nika

Apple was founded with the proceeds from selling a VW bus and an HP calculator. Maybe with inflation that's $20k in today's dollars. And they were building hardware.

If anything the cost of doing significant startups in the intervening years has declined, certainly for software, but also for hardware too. Apple had to build their own factories, even after they got venture funding. Now nobodies can hire factories on demand for your hardware.

$100k in the right hands would do a hell of a lot. However, the government isn't usually the best at determining the right hands.

You answered your own question. This article is exactly the kind of thing the people on this site upvote, and that tells you exactly the nature of the people on this site.

Yeah, I failed to toe the party line that Apple is evil, and therefore everyone else is good.

So long as ideological purity is demanded by ideologues, hacker news will continue to be a thought-free echo chamber.

I find it kinda amazing how rumor becomes mythology which eventually morphs into accepted fact. Apple has good relationships with game developers. They may not kowtow to egomaniacs, and it always seems a roll of the dice whether a given iteration of hardware compromises results in a pan or a plug from carmack.

I develop apps. This is how I make my living. It would take a complete reversal of apple's attitudes and directions to get me to develop for android. Apple treats me well, pays me on time, and has a viable market where the rules are consistent and reasonable.

Apple treats game developers well. Apple embraced OpenGL way back in the day so that developers could write to one API and deploy on multiple platforms (even Linux, presumably) This isn't Java, of course, but then, Apple also supported Java completely until it became obvious Java had lost in the marketplace (or market segment.)

Apple provides great APIs and functionality to support games on iOS. Maybe Google will catch up, but they're still working on allowing native development.

But this subscription thing is a perfect example of the disconnect between android lovers and reality. Apple has offered a new mechanism to make payments to developers. Do you think developers are angry about this? You think we're switching to android because Apple allows us to sell our software by subscriptions? Why would we be angry? This gives us more flexibility, and saves us the hassle of setting up paypal or whatever.... I've got thousands of customers, and I can assure you, less than a fraction of a percent of them visit my website.

As a developer for and a user of iOS this just furthers Apple's value to me.

I've considered porting apps to Android. I'm not inclined to because I'd rather spend the time making new apps in a market I know is viable for my type of apps.

To win me over, Android would need to: 1) Provide native development (in progress) 2) provide a level of APIs and frameworks of comperable quality to Cocoa touch 3) provide a hardware reference platform and require android licensees to build to it (apparently impossible) 4) develop enough of a market of that common reference platform such that I can develop no more than 2 variations and address >%90 of the market (I develop two versions for iOS an iPad and an iPhone version.) 5) Provide a market where I can sell internationally, where people can easily buy my product, and where people are in the habit of doing so. Right now that's three things the android market doesn't offer.

I had the kindle app for about a year before iBooks came out. I bought some books, but having had an unfortunate incident with Amazon taking a book I'd bought away from me in the past, I didn't invest much time in it.

The Kindle app is so clunky it might as well be a webpage.

Once iBooks came out, the experience was so much better that I was happy to switch. I now have several hundred books in iBooks, including all of my technical books, lots of free books, pdfs, DRM free ebooks from people like pragmatic programmers.

If amazon were to release books in a DRM free epub format, I'd buy them and read them in iBooks too.

But for all the gnashing of teeth and exclamations from people who seem to think this is the Great Tragedy of The Ages, I'm amazed that after so long people haven't figured out Apple's priorities.

Apple does right by the customer. It is the key to their success. non-discriminatory pricing is right by the customer. consistent-terms across sales methods is right by the customer, and by the developer.

Imagine if subscriptions were only %10 while sales were %30-- suddenly instead of buying your apps we'd go back to the way things were before liberated the mobile landscape, where if you wanted Doom on your phone, you had to pay $2.99 a month to rent it.

The rule has been in the T&C since launch of the AppStore. Apple didn't provide a mechanism for in app purchase of subscriptions, and so was lax in enforcing it. But it isn't like this is news to anyone who read the T&C.

That policy has been in place for 2.5 years, since the original AppStore terms and conditions. It wasn't enforced because before now, Apple didn't offer SDK support for subscriptions. People have had 2.5 years to prepare.

When he doesn't, and when he adds in-app subscriptions, will it cause you to revise your perspective?

Instapaper is exactly the kind of app this is directed at. It is a SaaS subscription. It would be foolish to turn away all the additional sales you'd get by being able to offer subscriptions within the app (something you couldn't do previously, forcing Marco to take paypal.)

I think it is worth noting, because everyone seems to have forgotten, that this has always been the rule. I remember it from the very first reading of the terms and conditions (back when they were under NDA).

It has always been against AppStore rules to monetize apps outside of the AppStore. Apple has been lax in enforcing it, primarily because Apple didn't offer a subscription mechanism.

