry-
| leading.
|
| VRChat, I agree, should absolutely be there and
| unrestricted. It wont be though. It isn't uncensored on
| Oculus either.
| chmod775 wrote:
| > Trust me, porn on the Vision Pro is plentiful and
| industry-leading.
|
| VR pornography is quite massive in Japan for instance.
| Huge in fact. The Vision Pro doesn't even have a
| DMM.com/Fanza app for that.
|
| I don't think most users would even consider getting a
| device that doesn't allow them to view their existing
| catalog of purchases, pornography and not.
|
| Again, this could've been solved by simply supporting
| PCVR.
|
| > VRChat, I agree, should absolutely be there and
| unrestricted. It wont be though. It isn't uncensored on
| Oculus either.
|
| I don't think the VR Chat app on Oculus is very popular.
| Most users are just going to run it via PCVR for better
| performance, feature support, etc.
| modeless wrote:
| It's not really a chicken and egg situation, it's more of a
| cost problem. It still costs $3500. Even if the next version
| is a third of the price it will still cost three times more
| than the competition.
| throwanem wrote:
| And if I'm buying it as a devkit I'm sure my accountant and
| I will find a way to write that off, anyway. $3500 isn't
| quite pocket change, but it is close enough to petty cash.
| But why do that if there's no users? And even the day-one
| diehards among my colleagues stopped wanting to be seen in
| them before long.
|
| I think it isn't really chicken-egg, is what I'm saying.
| Devs were so hot to target iPhone from day one that the
| first or second major OS update added an entire
| infrastructure to make that possible. There was so much
| interest it made _Apple_ back down! For the Vision Pro they
| _had_ that on day one and it wasn 't nearly enough to sell
| the thing to devs, because again, nothing did nearly enough
| to sell the thing to users.
| WD-42 wrote:
| What made the early apps great and viral on iPhone were
| the indie developers. The ones making flashlight and
| farting sound boards. They paved the way, and for them
| $3500 is a lot of money.
|
| Who cares if it's pocket change for google or meta,
| nobody wants another Facebook app.
| throwanem wrote:
| Sure. And those early indie devs paid, inflation
| adjusted, iirc around $500-1000 for the hardware they
| developed against to put those indie flashlight fart
| noise apps on the then nascent App Store, because that's
| what an iPhone cost.
|
| $3500 is, as I said, pretty close to petty cash even for
| a sole-owner LLC that needs taking at all seriously, and
| I would front that sum without a second thought out of my
| own personal pocket if I thought VR had legs, the same
| way I've put about $9k toward inference-capable hardware
| in the last two years because AI obviously _does_ have
| legs. It 's an investment in my career, or at least
| toward the optionality of continuing a career in software
| in a post-AI world, assuming I don't decide to go be an
| attorney or something instead.
|
| I appreciate not everyone can drop a sum like that, like
| that. I can and I'm not ashamed of it. Why should I be,
| when it's exactly what I've worked the last 21 years
| straight to earn?
| Bluestrike2 wrote:
| I think the issue is less the cost to developers and more
| the cost to users. Were there more users, no doubt a
| larger number of indie developers would be able to
| justify the expense. Without those users--or at least a
| reliable _promise_ of those users in the near future--it
| 's tough to justify even dipping your toes into it. It's
| a chicken and egg problem that's fundamentally tied to
| cost as well as hardware limitations. Discomfort from the
| bulk and weight was my biggest sticking point even before
| the price, for example.
|
| Plus, the hardware is just the initial starting point.
| Your initial outlay will quickly be eclipsed by the dev
| hours spent working on Vision versions of your app(s),
| and that's when the opportunity costs become particularly
| noticeable. Time spent on a Vision app that may have no
| real market for years is time you could be spending
| adding features, testing changes, fixing bugs, marketing,
| etc. Skipping on Vision Pro is really a no-brainer for
| most indie developers, at least for the foreseeable
| future.
| throwanem wrote:
| Yes. That was my original point, just above the head of
| the branch where you responded. Could I have been more
| concise or more clear? Serious question, I am mildly
| retooling my prose style of late.
| modeless wrote:
| $3500 doesn't matter at all for developers. It matters
| for users. If there are a billion users, devs will pay
| $3500 for access no problem. But you can't get a billion
| users for a $3500 product unless it's at least as useful
| as a car.
| xp84 wrote:
| This is the best way to sum it up. The diehard Apple fans
| still defend it, with handwaved promises that the future
| will bring a cheaper one, but in this economy I don't
| think Apple can do it. The price people will bear is
| proportional to the _current_ usefulness, and the
| usefulness is proportional to third-party dev interest.
| The irony is that of all companies, Apple would be the
| _most_ capable financially of loss-leadering it into
| existence with their cash hoard, but they 're so stingy
| that the idea of a loss leader offends them to the core.
|
| But imagine for a moment an alternate reality where they
| at least moderately tried to keep the cost down, and then
| further subsidized it, selling the headsets for $599 and
| made developer terms wildly attractive (like, your first
| 20 million in revenue having a 5% fee instead of 30%). It
| would cost Apple billions, but they pissed away more on
| the car idea with nothing to show for it. This could have
| launched a category, instead I predict a future more like
| Apple TV hardware where it's niche due to being 4x the
| price of what most people want to pay for the category.
| babypuncher wrote:
| The price isn't as much of a problem for developer
| adoption, it's a problem for user adoption. Users aren't
| buying the Apple Vision Pro because it's $3500.
| Developers aren't writing apps for the Apple Vision Pro
| because it has no users.
| throwanem wrote:
| I said precisely as much in the comment to which you
| replied. Can you offer advice on my prose style therein?
| pests wrote:
| You didn't really talk about users at all. The only part
| of your comment about users is "But why do that if
| there's no users?". There can be many reasons why there
| are no users, price being just one of them.
| throwanem wrote:
| That's fair. The implication was all in the comparison
| with week-1 campsites for iPhones versus day-1 yawns for
| Vision Pro, but it's smeared across two paragraphs and
| should have been hoisted and made explicit. Thanks for
| the review!
| RajT88 wrote:
| I know a lady who owns an ISV. Per her, you make a lot more
| money on the app store compared to other platforms.
| RajT88 wrote:
| Why the downvotes about an anecdote about the owner of
| (actually a couple of) software companies? She gives talks,
| in those talks she says she makes more money off iOS apps
| than other platforms. You can probably find a few of those
| talks on Youtube.
|
| Her gaming company you can read about here:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Webfoot_Technologies
| pjmlp wrote:
| Apple always has been like that, see The Cult of Mac book.
|
| However, it appears being at the edge of bankruptcy, and having
| turned the ship around has made them paranoid of losing a
| single cent.
|
| When Apple Store came out it was great.
