I've had many computers since the 1st personal computers came out in 1977. I've owned the earliest Commodore PET and Radio Shack Tandy and used the Apple 1, and many other PC's since then to this day. I've seen how the founders of Apple, Steve Jobs and Steven Wozniak, stole many technologies such as icons and the mouse, etc, from other companies, claiming they developed these and other technologies. Lies lies. They claimed so many lies, sucking proud affluent (rich) people into believing that their way-overpriced boxes were something special and better, when they really weren't. The 2 Steves were the greediest, most monopolistic liars on the planet. Jobs is still up to their old tricks and lies, today.
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One Bad Apple
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With its retail stores, Apple controls another ecosystem—the market for iPod and iPhone accessories, like speakers and cases. Apple determines when accessory makers can announce new products, and charges them a variety of fees, including one for putting a MADE FOR IPOD sticker on the items. One iPod accessory maker—who insists on anonymity, as he fears reprisal from Apple—gripes that Apple takes up to 75 percent of the sales price, leaving him with zero profit on some of his products when he sells them in Apple stores. This guy plays along because having his products on display in Apple stores builds awareness of his brand, and he can make a profit selling his speaker systems through Best Buy, Target and Circuit City.
Apple's tactics might seem like smart business: why not squeeze every penny out of every deal? The problem is that if Apple squeezes too hard, some partners may go out of business, harming the ecosystem. Bully behavior also invites backlash, as it did for Microsoft when that company rose to power in the 1990s. In the U.K., a regulatory board has banned an Apple advertisement that claimed its iPhone gives you "all the parts of the Internet," when the phone won't display information created using Flash or Java, two popular Web software programs. In Alabama, a woman has filed a class-action lawsuit because her new 3G iPhone won't always attach to a 3G network, which provides faster wireless Web downloads. In July customers howled when Apple rolled out MobileMe, a new online service for synchronizing personal data to the iPhone and iTouch that wound up having some pretty serious glitches. Apple offered three months of free service to subscribers as a form of appeasement.
In the old days, stuff like this didn't matter. Apple was such a fringe player that nobody really cared how the company behaved. I wonder sometimes if Apple misses those days.
© 2008
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