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It really boils my piss how Apple refuses to acknowledge that their relationship with developers is symbiotic.

Sure, Apple has built up a platform with tens of millions of paying customers, and invests in development of APIs (though they certainly aren’t investing in any fucking documentation or quality control). But anyone with two brain cells to rub together can see that without third party apps there would be nothing left to invest in.

Did Windows Phone fail because the devices and system software were inherently worse? Of course not, it failed because Microsoft couldn’t convince developers to support it.

I know it’s in company interests to act this way—to the tune of dozens of billions of dollars—but when you read some of the things Cook, Federighi, and Schiller said during the Epic trial, it gives an impression that they genuinely do believe that all economic activity on an iPhone or iPad is thanks solely to Apple. Absolute lunacy.

It has prevented me from pursuing a couple of business ideas that would not be viable if we didn’t have iPhone coverage.

When I see that their own software quality is lagging years behind the hardware despite effectively unlimited funding; and the App Store is so chaotic that big-name apps can do Porn while startups have to fear the underpaid reviewer’s wrath on every random detail —

Well I don’t feel like that’s a very stable bet to place on your business. And it makes me sad because the devices, especially the MacBooks, are still the best on many measures.

Correct me if I am wrong, but I believe you are mistaken because pornographic content is forbidden on both major app stores so I find it unlikely Apple would allow even a big company to have such an app on their platform

There is a lot of porn on Twitter, and the app doesn’t do anything to block it.

Symbiotic? I think parasitic, or possibly predatory, night be a battery description :-/

> ...Apple and Google demand 30% cut of all transactions happening in the apps that run on their OS.

While I too think 30% is ridiculous, Google is the only one of the two here that allows for alternative app stores and side loading. Yes, the side loading process could be better, but Apple provides no such option.

Microsoft got the flack for using their near total market dominance in PC operating systems to destroy Netscape. Short memories I guess...

Microsoft never prevented you from installing anything you like on their OS.

Yes, by giving IE away for free while bundling it with Windows, at a time when Netscape was trying to sell their browser - basically the polar opposite of what Google and Apple are doing with their app stores.

Since then, it has become completely expected that any consumer OS includes a bundled web browser for free.

Not that MS is not doing many other shady things to try to control what you do and push their products in today's Windows, mind you. The only point is that, as bad as consumer computing was in the 90s, it's much much worse today in terms of user and developer freedom/choice.

No. By blackmailing hardware vendors. If they shipped their computers with Netscape installed, they wouldn't let them license Windows.

This is true, but what Google do with the play store (install it by default, take 30% of everything, make it hard to install without it) is so much worse.

And Apple's app store where you can't even get around it if you want to is an order of magnitude worse again.

Google are currently having significant issues with antitrust about how they deal with the play store and their requirements on manufacturers.

> Even when Android launched, it was open and these stores carried Android apps as well.

Android is still open and you still absolutely can DIY your app distribution. You can completely ignore the existence of Google and their services if you so desire. As a user, you can set up your new phone completely offline, then disable all Google services, and only then give it an internet connection.