|
| I was a Nokia employee at the time, and 30% was a dream
| compared with what you would have to pay to phone operators,
| app listenings in magazines with SMS download codes, for
| Blackberry, Symbian, Windows CE, Pocket PC, Brew, J2ME,...
|
| However we are now in different times, and acting as if the
| developers didn't have anything to do with it, it was all
| thanks to Apple's vision of the future, it is pure arrogance,
| and yes the Vision Pro was the first victim.
|
| Here is another one, if they do really announce an UI revamp at
| WWDC 2025, I bet most will ignore it.
| throwanem wrote:
| Honestly, I think they're less jealous of money than rep. A
| man like Jobs would rather die under torture than be laughed
| at, and even almost 15 years gone, we still see his mark.
| behnamoh wrote:
| > However, it appears being at the edge of bankruptcy, and
| having turned the ship around has made them paranoid of
| losing a single cent.
|
| That was more than 20 years ago, under a totally different
| market condition and Apple leadership. Back then, they needed
| developers to turn the ship around, now they think devs need
| them. They's a cash cow and act like assholes.
| pjmlp wrote:
| There are enough people at Apple from those days, including
| at management levels.
| adonese wrote:
| Especially execs and management level
| jbverschoor wrote:
| Might as well scrap Memorial Day, thanksgiving, and all
| other (holy) celebrations. It's been ages ago
| jasode wrote:
| _> Back then, they needed developers to turn the ship
| around, now they think devs need them._
|
| No, that's the opposite of what actually happened with the
| iPhone. Back in 2007, Apple actually saw evidence from the
| customer buying frenzy that Apple didn't need 3rd-party
| devs to make iPhone a wild success. After the very
| desirable iPhones got into millions of customers hands, it
| was the 3rd-party devs that needed Apple more than Apple
| needed the 3rd-party ecosystem as I've mentioned before:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39291668
|
| Maybe an alternate history would have had all the 3rd-party
| devs deliberately boycott Apple iOS and thus only create
| apps for Android in 2008. We now know that didn't happen so
| we'll never know if devs realistically had enough leverage
| back in 2008 to alter Apple's App Store commission
| structure and policies.
|
| The iPhone was so desirable as a platform that new popular
| apps like Instagram and WhatsApp were released for Apple
| iPhones months before Android.
| kridsdale3 wrote:
| OP was talking about 1997, not 2007.
| semanticist wrote:
| The OP isn't talking about iPhone devs, they're talking
| about a decade _before_ that when Apple was called
| 'Apple Computer' and had mad a series of bad business
| choices (confusing product line up, allowing other
| companies to make Mac clones, etc).
|
| Developers had started to abandon the Mac OS platform -
| or at least start making Windows versions of previously
| Mac-only software - and getting developer confidence back
| was one of the key things that kept the company alive to
| grow into the consumer electronics manufacturer that it
| is today.
| jasode wrote:
| _> The OP isn't talking about iPhone devs, _
|
| OP's wording was somewhat confusing because they were
| talking about the later iPhone devs with, _> ", now they
| think devs need them"_ by comparing them to the 1997 Mac
| OS devs.
|
| As though possibly implying that Apple _incorrectly
| misjudged_ the later iPhone-era devs ' leverage as if
| it's the opposition situation of _" Apple is the one that
| needs the devs"_ and somehow Apple misunderstands that.
|
| I was clarifying that Apple didn't misjudge the devs and
| they correctly predicted that devs would want access to
| millions of new iPhone customers. It isn't just _" Apple
| thinks devs need them"_, it's more definitive in _" Apple
| _knows_ that devs need them."_ The timeline of events
| reinforced in Apple's mind that it was "Apple's
| customers" more than the "dev's customers".
|
| Seeing customers camp out overnight in front of Apple's
| stores for iPhones that didn't have any 3rd-party apps --
| and still sell millions of them -- is why they're so
| arrogant. Apple concluded it was Apple's efforts alone
| that recruited those customers to their new platform and
| not the 3rd-party devs. (Apple itself created the first
| Youtube app instead of 3rd-party Google devs doing it.)
| The 2008 devs may have had a chance to flip that
| narrative by rejecting iOS and only create apps for
| Android and Windows Phones but they didn't do that and
| instead, went along with Apple's gatekeeping and 30%
| fees.
|
| _> Developers had started to abandon the Mac OS platform
| [...] and getting developer confidence back was one of
| the key things that kept the company alive to grow_
|
| Well, the 1997 dev confidence behavior for a Mac platform
| with only ~5% market share at that time wouldn't be
| relevant to Apple's attitude about iPhones because _devs
| never abandoned the iPhone_. iPhones were an instant hit
| with 100% market share of touchscreen smartphones until
| Android came out a year later.
| giancarlostoro wrote:
| > has made them paranoid of losing a single cent.
|
| I get the exact same feeling. They're afraid of collapsing
| despite being way ahead.
| layer8 wrote:
| They aren't that much ahead anymore.
| joezydeco wrote:
| _" In 2013 i met a very close friend of Steve Jobs and i
| remember saying "there's one thing i absolutely have to know,
| it's really important to me" he responds "okay what is it?"
|
| I ask "what was all the money for?!" puzzled "what do you
| mean?" "Steve Jobs saved up like 200 billion dollars in cash
| at Apple, but what was it all for? what was the plan? was he
| going to buy AT&T? was he going to build his own telecom or
| make a giant spaceship? what was it for?"
|
| And he looked at me with just the deepest and saddest eyes
| and spoke softly "there was no plan" "what??" "you see,
| Steve's previous company, NeXT, it ran out of money, so at
| with Apple he always wanted a pile of money on the side, just
| in case. and over years, the pile grew and grew and grew...
| and there was no plan..."_
|
| https://x.com/DavidSHolz/status/1900334446928421081
| jofla_net wrote:
| Totally believable. My grandmother lived though the great
| depression, wherein she was lucky to get an Orange at
| christmas. The last few decades of her life she basically
| was a food hoarder, pantries overflowing with canned goods,
| and a freezer where you never saw the back.
| bee_rider wrote:
| When I was a kid I did odd jobs, and one of the odd jobs
| was cleaning out a semi-hoarder's house after he'd passed
| away (iirc he'd lived through the Great Depression). Not
| like you see on TV, with the heaps and heaps of garbage.
| Maybe like your grandmother, tons of... basically well
| organized supplies and stuff.
|
| I dunno. Toilet paper, some canned goods, lighters, I
| guess that stuff all lasts decades if stored properly.
| Takes up a lot is space, though, and your descendants
| might have to pay some kid to throw it all away if you
| don't use it up in time...
|
| But, some folks wished they were toilet paper hoarders
| during the pandemic I guess. Wonder what the kids of 2060
| will be throwing away as a result of our life-
| experiences.
| MisterTea wrote:
| > Wonder what the kids of 2060 will be throwing away as a
| result of our life-experiences.
|
| Likely old computers that could do anything the user
| wanted.
