Apple Is Growing Rotten To The Core, And It’s Likely AT&T’s Fault | Hacker News Reader

Apple Is Growing Rotten To The Core, And It’s Likely AT&T’s Fault

techcrunch.com

126 pointsfoppr62 comments

Oh man, AT&T might be rotten, but Verizon is actively evil when it comes to this. Like cackling Emperor Palpatine levels of evil.

They heavily modify the software running on the phones they sell, and they don't allow any others on their network.

  Modifications include:
  * Shoving their logo into every orifice
  * Leasing you access to the GPS chip in your phone (or even the E911 data)
  * disabling all file transfer methods to try to get you to pay for MMS
  * disabling native Exchange support to upsell you to enterprise bullshit
  * blocking any media content that doesn't come through their bizdev
  * Still pushing motherfucking WAP (Gopher over telegram, I tell you)

I have a Blackberry 8830 on Verizon. I'm loathe to switch carriers or phones.

The customer service is pretty great. I have access to the GPS. I've been able to get media on and off the phone as necessary. It has unlimited network connectivity and tethering.

I'm not convinced they're any worse than any other carrier.

I think the OP's points were that they're hostile to developers, and the software that they'd like to deploy.

In fact, most of the carriers here are fucked up.

Most of the asia carriers would compete over their services(no carrier-locked phone). But, in US, it seems like most of the carriers are competing over what phones they can provide.

Sort of. The GSM providers don't know/care if you use a random GSM phone on their network. Of course, if you rent their GSM phone, they are not going to let you use it on a different GSM network.

(People seem to want free phones, and then seem confused when the person that gave you the free phone doesn't want you to use it on the competitor's network. If you buy your own phone, you can use it wherever you want.)

In Asia, you can get free unlocked phones just by signing up a contract.

In US, you get free locked phones and you still have to sign the contract.

You see the difference? If you have already signed the contract, why do the carrier still has to lock your phone to its network?

They're competing over how much they can get away with.

I am quite happy to invest my time learning Android. Apple has taken Microsoft's place as the biggest bully on the block.

Apple has taken Microsoft's place as the biggest bully on the block.

Microsoft seems closed and bullying next to the FS/OSS communities, but its success among proprietary vendors has traditionally been a result of its relative openness - to hardware platforms and devices, to third party developers, to add-ons and plugins and even competing products.

Sure, they threw their monopoly power around by bundling applications with their OS, but it's not like they actively prevented third party developers from making competing products available.

(Obligatory aside: I'm no Microsoft apologist. I had been replacing proprietary software with open software on XP for several years, and when it came time to replace my PC, Vista was so bad that I finally made the jump to Linux. Likewise, I'm holding out for Android before investing in a handheld device.)

Apple, by contrast, has always been fanatically controlling about their products. They ship slick, highly refined products, but the flipside of that obsessive attention to detail is an obsessive need to control how you use those products.

The App Store is just business as usual: Apple exercising its customary full-spectrum vertical dominance of the entire hardware/software stack.

I agree. Plus, Apple's walled garden approach makes the more open android market a lot more appealing.

Any money to be made with Android? And does it have an accelerometer? if so I'm close to being sold.

Yes, there is an accelerometer, and it's pretty easy to use.

The market share is VERY small at this point, but that also means less competition, likely. The bigger mobile app companies are starting to release Android apps, and it seems like a pretty good time as well, as more carriers are planning to release Android-powered phones.

On the flipside, cheers to T-Mobile for not squashing this fantastic app on their Android phones. I love my G1.

It's not like they could (on the handset level) even if they wanted to—you can install applications on Android phones from any source, since they don't have the draconian application installation restrictions that the iPhone does.

Surely you must agree though that allowing these apps on The Distribution Channel of Android that 99% of the users use exclusively, and the remaining 1% uses it as well by default has quite some symbolic value.

Though it's probably questionable for Techcrunch to keep posting about the same story, I think Apple's anti-competitive practices deserve the extra notice.

Different story — it had not been previously reported that Google's official app was blocked.

