We are getting lots of claims that apple has "destroyed" it's reputation. Other comments say that apple has "destroyed" is brand.
This is a very significant set of claims, because apple's brand is KEY to what apple offers, what they charge, and what they sell.
In other words - $X in parts cost $Y with the apple brand on it - because of users trust in apple.
This is why brand surveys are done. You can see that brands (alone) make a huge difference in pricing / sales power vs basic functionality (sometimes ridiculously so in things like handbags).
You are making my point for me. It is possible - very possible - that despite the outrage on HN at these efforts around child porn, the demands that govt criminally prosecute apple etc, that in actual fact users may not care or may LIKE these types of features, and that similarly, govt may not prosecute apple for the supposedly felonies they are committing but will LIKE what they are doing here and thank them for it.
In the end apple may not have "destroyed" users trust so that they are seen as worse than facebook (!!) but may continue to be trusted (at least as much as facebook - which is NOT AT ALL), and be able to sell products at a premium etc.
When you say Apple is worse than facebook - that is a VERY strong claim. Do folks on HN not understand this? When folks claim apple is committing felonies those are strong claims. So you need some strong evidence.
Apple is a business - they may decide they want to take an anti-child porn stance. Is this bad for business? We will see. They will make the argument I'm sure that they will continue to do privacy as well - but the balance there is different than what HN wants, but may be fine by users.
It just gets a bit tiring hearing that apple is destroyed (which comes up in lots of ways) when my own read is they are long way from being destroyed.