| n_ary wrote:
| > Wonder what the kids of 2060 will be throwing away as a
| result of our life-experiences.
|
| EOL devices(tablets, phones, macbooks, thinkpads, hobby
| electronics boards, home lab equipments, hdd and ssd full
| of archive data, swag from conferences, outdated books on
| product and programming, smart watches etc).
| scruple wrote:
| Rats nests of USB cables and power cords, etc., probably.
| robotnikman wrote:
| Same thing with my grandpa, he hoarded everything.
| Cleaning out his house after he passed was a huge
| undertaking.
| TYPE_FASTER wrote:
| Also, Apple was down to 90 days of operating cash and
| almost went bankrupt in 1997.
| masklinn wrote:
| And Microsoft had to invest in Apple, as a bankrupt Apple
| would have left them with effectively no defense against
| the antitrust investigation they were undergoing.
| tough wrote:
| The irony in that is pretty funny tbh
| gruturo wrote:
| It's also proof that antitrust laws are beneficial, if
| only they were enforced (a lot) more seriously and
| frequently and uniformly.
| joe_the_user wrote:
| The only way that differs "any corp" is that in most
| publicly corporations, you want to return that money to
| your shareholders - and they sit on it for the same reason.
| IE, this just says Jobs ran Apple as his personal fife. But
| since he made lots of money, no one cared.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| I'm a shareholder, and I would rather that money be used
| to grow stock price (since it is already at a business
| known for creating new products and markets).
|
| If I get a dividend, I have to pay tax today. And then I
| just turn around and buy more stock with post tax income?
|
| If I can sell the share at a higher price when I want the
| cash, then I can pay the tax whenever I want, possibly
| under more preferable terms.
| ChuckMcM wrote:
| This and the Cult of Mac book completely describe it.
| Leaders are people who can have emotional damage that they
| compensate for in their business decisions.
|
| It is "easy" to understand why parents would lie to home
| invasion robbers about whether or not they had a safe in
| the house. Leaders of companies will readily lie if they
| believe that the survival of their company is at stake. The
| rational is "well someone might get mad that we lied but at
| least the company will still be here."
| g42gregory wrote:
| Alternative/complementary view: traditional software
| applications business is extremely high-risk high-return.
| It's no accident that NeXT (and Microsoft in early days!)
| almost ran out of money. To balance the risk, you would
| want to compensate with extremely conservative balance
| sheet.
|
| Michael Milken published a paper analyzing exactly this
| issue a while back.
| fortran77 wrote:
| > Apple always has been like that
|
| They were better in the pre-Mac days. I was a big Apple fan
| until the Mac came out.
| FabHK wrote:
| So, you liked the Lisa?
| pjmlp wrote:
| So basically Apple II days?
| Neonlicht wrote:
| I recall Apple's commercial slogan "There's an app for that"
|
| Apple did not write those apps themselves.
| Workaccount2 wrote:
| I wouldn't blame them, Americans on the whole fall over
| themselves to defend Apple. Apple is the magic entity that
| figured out how to send full videos and pictures in text
| messages. Something a google android could never figure out.
| Apple phones didn't come bloated with garbage. You go to the
| apple store for help rather than the verizon store. You are
| above others when you have an iPhone.
|
| Apple's external veneer is stellar, and the overwhelming
| majority of people don't know and don't care what it is holding
| up that veneer.
| nostromo wrote:
| I want Apple to protect me from app developers. For me, it's
| a feature not a bug.
|
| I want them to prevent social media companies from tracking
| my device across my other apps.
|
| I want them to integrate billing so I can easily cancel
| subscriptions or get refunds.
|
| I want them to require Oauth that allows me to keep my email
| private from app developers.
|
| These features make my customer experience better not worse.
| I'm sorry it sucks for app developers to make less money but
| for customers it's mostly a good thing.
| mperham wrote:
| None of that requires a 30% cut.
| roamerz wrote:
| Requires, no but in all regards it's a great deal for app
| developers. You write code they do everything else. You
| want options? They exist (Windows/Android) but are all
| shitified minefields of commercial ads and poor design
| choices that I only use when required. Is Apple perfect?
| No far from it. When I buy and use their products though
| I feel more like the customer than the product. It's a
| tool built for me not their advertisers.
| nostromo wrote:
| This is correct.
|
| App devs hate "paying" the 30% cut, but often aren't
| smart enough to realize that they make more on iOS than
| Android specifically because it's a high-trust
| environment and people trust that Apple has their back.
|
| There's a reason most of us app devs make most of our
| money on Apple devices.
| pjmlp wrote:
| Except there are markets where Apple is hardly present,
| so this doesn't hold, as those money making apps on
| iDevices are mostly from tier 1 countries.
|
| I assume most app vendors would gladly get some money
| from those countries as well, if they want to grow their
| user base.
| jbverschoor wrote:
| They also happily pay 3+% for charging a card with
| stripe. And more than happy to fork a few percent for
| some accounting / VAT handling.
|
| That's included with the App Store.
| mullingitover wrote:
| Kinda dishonest to cite that 30% number when most
| developers don't pay it. The fee has been 15% for years
| now if your revenues are under $1M.
| kagakuninja wrote:
| And it is the same cut that console companies take from
| developers. And then when we point this out, people
| respond with some bullshit that consoles are not "general
| purpose computers"...
| TheDong wrote:
| Consoles are trivially avoidable. Family group chats that
| require a blue-bubble-capable phone, grandmothers that
| only know how to use facetime, those are actually
| important.
|
| I can't get into my coworking space without a door unlock
| app on my phone.
|
| On the other hand, exactly 0 times in my life have I ever
| been told "yeah, you need to own an xbox to go to the
| dentist's office".
|
| Phones are indeed in a different class from game consoles
| and should be held to a higher standard.
|
| But yes, also, game consoles should allow you to develop
| your own programs and side-load them.
| mullingitover wrote:
| > I can't get into my coworking space without a door
| unlock app on my phone.
|
| And that app is probably free, covered by the costs of
| the paid apps, the majority of which are brainrot games
| and social media[1].
|
| Honestly this system isn't half bad, it's essentially a
| tax on idleness that funds a bunch of virtuous activity.
|
| [1] https://www.statista.com/chart/29389/global-app-
| revenue-by-s...
| TheDong wrote:
| The app is free for users, but the coworking space pays
| the app's company a considerable fee to manage access to
| the doors and audit logs and such, so it's not that it's
| subsidized by brainrot games.
|
| Free apps on iOS should be subsidized by, I don't know,
| the purchase price of the phone and the $100 yearly
| developer fee I'd think.
|
| > Honestly this system isn't half bad, it's essentially a
| tax on idleness that funds a bunch of virtuous activity.
|
| The system isn't funding "virtuous activity", the system
| is a for-profit system for the benefit of the richest
| company on the planet.