I'm definitely "not an Apple fan", but I think these stories get a bit old. Apple has been all about control since... well, the days of the Mac. Remember the look and feel lawsuit? Steve quashing the clones? Pretty much par for the course - I'd rather read about people doing cool new stuff (and that includes Apple when they're doing that instead of trying to rule their turf with an iron fist).

Cloning was never tenable--it would have run Apple out of business and destroyed the platform.

"Palm, if you’re looking for marketing material — take note."

They can't. They don't offer a Google Voice client either. The SDK they have released (that doesn't let you publish apps yet) doesn't appear to be capable of it either. Good marketing material for RIM perhaps.

The SDK would support a Google Voice app at the same level as the Blackberry one does, but it wouldn't let you hijack the dialer and SMS like the Android one. So good marketing material for Google. :)

One of the big selling features of the Android SDK, for me, was the ability to completely replace any aspect of the system including the dialer, contacts, music, etc.

I hope so. I'd like to be proven wrong on that. I have a Pre for work -- it desperately needs good third party apps.

Anyone know what the status is of a Google Voice client for the S60 platform?

It seems far less restricted than most of the other smartphones, except perhaps Android. It even comes out of the box with a SIP client, and you can toggle a setting that uses SIP preferentially instead of making regular cell calls, if you want.

If Nokia is willing to develop and include a SIP client, which I can only presume the cell carriers wouldn't be thrilled with, they don't seem like the types to block Google Voice.

Is there a single US carrier that sells a subsidized S60 phone that includes the SIP support at all?

Why edit the bit that contains actual information out of the the title?

Official Google Voice App Blocked From App Store

It's funny how helpful and nice T-Mobile was when I brought in my unlocked iPhone. They got me setup on a pay-as-you-go plan in no time.

After 2 years of being a loyal customer, AT&T shut my account off for "excessive use of partner coverage" ... even after repeated begging and pleading, they wouldn't restore my service.

Sometimes it feels like they don't want my money.

I hate to jump on any sensationalist bandwagons, but shame on Apple.

Of course this a techcrunch article- so I have to ask: is there any other side to this they are leaving out?

Seems like this might be an anti-trust issue: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherman_Antitrust_Act

Time to get out the burning torches, stakes and lawyers for a class action lawsuit.

Are the torches and stakes for Apple or the lawyers?

Apple is the most closed software company I know of. I see no reason to blame it on someone else.

There's gotta be a way outside of the App Store to get software onto the iPhone, right? If nothing else, developers gotta test their apps out. If that whole process (whatever it is) were wrapped into a neat little app, an entirely new distribution channel could be opened up. Has this happened yet? And if not (I assume not), why not?

edit: not an iphone app, a regular-type computer app.

Apple is trying to lobby the government into making it a federal crime to install your own software on the iPhone. I love this digital millennium that we live in...

Anyway, it comes down to -- what do you want more, pretty icons, or your freedom? Right now, the majority of phone users seem to want pretty icons.

Source? I'd really like to hear more about this.

http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/02/apple-says-jailbreaking...

Basically Apple wants it to be a crime (copyright infringement/DMCA violation) to jailbreak your phone.

I believe they will be ruling in October.

You mean apple's in-house legal council argued that it's a DMCA violation to jailbreak a phone. E.g., doing the exact job any decent lawyer would do for their client.

That's a little different from Steve Jobs saying "If you jailbreak your phone, I want you in federal prison."

I'm no apple fanboy or hater (I donate to the EFF, and write this from a macbook pro), but if we want a company to behave "right" (for our definition-of-the-week of "right"), we have to be fair to them first.

Really sad. Is this kind of treachery the inevitable result of success?

No, it's the inevitable result of making it legal for congresspeople to accept bribes. (Oh sorry, not bribes; lobbying money.)

No, it's campaign contributions. Lobbyists are paid to ostensibly lobby. Of course, a part of lobbying is donating to various candidates and PACs.

An iPhone isn't intended as a general purpose computing device, nor it it sold as one, nor should anyone who wants such a device buy it.

