No Sex Please, We’re Apple: iPhone Giant Seeks TV Success on Its Own Terms

This sounds like a case of Apple not learning from their own history. Previously their management actively discouraging gaming for a while because they wanted to be business machines and they worried computers were already too whimsical. It isn't an end-all as a niche but the forfeiture is pointless - especially since endearing itself to a young niche as a brand can pay premiums. They wound up left behind anyway since they aren't their customer base anyway and prefer others. IBM got the business market largely. Meanwhile Apple's target while pretty broad certainly doesn't seem concentrated on prudes and stodgy sort but the trendy if anything.

I know that slogans tend to be pretty vapid and poorly followed at best but the irony of 'think different' and that sort of mindless conformism to outdated norms is staggering.

I’m OK with this.

The market is already saturated with entertainment that is little more than shock value. There’s a reason that channels like GSN, RFD, MeTV, etc... have growing audiences. As some point people want their entertainment to be entertaining, not a stream of sensory overload.

If Apple goes all-in in this programming strategy, we’ll have a better idea how popular this sort of thing really is.

Here's the subhead from the article: The tech giant wants to make scripted shows for streaming, only without violence, politics and risqué story lines

That already exists. It's called the Hallmark Channel.

My wife likes to watch. I also occasionally watch. At Hallmark the movies are invariably rated G and often end with the romantic leads having their first kiss (after about three interrupted attempts earlier in the movie).

I wish that, in at least some subset of the Hallmark movies, the romantic lead characters would "bang it out" at some point in the film. But that never happens. Nor have I ever seen a Hallmark movie with black lead characters. Haven't seen any gay lead characters either.

Hallmark is enjoyable. But it's a niche. Apple couldn't make enough money to move the needle by pursuing a niche like that. And how much edgier could they get if they're so worried about their brand?

Disney used to use the Touchstone Pictures distribution label for their edgier content. But that now seems to have faded out. Maybe the simplest answer is for Apple to use a different label for the risqué stuff?

Really wanted to watch the show Billions, but the opening scene is literally main character’s ( Paul Giamatti) wife peeing on him right after she burns out a cigarette on him during a severe BDSM session.

What.

I’m good with it.

In comedy toilet humor is easy.

In Movies, it seems shock value is the equivalent. It’s much harder to tell a great story.

There are many popular titles that don’t include shocking levels of violence or sex. Just take a look at Star Wars or lord of the rings

As a new entrant in this space, I don’t see an issue with Apple being cautious and sticking to non-controversial content.

But there are several ways to tastefully include sex and nudity to add to the artistic value of the work without compromising its brand. The same goes with violence, drugs, politics, etc. The English speaking world may be fine with this. But this decision could possibly end up being an impediment to getting more creators and in turn making more money if Apple wants to get into local content beyond English and beyond that world.

Different people in cultures may have slightly different views on the well known characterization of porn as “I know it when I see it” (by Alan Novak/Justice Potter Stewart), but what matters more is whether the content fits the context (or sets the context) and is useful to carry the story along. Even people who are more conservative in their views of sex and nudity can distinctly evaluate/classify pornographic movies from non-pornographic movies.

Would not Apple miss out on hugely popular shows like Game of Thrones or Breaking Bad if it starts filtering out shows that have violence or sex from its original programming? Apple can be successful but it won;t be hugely successful with this strategy like HBO or Netflix in my opinion.

I understand that this is largely a marketing strategy, and I'm fine with that.

What's always kind of hilarious is when their "no porn" strategy, again a marketing choice, is portrayed by third parties as a moral issue for Apple. I mean, if Apple actually actually cared about adult content in general, they would remove browsers from all their content, lest their users be exposed to an infinite torrent of smut and filth.

It's interesting that Apple does already sell music with explicit lyrics and R rated movies as well as television content like Game of Thrones and video games with violent content (all labeled with appropriate ratings so parents can use the provided parental controls to exclude them on children's devices).

One wonders why it wouldn't be good enough to give explicit apps an accurate rating and go on about your business, given what they already sell.

My guess is that this case was more about being wary of what sort of content they produce in house than what they sell.