| mullingitover wrote:
| > the coworking space pays the app's company a
| considerable fee to manage access to the doors and audit
| logs and such, so it's not that it's subsidized by
| brainrot games.
|
| I think you're well aware that these fees don't go toward
| the iOS SDK
| licensing/infra/staffing/security/distribution costs of
| the app and the App Store. That's what is being
| subsidized by the brainrot games.
|
| Furthermore, there's nothing stopping that app maker from
| bypassing the app store and simply making a webapp, so
| this argument that you need an iphone to open the door is
| really moot. It's not the smartphone makers' fault that
| the door company's customers demand this product.
| sodality2 wrote:
| > Family group chats that require a blue-bubble-capable
| phone
|
| This is a social walled garden they've built over years
| and has been solidified by users _choosing it_ over and
| over again. Are they exploiting our brain 's capacities
| regarding social pressure to extract profit? Sure, but so
| does every fast food company, social media company,
| marketing company, etc.
|
| I think it's interesting that you phrase it as "require"
| regarding a group chat made by your family members. Apple
| doesn't _require_ this, your family members _chose_ Apple
| when they purchased their phones.
| TheDong wrote:
| Practically every other chat ecosystem I've used has
| worked fine from android or ios, or for the most part my
| desktop computer. Signal, XMPP, Facebook Messenger,
| Telegram, Twitter DMs, Google Chat, all of these work
| _fine_ from every general computing device I own (iPhone,
| android, linux).
|
| Somehow it's only iMessage which doesn't have an android
| or desktop or web app, despite Apple having more money
| than every other messenger app I mentioned.
|
| > your family members chose Apple when they purchased
| their phones.
|
| Apple chooses the default and integrates it into the OS
| more deeply than any third-party app can be integrated.
| It's not a free choice... and then Apple also refuses to
| provide open access to this ecosystem to other devices.
|
| I know other people have sometimes said that it's an
| anti-spam measure to tie the iMessage account to an apple
| ID which is associated with a purchase. I'd be fine
| making an apple ID and paying up to $300 to get iMessage
| access for it if that would allow me to not use iOS and
| still communicate with my family (via an officially
| supported / recognized android + linux iMessage app).
|
| When my iPhone finally breaks (and may it be soon), I am
| planning to get a mac mini server and install
| https://bluebubbles.app/ to solve this.
|
| I am mildly worried that apple will eventually ban me for
| that, as they did with beeper
| (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39156308), and also
| not thrilled about the increased electric bill that'd
| entail.
| sodality2 wrote:
| > Apple chooses the default and integrates it into the OS
| more deeply than any third-party app can be integrated
|
| And this is _well known_ by everyone, and your family
| still chose Apple (in fact, I 'm fairly certain this is
| _why_ most people choose Apple - they _want_ everything
| to "just work"). Apple has no obligation to provide any
| "ecosystem".
|
| At the end of the day there isn't some mass hypnosis at
| work here. People choose Apple en masse because it
| _works_ for them. Nothing stops Apple users from making
| an SMS (now RCS) group chat, either, nor from you and
| your family hosting a group chat on _any other app_ on
| the App Store.
| heavyset_go wrote:
| Free the consoles, too.
| Workaccount2 wrote:
| Those features have fat apple tax overhead and are not
| unique to iPhones.
|
| That's why I talk about the veneer that users don't care to
| look beyond. Customers get bent by Apple and aren't even
| aware of it.
| gostsamo wrote:
| If you don't like social media, don't use it. Isn't that
| what all apple fans tell when someone dislikes apple
| practices?
| hightrix wrote:
| > I want them to prevent social media companies from
| tracking my device across my other apps.
|
| They didn't say anything about not liking social media,
| only that they don't want to be secretly tracked.
| spacedcowboy wrote:
| This is good advice. I do that. HN and occasional reddit
| browsing (on the "old" design, the "new" one sucks ass)
| is where I draw the line.
| JimDabell wrote:
| The problem is that _other_ apps advertise on Facebook,
| and in order to attribute new installations to the ads
| (to find out how effective they are), they had to add the
| Facebook SDK in those other apps. Then when the social
| media-avoiding users ran those other apps, they ran
| Facebook code on their device without knowing and still
| got tracked.
|
| This is what Apple's ATT was designed to prevent. If app
| developers want to do that now, they need to ask the user
| for permission. The more Apple's control over the
| platform is rolled back, the more stuff like this
| happens.
|
| As a user, I don't want to be using, say, a recipe app
| and be secretly tracked by Facebook in the background.
| tomp wrote:
| All those are awesome features, and I use them all the
| time.
|
| But that's no reason to prevent them from being opt-out. It
| should be _possible_ to not use OAuth, integrated billing,
| social media tracking etc.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _that 's no reason to prevent them from being opt-out_
|
| I'm genuinely surprised Meta and _e.g._ Citrix haven't
| launched their own app stores in the EU. Maybe GDPR
| disincentivises the worst shenanigans.
| wtallis wrote:
| If privacy or security protections are opt-out, Facebook,
| _et al._ will try to use any leverage they can to push
| their users to opt out. There 's real value in a platform
| that _doesn 't_ give Facebook, _et al._ that opportunity.
| There are also obvious downsides; it 's a tradeoff that
| might not be right for you but definitely isn't one-
| sided.
| _aavaa_ wrote:
| > I want them to prevent social media companies from
| tracking my device across my other apps.
|
| Apple is the one who implements the advertising ID
| companies use to track you. And preventing that tracking is
| a os-level feature, not a thing they review out of app.
|
| > I want them to require Oauth that allows me to keep my
| email private from app developers.
|
| You are describing a private email address.
| TheDong wrote:
| We're on Hacker News, not Granny News.
|
| Being a hacker means having curiosity about the things
| around you, having the desire to be able to change and
| understand things.
|
| On android, I wrote small toy apps for myself, I could
| build and self-sign an APK, I could poke at how the system
| worked and read all the source code I wanted.
|
| Tragically, due to blue bubbles and group chats within my
| family, I was forced to switch to iOS, and I thought sure,
| it wouldn't be so bad...
|
| No, it sucks for hackers, you can't build and sign apps
| from linux reliably, you need an apple account and to pay
| $100 even if you do have a macbook, the APIs are limited,
| you can't see the source code for the most of the kernel or
| platform, apple has a ton of APIs you're not allowed to
| use.
|
| My firefox addons I developed for myself installed fine on
| android, but I can't even use those on iOS.
|
| I want apple to let me use the device I paid for.
| davisr wrote:
| You weren't forced to do anything. You submitted to peer
| pressure, and that was a decision that, along with
| millions of others making that same decision, led to the
| current state. The very state that you're now complaining
| about.
|
| Don't like it? Don't use it. (I don't.)
| lucianbr wrote:
| Government intervention, or legal system intervention is
| one way in which millions are collectively deciding to
| move away from the current state. In theory at least.