Now they offer a mechanism, and so now people can comply with the rule, and so now they are enforcing it.

Interesting, he makes the argument that lack of protection for IP reduces innovation. I know that todays hipsters think that IP is not real property, and I agree philosophically.

But the patent system causes the inventors to publish their inventions and this gives everyone awareness and an opportunity to build on the invention to find their own innovations... whereas without the patent system, IP protection would likely come from obscurity.

I've yet to see an anti-patent person who proposed an alternative. And this article seems to indicate that with little protection, innovation is stifled.

I'm not saying there aren't problems with the patent system, obviously, but before throwing it out one has to consider what alternative would be superior.

You want to be a startup founder, right? Look forward.

Your Ex may turn into a valued contact in the future, or might be your future boss, you never know. If they lied then it will really depend on whether they can do the job or not, and a resume only gets you in the door, interviews are what gets you jobs anyway.

That said, I once received a resume from someone who listed as one of their past employers a company I'd also worked for. He listed his work there as being on a project that I'd worked on, and partially led. One with less than 6 people on it. One that happened without him being involved at all!

I was amazed at the nerve. Would have been easy to call the company if we'd been reference checking and found out, but worse, I'd worked there so I knew right away it was a lie.

We uninvited him from his interview.

... and a MacBook Pro is a ripoff because AT&T has a netbook for 1/10th the price (on 2 year contract)!

I don't see what will change between now and christmas. Many of the android tablets are vaporware at this point so there is nothing to stop them from advertising that they'll be cheaper... yet they seem to be more expensive for the most part.

This makes Time Cook my dream date. Seriously, and I hear he swings my way too.

There are many ways to innovate in business and technology and design get a lot of time in the spotlight.

Operations, especially of a very large enterprise, with thousands of suppliers which also demands highly precise manufacturing and quality control, while having operations spread around the globe, and a public awareness factor that makes it vulnerable to any "Watchdog" who wants to make news... running a less-than-30-days-inventory system is playing on the Nth level.

Can anyone name anybody who has done something like that? Amazon's distribution network is a lot easier, as they control all the infrastructure. Dell doesn't have the volume or quality requirements or focused product lineup (which reduces substitution- eg: if dell is out of a particular laptop model, they have others to substitute, apple doesn't have that luxury.)

It is no wonder Apple is doing long term contracts for supplies like this.

Some have accused them of cornering the market, but this is not like cornering the market on Silver (look up Hunt Brothers) -- as anyone with reasonable technology can make a substitute for electronics components which are fungible commodities for the most part.

This is just good management of a very sophisticated manufacturing network.

Dude deserves and Oscar in Operations!

I specifically focused on the standard of living of the poorest %20.

"income inequality" presumes that everyone should make the same amount of money. This is silly, and the only way to achieve it is to have absolutely everyone be poor.

The overall total wealth of the country, and the standard of living of the lowest %20 goes up more when you allow for capitalism.

There are no excesses in unregulated capitalism that I've seen because there is no unregulated capitalist country. The extensive "documentation" you refer to, that I have seen have been essentially easily refuted propaganda.

I do not doubt that there are a lot of people who wish to see society absolutely controlled, such that nobody is richer than them. But in doing so, they make everyone poorer.

First off, the idea that apple is buying a bunch of screens is speculation. It hasn't been confirmed by anyone involved. It is imformed speculation. Apple talked about making an investment in supplier to insure adequate supplies at their last earnings call. So we have a publicly stated motivation.

Now you're attributing another motivation to them, and what are you basing this motive on? The secondary effect of constrained supplies? Aren't you just simply assuming that apple is doing this to keep competition out?

And isn't it obvious that actual competition-- companies that like apple saw the opportunity and spent years working on a tablet- aren't likely to need the same component?

And wouldn't any reduction in availability immediately cause all the non-apple suppliers to boost output?

Trying to corner the market on anything they can make more of is a foolish proposition.

I'm glad to see this. I for one am looking forward to the day when javascript is at the point where it offers a level of programing ease for animations, etc, that you get with flash. (It may have happened already, last time I did lingo programming it was called lingo, and I am not conversant with the state of the art in javascript.)

Or it seems that CSS is supporting animations and maybe that is a better choice over javascript? (because the browser, I presume, can optimize CSS a lot easier than javascript which can have arbitrary functionality.)

Give it a second and it replaces it with a javascript site.

I have click to flash set up and before I could click, it replaced.

Or, for those who aren't quite ready to do a steady job, the legalization of interent or part time jobs. Let them work when they are sober and not when they are not.

Unfortunately the burden on businesses for "hiring someone" is so high due to regulations that it only makes sense to make positions that are full time, or part time with dedicated hours.

There are a lot of jobs that could exist where people worked some number of hours when they wanted to work, but where if they didn't show up for several weeks someone else could be doing it while they're gone.

