[tsotha]

>Apple has a moral and ethical onus to make the right choices be it related to the confederate flag, changing drug laws, or using emoji to fight bullying, and we respect that.

I can't decide if he really respects that or if he's still hoping to get his app approved. Companies should not be in the business of trying to enforce (clearly unenforceable) laws by removing features that do perfectly legal things.

[msbarnett]

> Companies should not be in the business of trying to enforce (clearly unenforceable) laws by removing features that do perfectly legal things.

Dragon-dick dildos are legal, but that hardly means Wal-Mart is under any obligation to stock them for sale if that's not something they want their brand associated with.

If Apple doesn't want their brand to be associated with racist apps, or pornography, or pony apps, or whatever they choose, why would it not be their right to do the same as Wal-Mart?

As consumers, we can choose where to shop based on what stores do and do not stock. If you don't like what Apple stocks, don't shop in its store, and don't buy their devices.

[IkmoIkmo]

> As consumers, we can choose where to shop based on what stores do and do not stock. If you don't like what Apple stocks, don't shop in its store, and don't buy their devices.

You're right, but I hate this line of reasoning. At the end of the day, I like using an Apple product and I don't have a problem with 99% of the things they do. So simply telling someone to 'stop buying the product' when they disagree with a relatively minor issue, is silly, and it kills the discussion immediately.

It's like congress passes a law I don't like and you suggest to 'leave the country', instead of focusing on the fact it's a bad law that could be changed without having to do something so drastic as leave the country.

Debate like this can help, calling them out for things that aren't very sensible is okay and it doesn't have to immediately be met with the obvious 'under the law they can do what they want so your only recourse is to simply never use their product ever again, end of discussion'.

Let's also not forget when Apple changed its mind. For example, remember the iPhone 4? It introduced the LED flashlight for its camera, a feature none of the iPhones before had. Immediately flashlight apps were made, and rejected by Apple. Later it changed its mind and they're now a staple in every app store, and later even became an integral part of the OS requiring no app at all, without any changes to the hardware. And it didn't happen because people suddenly sold their iPhone 4 and people stopped buying iPhone 4s because they couldn't get the flashlight app, that'd never have happened. On big features, yeah, not on small stuff.

[smokeyj]

Then why allow safari? There's so many scary things online, why would they endorse such things?

[msbarnett]

Because Dateline can't build a concern-trolling episode around "Are iPhones Youth-Corrupting Pornography Machines" when everything and your toaster has a web browser. Every criticism would equally apply to Android and your laptop. It's water off the brand's back.

But if Apple is literally taking money and distributing pornography, a news unit is shooting that story tomorrow.

Nintendo faces many of the same problems, e.g.) http://www.examiner.com/article/pedophiles-could-take-advant...

[smokeyj]

Explain to simpletons like myself how pornography distribution is like measuring weight. I'd love to draw the connection but I'm afraid logic prevails.

Furthermore, if Dateline is an influencing force in Apple product decisions - remind me to smash my iPhone into a million proprietary pieces.

[msbarnett]

> Explain to simpletons like myself how pornography distribution is like measuring weight. I'd love to draw the connection but I'm afraid logic prevails.

Reread thread. This grew out of discussion about Apple forbidding apps with confederate flags etc. Inflammatory, controversial content.

Y'know, like pornography.

The weight thing is obviously much simpler: Apple doesn't want to be the punchline on a lolpiece on the 6 o'clock news about "Are people breaking their iPhones with controversial new 'scale' apps? Find out after news and weather with chuckles the rain stooge"

> Furthermore, if Dateline is an influencing force in Apple product decisions - remind me to smash my iPhone into a million proprietary pieces.

News Organizations are absolutely an influencing force in any major brand's decision making processes. All brands live in utter terror of being on the wrong side of a "won't somebody please think of the children??" shit-storm.

You're kidding yourself if you think otherwise.

[smokeyj]

"Child installs eBay app to purchase dildos - news at 9."

I understand PR is an influencing factor in corporate decision making - but if Apple is choosing to cater to the Dateline crowd rather than satisfy their core audience, Tim might as well purchase dragon dildos for the entire staff.

Allowing or banning an App is PR worthy. Damned if I do or don't type thing. But a developer wasted time from his life that'll never be returned. Responsible adults who wish to use this functionality aren't able to. The proprietary nature of Apple's wall gardened is coming into question. That's the PR Apple should worry about, and this is a gross miscalculation.

[johncolanduoni]

The concern here is likely that some idiot will try to measure their own weight with it or some such nonsense, and then break their phone. I'm sure Apple still remembers "bendgate", and has no desire to get a bunch of bad press about how the screen's glass is fragile. Like bendgate, they'll probably be vindicated when actual experiments are run, but that is of little comfort.

Also, the parent was responding to why the same argument doesn't apply to Safari. I'm afraid what prevailed was ignoring context, not logic.

[pjlegato]

Completely aside from the merits of anti-drug laws, the number of perfectly legitimate applications for "weighing things" is vastly larger than the number of illegal ones.

[threeseed]

But companies equally have a right to own the experience. Creating an app to harvest hardware identifiers and using that to track them is legal. But it tarnishes the experience of their product and is anti-consumer by every definition. Apple should have the ability not to allow that.

Just because something is legal does not make it morally or ethically "right".

[pjlegato]

The company doesn't own your phone. You do.

Surely YOU should be the one who decides what constitutes "proper" software to run on hardware that you purchased?

[TeMPOraL]

I'm a bit torn on this. On the one hand, I hate how not having ultra strict UX guidelines turns Android app ecosystem into shit (with every major app maker providing their own crap experience). On the other hand, I firmly believe the right of a company to control the "experience" I get from using a tool I bought from them should end the second I walk out of their store.

If they are to tell me how I can and can not use my device (above what the law says), then it's not my device, and it's not a tool.