|
| > Don't like it? Don't use it.
|
| Life is _slightly_ more complicated than this.
| nostromo wrote:
| It's true, I like my Granny phone. And you can choose a
| hacker phone if you want!
|
| I personally do my hacking on Mac, Linux, and on my
| RasberryPis, in my secure home and behind a firewall. But
| I don't want a hacker-friendly phone holding my
| passwords, credit cards, social media, email, photos, GPS
| location, cameras, microphones, etc., with a persistent
| cellular connection to the internet and at constant risk
| of being left in a taxi or cafe. I would never put the
| effort into locking everything down, and I'd probably
| fuck it up if I tried anyway.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| _I want Apple to protect me from app developers. For me,
| it's a feature not a bug._
|
| Security is not mutually exclusive with informed consent.
| Apple's greatest trick was convincing you -- and,
| evidently, themselves -- that it is.
| wtallis wrote:
| Every attempt at providing the general public with an
| "informed consent" escape hatch to security or privacy
| features ends degrading to either consent fatigue or
| "misinformed consent" dark patterns.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| What do you suggest, then? As users, does rent-seeking
| paternalism really serve us better in the long run?
| wtallis wrote:
| The rent-seeking is fundamentally a separate issue from
| the paternalism. Lots of the anti-Apple lobbying and PR
| is drawing attention to the 30% fees, but for many of
| those companies, they care _much more_ about winning the
| freedom to spy on their users or engage in other
| predatory or abusive business practices.
|
| But aside from that, you cannot simply point people at
| the approach that led to Windows UAC and GDPR cookie
| consent banners and consider the problem adequately
| solved.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| So you'd prefer that instead of the (rare) UAC prompt,
| Windows should simply refuse to do what the user asks,
| unless they pony up for a developer license?
| wtallis wrote:
| No, but I think it's incredibly naive and shortsighted to
| suggest that we should impose a legal requirement that
| any platform adopt such an obviously imperfect approach.
| Your memories of Windows Vista may have faded, but UAC
| prompts were certainly not rare when UAC first showed up,
| and they're _still_ common enough to cause consent
| fatigue and undermine their effectiveness as a security
| measure.
| m463 wrote:
| I would like to know what is running on my phone, what it
| is doing and who it is communicating with.
|
| I would like to be able to prevent it, like running a
| firewall or disabling bluetooth for certain processes or
| more...
| tech234a wrote:
| I think apps have to request permission to use Bluetooth
| on iOS with the exception of audio playback
| autoexec wrote:
| No phone can really give you that. Even if the OS were
| better, the wireless chipsets themselves are black boxes
| that do their own thing giving you zero insight or
| control into what how or why. There's plenty of room for
| improvement, but ultimately they'll always be insecure
| and untrustworthy by design.
| trinsic2 wrote:
| And they also tie you into systems you don't control. That
| power can be wielded against you when you least expect it.
| When you trade security for freedom, you deserve neither.
| henry2023 wrote:
| Have you ever used a PC or laptop? I bet you have at least
| a computer and the fact that you can download and install
| software without an intermediary doesn't make you lose any
| of the things mentioned above.
| leptons wrote:
| So it's okay to leave your macbook wide open to all of the
| things you described? Because Apple doesn't force any of
| that on their macbooks. So are you really that safe?
| rythmshifter wrote:
| "americans on the whole"
|
| blanket statements like this are never accurate
| jtmarl1n wrote:
| Your comment also makes a blanket statement.
| burnte wrote:
| That's the joke. All generalizations are false.
| Takennickname wrote:
| That's a generalization.
| burnte wrote:
| THAT'S THE JOKE.
| behnamoh wrote:
| > Americans on the whole fall over themselves to defend
| Apple.
|
| What does it have to do with nationality? I've seen Apple
| fanboys from all countries. Sure, Apple's market share in the
| US relative to other phone manufacturers is high, but that's
| mostly due to the "trust" Americans have in US-based
| companies (you can argue this trust is misplaced).
| burnte wrote:
| > Americans on the whole fall over themselves to defend Apple
|
| No, we don't. Apple fans from all nations do, but there is
| literally zero national pride in Apple.
| emchammer wrote:
| Not magic although it seems like it. Pixel perfect graphics
| and smooth video go a long way even if you're not a graphic
| designer. Silicon Graphics had this figured out.
| Tryk wrote:
| Well they've been getting away with it for years seemingly
| without any real consequences. Why should we assume
| corporations behave morally when there are no sanctions?
| Swoerd wrote:
| >Look at how snubbing developers has worked out for the Apple
| Vision Pro. It was already a niche device, but it's a ghost
| town.
|
| This isn't really about that. The reality is that the AVP costs
| $3500,- and realistically, how many users are there? It's much
| more likely that developers will begin building for VisionOS
| once Apple releases a more affordable device.
| mjamesaustin wrote:
| This is the reality of development when you don't have
| support from developers - they will follow the money.
|
| Contrast this with early iPhone app development where people
| were turning out in droves EXCITED to build something.
|
| Apple has lost the trust and enthusiasm of the developer
| community by making their lives harder and harder over time.
| Of course they aren't going to lift a finger now unless it
| will make them money. The same wouldn't be true if Apple
| provided them the support to get excited about a new
| platform.
| CharlesW wrote:
| > _The reality is that the AVP costs $3500,- and
| realistically, how many users are there?_
|
| This is exactly what everyone said about the original
| Macintosh, which cost $7,695 in 2025 dollars. The prediction
| value of the price of this AVP model is close to zero.
| xp84 wrote:
| Does Apple have the willingness to sell a hypothetical
| future device for cheap enough to appeal to the mass market
| _without_ the third-party developers who have thus far
| completely ignored it? Just on what comes with it alone.
| Nothing but a web browser and a bunch of iPad apps. It 's
| expensive hardware, and admittedly much of the appeal is
| said to come from the amazing high resolution and perfect
| motion input. That puts a floor on the BOM. And Apple
| hasn't sold a loss leader in _checks watch_ ever? Certainly
| not in the past 25 years.
|
| And remember, you need more than us on HN to spark
| enthusiasm amongst developers of the calibre they need.
| Think AAA game studios, major sports leagues to produce
| premium courtside experiences, etc. The only way forward I
| see for Apple Vision (Pro) is if they put their money to
| work.
|
| They can pick:
|
| 1. Subsidize it down to upper-middle-class impulse
| buy/middle class splurge, so about $600-800. This is still
| a stretch because even at that price it's hard to justify
| as-is today, but iPhone Pro Max and AirPods Pro sell and
| they don't do that much more than what you can get for half
| the price.
|
| 2. Back up a truck full of cash to NBA and/or NFL for
| courtside/sidelines experiences at every game.
|
| 3. Back up a truck of cash to the biggest names in gaming
| to nab full exclusives, and make sure those games are so
| good even diehard Apple haters can't resist it.