Businesses would be willing to hire people on such terms (especially for some jobs like construction, or cleaning, etc) but they have to create positions that are focused on specific people due to the impact of regulations.

Hell, under Obamacare anyone who hires a kid to mow their lawn and pays them $400 over the course of a year has to file a 1099 on them!

That's about $1,300. Or about $7.50 an hour for one month. This is about minimum wage. If they could get minimum wage jobs, they would, and they'd quickly not be homeless.

But they can't because students and recent graduates and stay at home moms, etc, get the minimum wage jobs.

If we eliminated the minimum wage, then all the jobs that need doing, but whose economic value is $2.75 an hour would come into being. This means that the homeless person would be able to earn that $1,300 in two months. If low cost housing were legalized, they'd be able to live cheaply while getting on their feet and saving for getting a better job.

Minimum wage is the idea that we'd rather have someone homeless and not working at $0 an hour than have them have a home and be digging themselves out working for $2.50 an hour.

Am I supposed to cite Godwins Law now? (Just kidding... )

There are many cities where these permitting and zoning laws work as a subsidy for wealthy people. For instance, they do not want walmart and they do not want more apartments built in my town (which is a very liberal university town) because they want to "preserve its character"... but they go way overboard.

The effect of this is that home prices go up significantly and they profit when they sell.

This seems to be common among towns up and down the west coast. I've seen it in California, Oregon and Washington.

Artificial constraint on the supply of homes means more homelessness, but also, more returns for homeowners there.

So, they have a financial incentive to vote to prevent these apartments from being built.

And I'm talking $600-$1,000 a month apartments, not even cheap housing.

Thanks for digging up that link. Larry got taken care of because of the stink, but here are thousands of other stories of a similar nature, up and down the spectrum. Many small businesses started by "amateurs" run afoul of regulations, or simply discover that the tax burden is too much in the early days. Once when I started a small business it turned out I'd located my office in a special tax zone that wanted %3 of all revenue earned by the business.

I have a friend who spent 4 days in jail because he was caught near a bar without a drivers license. He didn't have ID, couldn't prove who he was and got locked up. They didn't let him make a phone call, and he stayed there until they decided he'd "learned his lesson". This one was sometimes homeless, but not a drunk or drug user. Just lost his ID.

"when Apple commands such a large portion of the global market for a key component it creates enormous barriers to entry for potential competitors. "

This is true, but it also creates enormous opportunity for potential suppliers of the component that apple has secured.

Apple's operating here to ensure they are able to meet their own internal demand. They have a lot of difficulty doing this, as was acknowledged in the last conference call. This means that they lose out on sales they would have otherwise made.

Over time, the component industry grows capacity to support Apple and everyone else. This does take time and is a competitive advantage for apple in the short term. But it is not sustainable. Meanwhile the long term pricing contracts on critical components is a financial (rather than supply) advantage.

But note that the barriers to entry are only for competitors creating a derivative product.

If HP or any of these other companies had spent the last 10 years working on a tablet design, they would have likely made different choices than Apple and likely arranged for a different spec components. It is only because they want to quickly ship a replication of the iPad that they are going after 10 inch displays.

If they'd developed their own touch UI and their own ergonomics they would have their own specs and thus be seeking different components.

Leo focusing on value offered!

Imagine a programmer resume. None of this "have you worked with ruby"... "I know how to construct complex system that are able to scale such that the cost per given unit of load declines as load is increased", etc.

Also the motivations of the state are based on the motivations of any government. Buracracy is unavoidable.

If you're going to be handing out money, it would be better to give it to genuine charities that have an interest in helping the homeless. They generally will be better (imperfect of course, but better) at spending the money to help the most people.

The homeless oriented charities I'm aware of do amazing things with small amounts of resources, and they have to scrape by.

A real shame when we're blowing a $3.7 trillion dollar budget every year.

Sigh. This reminds me of the story about the poor guy in San Francisco who developed a small business (selling flowers? shining shoes? can't remember) but was caught and fined and made homeless (he'd just put down a deposit on an apartment) by the city because he didn't have a business permit.

There's only one law, and it is pretty specific:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

They could have asked him to leave. Then demanded he leave. Then arrested him if he refused to leave. That would have been legal.

Strawman.

So you're saying that the standard of living was worse or no better in 1900 than it was in 1800?

People talk about the "Robber Barrons" but this is really a pejorative. Standard oil, for instance was able to lower the cost of gasoline dramatically, I believe it was more than an order of magnitude. This paved the way to the car being a viable product for the middle class and eventually nearly everyone.

Thats the thing about integrity. You never know if someone has it until it is tested.

This same question could be asked about any hosting company that hasn't been presented with such a request.

I'd be interested in hearing about hosting companies that have, and that stood up to them.

The US is supposed to be a country of rule of law. They should need to get a court order.