It shouldn't be a federal crime to fool around with it, mind, but this is emphatically not a "freedom" issue.

"If that whole process (whatever it is) were wrapped into a neat little app, an entirely new distribution channel could be opened up."

Yes! And then that app could be distributed through the App Sto... uhhh... hmmm... err...

"And if not (I assume not), why not?"

See above.

Check out Cydia and Icy:

http://cydia.saurik.com/

http://ripdev.com/icy/

Code needs to be signed to run on the iPhone unless you've jailbroken it - which most users don't do. So a key step in developing your neat little app is brute-force reversing Apple's private key (or stealing it, I suppose).

You can jailbreak your iphone and then install apps from a number of repositories. This, however, probably voids your TOS and warranty agreement.

While Apple would deny warranty service if they discovered the phone is or was jailbroken, a full restore from iTunes completely reverses a jailbreak, so as long as your phone is either dead or restorable, there are no warranty issues.

(Do you not find this completely unsatisfying though?)

I've found that for better or worse, most of the real world involves compromise and taking the good with the bad. So while I'd love Apple to totally open up the iPhone (I'd also like a free yacht) on the balance, I personally choose to have an iPhone instead of a G1 or whatever else. The upside is bigger for me than the downside.

I find this view disappointing. RMS (famously) remarked that he uses open source software, even if there is a superior closed source version because by using it, he can contribute to an open ecosystem.

When I look at the mobile phone market, I am quite willing to use a G1 solely to support the prospect of a handset that I can control. The more people use an iPhone because it is epsilon better, the less companies will be inclined to give users freedom.

The difference between an open iPhone and a free yacht is cost. A free yahct would cost someone money. An open iPhone would save Apple money (no need to pay app store reviewers, etc.)

No way - Apple gets a cut of all those app purchases.

Sir, did you reboot the computer?

That didn't fix it? Ok, reinstall windows and the latest drivers from our website.

That didn't fix it? Ok, here's an RMA.

Not that different from other platform vendors...

As an iPhone developer, Apple vs. developers reminds me a hell of a lot of the MPAA vs. filmmakers as documented in "This Film is Not Yet Rated". The more I've experienced, the more it amazes me how true this analogy is.

I'd like a moratorium to stop Apple puns.

It's just sickeningly bad.

It’s Likely AT&T’s Fault [..] it’s not hard to guess who’s behind the restriction: our old friend AT&T. [..]Apple is now actively stifling innovation [..] All the more upsetting is that this comes from the company that Steve Jobs built. [..]

Make your mind up! Is it AT&T or Apple you want to whine about?

When two companies collude like AT&T and Apple, it's hard to determine who is at fault. Might as well blame them both.

But, does anyone who's not from the US have anything to say about this? Are the networks that carry the iPhone in Europe and Asia as evil as AT&T?

If you buy it here without 3g support it costs 896 dls (only the iphone and a phone line). If you buy it with a 3g plan the cheapest plan costs 46 dls per month and an extra cost for the iphone (597).

Of course the service is bad, we don't have all the nice features like in USA or Europe (because of the old service provided).

So here in Mexico the problem is not Apple, AT&T, etc, but the carrier (Telcel). The Iphone is useless here, excepto as phone and mp3 player, and sometimes for bad surfing.

By using the word 'collude' you are implying that AT&T and Apple are acting illicitly. While I do find their actions extremely objectionable I doubt any of this is illegal.

Mirriam-Webster disagrees in that collude necessary implies illegality:

Collude: Definition: conspire, plot <colluded to keep prices high>

Collusion: Definition: secret agreement or cooperation, especially for an illegal or deceitful purpose.

Indeed. I intended to convey a secret cooperation that is not beneficial to their customers.

I didn't say that it was illegal; I said it implied it. I'm not sure how much more firmly it can be said so I'll just repeat what you already pasted: _especially for an illegal or deceitful purpose_

I really look forward to the day when HN's free-market, all-government-intervention-is-evil ideologues finally collide with the "I don't like what Apple did, so it should be outlawed" brigade.

I shall bring popcorn.

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