|
| Anything besides those 3, in my view, will not launch this
| platform.
| hedora wrote:
| It's been under a month since Apple's lawyer took over the NLRB
| and immediately made a bunch of lawsuits over union
| suppression, employee rights and widespread employee harassment
| go away.
|
| https://appleinsider.com/articles/25/04/02/trump-admin-poach...
|
| I'm hoping this judge's ruling will actually be enforced by the
| executive branch, but I'm not holding my breath. I wonder if
| there are any mechanisms that allow state law enforcement to
| enforce federal judicial orders.
| weaksauce wrote:
| if it's anything like wells fargo 8 million fine for opening
| up bank accounts in peoples names without their knowledge...
| after a 1 million donation to trump's inauguration the fine
| will go down to 150,000 dollars.
| HPsquared wrote:
| Developers, developers, developers, developers!
| paxys wrote:
| That's because they are above everyone else. Tell me -- do you
| think this executive or any other higher-up at Apple will face
| any real consequences because of this?
|
| In the absolute worst case the company will pay a fine in the
| order of tens of millions and the whole thing will go away. And
| the executive in question will get a fat bonus and promotion
| for his loyalty.
| Octoth0rpe wrote:
| > Look at how snubbing developers has worked out for the Apple
| Vision Pro
|
| I really don't think Apple's dev policies has had anything to
| do with this. The issue is the price - it's simply inaccessible
| to the vast majority of consumers, even many moderately high
| income consumers due to its value being somewhat unproven.
| ysofunny wrote:
| > The sheer arrogance of _American_ leaders is astounding.
|
| there, fixed it... the top brass at USG also behave this way,
| they're following the leader (or more likely the other way
| around, USG behaving like a private interest corporation)
| pixelatedindex wrote:
| To be fair, the top brass at Google, Facebook, etc also think
| they are above everyone else. Even Trump is above the law these
| days.
| philistine wrote:
| Tim Cook has overstayed his welcome. He should have left years
| ago at this point. That plus the fact that all his successors are
| built on the same nondescript mold he came out of, does not bode
| well for the strategic vision of Apple.
| sitkack wrote:
| I know Tim does a better job, but he is the mirror image of his
| counterpart at Google. Made from the same mold. Great peace
| time substitutes, lousy leaders.
| behnamoh wrote:
| > Tim Cook has overstayed his welcome.
|
| This isn't the first time an influential leader (like Jobs)
| chooses the next leader only for everyone to realize the next
| person isn't a "leader" type, but rather someone who was put in
| charge to maintain the status quo, not tarnish the previous
| leader's legacy, and not come up with crazy new ideas.
| layer8 wrote:
| It doesn't look to have achieved those goals this time
| around.
| bauble wrote:
| Innovators like Jobs are incredibly rare. We're lucky he
| chose someone who would not only preserve the company, but
| stave off the worst of the enshittification that has eaten
| Microsoft and HP. Cook is also surprisingly protective of
| privacy and civil rights. I'll take him over 99% of
| executives these days.
| dns_snek wrote:
| In what sense is Cook protective of privacy and civil
| rights? Apple collaborates with the government to the full
| extent that is required to have access to their market,
| irrespective of privacy and civil rights implications.
| China, for example.
| sparky_z wrote:
| In the sense that they don't go much much further than
| just the bare minimum required by government regulations
| from the various jusrisdictions they operate in, and they
| don't treat this overreach as their primary profit
| center, thereby incentivising themselves to push it as
| far as they think they can get away with, the way all the
| other major tech companies do?
| philistine wrote:
| Let me push back on that: Cook was an extraordinarily good
| choice as successor to Steve, but he also should have left a
| while ago.
| adrr wrote:
| Multiple failed large projects under his watch, Apple
| Intelligence, Apple Vision, Apple Car. For comparison, Huawei
| and Xiaomi both have launched cars. Samsung AI offering is much
| better than Apple's.
| k2enemy wrote:
| I'm hoping for John Ternus to take the reins soon. At least
| from the casual outside observer, he seems like someone that's
| actually excited about tech and customer experience.
|
| Maybe Apple is too big to have a product person as CEO? They
| are so big that they essentially need a diplomat at the top
| spot? If so, at least let someone like Ternus call the internal
| shots and lead the products.
| TillE wrote:
| Ternus generally comes across well - technically
| knowledgeable and a good speaker - but also he is literally
| the only notable Apple executive who is significantly younger
| than Cook.
|
| Apple is extremely not the type of company to recruit a CEO
| from outside, so if Cook is doing any kind of succession
| planning I have to imagine it's Ternus.
| AtlasBarfed wrote:
| My biggest takeaway out of this is Jim Jordan in the Senate
| trying to sneak through antitrust weakening.
|
| From the "free market" party from a senator with at least some
| shame on the red aisle.
|
| It really is open season for buying politicians.
| cynicalpeace wrote:
| Correct, but as the article states, it was the MAGA side that
| laid into him and made him pull it.
|
| Steve Bannon has said many times he would've kept Lina Khan.
|
| The populists are socially conservative but economically
| liberal in many respects (not all, obviously)
| cosmicgadget wrote:
| > This is an injunction, not a negotiation. There are no do-overs
| once a party willfully disregards a court order.
|
| ...
|
| > referred the matter to the U.S. Attorney for a criminal
| contempt investigation.
|
| It's suddenly become a negotiation again.
| hedora wrote:
| You need two sides for a negotiation.
|
| Based on the tariff carve-outs and the political appointments
| Trump's made, Apple leadership is definitely inside Trump's
| inner circle.
|
| They've been smart enough not to parade Tim Cook around in a
| MAGA hat, but just barely:
|
| https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/apple-ceo-tim-...
|
| I expect there to be some performative lawyering by the Trump
| administration until the case blows over.
| cosmicgadget wrote:
| Haha okay fair point, the negotiation already took place.
|
| Though the contempt referral may have not been part of the
| deal and might cost extra.
| vessenes wrote:
| In the words of a trial lawyer friend of mine, "Nobody in the
| history of the world has said, 'You know what? The judge was
| right; I was an asshole.'
|
| Definitely some of those vibes there. I've generally been on team
| apple for this case, and as Gruber notes, they largely won the
| case. Dunking on their power to set other contractual fees seems
| to have come back to bite them. That said, as a user, I strongly
| prefer to use Apple's in-app payments -- I was just buying a
| hearthstone purchase from Blizzard; on my laptop it popped up
| options like "Credit Card or PayPal?" I was like "nah" and loaded
| it up on my iPad to pay with Apple Pay.
|
| Do I hate PayPal? No. Do I appreciate a payment service that
| shows all my recurring payments in one place, lets me cancel
| them, and feels generally very safe? Yes. I'm happy to have Apple
| compete on fair playing field for payments.
|
| Summary: Oops.
| rideontime wrote:
| I'm unable to find where Gruber says that Apple "largely won"
| (not that I would be surprised to see Gruber making such a
| claim). His latest headline literally begins with "Apple lost."
| Where are you seeing that?
| wtallis wrote:
| From https://daringfireball.net/2025/04/gonzales_rogers_apple
| _app...
|
| > Keep in mind this whole thing stems from an injunction from
| a lawsuit filed by Epic Games _that Apple largely won_. The
| result of that lawsuit was basically, " _OK, Apple wins, Epic
| loses, but this whole thing where apps in the App Store
| aren't allowed to inform users of offers available outside
| the App Store, or send them to such offers on the web
| (outside the app) via easily tappable links, is bullshit and
| needs to stop. If the App Store is not anticompetitive it
| should be able to compete with links to the web and offers
| from outside the App Store._ "
|
| And there's a subsequent post elaborating on this point:
| https://daringfireball.net/linked/2025/05/01/apple-lost-
| but-...
| rideontime wrote:
| I don't buy into the analogy. Cable providers can't prevent
| you from watching free OTA channels on your television, but
| Apple prevents Epic from publishing iOS apps outside of the
| App Store. Considering Fortnite was removed from the App
| Store specifically due to offering outside payment options,
| denying its return will likely lead straight back to court.
| KerrAvon wrote:
| IANAL, but that's not true. Fortnite was removed due to
| breach of contract.
| Osiris wrote:
| The breach being that they offered a payment method
| outside of Apple Pay. That's exactly what he said.
| wtallis wrote:
| It's _not_ exactly what he said. The fact the they agreed
| to a contract prohibiting them from using an outside
| payment method and then willfully violated that contract
| is a detail that courts may not be so willing to
| overlook.
| rideontime wrote:
| Even though the court found that particular provision to
| be illegal?
| spacedcowboy wrote:
| It's in the text of his blog entry. Right there. In black and
| white. Word for word.
|
| Keep in mind this whole thing stems from an injunction from a
| lawsuit filed by Epic Games _that Apple largely won._ -
| emphasis his.
|
| And he's right, Epic "largely lost" that case, Apple only
| needed to concede the minimal things they didn't win and it
| would have been an epic win (as opposed to an Epic win) for
| them. Sweeney didn't get much of what he wanted, Apple mostly
| got everything they wanted.
| rideontime wrote:
| He has several blog entries, the latest of which says
| explicitly that Apple lost ("the ruling was clearly a
| significant and reputationally-damaging loss for Apple"),
| hence asking for guidance toward the entry that contained
| that text. I don't understand the reaction toward that.
| vessenes wrote:
| They won on almost all counts; you can tell this by trying to
| download a Tim Sweeney backed App Store on your iPhone in the
| US.
| chrisjj wrote:
| > a payment service that shows all my recurring payments in one
| place, lets me cancel them
|
| PayPal does.
|
| > and feels generally very safe
|
| PayPal doesn't??
| crazygringo wrote:
| I've heard so many horror stories about people's PayPal
| accounts, it feels like the last thing from safe.
|
| On the other hand, if you're using it exclusively for
| payments rather than receiving money maybe it's fine?
|
| But there are so many stories where PayPal closed someone's
| account and didn't give them back their money, am I really
| supposed to trust them in the case of a dispute where I'm
| owed a refund?
| jampekka wrote:
| > That said, as a user, I strongly prefer to use Apple's in-app
| payments
|
| I'm sure both the app developer and Apple are happy to let you
| pay 30% extra for the convenience of Apple Pay vs PayPal.
| vessenes wrote:
| Well in blizzards case, I pay the same - they pay the fee.
| asadotzler wrote:
| Apple Pay on Stripe?
| qingcharles wrote:
| I've never had to dispute anything yet through Apple Pay. Does
| anyone have any experience? Are their reps decent and have a
| fair process?
| benoau wrote:
| Apple Pay is 0.15% fee and have no bearing on this case. In-App
| Purchases are 30%.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Note that the 0.15% fee for Apple Pay is paid by the banks
| issuing the card, and I assume it sufficiently reduces
| chargebacks since the banks are happy to offer Apple Pay.
| benoau wrote:
| All fees get factored into the retail price, generally
| speaking. Bankrupt companies excluded.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| That is not a proper accounting of this situation.
|
| Suppose the chargebacks due to fraud/whatever without
| Apple Pay cost the issuing banks 0.20%.
|
| Then the banks reduce their expenses by paying Apple
| 0.15%.
|
| Maybe it helps reduce customer service calls and the
| associated expenses. Maybe Apple results in higher total
| spend. I'm sure the leaders at JPM, BoA, Wells Fargo, etc
| have done the calculations to figure out that it is
| better for them to pay Apple than to not.
|
| And since it is not required for any bank to allow Apple
| Pay to work with their cards, it stands to reason that in
| a competitive market like credit cards, it doesn't result
| in an increase in end user prices.
| rdtsc wrote:
| Link to the court doc:
|
| https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.36...
|
| > The testimony of Mr. Roman, Vice President of Finance, was
| replete with misdirection and outright lies. He even went so far
| as to testify that Apple did not look at comparables to estimate
| the costs of alternative payment solutions that developers would
| need to procure to facilitate linked-out purchases. (May 2024 Tr.
| 266:22-267:11 (Roman).)
|
| > Mr. Roman did not stop there, however. He also testified that
| up until January 16, 2024, Apple had no idea what fee it would
| impose on linked-out purchases:
|
| > Q. And I take it that Apple decided to impose a 27 percent fee
| on linked purchases prior to January 16, 2024, correct? A. The
| decision was made that day.
|
| > Q. It's your testimony that up until January 16, 2024, Apple
| had no idea what -- what fee it's going to impose on linked
| purchases? A. That is correct
|
| > (May 2024 Tr. 202:12-18 (Roman).) Another lie under oath:
| contemporaneous business
|
| So was Roman incompetent or just kissing ass hoping to become the
| President of Finance
| chrisjj wrote:
| > So was Roman incompetent or just kissing ass hoping to become
| the President of Finance
|
| Why not both?
| rdtsc wrote:
| Well good point. I guess I was just trying to present it as
| he just lied because he thought it's not a big deal, as in he
| is incompetent enough to not understand in the kind of
| trouble he can be in. Or, he fully understood what deep shit
| he would be in, but it was a worthy risk to become Mr. Cook's
| personal favorite.
| yalogin wrote:
| Wow that is pretty damning. I understand that they want to
| protect their revenue, but looks like they screwed up here.
| fencepost wrote:
| Ah, but will there be any actual financial penalties against
| Apple to address the revenue they received as a result of this?
| Or would developers have to start their own cases to attempt to
| recover anything?
| Osiris wrote:
| The end of the order says that they are referring the issue to
| the DoJ for criminal charges, which is where a fine would be
| issued if found guilty.
| 1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote:
| No Server Name Indication (SNI):
|
| https://web.archive.org/web/20250501083454if_/https://www.th...
| aylmao wrote:
| Out of curiosity, what does SNI stand for?
| 1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote:
| https://github.com/kontaxis/snidump
|
| Try running snidump for a day while reading HN, including
|
| (With SNI) firefox
| https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/judge-rules-apple-executive-
| lied
|
| Have a look at the snidump output. Then restart snidump and try
|
| (Without SNI, i.e., "No SNI") { printf
| 'GET /web/20250501083454if_/https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/
| judge-rules-apple-executive-lied HTTP/1.0\r\n' printf
| 'Host: web.archive.org\r\n\r\n' } |openssl s_client
| -connect archive.org:443 -ign_eof -noservername > 1.htm
| firefox ./1.htm
| asadm wrote:
| Is it a coincidence that this ruling comes near earnings (which
| is today)?
| pdabbadabba wrote:
| It's probably a coincidence. Having worked for federal judges I
| can tell you that, by and large, they make a point of paying no
| attention to that kind of stuff.
| MisterBastahrd wrote:
| This is nothing that a donation to a Trump PAC or shitcoin won't
| be able to fix.
| Der_Einzige wrote:
| Can we go after Apple for the green bubble discrimination? It's
| responsible for the rise of incels...
|
| https://www.joe.co.uk/life/sex/owning-an-android-is-official...
| dang wrote:
| Related ongoing threads:
|
| _Apple violated antitrust ruling, judge finds_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43852145 - May 2025 (504
| comments)
|
| _A senior Apple exec could be jailed in Epic case_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43859814 - May 2025 (58
| comments)
| vjvjvjvjghv wrote:
| I really, really, really hope this guy gets treated like very
| else under similar circumstances. Top execs are totally used to
| be able to buy their way out of problems with company money
| without any personal repercussions other than maybe a big
| severance package.
| atoav wrote:
| The argument for the high wages was always the "big
| responsibilty" the manegerial class has to bear. IMO to hold
| them personally liable is the absolite bare minimum, they
| already for the money for it. In reality CEO processes are
| often among the line: "You earned 10 Millions in boni for
| illegal behavior? Here is a 100K fine!"
|
| A simple tradesperson is also personally responsible when they
| fuck up their job despite better knowledge. So if those can go
| to jail for the consequences of their dealings why shouldn't a
| CEO where the consequences are potentially of a scale several
| magnitudes higher? Wasn't personal responsibility in
| everybodies mouths, or is that only important when we talk
| about poor people?
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| I am not sure but it does seem that apple's stock price has taken
| a hit.
|
| https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/AAPL/
|
| Maybe somebody could enlighten me but the off hours part shows
| -2.3%, is that a correction because people are losing faith in
| apple or what exactly? and would these off hours loses get
| converted to on hour losses or what exactly? (Sorry I could ask
| AI but I might as well ask here as well)
|
| So I had done some calculations and please correct me if you
| think I am wrong but at 4:00 pm USA time (EDT?) the stock was
| selling at 213.5 open (I am not sure what the differences b/w
| open,close etc. are , I am not a finance guy) but it went from
| 213.5 open to 207.8 right now
|
| Taking the % lose from its peak just at 4 PM EDT & multiplying it
| by its market cap? 3.19Trillion(1- 207.5/213.5 ) is
| 89_648_711_944 , ie. 89 Billion $.
|
| So from my understanding Apple lost 89B $ in like a span of 2
| hours (4PM EDT to 5:10-ish PM EDT which is the approx current
| time while writing this post)
|
| That sounds REALLY BIG. Like I used to think damn Trillion $ are
| a lot but if such a case can cause apple to lose 89B$ in span of
| 2 hours then either I am doing some calculation wrong or this
| case has a truly big gravity that its worth not to just skim over
| it I guess and truly read it at detail I suppose.
|
| Just my two cents..
| TeaBrain wrote:
| Bloomberg reported that the shares fell because their sales in
| China under-performed estimates.
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| By bloomberg, you mean bloomberg terminal or what exactly?
|
| Thanks for this information. I was genuinely confused after I
| had written this comment because well this information of
| epic games was already available 8 hours earlier so that had
| already been factored in the market 2 hours ago so I was
| confused as to why this change in 2 hours.
|
| Also, I would genuinely appreciate it if we could have a
| seperate HN thread just for this news itself. Sounds really
| interesting and I have quite an opinion on it
| sgerenser wrote:
| Apple's earnings call is going on right now:
| https://finance.yahoo.com/news/apple-tops-q2-earnings-
| estima...
|
| The headline sounds positive, but apparently its not
| positive enough to keep the stock from dropping.
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| wow, this has dropped even further it was around 2.5 last
| time , now its 3.7 , these are in some serious Billion
| dollar loses.
|
| I don't know but seeing so much money move so fast with
| such high velocity and such corrections in minutes and
| thus losing or making billions. I really want stability
| and it does seem to me that in some sense I wish for
| every economy to be more comprised of small businesses
| which aren't changing their stock price in such drastic
| measures though I think such an opinion might be
| unpopular around here.
| Imustaskforhelp wrote:
| are you referring to this?
| https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-05-01/apple-
| chi...
| burnte wrote:
| Since no one puts a reason down when they sell, it's all tea
| leaf reading.
| TeaBrain wrote:
| There's always a story that can be thrown together for
| every price movement, although it looks like apple did miss
| sales estimates in China by several percent. Looks like
| they also withheld guidance on services growth.
| jacobgkau wrote:
| > That sounds REALLY BIG. Like I used to think damn Trillion $
| are a lot but if such a case can cause apple to lose 89B$ in
| span of 2 hours then either I am doing some calculation wrong
| or this case has a truly big gravity
|
| The thing about a company worth several trillion dollars is
| that even minor movements involve (what are to us laymen) huge
| sums of money. Conversely, huge sums of money really are just
| minor movements to that company.
|
| Some people talk about how the middle class has a hard time
| understanding the vast difference between a millionaire and a
| billionaire. The same thing applies (but probably compounded
| due to being at a larger scale) for thinking about billions vs.
| trillions of dollars.
|
| (Just speaking to the question of scale; as someone else
| brought up, there've been other happenings that affect stock
| prices besides just this case.)
| jagged-chisel wrote:
| Apple didn't lose money because their stock price dropped. All
| their shares out in the world lost that much _value_. The stock
| price has little, if any, affect on the company and its bank
| accounts.
| jongjong wrote:
| I wish the government took more steps to fix the monopolizing
| forces in the system instead of focusing on antitrust.
|
| The way the monetary system is set up guarantees that market
| monopolies will occur. The monetary playing field is centralized
| and asymmetric. It's a basically a system of privilege and
| handicaps on a broad spectrum. Then people are surprised that
| those with more privileges keep winning predictably and form
| monopolies.
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